Last Tuesday, the Santa Monica City Council unanimously voted to adopt an ordinance officially banning non-recycleable food service packaging, as a step towards ridding "Santa Monica beaches and streets of harmful and unsightly food service packaging."

While other cities, such as Berkeley and Oakland, have already banned expanded polystyrene (commonly referred to as styrofoam) food containers, Santa Monica is the first city to ban clear plastic containers made of petroleum-based polystyrene.

This groundbreaking step came as a direct result of the dilligent work of environmental groups in the Santa Monica area, including Heal the Bay. This environmental organization argued for a strict ban on non-recycleable plastics (PDF), noting that "Heal the Bay beach cleanups at Santa Monica beaches have demonstrated that nearly two-thirds of the debris on the beach is non-recyclable plastic, including Styrofoam, straws, bottle caps, etc. In the ocean, plastic marine debris causes the deaths of an estimated 2 million seabirds and more than 100,000 marine mammals globally each year."

The California Restaurant Association fought the ban; some of its members argued that the ban would cause undue financial hardship -- and fail to keep take-out food hot enough. Other restaurants, however, said that their take-out business did just fine using recyclable and biodegreable packaging, according to the Santa Monica Mirror.

Now that the ban has been made official, the California Restaurant Association is reportedly coordinating anti-litter campaigns with the city. The ban goes into effect on February 8, 2007, by which time city facilities, city-managed concessions, and events permitted or sponsored by the city must use only recycleable and biodegreable food containers.

Restaurants currently using non-recycleable materials will be given much more time to make the switch; they'll have a year to comply with the new ordinance. For more information, read the full text of the ordinance here.

[Top image from Heal the Bay]