By Joe Kellard
The bill expands the current deposit law on carbonated-beverage bottles, to now include a nickel deposit on water bottles, raises the handling fee paid to businesses that accept empties from 2 cents to 3.5 cents per bottle, and turns over to the state 80 percent of unclaimed deposits that the beverage industry have heretofore kept.
Protesters stood outside the offices of three other Democratic assemblymen, Marc Alessi of Wading River, Philip Ramose of Brentwood and Robert Sweeney of Lindenhurst, the primary sponsor of the bill, which Gov. Paterson signed into law earlier this month. Weisenberg came out and talked to the protesters, telling them that the bill merely expands the existing bottle bill to include water bottles, which goes into effect on June 1. The handling fee increase and the 80 percent return to the state provisions went into effect on April 15.
But protester Gary Konigsberg, owner of Garal Wholesalers in West Babylon, said that the bill forces distributors to count the empty bottles at deposit locations, rather than putting them through a mechanical counter at their facilities. "Doing it that way would take a lot more time for our drivers and warehouse people and will cost us a lot more money," Konigsberg said.
He noted that the bill also forces distributors to open separate bank accounts specifically for revenues on bottle deposits. Weisenberg said that when the assemblymen asked distributors how much deposit money they make due to unreturned bottles, they declined to answer.
"We were going to audit them to find out how much money they were getting in the situation as it was prior," Weisenberg explained. "That's why, obviously, they're out there: They're getting funds but not revealing how much, and now that's going to be cut off because money is now going to go to the Emergency Environmental Fund."
Weisenberg, who sits on the Assembly's Environmental Committee, which is headed by Sweeney, said that the funds from the new bill "can be distributed to meet the needs of other environmental issues."
The Assembly has been negotiating the bill for three years, Weisenberg said, and during that time the distributors' lobbyists never set foot in his office. "Nor did they indicate that they had any opposition to the legislation that was passed," he said. "If they want to picket, let them go picket their own offices."
Peter Sobol, past president of Empire State Beer Distributors Association in Bellerose, said he supports the bill. "This expansion with water will create more jobs, and we can hire more kids to handle the cans and bottles for us," Sobol said.
Sobol said that, as he understands it, when the state's original bottle bill was passed 25 years ago, when bottled water was rare, the redemption money was supposed to stay with distributors for a few years to fund the costs to start their bottle redemption programs. "But after 25 years they've had it long enough," he said.
Sobol said that the unredeemed nickels for deposits paid to distributors have added up to $2 billion to $3 billion over the 25 years, and that the new bill, with water bottles included, could generate about $200 million for the state.
For his part, Konigsberg predicts that due to the new law, the price of soft drinks will likely increase from about 99 cents a bottle to as high as $1.39, and a case of water from $5 to about $7. "With the implementation of this bill, you're killing the consumer on Long Island, who has already been stressed out and taxed to the hilt," he said. "They're skirting the issue by not taxing the consumer directly."
Konigsberg said he and other distributors, at the least, will fight to try to change some aspects of the new bill.
Comments about this story? JKellard@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 213.
