Sept 8 at the council: City grants and a polystyrene ban
The city council’s first post-recess session is Monday evening, September 8. A 7 pm presentation of large-grant recommendations will be followed by public comment and then council discussion of the grants and of a city food-service polystyrene ban.
Large Grants
The council budgeted $122,000 for this fiscal year’s large grants, for programming and capital projects that primarily benefit low and moderate-income residents and neighborhoods. Applications were due July 9; the city received 19. Grants Review Committee co-chairs Akena Allen and Gary Cardillo will present:
Capital Projects Grant Recommendations
– Old Takoma Business Association (OTBA) $8,000
– Takoma Park Presbyterian Church $10,000
Cultural and STEM Grant Recommendations
– African Immigrant and Refugee (AIRF) $12,500
– Docs in Progress $5,195
– Moveius Ballet $8,930
– Old Takoma Business Association (OTBA) $15,000
– Takoma Ensemble $15,000
Program and Operational Support Grant Recommendations
– Real Food for Kids $5,632
– Crossroads Community Food Network $19,622
– EduCare Support Services, Inc. $19,621
– Takoma Plays $2,500
STEM is science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The Takoma Park Presbyterian Church funding would go toward the church housed community commercial kitchen project. The OTBA funding would pay for banners (capital) and underwrite the Takoma Park Street Festival and the Art Hop arts fest (cultural).
Do attend the presentation (7 pm) and council discussion (8 pm) (or watch them on city TV, live-streamed), and please comment at the meeting (7:30 pm) or relay your views to me (301-873-8225, sethg@takomaparkmd.gov). You’ll have another opportunity to testify about the grants on September 15, when the council is slated to vote our awards.
Food-Service Polystyrene Ban
The Young Activist Act of 2014 would ban food-service polystyrene use in Takoma Park starting January 1, 2015. It is named in recognition of the hard work and dedication of the Young Activist Club in pursuing an end to food-service polystyrene use given harmful health and environmental impact.
The council will discuss the proposal on Monday evening; I anticipate only minor tuning to the draft if any so that we should be able to bring it to a vote later this month.
I drafted the bill, translating the young activists’ advocacy into legislation with the help and review of community activists including Brenda Platt, Committee on the Environment members Cindy Dyballa and Paul Chrostowski, Public Works Director Daryl Braithwaite, and Assistant City Attorney Ken Sigman. The council last discussed it in June.
We had actually been working on much broader bill. An earlier draft is included in the June 16 council backgrounder.
The earlier version mimics San Francisco and other West Coast cities in requiring food-service businesses and operations to use only compostable disposable food-service ware and to compost food wastes and other “organics.” The earlier version also extends food-waste composting in Takoma Park to multi-family apartment buildings by instituting a requirement that landlords provide food-waste collection services in addition to recycling. These steps proved infeasible because of a dearth of local organics processing sites. I expect that we will revisit these steps in a year or so. In the interim, proponents including myself, perhaps with city involvement, hope to pursue pilot programs at several Takoma Park apartment buildings whose current waste haulers do provide organics collection services.
Montgomery County Councilmember Hans Riemer plans to introduce, on Tuesday, a county bill banning food-service polystyrene and requiring that food-service disposables be either compostable or recyclable. This bill follows on a very similar bill passed in the District of Columbia just a few months back. The DC bill, introduced by Councilmember Mary Cheh and signed by Mayor Vincent Gray, covers only expanded-foam polystyrene service ware. Think “Styrofoam” cups and plates. The DC polystyrene ban and the draft Montgomery County bill’s ban are more limited than Takoma Park’s proposed ban and go into effect later, in 2016.
Finally, the earlier version of the Young Activists Act also included a provision stating that Montgomery County’s business recycling requirements apply in Takoma Park. But it seems that we’d have to create an operational agreement with the county — an opt-in to county law wouldn’t be enough — so instead City Manager Brian Kenner and the city attorney have agree to draft an update to Takoma Park’s ’90s recycling code. It would refresh residential recycling requirements and add a business recycling requirement. Look for a draft in the fall.
Contact
As always, please get in touch if you have questions, comments, or need help with city matters: 301-873-8225 and sethg@takomaparkmd.gov.