Bay Area Madness
Two new bills have popped up in the bay area in the previous week and both are strange to me in their own way. While its nothing new for strange ideas to come out of the bay, for two to come out in such a short period of time and for both to get the amount of media coverage that they are getting is odd.
The first bill has to do with the car pool lane. You know, that nearly empty lane on the left side of the freeway that you never get to drive it because you're not being carbon neutral (whatever). Sen. Abel Maldonado, a Republican from San Luis Obispo, has proposed that drivers who see someone driving alone in the car pool lane can dial an 800 number and report the offender to the CHP. The CHP will then send the offender a very strongly worded letter warning about car pool violations. Do it again and you'll get another strongly worded letter. Actually its the same strongly worded letter. Keep doing it and you'll never have to look for paper to start your fireplace with because they will just keep sending you strongly worded letters. Never will you be send a ticket. While it irritates the hell out of me that people use the carpool lane when they shouldn't, proposing a bill that does nothing to stop the violations and will end up costing taxpayers money irritates me more. Besides that, how are you suppose to turn in the violators? As of 2008 you're not suppose to drive and talk on the phone anymore. Sure you could write down the persons plate number and call when you get home but that's dangerous too.
The second law comes out of San Francisco where Mayor Newsom is expected today to sign and "groundbreaking" new bill banning plastic bags in grocery stores. Environmental groups claim that the petroleum-based bags fill up the land fills and choke ocean life. Therefore as of today only paper, cloth, or "plastic bags that are environmentally friendly enough for a compost pile" can be used. The compost friendly bags that are being refered to are corn based and while on paper they sound good they are completely untested and very expensive. While I have to agree that plastic bags are hard on the environment, unless the paper bags are produced with 100% post consumer materials they can be just as damaging. While this idea is better than the $0.15 per plastic bag tax that was being perposed (seriously) I'm not sure that this will be the fix-all that it is being made out to be. Time will, as always, tell.