By Danielle Kelly
An analysis of garbage (click here) found on five Lake Michigan beaches finds that most trash comes from visitors instead of offshore sources, according to the Holland Sentinel.
Hundreds of thousands of pieces of trash were collected for the analysis, all by volunteers. Shorelines from West Side County Park, Chicago’s North Avenue Beach, Marquette Park Beach, Sand Bay Beach and Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore were included.
At West Side County Park beach, 60 volunteers collected 3,234 pieces of trash totaling about 92 pounds. At North Avenue Beach, 1,817 volunteers collected more than 170,000 pieces of litter....
More of the Snyder wayward death spiral. When all the Governor's former experience is balance sheets, there is little there to actually govern.
December 30, 2016
By Chelsey Harvey
A new law in Michigan (click here) will prohibit local governments from banning, regulating or imposing fees on the use of plastic bags and other containers. You read that correctly: It’s not a ban on plastic bags — it’s a ban on banning plastic bags.
Michigan Lt. Gov. Brian Calley signed the new public act into law on Wednesday, along with 11 other bills. Gov. Rick Snyder is currently on vacation out of state, local news sources reported, and Calley has the authority to sign bills into law in his absence.
The new public act prohibits local ordinances from “regulating the use, disposition, or sale of, prohibiting or restricting, or imposing any fee, charge, or tax on certain containers,” including plastic bags, as well as cups, bottles and other forms of packaging. This means individual cities and municipalities are not allowed to ban plastic bags or charge customers a fee for using them.
Bans and restrictions on the use of plastic bags are widespread in other parts of the country and around the world. The rationale is simple: Plastic bags are infamous non-biodegradable sources of pollution — although they will eventually break down into tiny pieces, scientists believe this process can take hundreds of years, or even up to a millennium, in landfills....
More of the Snyder wayward death spiral. When all the Governor's former experience is balance sheets, there is little there to actually govern.
By Chelsey Harvey
A new law in Michigan (click here) will prohibit local governments from banning, regulating or imposing fees on the use of plastic bags and other containers. You read that correctly: It’s not a ban on plastic bags — it’s a ban on banning plastic bags.
Michigan Lt. Gov. Brian Calley signed the new public act into law on Wednesday, along with 11 other bills. Gov. Rick Snyder is currently on vacation out of state, local news sources reported, and Calley has the authority to sign bills into law in his absence.
The new public act prohibits local ordinances from “regulating the use, disposition, or sale of, prohibiting or restricting, or imposing any fee, charge, or tax on certain containers,” including plastic bags, as well as cups, bottles and other forms of packaging. This means individual cities and municipalities are not allowed to ban plastic bags or charge customers a fee for using them.
Bans and restrictions on the use of plastic bags are widespread in other parts of the country and around the world. The rationale is simple: Plastic bags are infamous non-biodegradable sources of pollution — although they will eventually break down into tiny pieces, scientists believe this process can take hundreds of years, or even up to a millennium, in landfills....
