Chicago Sun-Times - Kicking the bottle, restaurants turn on the tap

By Rummana Hussain, Staff Reporter
 
A handful of green-friendly Chicago restaurateurs aren't tap-dancing around their distaste for bottled water.

Citing the environmental burdens and economic strain they say the bottled water industry soaks up, the eateries pledged Wednesday to serve customers tap water and pushed colleagues to do the same.
            
"We realized bottled water left too much of a carbon footprint in the world," said Ina Pinkney, the chef owner of Ina's, 1235 W. Randolph.

Pinkney, who made the switch to Chicago tap about eight months ago, thinks more local restaurants head straight to the faucets for their H20 than just the four

that have signed the pact with Corporate Accountability International, which is spearheading the "Think Outside the Bottle" campaign across the country.

"Nobody tastes the water and says, 'What's this? Do you have any bottled water?' " said Josh Alper, business development director of his wife and daughter's new vegan eatery, the Balanced Kitchen, 6263 N. McCormick.

So far, 31 cities and 15 restaurants nationwide, including the popular Heartland Cafe and Clarke's Diner, have committed to public water sources, according to Noelle Janka, the Chicago field organizer for Corporate Accountability International. Chicago hasn't formally endorsed the campaign.

Nearly half the bottled water on the market is essentially over-priced filtered tap water, Janka said.

Revenues from Chicago's new nickel-a-container bottled water tax are coming in at a rate nearly 40 percent below projections.

International Bottled Water Association spokesman Stephen Kay said the restaurants' tap water-only policy will only confuse consumers and further spread misinformation.
 

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