Junk mail!
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San Francisco is leading the charge for Do Not Mail. This week, the city of San Francisco came closer to becoming the first municipality in the country to take action against junk mail. On Monday, the full Board of Supervisors will vote on a resolution in support of a state and national Do Not Mail Registry. We’re in the home-stretch, according to donotmail! San Francisco is setting the stage for other cities and states to take similiar action, creating the momentum we need to make the waste and destruction of the junk mail history.
I hope it includes the option of just saying no to those bulky phone books that we immediately put into the recycling bin.
The board of supervisors vote on this resolution comes up next Tuesday, March 31. According to advocates the move is long over due:
You would think, as someone who often looks at the Do Not Mail petition, I’d be used to all the reasons why people want to stop junk mail. And even though I know how annoying, wasteful, and destructive it is, the San Francisco committee hearing blew me away. Over nearly three hours, testimony in support outnumbered the opposition’s by 2-1.
We heard from a truly diverse group of people: a retired postal worker, a local printer, a paper company, the SF Department of Environment, Global Alliance Against Incinerators, Greenpeace, and Rainforest Action Network. In total, over forty people took time out of their day to support the resolution.
The resolution will be voted on by the full board of supervisors next Tuesday. Now, with Supervisor Chris Daly throwing is support behind the resolution, the total number of supervisors sponsoring the resolution is four. It will take eight votes for a veto-proof passage of the resolution.
If you live in San Francisco, you can help! Call your Supervisor (contact info listed below), and tell them to support the Do Not Mail Resolution!
Hmm. How about a Do Not Mail Registry for political junk mail?
Nonprofit, religious, and political speech have stronger First Amendment protections than commercial speech, and past attempts to restrict mail have usually gone down in court because at least one of those three were included. So a Do Not Mail Registry would likely cover only commercial junk mail. But that’s still the majority of what people are receiving every day.
Hello guys,
This thing is going to have to get full 8-0 support to be veto proof. One of the problems with cutting out the junk mail is that the post office will have to do without that revenue. This will also impact the printers who print up all that trash. I had also read that it costs the average person about $7k to move to a new place, and that the junk mail that comes to the new home targeting the new neighbor is beneficial to a variety of businesses who have first access to the new address.
It will be interesting to see if this passes and if it has any further impact elsewhere. San Francisco kinda moves to it’s own drumbeat 😉
Wow! I agree with People in San Francisco? Damm, this world is crazy! Just as an FYI, when the Do not call list come into effect, sales in the financial industry actually wen UP from calling?!?!?! Who knew!
As a Fifth generation San Franciscan, who holds “San Francisco” values high.
I ask why all the iowans and Nebraskans left to come west if they disagree so much with the states politics?
The San Francisco Bay Area leads the way in so many areas of defense, technology, social issues, it’s citizens offer way more community activism than in other areas of California. So what’s the beef.
Certainly we are a strange, unique breed, but the same could be said for those on Newport Coast that make thier housekepper dig through dog shit for a reciept.
The fact is, if everyone practiced what the preached, we’d have a much different society.