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Calabasas
Retail Food Establishments Need to Certify Their Awareness of the
City's Ordinance Banning the Use of Expanded Polystyrene for Food
Packaging
PRESS RELEASE
Issued March 21, 2007
Calabasas retail food establishments need to certify their awareness
of the City’s ordinance banning the use of expanded polystyrene for
Food Packaging
By March 31, 2007, the owners of each retail food establishment within
the City of Calabasas should report to the City their awareness and
compliance of this newly adopted ban on the use of expanded
polystyrene for food packaging.
On February 21, 2007, Calabasas City Council members adopted Ordinance
2007-233 banning retail food establishments, nonprofit food providers
and City facilities from using food packaging materials made of
expanded polystyrene, known popularly by the trademark name Styrofoam.
The ordinance requires food service establishments in Calabasas to
start using environmentally acceptable packaging (i.e. returnable,
recyclable, biodegradable, degradable) by March 31, 2008, and report
on-going compliance with this ordinance on the first business day of
each calendar year.
The purpose of this ordinance is to protect the natural environment
from non-biodegradable litter, reduce solid wastes, and promote public
health. Most polystyrene food packaging products consist of disposable
food and beverage take-out containers. They make up a majority of
visible wastes littering public places and natural environments, and
are known to persist in the environment for many years before breaking
down into non-biodegradable components, posing potential environmental
and public health risks.
The ordinance therefore requires food service providers to purchase
packaging that is:
(1) Returnable – food or beverage
containers are capable of being returned to the distributor for reuse
(2) Recyclable – material that can be
recycled, salvaged, composted, processed, or marketed by any means
other than land-filling or burning. Recyclable materials include
plastic which can be feasibly recycled by a municipal recycling
program in California. Such plastics have recycling symbols #1 through
#5 and include PET or PETE, HDPE, LDPE, and PP plastics. Polystyrene
bears the recycling symbol #6, but is not feasibly recyclable in
Calabasas.
(3) Biodegradable – capable of being
broken down by micro-organisms in the environment into non-toxic
components within a reasonably short time after disposal
(4) Degradable – capable of being
broken down through natural processes via natural organisms or
ultraviolet light.
Restaurants and other food service
providers have the choice of many food packaging products made of
environmentally friendly alternatives, such as bio-plastics made of
corn, paper, and bagasse-ware made of plant pulp, all of which meet
the requirements of the ordinance. Several other California cities,
such as Berkeley, Oakland, Malibu, Santa Monica, and San Francisco,
have already passed similar bans, paving the way for others, like
Calabasas, to follow. Food service providers in Calabasas will be
seeing the availability of helpful resources posted on the City
website in the near future to help make the switch from polystyrene
use to environmentally acceptable packaging a smoother transition.
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