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Breckenridge implemented another stage of its plastic ban on Monday, Jan. 1, as the town gears up for full implementation in July.
On the first of the year, the entire state of Colorado banned food establishments from using Styrofoam food containers or service ware for take out in accordance with a 2019 Senate bill.
For Breckenridge, this is the third to last step in the town’s plastic ban initiative. A ban for single-use plastic water bottles and single-use plastic service ware will be going into effect July 1.
According to town officials, it will be one of the first towns in Colorado to enforce such a ban.
Restaurants have seven months to get all plastic service ware out of their establishments, and Breckenridge’s parking and sustainability manager Jessie Burley said the town has been looking to keep a strong line of communication open.
Breckenridge Restaurant Association president and Fatty’s Pizzeria owner TJ Messerschmitt agreed that this transition will cost his restaurant and others. He noted compostable products are “more expensive to produce.”
“They cost us more money, plain and simple,” Messerschmitt said.
Despite that, he is in support of the plastic ban and said the town has been extremely communicative about this ban and is willing to listen to the concerns of restaurant owners.
He said there is one aspect of this ban that worries him that he thinks could have some negative impacts by summer.
“I think it’ll become a supply issue with distributors because they’re gonna run out of all this stuff,” Messerschmitt said.
