By Alan Pryor –
Timing and Information Availability
Summary of the Proposed Ordinance
This proposed Davis ordinance’s language and format is very similar to that considered last year in the California legislature (AB 1998 – 2010) which died in the State Senate. The primary modifications pertain to the fact that this proposed ordinance for Davis is implemented on a local basis and that references to adverse impacts on marine life have been removed because they are not particularly pertinent to Davis.
Also, this proposed ordinance exempts smaller retail establishments with gross annual sales less than $1,000,000 as in now implemented in many other municipal ordinances. Thus, the proposed Davis plastic bag ordinance will cover all the major grocery, drug, and large chain stores in Davis (about 2 dozen total) while almost all of the small downtown business merchants will be exempt. Even so, the proposed ordinance is expected to eliminate well over 90% of the estimated 3,500,000 to 4,000,000 larger size, single-use plastic bags distributed annually in Davis.
Note: Partial survey only. Some large outlets (including Target) refused to release information
The proposed ordinance will only restrict handled take-out plastic bags, though. Restrictions on the thinner handle-less plastic bags shoppers use for meats and produce within a store are NOT included in this ordinance for sanitary reasons and restaurants and fast food establishments are also exempt.
A 10 cent per bag charge will be applied to all full-size paper bags distributed by affected retailers to encourage people to bring their own reusable bags. However, these bags must be recyclable and contain 40% post-consumer content as is the case with all similar municipal ordinances. The 10 cent charge is the presumed estimated cost of recovery incurred by stores for distribution of the recyclable large sized paper bags and is also the most common fee imposed by other municipalities with such ordinances. Davis Food Coop shoppers are well aware of the impacts of this type of ordinance as the Coop has eliminated single-use take-out plastic bags for years and already charges $0.05 for a paper bag.
Additionally, recycled plastic fiber fabric-sewn bags are considered reusable but the handled thicker plastic bags made from virgin plastic are not. Currently, only one grocer in Davis that might be affected by this ordinance uses these types of thick plastic bags (Westlake IGA Markets). They have reported that very few customers come back into the store with the bags to be reused. The City of San Francisco’s existing plastic bag ordinance had a similar provision allowing for these thicker plastic bags to be distributed as reusable but the City is now modifying their ordinance to also restrict these thicker bags because so few were being reused.
The original ordinance proposed in the state legislature last year was crafted by a broad coalition of stakeholders including Green Cities California (a coalition of municipalities in California), Californians Against Waste (CAW – a non-profit waste reduction advocacy group) and the California Grocers Association (GCA). The CGA is a non-profit, statewide trade association representing the food industry with approximately 500 retail members operating over 6,000 food stores in California and Nevada, and approximately 300 grocery supplier companies. Retail membership includes chain and independent supermarkets, convenience stores and mass merchandisers.
This proposed Davis ordinance is proposed to be effective on July 1, 2012 to allow Staff and affected major retailers time to publicize the ordinance so shoppers are aware of the new restrictions on single-use, handled plastic bags. It is the first major step towards implementing the recent NRC-approved Zero Waste Resolution which is scheduled to be approved on the Consent Calendar of the Davis City Council on December 6, 2011.
The Problem with Plastic Bags in Davis
Plastics have important uses in society, but can have environmental and fiscal impacts. Certain uses of plastic can be restricted without these adverse impacts on society. Single-use plastic bags are one such use. Firstly, plastic bags are an impediment to our waste diversion goals in Davis which must be increased under state law. According to recent studies, only 3% to 5% of the average 500 plastic bags used per capita in the state (over 19 billion annually in California alone) are recycled. The rest are land filled or end up in the ecosystem.
People think of plastic bags as being free. In fact, cities and recyclers spend large amounts in picking up plastic bag litter from parks, roadways, and other public areas. In San Francisco alone, City officials estimate that they spent $8.5 million annually to deal with plastic bag litter or about 1.7 cents for every plastic bag used in the city.
Bags in East Davis Field
Significant efforts are also required locally to remove plastic bags from the Davis recyclable and compostable waste streams where they jam machinery and necessitate removal adding to the manual labor costs of recycling and composting. According to conversations with Davis Waste Removal (DWR), plastic bags are the primary contaminant in the City’s green waste and recyclable waste streams. In addition to the costs to manually remove the plastic bags, they present substantial operating difficulties because they often clog or jam DWR’s sorting and waste handling equipment.
