Cities: Seattle, Washington

by Marcia Croft

Seattle is #3 on sustainlane.com’s rankings and has similar motivations/disincentives as other cities, but the largely liberal and “green” base makes sustainable changes easier.  There are three approaches: top-down, bottom-up, and sideways, and all intersect in the Seattle Green Bag Campaign. 

Green Bag Campaign was inspired/motivated by other cities/countries (France, Bangladesh, Ireland) imposing bag fees or banning plastic bags.  In 2008, Seattle city council members instituted a 20 cent bag fee on all paper and plastic bags to encourage reusable bag use and decrease plastic waste.  Before it could take effect, a sufficient number of signatures were obtained to put a measure to repeal the fee on the ballot, led by the American Chemistry Council (lobby group for oil and plastics company).  Funded by the same group, the opposition encouraged voters to repeal the fee.  Citizen-led activist groups supported the fee, but voters eventually overturned the fee and no bag tax currently exists in Seattle.  Despite top-down and bottom-up support, a sideways intervention from a lobby group managed to sway voter opinions enough to repeal this measure.  This shows that Seattleites may have good intentions with relation to sustainability measures but may not always follow through when it concerns paying a little more for convenience.