Cathedral City proposes plastic straw ban
Many major companies and cities throughout the country are banning plastic straws in an effort to be more environmentally friendly. Reports indicate that Americans throw away 500 million plastic straws every day. According to a report by the World Economic Forum, by 2050 oceans will have more plastic than fish (by weight).
Cathedral City could be the first city in the Coachella Valley to adopt this ban.
The city council is developing a policy to ban or severely limit the use of plastic straws. Four out of the five council members support an outright ban. The council proposed the ban last week and is developing an ordinance to be voted on at a future meeting.
Some businesses in other valley cities are already doing their part for the environment, like Ristretto, a coffee shop in Palm Springs.
“Every business has an effect on the environment and we can all make small changes,” said Richard Laferriere, the general manager of Ristretto. “The straw situation is a small change. But the nice thing is cups are completely recyclable. Straws were never recyclable.”
Americans use 500 million plastic straws every day.
“It’s not okay to just keep consuming and creating waste,” said Ernest Coffee customer Cassandra Santamaria. “I think we have the responsibility to care about our environment.”
Other businesses are already doing away with plastics.
“I thought, well why wait for the city to ban plastic straws,” said John Monahan, owner of Ristretto.
His shop offers paper straws instead.
“The thing is, even though some people don’t like them, we would never go back because it’s environmentally safe for the paper straws.”
Some customers are joining in on the movement too, despite their personal tastes.
“As much as I like drinking anything from a straw, I opted not to because again I’m trying to do my part and be a little bit more green these days,” said Gregory Gomez, a resident of Cathedral City. He said he supports a city-wide ban on plastic straws.
Employees up the street at Ernest Coffee in Palm Springs are offering customers another alternative to plastic too — biodegradable straws made out of corn starch.
They look and feel exactly the same as plastic straws, and if they weren’t marked, you might not even know the difference.
The manager at Ernest Coffee hopes making the switch will help the environmentally friendly trend catch on.
“We want to start having people recognize what’s actually going on with this world and if it means the small little switch of the straws and having them get used to something new rather than their convenient whatever they’re used to kind of day, that’s fine,” said Kayla Doughty, manager of Ernest Coffee.
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