SPARRING OVER PLASTIC: Efforts to ban takeout containers and other chemical-based packaging divides environmentalists and retailers.

• Author: Martin, Edward
• Position: NCTREND >>> Environment

The Swannanoa River originates in eastern Buncombe County, meanders through Black Mountain and joins the French Broad River in Asheville, not far from the city's popular art galleries and beer gardens. The river is a sliver of the beauty and natural resources of western North Carolina that attracts people from all over the world.

But the gorgeous rivers and streams across the mountainous region hold distressing secrets that are at the bottom of a heated debate.

"Learning they're polluted by petrochemicals and microplastics is not what people want to hear," says Anna Alsobrook, watershed coordinator for MountainTrue, a coalition of environmental groups that was formed in 2015.

MountainTrue, the Western North Carolina Sierra Club and other groups have formed the Plastic-Free Western North Carolina coalition. They propose to rid this region's waterways of chemicals such as phthalates, used to make grocery, garbage and other bags and other products flexible, and Styrene, a principal component of the ubiquitous takeout boxes from restaurants.

The western N.C. coalition proposes a ban on single-use plastic bags and throw-away containers that contain what environmentalists call forever chemicals. Many are carcinogens and or substances otherwise linked to childhood asthma, and nervous- and reproductive-system harm and other ailments.

"We have the water samples to prove it," says Alsobrook. "A pollutant that's harmful to human health and the environment has been documented here." She contends the city and county have a legal duty to protect their residents.

The mountain movement comes five years after the North Carolina legislature repealed a ban on single-use plastic bags, Styrofoam containers and similar products on the Outer Banks. Environmentalists backing the coastal plan focused on health concerns.

This time, the proposal frames the bags and containers as a solid-waste issue, which supporters argue local governments have the power to regulate directly.

The 25,000-member N.C. Retail Merchants Association is pushing back by lobbying local officials, with aid from representatives of the Fox Rothschild law firm. The association, whose members sell 75% of the state's groceries, sundries and other goods, believes a wave of local initiatives such as the Asheville proposal would hurt consumers and businesses, says Andy Ellen, the group's president.

"The Supreme Court of North Carolina has said, it's not a good thing to regulate commerce on a local...