By Samuel Rubenfeld

Progressive groups on campus have complained about the lack of a visible recycling program on campus, and Lackmann has responded. Eisa Shukran, Director of Culinary Services, has endorsed the “Bigger Better Bottle Bill,” which was pushed recently in Suffolk County.

The proposed legislation would enable the public to return bottles of noncarbonated beverages, such as water, tea and sports drinks, for the same five-cent refund given for carbonated bottle deposits. The five cents, which manufacturers currently keep when a bottle is not recycled in a machine, would instead be put into an environmental conservation fund. Opponents say the bill is ineffective, detrimental to business and costly.

The University has a bottle return policy of its own, which has the bottles returned to Dutch Treats in exchange for the refund. Dutch Treats is a convenience store located next to Hofstra USA on north campus.

Vendors such as Coke or Pepsi claim the bottles when they deliver new ones.

Alexander “Pete” Grannis, Commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation, in his first official visit to Long Island, joined Brookhaven Town Supervisor Brian Foley and other environmental advocates to announce the latest push at Brookhaven Town Hall in a press conference May 23.

Grannis was one of the sponsors of the original bottle bill. June 15th marks the 25th anniversary of the state’s returnable container deposit law. “Even a great law needs a tune-up,” Grannis said.

The bill is currently stuck in the state legislature, but Grannis wants it to pass before lawmakers go home June 21 for summer vacation. Gov. Eliot Spitzer has endorsed the bill and indicated he would sign it into law upon passage.

“Now it’s time to strengthen and modernize the bottle bill by including new categories of containers-like fruit juices, bottled water and sports drinks-that barely existed in 1982 when it was passed,” Spitzer said in a statement provided by the D.E.C.

Shukran said an average of between 50 and 75 bottles were returned per week. But he also said that the returned bottles can create an “unsanitary situation” in Dutch Treats due to the size of the store.

If there were more volume, Shukran said he would consider acquiring a machine for depositing bottles. “If there’s a demand for it, we’ll do it.”

Opponents say the bill will increase costs to consumers without any benefits. “The proposal makes the mandate larger but removes its funding,” said Jonathan Pierce, spokesman for New Yorkers for Real Recycling Reform, a group which represents beverage distributors and store owners. The drinks will cost up to 15 cents more than they do now, he said.

By taking the five-cent deposit out of the hands of the distributors and placing it into an environmental protection fund, the state is betting that people will not recycle the bottles, he added. “That is bad public policy.”

According to Grannis, noncarbonated drinks now make up more than 25 percent of the market share of bottled beverages, while they only constituted a “minute” portion of drink sales in 1982. These bottles make up more than 60 percent of the beverage containers cleaned up around the Hudson River, according to a study of the area, he added.

Grannis estimated that there would be up to 3 billion noncarbonated beverage bottles returned each year with the passage of the bill, and unreturned deposits would net the state over $100 million annually, which he said could be used for land acquisition and preservation, estuary maintenance and other environmentally friendly initiatives.

Students said they would return bottles given the greater opportunity of a machine. “I would return them to a machine,” said Michael Rieger, a senior TV/Video major who does not currently return bottles on campus. “It’s not that I am too lazy to recycle the bottles, but I think it would be a hassle to deal with Dutch Treats. A machine would have a better personality.”

Proponents of new bottle bill display plastic bag filled with water and Snapple bottles. Under the proposed legislation, these bottles will be returnable for a refund.