Anyone from Seattle here?

[Professur]

The Seattle city council has voted to fine businesses and residents that waste too much food.

Under the new rules, households will be fined $1 (£0.61) if their rubbish bins contain more than 10% food waste, and businesses and apartment buildings $50.

The city already recycles 56% of its waste but is aiming for 60% by 2015.

Seattle, in Washington State, is the second US city after San Francisco to make composting mandatory in an effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Composting is the processing of breaking down food and lawn refuse into useable soil through decomposition.

Up to 40% of food in the US is wasted, according to a report by the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Only 5% of food scraps are composted, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The city will begin issuing warning tickets on 1 January 2015 and fining customers on 1 July, according to the ordinance, which passed unanimously on Monday.



Under the new rules when Seattle garbage pickers see too much food waste in a bin, they will note it in a computerised system and the fine will be added to the customer's rubbish carting bill, local media reported.

Multi-unit flats and businesses will also be required to limit their food waste but will get two warnings before they are fined, according to the Seattle Times newspaper.

Seattle officials do not expect the programme to be a money-maker for the city, Tim Croll, the Seattle Public Utilities solid waste director, told the newspaper.

He added the city has collected less than $2,000 (£1,220) over nine years of a similar programme that banned recyclable items from the rubbish.

"The point isn't to raise revenue," Mr Croll said. "We care more about reminding people to separate their materials."

source





Will they be issuing the garbage men badges too?

 

[be9ak7ts16]

Some folks have way to much time on their hands.

 

[Professur]

Wait ... there's more

Test sewage to gauge marijuana use: Pot law author

SEATTLE - The main author of a Washington state law that legalized recreational marijuana said on Wednesday that testing sewage for the active ingredient in pot could give municipalities a broader and more reliable picture of drug use than traditional surveys.

Alison Holcomb, who is also an American Civil Liberties Union attorney, said wastewater analysis for psychoactive THC could provide policymakers crucial data at a time of sweeping shifts in marijuana policy in U.S. states and cities.

"Using wastewater data to actually get a baseline of what drug use looks like in various communities over time can help us develop more sound drug policies," Holcomb told Reuters. "It's too easy for surveys to be skewed."

Holcomb's suggestion came at the Spokane City Council's marijuana policy committee meeting on Tuesday, she said.

The panel of educators, law enforcement and lawmaking officials were seeking input on how to measure cannabis use, including by minors, and the growth of marijuana tourism, among other data, Holcomb said.

She said the analysis could be similarly applied to test other harder drugs and how isolated population segments react to policy shifts, but it should not target individuals or replace traditional surveys, which can provide more granular demographic data.

The United States has become a patchwork of local cannabis laws as voters in two states have sanctioned its recreational use and other states and cities increasingly allow medicinal use, while marijuana remains illegal under federal law.

Policymakers may find themselves walking a fine line between seeking to maximize pot tax revenue and ensuring public safety and compliance nearly three months after cannabis retail shops opened in Washington. They opened in Colorado earlier this year.

Holcomb said Oregon, Alaska and the District of Columbia could use the testing methods, including freezing feces for later analysis, as they weigh legalizing recreational marijuana in upcoming votes.

She cited research that found deviations between self-reported levels of drug use and the measured amounts in sewage, and University of Puget Sound researchers who used such analysis to confirm reported increases of amphetamine use by students during times of high academic stress.

Spokane's sewage has not been tested for THC, but wastewater director Dale Arnold said he would check with a lab on the proposal's viability, The Spokesman-Review newspaper reported.

"A large portion of that wastewater doesn't come out of human beings," he said, according to the Spokesman-Review.

source

Even your poop isn't sacred