Connie Richardson gives her personal experiences (all bad) with plastic bags.

I lived in Emerald Isle, NC for 8 1/2 years and was part of the Sea Turtle Protection Program. You can only imagine how devastating it was to assist in necropsies on some of these threatened/endangered magnificent creatures and find they had died a slow , painful death from plastic bags wrapped around their intestines. Also, my husband and I are frequent greenway walkers and plastic bags hanging from the trees that clean up crews can’t reach are not a pretty sight.

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Name Withheld  suggests stores stop providing their customers with bags of any sort, period.

How about NO bags at the store. You either bring your own bags, or they just put all your groceries back in your cart for you, or you buy reusable bags right there at the checkout. All the big stores have them available and the small ones can too, it’s not a tremendous hardship. Stores could compete with one another by making them cheaper or giving you a free bag for a couple hundred fuel points, etc.

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Craig Coker gives the dollars and cents on why plastic bags have replaced paper versions.

It costs about 8.4 cents for a 17″ 1/6 barrel paper bag, but only 0.7 cents for a 15″ 0.65-mil single use plastic bag. If asked, I’m more than happy to pay 10 cents per bag for a paper bag for my groceries rather than support the use of plastic. Plastic bags have been found to be the main reason for serious sewer blockages and overflows in many cities, have been found to be a significant component of the huge plastic gyre in the Pacific Ocean, and have been found to strangle marine animals. In the April Clean Valley Day clean-up, our team worked on the section of Lick Run between Washington Park and the Civic Center and these plastic bags were among the most frequent litter we found.

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Should flimsy plastic bags be banned or taxed?

Bags are ruining crops and harming livestock

By Wilmer N. Stoneman III

It’s bad enough that plastic bags scattered across a farm field ruin the bucolic view of Virginia’s farmland. But what farmers strongly object to is that they pose a threat to their animals and machinery.

Livestock have died after ingesting plastic bags they find in fields, and thousands of dollars of damage has been done to farm equipment. In addition to the damaged equipment, plastic bags pose a safety hazard to farmers who are trying to remove them from the machinery.

Additionally, for the state’s cotton producers, the plastic bags create an economic problem when they get caught in cotton balers and go unnoticed at the gin. The plastic gets shredded into cotton fiber and is not found until finished textiles are inspected. Plastic particles won’t take a fabric dye and leave a white streak. The cloth ends up useless, and a farmers’ ability to sell more cotton is jeopardized.

All of these problems are easily remedied by using alternatives to plastic bags.

That’s why the Virginia Farm Bureau Federation’s members approved policy supporting legislation that would encourage all retailers to use paper or reusable bags.

Virginia Farm Bureau producer members have supported proposed legislation sponsored by Del. Onzlee Ware, D-Roanoke, in the past. That, and similar legislation sponsored by Del. Joe Morrissey, D-Richmond, and Sen. Adam Ebbin, D-Alexandria, called for a tax on consumers who opt to use plastic bags. Stores imposing the tax would keep a percentage, and the rest of the money would go into the Virginia Water Quality Improvement Fund.

The fact that legislators from three diverse areas of the state support the tax indicates statewide concern about plastic bags. Unfortunately, that legislation was defeated.

Farm Bureau policy also supports enforcement of existing litter laws, which classify disposing of trash on public or private property as a misdemeanor, punishable by jail time up to 12 months and fines of up to $2,500. The state’s largest agriculture advocacy organization also supports increased penalties for littering.

The problem is, plastic retail bags are nearly weightless and can travel great distances. So trying to determine who has littered is virtually impossible.

It is sometimes unintentional littering, but plastic bags still cause problems for virtually every kind of farmer. And in today’s reduce-reuse-recycle world, it’s time to pursue options other than plastic bags.

 Stoneman is associate director of governmental relations for Virginia Farm Bureau Federation.

Better to recycle plastic bags than to ban them

By Jodi Roth

To the untrained eye it might look like a growing coalition of environmental groups are pushing bans on plastic bags throughout the country. Only a small number of communities in the United States have even considered a bag ban.

We need to make sure that the environmental, health and economic facts supporting the case are understood. When the public gets the facts — and not just emotionally charged imagery — it will come to the same conclusion that we’ve always known: Plastic bags are the best choice at checkout and should not be restricted.

The economic case is on our side at every level of the value chain. The plastic bag industry supports more than 30,800 U.S. jobs. These jobs often support an innovative sector of the green economy. Additionally, for each one of these manufacturing and recycling jobs, the plastic bag industry creates an additional two support jobs; that is more than 60,000 American jobs that supply cartons, color concentrates, inks, transportation and local industry supply support.

The alternatives — paper and reusable bags — are in fact far worse for the environment than plastic bags because they have more impacts relative to greenhouse gases, water usage and landfills.

It’s counterintuitive that some environmentalists have targeted plastic bags, which are made from natural gas in the United States, and not paper, which comes from trees. Greenhouse gases emitted during paper bag production and transportation far exceed those released in plastic bag production. Additionally, because paper bags are seven times larger than plastic they require seven times as many trucks on the road to transport.

