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Bring your own container

By Staff | Dec 21, 2012

To the Editor:

I write in strong agreement with the two very smart tourists from Orlando who wrote a letter to the editor in the Dec. 14 issue: “Sanibel conflicts with environment.”

They confronted some hard issues. I’ll pick up on just one, their first disappointment with our island and that was about the abundance of Styrofoam plates and cups used in all the restaurants and the hotel where they stayed. I can feel the restaurant owners getting angry with me as I repeat what our new visitors had to say about our Island.

But, there are alternatives to the literally un-disposable POLYSTYRENE. Current wisdom says it will take 500 years in a landfill for Styrofoam to to be disposed of. Will our affluent restaurant devotees spend more for their take-home boxes?

If not, here’s one personal alternative I suggest. If you go to a restaurant, and regularly take home the leftovers, I suggest you bring from home a glass or stainless steel container, and ask your server to put your leftovers in that. Yes, it might be embarrassing, and inconvenient, etc.

Yet, it could be one stroke for the environment, and also for you standing up for something you truly, really, really believe in. I hope your dinner mates would agree, and start bringing their own safer, wiser container in the future, as well.

Sincerely,

Sidney B. Simon

Sanibel