BY JACOB SZETO
WILSONVILLE – “I pledge to no longer buy bottled water for personal use. I pledge to tell my friends and family why I am making this choice and encouraging them to join me.”
These are just two of the six pledges that students, staff and community members had to make to get one of 500 new stainless steel water bottles, at a cost to taxpayers of $5,595.
In May, the West Linn-Wilsonville School District held their annual “Sustainability Showcase,” themed this year as, “Water for the World.” April was the last month that bottled water could be purchased in the district’s high schools, with the district “Proclamation to Eliminate Bottled Water” taking affect on April 29, 2010.
The ban on bottled water will be applied later to the district’s middle schools, once water filling stations are installed. If you think “water filling stations” are water fountains, think again. These filling stations are specially designed for water bottles and don’t have a small price tag. The cost to buy and install filling stations at West Linn High School was over $11,000 and $15,000 at Wilsonville High School.
If you are keeping track, that adds up to over $31,600 spent to eliminate bottled water from the school district’s high schools.
Sounds like the DARE program for water drinkers, do they ask you to turn in your parents if they use bottled water? The public school pursuit of social correctness is boundless. DARE I can get behind, but this is wasteful.
On a purely economic scale, who is to say that all of these aluminum bottles are not worse for the environment that recyclable plastic - or worse for your health if not cleaned properly. Gee, consider the gobs of “salmon-killing hydro-power” used to smelt aluminum.
Sadly, economics are rarely part of the discussion.
I would have sold the district 500 new stainless steel water bottles for $2000 (after buying them for $1000 at Wal-Mart), created a Facebook page (10 minutes’ work) to deploy the information pieces and polls for $3000, and advised them to have their students fill up their spiffy new water bottles from existing water fountains.
I am a big supporter of staying away from bottled water and use tap water in a stainless steel bottle. Sure it costs a little more for the bottle, however it is reusable and will prevent global warming.
I wonder how the teachers being laid off (budget shortfall) feel about the school district spending this kind of money on water bottles? Students should provide their own if they want water.
Matt,
DEQ conducted a life cycle analysis on bottled water vs water bottles. I am not astute in lca studies but this report may provide some insight. See the below link for the study.
http://www.deq.state.or.us/lq/sw/wasteprevention/drinkingwater.htm#Report
@yip bop the idiot.
Global warming? seriously?….did you just bring that into a discussion about bottled water….?
Ugh. I hope you don’t have children…ever.
No one has mentioned the fact that an aluminum bottle would make a far more effective weapon than a plastic one.