Further, to minimize wind-borne plastic bags, the operators of the Yolo County Landfill site must roll out a series of 30 ft wide tarps every evening to cover the day’s deposited trash. These tarps are then removed prior to covering the trash with dirt at the next opportunity. They have been unable to calculate their exact expenditures for these required activities which are only partially successful in preventing wind-blown plastic bags from scattering over the landfill area and beyond.
Bags Littering Yolo Co. Landfill Site North of Davis
Additionally, substantial City efforts are made to remove discarded or “escaped” plastic bags from Davis parks, pathways, and roads which costs are not available from the City’s Public Works or Parks Department. And many times, these efforts are not completely successful and numerous plastic bags are routinely swept into the City’s storm water drains by rains where they mostly end up in the City’s holding ponds. Most of Davis’ storm water runs through these storm water retention ponds to capture street pollutants, litter, etc, before heading to downstream receiving waters. Following are the numbers of plastic bags collected in these holding ponds over the last 3 years.
Bags in UC Davis Arboretum
It is now widely considered indisputable that plastic bags entering our environmental have adverse affects on plant and animal life. Those plastic bags not directly killing animal or plant life enter our environment by eventually breaking down into smaller and smaller fragments that can take up to centuries to completely break down. Numerous recent international, national, state and local reports have called for and implemented the banning or drastic reduction of plastic bags due to their environmental damage.
Achim Steiner, head of the UN Environmental Program, recently said “there is simply zero justification for manufacturing [plastic bags] any more, anywhere.”
Bags along Roadway and in Field North of Covell and Pole Line
Legal Aspects of Proposed Ordinance
In California, due to AB 2449 which was proposed and supported by the plastic bag industry, no fee can be placed on single-use HDPE plastic bags. This was designed to dissuade municipal governments in California from placing fees on plastic bag use; the prospect of which was abhorred by the plastic bag industry. This law, however, has come back to haunt plastic bag manufacturers. This is because every subsequent municipal ordinance enacted in California thus far outright restricts distribution of such single-use plastic bags to some extent while only placing a minimum fee of distribution of recyclable paper bags
Not content to see their lucrative franchise wither, though, a coalition of plastic bag manufacturers began suing all of the early California municipalities that adopted plastic bag restrictions. The suits generally claimed that the ordinances are “projects” subject to CEQA review and aim to force municipalities to spend money on expensive Environmental Impact Reviews.
While many non-profit agencies and municipalities do not believe that plastic bag restrictions are subject to CEQA, some cities decided to conduct full Environmental Impact Reviews under CEQA before implementing their ordinances. These include the City of San Jose and the County of Los Angeles, among others. Other cities have relied on Mitigated Negative Declarations or simple Negative Declarations stating that no environmental impact reviews are necessary.
To counter this growing trend toward reliance on simple Negative Declarations, an industry group calling itself the Save the Bag Coalition filed a lawsuit to overturn a restrictive plastic bag ordinance enacted by Manhattan Beach, California that relied on such a Negative Declaration in July 2008. The coalition argued that paper bags have a greater negative effect on the environment than plastic bags and demanded an in-depth environmental study be done before the Manhattan Beach plastic bag restrictions went into effect.
Recently, the California Supreme Court agreed to hear the City of Manhattan Beach’s appeal of the lower court decision requiring they prepare a CEQA Environmental Impact Review for their plastic bag restriction ordinance. On July 14, 2011, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled in favor of Manhattan Beach affirming that their Negative Declaration was sufficient and that the City did NOT have to prepare an Environmental Impact Report.
The California Supreme Court ruling means that Manhattan Beach can restrict retailers from distributing single-use plastic bags, as is proposed in Davis by the NRC Zero Waste subcommittee, without going through a lengthy and expensive environmental study to determine the possible adverse effects of any potential increased use of paper bags. The unanimous court said that “substantial evidence and common sense” show that the plastic bag restrictions wouldn’t harm the environment.
Justice Carol Corrigan, writing for the entire court, concluded there would be no environmental harm caused by the restrictions. Thus, local governments should be free from fear of future industry intimidation lawsuits if they restrict plastic bags without a CEQA Environmental Impact Review but instead can comply with CEQA requirements by adopting a Negative Declaration. A Negative Declaration simply asserts that, based on an initial study, the ordinance will result in no environmental impacts. The prior statement of facts will justify the Use of a Negative Declaration in the City of Davis.
