Assembly OKs Fragile Bill on Bottle and Can Deposits

The Assembly on Thursday resoundingly approved compromise legislation aimed at removing litter from parks and highways by rewarding consumers who recycle rather than dispose of their soft-drink and beer containers.

The delicately balanced measure, sent to the Senate on a 54-16 vote, was pieced together just days ago by environmentalists and powerful industry groups that have been battling each other for two decades over the prospect of a bottle and can deposit law in California.

It was the first time that either house of the Legislature has been able to muster enough votes for such a measure, although similar attempts have been made almost every session since the environmental movement took hold in the mid-1960s.

But while the vote represented a major breakthrough, the measure’s author faced some tough questioning during floor debate, and no one was certain in what form it may emerge from the legislative process.

“This admittedly is a compromise in which neither side has exactly what they want,” said Assemblyman Burt Margolin (D-Los Angeles), the bill’s author.

“But a consensus among the parties developed quite recently that it is better to sit down together to work to create a new system . . . so that the cleanup could begin soon rather than to continue the debilitating, divisive and costly battle over the traditional bottle bill for 20 years or more,” he said.

Most of the container deposit laws in effect in nine other states--as well as the proposal that has been consistently defeated over the years in California--call for consumers to pay a deposit on all beer and soft drink containers to be refunded when the containers are returned to the store.

The compromise proposal, by contrast, would require distributors to pay a 1-cent-per-container deposit into a recycling fund. This would be passed on to consumers as part of the product’s price.

A 2-cents-per-container refund would be paid directly to those who return the containers to special recycling centers, which probably would include some large grocery chains. The additional penny would be raised from the scrap value of the container as well as the expectation that a large percentage of containers would not be returned.

Another feature of the plan intended to motivate the beverage industry to promote recycling would increase the distributor-paid deposit to 2 cents a container if the program has not achieved a return rate of at least 65% by Dec. 31, 1990.

Various Groups in Support

Retailers, who once fought hard against any deposit bill, support the plan because they would not be forced to collect or refund the deposits. The beverage industry backs it because it would preempt local attempts to enact container laws that are likely to require larger deposits.

Environmentalists, who sponsored an unsuccessful bottle bill initiative in 1982, were not enthusiastic about the compromise but decided to support the bill because it would establish a state-mandated recycling program in California for the first time.

Yet the compromise still has some enemies on both sides of the recycling issue.

Assemblyman Richard E. Floyd (D-Hawthorne), in a particularly virulent attack during floor debate, likened the measure’s supporters to “over-aged hippies,” asserting that the compromise is “the last hurrah of this outrageous bill.”

Floyd and other critics maintained that more litter is caused by fast food wrappers and cups than by cans and bottles, and that consumers will find it too inconvenient to return containers to recycling centers rather than the markets where they bought the beverages.

Hayden Raises Questions

Assemblyman Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica), a strong supporter of recycling, voted for the measure but questioned whether a 2-cent refund was enough incentive for consumers to recycle. He also criticized the makeup of a new recycling commission that would be set up to oversee the program.

The 17-member commission would consist overwhelmingly of beverage industry representatives. This is expected to be a major sticking point as the legislation gets into the Senate hearing process. There also was concern that any bill which sets up a new bureaucracy is likely to draw a veto from Gov. George Deukmejian, who has opposed many measures that inflate the size of state government.

The governor has not yet taken a position on the legislation.

Margolin said he would be receptive to changes to the bill as it goes along, but he urged prompt action, suggesting that the compromise that produced it may be fragile.

“We now have a window of opportunity,” he told the Assembly, “and that may soon close.”