Articles Tagged: Bottle bill

A state lawmaker says it may be time to consider repealing the state law that places a 5-cent deposit on most plastic and aluminum beer and soda containers

In most of the 10 states that have bottle bills, the premiums paid to redemption centers haven’t kept up with costs, causing many private redemption centers to close. Now, legislatures are coming under pressure to help the struggling industry and programs.

B&B Redemption Center in Cascade is one of a handful of new redemption centers to open in Iowa since the Iowa Legislature last year updated the 45-year-old bottle bill. A major change was increasing the handling fee going to redemption centers from 1 to 3 cents per container. Those extra pennies started flowing in January.

The redemption businesses that remain are worried about a sudden influx of containers, similar to what they experienced after the early months of the coronavirus pandemic. Some fear it will sour Iowans’ attitudes about recycling the containers.

She also vetoes proposed change to Iowa’s district court judicial nominating commissions, saying the proposal did not go far enough.

SF 2378, which will take effect July 1 if signed by Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds, will raise the handling fee from 1 to 3 cents per container, let distributors continue to retain the unredeemed deposits, which are estimated to be as much as $40 to $50 million a year and let retailers that meet certain condition opt out of redeeming containers.

In addition to vouchers, K-12 transparency, unemployment benefits, a proposed ethanol mandate, and the bottle bill remain on lawmakers’ to-do list.

In addition to raising the handling fee from one to three cents per container and letting retailers that meet certain condition opt out, SF 2378 increases enforcement through the Attorney General’s Office, offers distributors a 1-cent credit against their taxes for each container they handle and increases legislative oversight. But the Senate must agree.

Lawmakers express frustration with lack of progress despite years of proposals and fruitless debates on how best to modernize the four-decade-old nickel deposit law.

Iowa Senate Republicans say their plan would breathe new life into the state recycling program, while Senate Democrats say the plan would strangle the program to death.

Bill would allow retailers to opt out of redeeming carbonated and alcoholic beverage containers, but they would pay a half-cent handling fee for five years. Distributors would pay an additional penny handling fee to redemption centers for each bottle or can returned.

Changes may be coming to Iowa’s recycling law, regardless of how beverage wholesalers and grocery stores feel about it, one state lawmaker Monday during a legislative hearing on the latest proposal in the seemingly annual effort to make changes to the state recycling law, more commonly known as the “bottle bill.”

Some have called expanding the bottle bill to include water and energy drinks, and double the deposit to a dime to increase the penny-per-can handling fee for redemption centers to 2 cents. Even that may not be enough to support redemption centers, especially in rural Iowa, according to Iowa State University economics professor Dermot Hayes, who has been analyzing the bottle bill for about 10 years.

According to a new poll from Selzer & Co., 84 percent of Iowans said the state’s recycling law is good for the state, while just 12 percent said it is bad. And 80 percent said the state should either keep the law as it is, or expand it to add more types of eligible containers and more retail locations where containers can be returned.

Lawmakers are seeking a way to maintain Iowa’s four-decade-old Iowa bottle bill and address retailers’ safety and health concerns about handling dirty beverage containers in their stores.