Conclusions
The City of Davis has long held its head high as an environmentally conscious and responsible municipality. Certainly that is without question when compared to some Central Valley cities of comparable size. But many Davis citizens, including this author, contend that we set our goals way too low (especially for a major university city) when we just look for regional comparables for justification of our environmental standards.
Innumerable cities in Southern California and the Bay Area have moved toward sustainability much more aggressively than Davis in terms of waste minimization and recycling diversion rates, aggressive water conservation and reuse, and air pollution reduction strategies. Implementation of the proposed plastic bag restrictive ordinance will at least start to get Davis back into the race of claiming environmental leadership. It is overdue.
I heard on the news this morning that more hacked emails were just released showing that global warming data is being manipulated or left out (if they didn’t like the numbers) to achieve the desired outcome for the climate change fanatics. These people will stop at nothing in order to tell you how you have to live your life. This is just the start, as stated in the article “Implementation of the proposed plastic bag restrictive ordinance will at least start to get Davis back into the race of claiming environmental leadership.” If they want to live their daily lives based on their saving the planet utopia, that’s fine, knock yourself out, but don’t mandate to the rest of us.
Rusty: No offense but that one requires a link or citation so that others can evaluate the report and source for themselves.
The second set of stolen emails is all over Fox News, but I don’t know if Rush has commented on them yet. This proves that scientists want to run your life.
Fox and Rush, Rush and Fox……
It gets tiresome, is that all you have?
the self-annoited plastic police have come to rescue us from ourselves again! yea! whooo!!
Rusty: link please
Several points:
1) Supposedly paper bags were condemned at one time and replaced with plastic bags as more “environmentally responsible”. Obviously the environmental tide has turned, and now paper bags are seen as the better choice environmentally. It makes one doubt the wisdom of environmentalists to make such decisions – as their reactions are too knee-jerk for every new fad that comes along. Frankly, they too often offer up solutions in search of problems… What next? No disposable diapers? No disposable baby bottles? No plastic bottles? How about advocating for the R&D to develop truly biodegradable plastic? It makes a whole lot more practical sense…
2) Citizens have the choice to not use plastic bags now, so why force this minority view on the majority of citizens who just don’t see it the same way as the minority?
3) Who is going to pay for the reusable bags for those who are low income? The low income certainly cannot afford it…
4) The paints and dyes used on the resuable bags are a very real concern. It has been recommended children not be allowed to physically handle the reusable bags with paints/dyes. If the city wants to make the use of reusable bags mandatory, then they ought to be required to provide reusable bags with no dyes/paints. And of course these bags need to be washed on a regular basis, which will use up precious water/energy resources…
5) Essentially what is going to happen is the lower income folks will be forced to use reusable bags they CANNOT afford to purchase (and will have to pay to wash them), while the wealthier among us can use paper bags with impunity bc the wealthier CAN afford the convenience of a 10 cent fee per paper bag.
6) I will predict the use of paper bags will go up astronomically compared to reusable, if such an ordinance passes, so that the ordinance will not have the results that are intended. The only people truly subject to the ordinance and hurt by it in all this will be the low income.
“Obviously the environmental tide has turned, and now paper bags are seen as the better choice environmentally.”
I get the sense the push is for re-usable bags, not paper bags.
what a silly waste of time…
You can usually find contrarian global warming info at Anthony Watts’ site:
[url]http://wattsupwiththat.com/[/url]
I think this ordinance is reasonable.
Elaine, I agree with you 100%. If I can go to a pet store and get recyclable poop bags for the dog, I should be able to get the same type of bags at the grocery store. The problem shouldn’t be put on the consumers. Force the manufacturers to comply. My understanding is that this won’t affect stores that carry a significant number of other things besides food, like Target and Wal-Mart. Does anyone know if this is true?
“Rusty: link please”
Like I said David, I “heard” it on the radio news this morning while driving.
What station, what news? Whose report was it? Details.
Sorry David, I don’t take notes while I’m driving. I would suggest that you don’t either.
So no idea what station it was or who was reporting it?
