As I promised Chica ~ here is a follow up to her blog ...

I have been following the ecology policies of San Francisco's mayor Newsom ~ Remember he was the first to ban plastic bags ~ Now the city has a new policy to also ban plastic water bottles in city offices ...here are some articles for more details ~

First an article by Charlie Goodyear about the plastic bag ban ~

S.F. First City to Ban Plastic Shopping Bags ~

Paper or plastic? Not anymore in San Francisco.

The city's Board of Supervisors approved groundbreaking legislation to outlaw plastic checkout bags at large supermarkets.

The ordinance, sponsored by Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, is the first such law in any city in the United States and has been drawing global scrutiny.

“I am astounded and surprised by the worldwide attention,” Mirkarimi said. “Hopefully, other cities and other states will follow suit.”

Fifty years ago, plastic bags — starting first with the sandwich bag — were seen in the United States as a more sanitary and environmentally friendly alternative to the deforesting paper bag. Now an estimated 180 million plastic bags are distributed to shoppers each year in San Francisco. Made of filmy plastic, they are hard to recycle and easily blow into trees and waterways, where they are blamed for killing marine life. They also occupy much-needed landfill space.

And here are some articles on the ban on water bottles ~

S.F. mayor bans bottled water at city offices ~

by Lloyd Alter, Toronto

First plastic bags, now bottled water; San Francisco is certainly setting an example. Mayor Gavin Newsom signed an order this week banning the use of City funds to purchase single-serving bottled water. The Mayor told Newsweek:

The transportation and distribution, developing the plastic for the water bottles, the cost of the water, has a huge environmental and economic impact....the difference between bottled water and Diet Coke is that you can’t get Diet Coke from the tap. It’s not like any other bottled liquids. These people are making huge amounts of money selling God’s natural resources. Sorry, we’re not going to be part of it. Our water in San Francisco comes from the Hetch Hetchy [reservoir] and is some of the most pristine water on the planet. Our water is arguably cleaner than a vast majority of the bottled water sold as "pure."

Here is another article from the Associated Press ~

S.F. mayor bans bottled water at city offices ~

SAN FRANCISCO - Is city water better than bottled water? San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom thinks so.

Newsom has issued an executive order banning city departments from buying bottled water, even for water coolers.

More than 40 million gallons of oil are needed to make the plastic water bottles Americans purchase each year, according to data cited in the mayor's announcement. Like other uses of fossil fuels, the process of making plastic bottles releases carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that most scientists tie to global warming.

"We're hoping to set the example for the private sector and other cities in getting off the bottle," said Tony Winnicker, spokesman for the San Francisco public utilities commission.

In a press release announcing the decision, the mayor cited the environmental impact of making, transporting and disposing of the bottles. More than a billion of them end up in the state's landfills each year, the release said.