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Ms. Howey wondered why a nursing home would be exempt. She indicated she <br />works in a nursing home and there are piles of polystyrene and she did not know <br />what the rationale is for that and if it was a finance thing. <br />Ms. Bakken assumed that it is because those nursing homes and hospitals contract <br />with certain food service companies so there might be a mix of pre -packaged foods <br />they are using and also whatever they are contractually obligated to use for certain <br />dietary restrictions, that would make it a little more burdensome for those locations <br />to try to comply. <br />Mr. Culver indicated they needed to figure out what is considered take-out. The <br />food is prepared in a kitchen and taken out to the rooms at the nursing homes or <br />hospital rooms so it is still kind of internal. He noted it is still not great to use <br />polystyrene but he thought the intent was to try to keep this from going to people's <br />homes and then being disposed of there. <br />Motion <br />Member Collins moved, Member Hodder seconded, to recommend the City <br />Council follow the St. Louis Park Ordinance as a base with 2023 as an <br />education year and 2024 to start enforcement of the Ordinance as well as some <br />type of sliding scale for penalties and banning black plastic as well as tying this <br />to Ramsey County roll out of curbside recycling. <br />Ayes: 4 <br />Nays: 0 <br />Motion carried. <br />Ms. Bakken made a presentation on Plastic Bag Ordinance. <br />Mr. Culver indicated this particular item was not driven by the Council. This was <br />not something that the Council suggested talking about. This was something the <br />previous chair of the PWETC, Joe Wozniak, brought up to research. He explained <br />he was not sure if this would be ready to make a recommendation on to the City <br />Council until more research is done. The question he thought was interesting was <br />why Minneapolis exempted food take-out for the plastic bags in particular because <br />that is kind of an interesting exemption. He thought it makes sense that if a City is <br />trying to promote not using plastic bags at all why would the City not go all the <br />way but there may be some reason why. He thought staff should research that a <br />little more and come back with some more information on that. <br />Chair Ficek was curious about this too because these Cities had a lot more <br />restrictions with the take-out containers than with the plastic bags which he <br />wondered about as well. <br />Mr. Howey explained he uses his compost bags for a lot of things because these are <br />plant -based resin bags and are strong. He wondered why more people are not using <br />Page 7 of 9 <br />