Is this by chance what you are referring to?
link ([url]http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2011/11/23/climategate-2-0-new-e-mails-rock-the-global-warming-debate/[/url])
To ERM re “The only people truly subject to the ordinance and hurt by it in all this will be the low income”
There is a provision in the proposed ordinance that reads, “Notwithstanding any other law, on and after July 1, 2012, a store shall provide a customer participating in the California Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children pursuant to Article 2 (commencing with Section 123275) of Chapter 1 of Part 2 of Division 106 of the California Health and Safety Code and a customer participating in the Supplemental Food Program pursuant to Chapter 10 (commencing with Section 15500) of Part 3 of Division 9 of the California Welfare and Institutions Code, with a reusable bag or a recycled paper bag at no cost at the point of sale.” Thus, the low income, especially with children, with children will not incur additional costs for bags. Others can always use reusable bags.
To JayTee re: “My understanding is that this won’t affect stores that carry a significant number of other things besides food, like Target and Wal-Mart. Does anyone know if this is true?
This is not true. All stores with sales greater than $1,000,000 are affected except restaurants and food take-out establishments. There is one exception for pharmacies but only when they are dispensing prescriptions. Target is most certainly covered. They are probably the largest provider of plastic bags in Davis
Washington DC imposed a small fee (5 cents)on both plastic and paper bags and I have heard it has worked well. If you can solve the problem with a small “environmental tax” that would be better than eliminating choice all together.
“Is this by chance what you are referring to?”
That’s the gist of the story I heard this morning, but I don’t know if it was exactly that one. Doing a Google search I see there are many more.
To: Alphonso re: “Washington DC imposed a small fee (5 cents)on both plastic and paper bags and I have heard it has worked well. If you can solve the problem with a small “environmental tax” that would be better than eliminating choice all together”
Agreed, but the plastic industry sucessfully lobbied hard for a California bill that does NOT allow any fees to be placed on plastic bags…thus restricting them is the only option to reduce their use.
@ rusty and David: all the information you need about the new emails is at the link I provided above. Anthony Watts has it as his top blog post right now. [url]http://wattsupwiththat.com/[/url]
Soon we will be able to move discussions like this to the bulletin board!
Don Shor, thanks for the links to real data. Although I have to admit, it is a bit annoying when the facts don’t support my accurate opinions.
ERM, the poor won’t suffer if this is passed; I have a pile of them passed out for free at various workshops, fairs, flea markets, etc. that I would be happy to share.
I agree with Gunrock. I think it would be fine to pass the ban, but this would be yet another brouhaha, and we still haven’t settled the water issue or the fire department staffing. Not to mention the pepper spray. Please, only two or three crises at a time.
Elaine,
Have you taken up employment at the Plastics Council or whoever that industry propaganda group is? Your remarks certainly sound that way.
My family has been using reusable cloth bags for years-something we all need to learn- and we have yet to be poisoned by dyes or paint. We have about 20 reusable bags and they go to Grocery Outlet, the co-op, Costco, as well as other local merchants. I can’t remember ever having to launder one, but retail products are generally clean when bagged. We also carry an insulated bag for frozen goods when combining trips to several stores. It stays in the trunk and frozen foods are removed from the cloth bag and placed in the larger insulated bag at the car.
I also occasionally use a drop in basket from a chest freezer for grocerys. It hangs neatly between the sides of a standard grocery cart and does not fall over when transporting grocerys in the back of my pickup truck. When I ride my 100 mpg motorcycle(my typical mode of transport around town) with my swim gear in a back pack, I can hit the Co-op on the way home. I just keep a cloth grocery bag in my pack so it’s always there. Then the full cloth bag gets stowed in the recycled dairy crate attached to the back of the motorcycle. I find this system much more convenient than trying to recycle plastic bags back at the store, which by the way, typically end up in the dumpster behind the store.
Why can’t we continue our RE-use of BOTH plastic and paper bags? We don’t need Big Brother (or Big Sister) interfering any further in our lives, not even this ridiculous and petty intrusion.
Come on Noreen, the NRC has to prove there’s a reason for their existence.
[i]”Sorry David, I don’t take notes while I’m driving. I would suggest that you don’t either.”[/i]
LOL!
[i]” agree with Gunrock. I think it would be fine to pass the ban, but this would be yet another brouhaha, and we still haven’t settled the water issue or the fire department staffing. Not to mention the pepper spray. Please, only two or three crises at a time.”[/i]
This got me thinking that the protesters should carry a pastic bag to place over their head in case of random acts of pepper spray.
“This got me thinking that the protesters should carry a pastic bag to place over their head in case of random acts of pepper spray.”