As for reusable bags being the answer to the world’s environmental problems, studies have shown otherwise. Cloth reusable bags require massive amounts of energy and chemicals to produce. According to a University of Oregon study, a quarter of the pesticides used in this country are used on cotton. Cloth reusable bags require so much more energy to produce than regular plastic bags that they need to be used 131 times to be as environmentally friendly as a plastic grocery bag used once, according to a U.K. government study.

Finally, when environmentalists justify attacks on plastic bags as an attempt to prevent litter, they ignore the fact that all plastic bag litter accounts for 0.6 percent of items littered throughout the nation and 0.5 percent of the solid-waste stream. That said, no amount of litter is ever acceptable, and the plastic bag industry is focused on recycling used bags and wraps as a progressive avenue to alleviate even this fractional amount of litter.

Opponents of plastic bags rely heavily on emotional appeals because the science simply isn’t in their favor. As is often the case, the best way to move this debate in the right direction is to defuse the misplaced emotional energy with facts that stand the test of scientific legitimacy and are not just emotionally and visually compelling. If communities have the full facts at their disposal, they will choose recycling over bans on plastic bags.

 Roth is director of government affairs for the Virginia Retail Merchants Association.

Should Virginia move to a merit-based system of electing judges?

Judicial selection should rise above politics; it doesn’t

Deeds

By Creigh Deeds

Deeds represents the 25th District in the Virginia Senate and is a former member of the Senate Courts of Justice Committee and the House Courts of Justice Committee. He was the Democratic candidate for governor in 2009.

The election of judges is one of the most important tasks assigned to the General Assembly by Virginia’s Constitution. It is neither an elite idea nor a liberal idea that the best qualified people be elected to the bench. In fact, merit selection has been embraced by people across the political spectrum and across the commonwealth of Virginia.

The process of electing judges should be transparent, and the people, those who are ultimately served by both the elected judges and the General Assembly, should have complete faith that every length is taken to elect the most qualified people to the bench. Instead of cutting deals to elect political allies or friends to the bench, the General Assembly should establish a vetting process whereby each potential candidate’s qualifications are objectively measured by nonpartisan groups and only those candidates whose experience, temperament and qualifications measure up would be qualified for election.

Commissions made of both lawyers and lay people could be established by the General Assembly to vet candidates. The role of bar associations, both at the state and local level, could be expanded to determine the merit of the various candidates. Providing a vetting process, while leaving the ultimate decision to the General Assembly, is consistent with Virginia’s Constitution.

The judicial selection process is supposed to be above politics. The deal-making that produces judges is not done in the open air, rather in the bowels of the General Assembly building. The process is fraught with smoky-room politics. While I believe our process is superior to direct election of judges because of concerns about the influence of campaign contributions in the judiciary, the taint of blatant partisanship cannot be avoided when a small group of individuals make critical decisions with limited involvement of the public.

We can do better.

Transparency and accountability are hallmarks of current system

Cline

By Ben Cline

Cline represents the 24th District in the Virginia House of Delegates. He is a member of the House Courts of Justice Committee and chairs the House Courts Subcommittee on Judicial Appointments. He is an assistant commonwealth’s attorney for Rockingham County and Harrisonburg.

My friend and colleague Creigh Deeds argued correctly in his column that the General Assembly should base its decisions about creating and filling judgeships on objective criteria such as case-load statistics, population and geographic area served.

But the question posed by The Roanoke Times was whether the General Assembly should “move to a merit based system for selecting judges.” This is a very different question. The criteria used to decide whether or not to fill a vacancy are different than the criteria used to decide who fills that vacancy. While objective criteria should (and currently do) determine the former, there are subjective criteria that must be considered when determining the latter.

When selecting a judge, it is essential to consider objective qualities such as prior experience in the courtroom, knowledge of both civil and criminal matters, and experience as a lower court judge. Additionally, it is important to consider subjective qualities such as judicial temperament, involvement in one’s community and a general sense of fairness and mercy.

Measuring these qualities requires the input and advice of multiple sources, including legal associates, colleagues in the local bar and the general public. As the elected representatives of the people, Virginia’s delegates and senators have been entrusted with the responsibility to collect and weigh the information provided by these and other sources in order to make well-informed decisions.

Recognizing this public trust, these elected men and women take great care to evaluate all relevant factors when nominating a candidate. Input from the local bar is sought and welcomed in most circuits. Formalizing that role, as suggested by Deeds, would only add bureaucracy to the selection process. In addition, it would reduce the transparency and accountability that have been hallmarks of a process that has consistently resulted in the election of excellent judges across the commonwealth of Virginia.

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Should Virginia move to a merit-based system for selecting judges? As of this morning, most of this participants in our online poll say yes. Please weigh in on the poll, and join the discussion here.

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A majority of those voting so far in our poll favor a switch to a merit-based process for selecting judges in Virginia.

Says Name Withheld:

Right now you get to be a judge by being someone’s crony. It’s not really even civilized.

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Add your voice to the debate over Virginia’s system for selecting judges. Do you agree with Sen. Creigh Deeds, D-Bath County, that the process should be reformed? Or is Del. Ben Cline, R-Rockbridge County, correct when he says Virginia’s system is superior to those used by other states?

