San Francisco's new law good or bad idea?

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Thirsty San Francisco city workers will no longer have bottled water to drink under an order by Mayor Gavin Newsom, who says it costs too much, worsens pollution and is no better than tap water.

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Newsom's executive order bars city departments, agencies and contractors from using city funds to serve water in plastic bottles and in larger dispensers when tap water is available.

"In San Francisco, for the price of one 1 gallon (3.8 litres) of bottled water, local residents can purchase 1,000 gallons (38,000 litres) of tap water," according to the mayor's order.

Newsom estimates San Francisco could save $500,000 (250,196 pounds) a year under his directive, which also addresses environmental concerns over the amount of oil used to make and transport plastic water bottles.

"All of this waste and pollution is generated by a product that by objective standards is often inferior to the quality of San Francisco's pristine tap water," according to the order.

The ban on the ubiquitous plastic bottles follows a prohibition in March by city officials on plastic shopping bags in large supermarkets because recycling efforts had largely failed.

It seems reasonable if just for the fact that they have been getting free bottled water off the tax payer. Most employers do not provide this. I'm used to seeing work crews drinking from the large orange plastic coolers that are filled from the tap.

GOOD!!!! Bottled water should only be used if your town water is BAD!

trying to save the environment is always a good thing. :)

Good idea. It saves on taxpayer money to the tune of 500K over year, and reduces many of the negative environmental impacts of bottled water.

Bad. What's next? Is he going to dictate what toilet paper you have to buy? Where does it end? He could promote the city's water but it should be a choice not a law.

It is always good to see SF trying to combat the real issues. Lets not forget this is the city with the highest homeless population and a decay public transport system. It is time for SF to start focusing on fixing their city, which is still very nice, and stop trying to make national news with their goofy little laws.

bag idea

City workers get more than enough compensation and benefits already ; let them buy bottled water like the rest of us have to.

For those unable to read this is not a "Law" that applies to all the people in SF, it is an executive order that only applies to Municipal offices and employees, and it is a good idea.

Let them drink tap water or buy their own,nobody buys my water as I do my job daily.

I agree with this law although normally I do not like to see any new laws.
I have a theory about this whole bottled water craze. Not too long ago when you went down to Mexico you were always told, "don't drink the water". In Mexico, tap water was often too full of germs to drink.
We now have tens of millions of Mexicans and Mexican immigrants-both legal and illegal living here. Since bottled water was a way of life for them in Mexico, the old familiar habit of buying water followed Mexicans ac cross the border along with many other cultural habits.
American corporations have always been quick to pander to any source of profit and never had a problem with making native Americans adjust to the ways of other nationalities; just look how everything is written in Spanish now days. Store shelves were soon stocked with bottled water and massive marketing campaigns soon convinced the typical American that they needed this product. With a solid sales base of Mexican immigrants to rely on, marketing water was a sure, reliable hit poised to grow into common habit without fear of dying as a fad.
It always helped to try to use scare tactics too-tell citizens that their water is poisonous.
Of course we do not even need it. Americans need to watch their money more. Many young people spend so much on water that if they drank tap water and banked the daily dollar spent on the bottle, they actually could accumulate enough money for a comfortable retirement. My guess is you could find bottled water in the pantry of any bankrupt household. If Americans do not start cutting out some of these "needs" soon, we are in big trouble when times start to turn sour.
Bottled water has always been available in the rare instances it was actually needed. In those cases it should be bought in large quantities and kept in a cooler.

Stupid....