Jeff, with breathing holes or not?
Jeff, I think you’re on to something, maybe that’s how we can keep the plastic bags in our stores. They’re needed for public safety.
[i]”Jeff, with breathing holes or not?”[/i]
Rusty, I was thinking it would be left open at the bottom only preventing a direct hit to the face… but the more I think about it, those bags are so wimpy a direct hit might dislodge it. Maybe paper bags would work better. The students could even draw slogans and stuff and personalize their paper anti-pepper spray head bag.
I read a report from the manufacturer of the pepper spray that said the affect lasts 30-45 minutes for most people… definitely too long for holding one’s breath.
Rusty – my entrepreneurial brain just kicked in. I called my supplier in China to produce paper bags with an image of a gas mask complete with plastic eye holes and “F U Police” and “F U One Percenters” stenciled all over. I plan to sell these at all Occupy events. It will be the first of many products leveraging the market of all the young people spending their parent’s money. If my company grows large enough I will consider hiring some of these kids to train them to be self-sufficient producers.
Jeff, great idea. The Saints (Aints) had them and called themselves the Bag Heads. Another plus for the Occupiers would be they could stay anonymous.
“The primary modifications pertain to the fact that this proposed ordinance for Davis is implemented on a local basis and that references to adverse impacts on marine life have been removed because they are not particularly pertinent to Davis.”
They knew that one wouldn’t fly anymore. LOL
Maybe toad tunnel traffic has been down this many years because the toads keep getting stuck in plastic bags on the way over to the tunnel. I say make Davis safe for toads too!
[quote]Thus, the low income, especially with children, with children will not incur additional costs for bags. Others can always use reusable bags. [/quote]
Low income seniors will most definitely be effected…
Jeff
It never ceases to amaze me how you know the source of disposable income of people you have never met. Or are you only referring to a handful of children of your liberal acquaintences who have shared the financial details of their lives with you? I would think as an experienced business man you must have done extensive market research to see if there is truly demand for your proposed product!
Noreen
Why can’t we continue our RE-use of BOTH plastic and paper bags? We don’t need Big Brother (or Big Sister) interfering any further in our lives, not even this ridiculous and petty intrusion.
The pictures accompanying Alan’s article would seem to me to address your question very well. If we all would recycle and not litter, then there would be no need for any “Big Brother” intervening. As is quite apparent from the pictures, that is not the case. What would you propose as an alternative to address what I see as a community issue in terms of the visible degradation of our environment ?
Are those pictures the norm or cherry picked? If I go out and post pictures of potato chips bags or candy bar wrappers in a field should we ban those too? I read a post where someone complained of plastic bags being strewn around the jogging path at Wildhorse. I run that everyday and believe me it’s clean. If I searched really hard I’m sure I could find a pic of a few plastic bags to post too. Big brother needs to stay out of our lives.
rusty49
“Big brother needs to stay out of our lives”
It seems to me that you only believe that when “big brother” disagrees with you philosophically. You were only too happy to support “Big Brother”
In the form of university police pepper spraying peaceful protestors.
Verifiable low-income senior here:
I have been bringing only reusable cloth bags to the grocery store for several years now. It’s a no-brainer and I have not been adversely affected at all. Most of my bags were acquired as inexpensive promotional items. In fact, I have extras I would gladly donate to other low-income folks
I have a question for those who promote the use of single use plastic bags. What do you see as the objective advantages of single use bags ?
As someone who has a great deal of interest in health, the only legitimate argument I have ever seen in their favor is the possibility of bacterial contamination from meat, poultry, and fish wrapping. Since this could easily be circumvented by using a multiple use plastic bag, I don’t find even this argument very convincing, but am certainly open to people’s thoughts.
[i]I have a question for those who promote the use of single use plastic bags. What do you see as the objective advantages of single use bags ?[/i]
First, they are not single use for me. They are at least double use, and often perpetual use until they fail. We have a container at home that we load with used bags after every shopping trip. We pull bags from the container to use when we take the dog for a walk, when we take food back and forth to the office or to friends and family’s homes for events. We use them to cover paper shopping bags used as trash containers to prevent recycle-able containers from leaking on the floor. We use them when traveling for packing clothes and shoes. When the container gets too full, we take a load of used bags to the store to put in the recycle bin.
