Massachusetts Considers Alternatives to Current Bottle Bill

The Berkshire (Mass.) Eagle reports that Massachusetts Sen. Robert A. O’Leary (D-Barnstable) has proposed replacing the bottle bill with a “litter tax.” Under O’Leary’s plan, distributors of recyclable products, including all cans and bottles, newspapers, cigarettes and tires, would pay a modest fee.  

The fee would be based on a fraction of a percentage of the distributor’s gross production, according to the report in the Berkshire Eagle. O’Leary suspects that distributors would pass the fee along to consumers, but he assures the paper that it would be much smaller than the current 5-cents.   

Proceeds from the fee would go to a special state fund from which grants would be made to cities and towns to boost their local recycling programs, the Berkshire Eagle reports.  

Bottle bill supporters say that the bill needs to be updated to include non-carbonated beverages and to reflect inflation. Supporters also credit the bottle bill with Massachusetts higher recycling rate relative to states that do not have such a law in place.  

Sen. Andrea F. Nuciforo Jr. (D-Pittsfield) has proposed a second bill that would expand the current bottle bill to include non-carbonated beverages, bottle water, wine and liqueur, according to the Berkshire Eagle.  

Jenny Glitlitz, a Pittsfield resident and research director for the Container Recycling Institute, which is based in Virginia, supports Nuciforo’s plan. She tells the Berkshire Eagle that O’Leary’s litter tax would create a state-administered recycling fund but not a recycling infrastructure or help towns that are lacking such an infrastructure to establish one.  

During the last session, Gov. Mitt Romney proposed expanding the bottle bill to include other types of beverage containers and to impose a 15-cent deposit on wine and liqueur bottles.