The San Francisco Public Library will start handing out unlaminated corn “EcoCards”, though you’ll still have the option of old-fangled plastic.
Our landfills are not overflowing with plastic library cards — San Franciscans are neither that literate nor wasteful — but, in an effort to be more environmentally responsible the library will next month kick off a test program featuring a run of 15,000 corn cards (the library usually hands out 60,000 cards yearly, so these may last a little while).
Fans of plastic need not despair — you’ll still have the option of getting regular cards (mine, says Joe Eskenazi, has crayon lightning drawn on it and was designed by a fourth-grader named Wing). But, if you agree to answer a few question over the next six months or so, the librarian will hand you the rather nondescript corn card. “We want to know how it works in your wallet and what happens if it gets wet,” says library spokeswoman of six months, Michelle Jeffers ([email protected]).
Environmentally Friendly cards
There are also other options for environmentally friendly replacements for plastic cards, you can use wood cards or recycled plastic. More information at http://uk.cpicardgroup.com/quality_products.html