It has been proven that these plastic bags are no more environmentally unfriendly than paper bags. The environmental wackos are attempting to force their worldview on others to use only reusable bags. However, this is not practical for most people. There is danger from food contamination and also there is lack of convenience.
The wackos should look for another cause and drop their plastic bag ban dream.
Jeff
While I applaud your many uses of “single use” bags, I certainly do not applaud your disdainful labeling of anyone who disagrees with you as
“wacko”. And I would strongly disagree with your statement that ” this is not practical for most people”. In France and Spain it is the norm to carry your own cloth or net bags to carry home your purchases. I think it is not truly a consideration about safety, but rather our hubristic attitude that we have the right to consume, waste, and pollute as much as we like that drives the argument in favor of “disposable” bags whether paper or plastic
“Environmental wackos” is a term popularized by Rush LImbaugh. I”m surprised he hasn’t trademarked it. The Republican party has certainly strayed a long way from the conservationist ethos espoused by Teddy Roosevelt.
This proposal is very benign compared to the original one. At least I won’t be having to send my customers home with their bat guano or spinosad in their cloth grocery bags. It applies only to the largest stores, and still allow for paper bags. I opposed the original proposal. This one is fine with me, for the rather self-centered reason that my store is exempt.
“I opposed the original proposal. This one is fine with me, for the rather self-centered reason that my store is exempt.”
As long as it doesn’t apply to me I’m all for it reminds me that
Al Gore goes by that credo as he’s flying around in private jets, driving SUV’s and using enormous amounts of electricity and gas in his huge mansion while at the same time telling everyone else they need to cut back.
I use the term “environmental wacko” (and I did not know that Rush was the one that coined it) because there is a large amount of nuttiness demonstrated for this and other environmental causes. These issues are pushed by single-minded activists unwilling to or incapable of listening to any reason… they act like whack-jobs, hence the name-calling.
Liberals should pat themselves on the back while also flogging themselves for co-opting the brand of environmentalists.
For example, take a look at the work of illegal immigrants attempting to cross the border into Arizona.
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/trash.jpg[/img]
The poor (read: more often Democrat and liberal), tend to pollute more.
Next, we add the rampant hypocrisy from the likes of Algore leaving his 24-room Tennessee mansion, flying on his private jet and taking a private limousine to preach how we should all be cutting our carbon footprint.
Lastly, we have the Divider-In-Chief leading the liberal Democrat charge of class warfare: demonizing the pursuit of profit and attacking successful business owners. With this Obama and his minions have also polluted the political air for environmental causes. For the rest of us, a ban on plastic bags is just another attack on business, and another step toward greater central control and away from the long-standing principles of freedom of choice and free markets.
Frankly, I find most of my conservative friends to be at least as concerned about the environment as any liberal. The difference is that they don’t trust the environmental activists (despite any science credential) because the cause has been politicized by and owned by the left… and they see the left as an enemy of the America they know and love.
Jeff
” they see the left as an enemy of the America they know and love”
What a splendid example of not considering the value of an idea, but rather rejecting it, regardless of its merit if it is supported by one of the demonized group. ( in this case, liberals) You are willing to statet this in the same post in which you accuse Obama of being divisive! Do you truly not see the irony of your words ?
I must admit I trashed most of my plastic bags until this year, when I noticed a plastic bag recycling bin at the new Food4Less store. Do most grocery stores have a plastic bag recycling bin? I’ll need to check this out; and I wonder how many people like me simply have not noticed the plastic bag recycling bins?
This comment has been moved to our Bulletin Board: Obama enflames class divisions ([url]/index.php?option=com_kunena&func=view&catid=2&id=24&Itemid=192#24[/url])
Jeff
I think it is quite a leap to go from a modest attempt to contain something that no one likes or would defend, namely plastic bags where they do not belong, to the ” evil Obama”. And I would like to point out that Obama did not create this countries divisions. They were their long before Obama came along. It is his willingness to openly call them out that you object to.
I just tested the ‘move’ option, using Jeff’s post above. No offense intended, Jeff; it seemed like a good opportunity. I can see some issues with this, like what to do with replies that already exist. Thanks for being a guinea pig for me….
Don, I agree that my post justifies a move.
Don: looks like you’ll just have to catch the off-topics before someone responds to them 😉
This is as good a time as any to suggest that people are free to start their own topics and discussion in the bulletin board and they can respond to the off-topic posts by going there.