Turn ‘nips’ into ‘caferos’; and Southbury defies FOI

By Chris Powell

Connecticut won’t be getting any relief this year from the plague of tiny liquor bottles littering the state. Legislation proposed by state Rep. Joe Gresko, D-Stratford, to allow municipalities to prohibit sale of the “nips” failed to get out of a committee in the General Assembly this month. 

Of course the liquor lobby, led by former state Rep. Larry Cafero, R-Norwalk, executive director of the Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of Connecticut, opposes the legislation. Cafero claims to see danger in having different standards of liquor regulation across towns, as if the public welfare would be diminished if “nips” could be purchased in certain towns but not others — just as Connecticut allows local option on marijuana retailing and as if most state residents don’t already do some out-of-town shopping each week.

But since nearly every legislative district has a bunch of liquor stores and most legislators are eagerly susceptible to special interests, the liquor industry’s opposition is always decisive on liquor law. Gresko acknowledges that even most municipal officials probably would oppose his bill as well, since they are glad to have the nickel-a-bottle tax money municipalities get on the sale of “nips” within their borders. 

While the “nip” tax law says cities and towns should use the money for environmental purposes, it needn’t be used to collect the “nip” litter, so few municipalities do anything to collect it, spending the money elsewhere.

“Nip” litter might be reduced if a substantial redeemable deposit was put on each bottle — say, 25 cents or more. But the liquor lobby opposes any deposit because liquor stores don’t want to handle the clutter they spew. The little bottles aren’t recyclable and liquor stores prefer the clutter to go on roadsides.

So people keep buying “nips,” hop in their cars, drink and drive, and toss the empties out the window, leaving any clean-up to civic-minded pedestrians, hikers, and scout troops — and sometimes to emergency personnel responding to drunken-driving crashes.

“Nip” litter gives the lie to all the prattle from Connecticut’s politicians about their devotion to the environment and public safety. They are devoted mainly to tax revenue. Against that revenue and the support of the liquor lobby, the environment and a few lives lost are of no consequence.

Gresko says he may introduce his local option legislation again next year. He should make it stronger, outlawing the sale of “nips” entirely, as New Mexico does. The next campaign against “nips” should go beyond the civic virtue of the pedestrians who collect the litter. It should have some bite illuminating the special-interest venality of the problem, as by calling the discarded bottles not “nips” but “caferos.”

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For almost 50 years Connecticut has had a pretty good freedom-of-information law and a state commission to enforce it subject to judicial review. Many FOI precedents have been firmly established. But some municipal elected officials defy the law anyway and get away with it until a complaint is adjudicated, since that can take years, fines for violations are small, and fines are seldom imposed no matter how great the contempt shown by the violator.

One of those officials is Southbury First Selectman Jeffrey A. Manville.

A political adversary, former Selectman John Diehl, has asked Manville for access to the personnel files of town employees and particularly to letters of resignation so he can evaluate Manville’s management ability and confirm high turnover among town staffers. Manville is refusing to comply though the law makes public nearly all material in municipal employee files.

Manville says, “I don’t know what can and can’t be released, but there are a lot of employees who are expressing concern” that Diehl’s request could make their personnel files public.

But those files are already public, and if, as he says, Manville really doesn’t know, he needs only to ask someone who does, like the town attorney or the FOI Commission. Instead Manville will break the law to delay what might be bad publicity for himself.  

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Chris Powell has written about Connecticut government and politics for many years. (CPowell@cox.net) 

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