In a December 18, 1992 letter to Council, (Attachment 1) Dan Wong, Chairman of

thre~Ebalition, asked Council to write to the Minister of Environment, Lands and

Parks requesting that the Minister grant approval for the Coalition to undertake a
area rede Pe :

study of this proposed system.

‘2 ttea34 03

A ‘second proposal from the Brewery, Winery and DOistullery Workers - Loc. 1300
supports refillable beverage container legislation. In a December 21. 1992 letter,
(Attachment 2) Tom Smith, President of the Brewery Workers asks that Council
consider adopting a motion in support of the legislation put forth by the Brewery
Workers. The BC Government Employees’ Union also supports this legislation. Ina
January 4, 1993 fetter, (Attachment 3) John T. Shields, President of the BC GEU
has asked Council to place the draft legislation on the agenda of a council meetina
and to consider adopting a motion of support for refillable beverage container
legislation for the Province of BC. :

The goverment has now made a decision on the conceptual design of a new
beverage container strategy and has asked the Environment Ministry to provide the
government with details for implementing an expanded deposit-refund system and
to involve industry in the analysis cf this option and other alternatives which will
minimize costs to industry and consumess. (Attachment 4)

ANALYSIS:

For more than 20 years British Columbians have paid a deposit on beer and soft
drink containers. Recent complaints have been that the current system is too
narrow and should be expanded to include all beverage containers. In addition,
there are concerns that refunds are sometimes diff 1 to obtain: for example,
most stores have a limit on how many containers ioey will accept: they will not
accept containers botued or canned outside of BC: bottle depots will not take back
pop cans.

The Ministry responded to concems by inviting suggestions from the public and
other stakeholders about how to amend the system. Local and regional
governments, the Municipal Waste Branch of the Environment Ministry and other
environmental groups want to see deposits maintained.

The Beverage Industry Coalition prefers to see deposits eliminated in favour of a
user pay system that wouid eliminate deposits on non-refillable beverage containers
and expand curbside collection programs as well as commercial collection programs
for businesses and institutions. The Coalition approached the Ministry last fall and
requested that the Ministry delay making any decisions on changing deposit
legisiation until such time as it (the Coalition) had’ completed its own study. The
Ministry had no objection nor did the GVRD but this study was not done.

The December 18, 1992 jetter from the Coalition does net include any -new
information or proposals and the GVRO Solid Waste Management Committee at its
January 12, 1993 meeting just tabled the new correspondence as information.