New Bedford Guide Your Guide to New Bedford and South Coast, MA
“Freitas Package Store” located at 1295 Cove Rd, New Bedford is making a vocal push against the idea to ban the sale of “nip bottles” in the City of New Bedford.
The store is currently displaying a message reading, “Stop NB Nip Ban Sign Petition Inside” on their sign outside the store. They also posted this message on social media:
“New Bedford did you know the city is trying to ban nips without resident vote!?
Let’s push the conversation away from banning nips town by town without city wide vote. Instead let’s encourage our city representative and lawmakers to move this issue to the state and update the bottle bill that has not been updated since 1982. That’s 41 years ago…
Banning nips is not the solution.
Sign the petition.
City meeting Monday July 24th 6pm”
Other towns and cities across Massachusetts have already passed the ban on nips, including Fairhaven which made the decision at a town meeting on May 6th 2023. Some will say this is an overstepping of local government restricting small businesses, while others believe this is a step in the right direction in regards to a cleaner environment.
Steven Richards photo.
Are they volunteering to be the epicenter for recycling nips? What is their solution? This is not restricting small businesses, this is protecting the environment and the pubic from businesses that only see the dollar sign.
Updating the bottle bill to include a deposit on 50ml and 100ml bottles can be integrated into the pre-existing redemption system for carbonated beverage containers. This is already done, successfully, in Maine, and could easily be rolled out in Massachusetts. That is the solution. It would curtail the litter problem/environmental impact (just as it has with soda and beer bottles and cans), without putting a such a substantial financial burden on the small family-run businesses of New Bedford and Massachusetts in general. Patch working nip bans is only driving business away from our city and into neighboring towns.