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RoundTable regular Sandi Saunders contends that legislators’ interest in judicial reform depends on whether or not they are in the majority.

Of course those who have gerrymandered their majority would be in favor of keeping their majority influence on the judiciary. This is how justice got left behind by the justice system IMO.

Deeds is correct and thinking of the best interests of the justice system. Cline is not.

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Should Virginia move to a merit-based system of electing judges?

Reform would select best qualified judges, not best connected

Deeds

By Creigh Deeds

Deeds represents the 25th District in the Virginia Senate and is a former member of the Senate Courts of Justice Committee and the House Courts of Justice Committee. He was the Democratic candidate for governor in 2009.

Virginia, home of the oldest legislative body in the Western Hemisphere and the mother of presidents, has a flawed process for selecting judges. Virginia is one of two states where election of the judiciary is entirely a legislative prerogative. While the process, by and large, has produced good judges, it is rife with subjective considerations that have little to do with whether the nominees are the best qualified to serve.

During the 1990s, two members of the House of Delegates led a charge to reform the process. Republican Andy Guest and Democrat Whitt Clement introduced bills to require more public input and a more objective examination of the qualifications of judicial candidates. Year after year, the bills were introduced, and year after year, they failed. Now is the time to resurrect the idea.

In 2012, one potential appointee for a district court judgeship garnered significant discussion on the floor of the House of Delegates. All who listened to that post-midnight debate had to wonder whether they were witnessing the vetting of a judicial candidate or a Salem witch trial. This year, there was discussion on the floor of the Senate about whether judicial vacancies would actually be filled. The argument was driven not by the nominees or their qualifications, nor about whether the positions should be funded, but by the fact that political expediency required someone other than the General Assembly to make the appointments. Talk about transparency.

The decision about creating and/or filling judgeships should be based upon objective criteria such as caseload statistics, population and geographic area served. The focus on who fills those judgeships needs to revolve around experience, temperament and merit.

Virginia should join the majority of states that have judicial candidates evaluated by local and state bar organizations. Lawyers familiar with a candidate’s abilities and temperament should have input in this critical decision. The process also should allow more citizen input, not only at the judicial hearings before the courts of justice committees, but at the level of nominating candidates.

Electing judges is serious work. For many Virginians, their one day in court is their sole opportunity not only to obtain justice but to see how government and our judicial system work. They deserve nothing less than assurance that the best qualified, not the best connected, are selected for the bench.

Thomas Jefferson, while minister to France during the Constitutional Convention, wrote to James Madison that he was most impressed by the independence of the judiciary established in the Constitution. More than two centuries later, we still do not live up to this expectation. We need to jealously guard its integrity in order to ensure the public that justice will be done. We can do better.

Current process is preferable to all others

Cline

By Ben Cline

Cline represents the 24th District in the Virginia House of Delegates. He is a member of the House Courts of Justice Committee and chairs the House Courts Subcommittee on Judicial Appointments. He is an assistant commonwealth’s attorney for Rockingham County and Harrisonburg.

The Virginia Constitution provides that “the judges of all courts of record shall be chosen by the vote of a majority of the members elected to each house of the General Assembly.” The responsibility to appoint the judges of the commonwealth is one of our most important duties as elected representatives of the people. Our system of justice is based on the rule of law, and as lawmakers, we recognize that the citizenry must have complete confidence in the qualifications, fairness and impartiality of the judges appointed to the bench. Without that confidence, our system of justice and, in turn, our republican form of government, will be consigned to the dust bin of history.

Most members of the House and Senate, therefore, take great care in selecting well-qualified judicial candidates on the basis of merit. For example, most would agree that the Roanoke area delegation to the General Assembly has cooperated amicably for many years to ensure that its appointments to the various courts have been a superior group of men and women. Judges in other areas of Virginia enjoy the same reputation. In addition, the current process is characterized by public access to and participation in the interview process by the courts of justice committees.

Nevertheless, complaints with the current system have surfaced from a few corners, most notably among liberal elites and newspaper editorial boards. The complaint heard most often is that the current process is too messy, too rancorous and too discordant. In short, the complaint is that the process is too political. But politics are only a symptom of the democratic nature of the current process. The authors of the Virginia Constitution created a public and highly accountable system in which the people electing the judges are themselves judged and elected (or rejected) by the people. In such a system, some politics are inevitable.

The critics would prefer that power be taken away from the people and instead given to an unelected bureaucracy known as a selection commission. They argue that this change would remove politics from the selection process. In actuality, it would hide the politics and weaken the accountability and transparency of the current process that make it superior to alternative methods.

In a 1947 speech to the House of Commons, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill said, “Democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried.” His point was that while often flawed, a democratically elected government always is preferable to the alternative, whether a monarchy, a dictatorship or a military junta.

The same can be said for Virginia’s current practice of assigning judicial selection to the General Assembly. While occasionally messy, often cantankerous, and always political, our current system of appointing judges by the democratically elected representatives of the people is preferable to all other systems.