Bottled Water Tax Back on Florida Senate Menu

Bottled water could get a few cents more expensive in Florida under a proposed surcharge to pay for environmental cleanup work.

The proposal, sponsored by Sen. Evelyn Lynn, R-Ormond Beach, would create a 6 percent tax on a bottle of water or a package of bottled water in order to fund an environmental trust fund that pays for programs to rehabilitate ecosystems and coral reefs and to clean up polluted areas.

"I think it's very important that we protect the environment as much as we can and plastic bottles are creating all sorts of problems with our wildlife as well as just littering everywhere," Lynn said Thursday. "And it just seemed an appropriate thing to do."

Lynn has proposed similar legislation in the past, and outgoing Gov. Charlie Crist in 2009 sought a per gallon water fee from bottlers in Florida. The bottled water industry, Nestle in particular, fought the proposal and it wound up going nowhere....