The New York City Council is pushing back against President Trump’s repeal of a six-year ban on selling bottled water at national parks, and a Bushwick representative is leading the charge.
The council is introducing legislation to ban the sale of single-use, plastic water bottles in city parks and beaches. Council Member Rafael Espinal, who reps parts of Bushwick, authored one of the bills.
“In the face of the Trump administration’s regressive and profit-driven agenda, it is time we step up and do our part to curb our reliance on single-use bottles,” Espinal said in a statement. “I look forward to making reusable containers — not single use bottles — the new norm in New York City parks and beaches.”
The package of legislation also targets city government concessions including those operated by Trump, such as Wollman and Lasker rinks and the Ferry Point golf course.
One million plastic bottles are purchased every minute. Less than 50 percent of those are recycled and only seven percent are turned into new bottles. As much as 13 million tons of plastic leak into our oceans each year. People who eat seafood ingest about 11,000 pieces of tiny plastic every year.
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Cover image by Steven Depolo