At the City of Richmond General Purposes meeting on May 20th, Mayor and Councilors passed the following Motion:
(1) That:
(a) staff be directed to bring forward appropriate bylaw amendments to the Business Regulation Bylaw No. 7360 to ban the commercial use or commercial distribution of foam cups, foam plates and foam take-out containers effective January 1, 2020, with exceptions provided for charitable organizations and hospital/care facilities;
(b) staff be directed to bring forward appropriate bylaw amendments to the Municipal Ticket Information Bylaw No. 7321 to incorporate a ticketing provision for those businesses who violate Business Regulation Bylaw 7360 as amended per item (a) above, effective January 1, 2020; and
(c) staff be directed to bring forward appropriate bylaw amendments to the Notice of Bylaw Violation Dispute Adjudication Bylaw No. 8122 to incorporate a fine of $250 for each instance where a business violates Business Regulation Bylaw No. 7360 as amended per item (a) above, effective January 1, 2020;
(2) That the implementation plan, as outlined in Attachment 2, with funding in the amount of $300,000, from the Sanitation and Recycling provision, to support implementation of a foam cups, foam plates and foam take-out containers ban, be approved;
(3) That funding for ongoing support, education and bylaw enforcement, for item (a) above, be included for Council’s consideration in the 2020 and future Sanitation and Recycling utility budget and rates;
(4) That staff bring forward two resolutions for the 2019 Union of British Columbia Municipalities convention requesting the provincial government’s support to address single-use items by:
(a) adopting a comprehensive provincial single-use item reduction strategy; and
(b) developing provincial standards for compostable single-use items ensuring they are designed to fully biodegrade if littered in the natural environment, that any standards and certifications for compostability are aligned with provincial composting infrastructure, and that compostable single-use items are collected and managed through an extended producer responsibility program that covers the residential and commercial sectors as well as materials from the public realm;
(5) That the Mayor write the Chair of the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage District Board and the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy to develop a provincial single-use item reduction strategy;
(6) That staff be directed to bring forward appropriate bylaw amendments to ban straws, similar to the City of Vancouver’s approach, together with an implementation plan and budget effective January 1, 2020, and also report back on the City of Vancouver’s research being undertaken regarding the ban on straws;
(7) That staff be directed to examine the issue of single-use food utensils, and report back;
(8) That staff be directed to bring forward appropriate bylaw amendments to prohibit the commercial use or commercial distribution of plastic checkout bags and regulate paper and reusable bags with incremental fees, effective January 1, 2020, with appropriate exemptions listed in Table 2, in the staff report titled “Single-Use Plastic Items – City of Vancouver Proposals”, dated May 12, 2019 from the Director, Public Works, with a six-month grace period to permit the use of existing plastic bag stock that was purchased by a business prior to the first reading of the bylaw; and
(9) That staff be directed to bring forward an implementation plan and budget to prohibit plastic checkout bags, for item (8) above.