POWELL RIVER, B.C. – The City of Powell River is looking at reducing single-use plastics.
Staff will be working with the Let’s Talk Trash team to create a reduction strategy for the city and report to the council at a future meeting.
Mayor Dave Formosa said the council is on board with the initiative, that could include bylaws that will restrict the use of single-use plastics within the city.
“It would be all-encompassing,” Formosa said.
Formosa said he and his family “really hate” the use of single-use plastics in packaging.
“We kind of curse to ourselves and out loud every time we buy a little product and it’s encompassed with all this plastic,” he said. “And paper products aren’t as bad but you just know that plastic is way overused and it doesn’t break down.”
We are already seeing a reduction, Formosa noted, with how prominent recycling has become.
“In my time, we didn’t recycle,” he said. Now here I am, 61 years old, and we recycle. It’s just part of our daily habits at home. For sure, it’s becoming more and more prominent to reduce plastics, but are they producing more quickly than we can reduce I think is the issue.”
Formosa said people are getting “fed up” with single-use plastics.
“I think it will definitely work towards seeing much less plastic over the next 10 to 20 years, for sure.”
