The End Of The Plastic Bag (Video)

As far as I know, my town of Morgantown, West Virginia, in spite of several City Council resolutions to make this a green city, hasn’t banned a single pollutant including plastic bags. Instead they waste their money on so-called “beautification,” wasting scarce fiscal and material resources. To their credit, they did build a LEED-certified fire station, but they could accomplish much more, at much lower cost, by banning plastic bags and styrofoam. At least they recently improved recycling, but it’s still a joke compared to more progressive towns. There’s no sign of a city-wide composting program or green construction codes, no city-sponsored green energy program.
The people recently voted out the corporate cronies but you’d never know it from the lack of progress here. Frankly, the people are the problem, even with the large demographic shift in recent years. West Virginia University hasn’t been any help: they’re in the pockets of the fossil fuel industry too, although in all fairness there are now some faculty who teach environmental sciences.
This is a perpetual, and growing, problem, in fossil-fuel dominated states. It was bad enough with King Coal ruling the land for more than a century; now we have a Fracking Queen as well. Like gulf states and some western states, West Virginia is becoming another national sacrifice zone to Big Energy.
The word “sustainability” is seldom uttered by state politicians in the pockets of Big Energy, who perpetuate the myth that fossil fuel jobs are needed for economic health. The truth is that the fossil fuel industry has put West Virginia near the bottom of every socioeconomic indicator.
All in all, the pace of progress here is so glacial that this community will not achieve sustainability in time to help slow the environmental catastrophes that promise to overwhelm us all. In that regard, Morgantown is perhaps an iconic American town.