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Michael Fuegmann of Ohio was sentenced to 45 days in Branch County jail today. He was charged by Branch County Prosecutor Kirk Kashian for trying to return over 600 out-of-state beverage containers for deposit refund to the Coldwater Meijer store, about 10 miles north of the Indiana state line near Bronson, Michigan on United States Highway Route 12. It is not known how Michael obtained the cans, but it could have been from one of Indiana's many recycle bins. A ring of recycle bin thieves was recently discovered and caught in Indiana. Some people apparently believe they can raid Indiana recycle bins and return the cans and bottles to Michigan for deposit money. Money stolen from Michigan citizens by these theives comes at the expense of the state's environmental clean-up fund, where 75% of the surplus deposit money goes. 25% of the deposit excess is returned to retailers to reimburse them for costs of running a beverage container return facility. Even though 98% of bottles and cans covered by the deposit law are returned, there is still $22.6 million in deposits that go unredeemed each year. I think the Branch County Prosecutor's surname is a bit ironic in this situation. Kashian. Kash-ian. Cash-in. It seems I used to read about incidents like this one several times a year in the Herald-Palladium newspaper in the 1980s. Most of the articles were about people from Iowa with a van full of Iowa 5¢ cans. It seems one of the special duties of the defunct New Buffalo Michigan State Police post was to keep an eye out for vans with darkened or covered windows, as those vehicles were suspect for smuggling something across the state border, like large quantities of cigarettes, alcohol, or out-of-state cans and bottles bound for deposit refund. I guess we have inflation to thank for these incidents becoming less common over the past decade. In 1999 dollars, today's 10¢ deposit buys what 3.4¢ did in November 1976, when the bottle bill was passed. If the 1976 10¢ deposit is adjusted for inflation, the deposit would be 29¢ in 1999-dollars. I haven't seen one in a long time, but some bottles used to be 5¢ deposit because they were refillable. I particularly remember some beer bottles being 5¢ deposit. The most cans and bottles I have ever returned at one time was 248 to the Benton Harbor Meijer in summer 1992. I did yard work for someone in Stevensville and he said I could have all the cans and bottles in his metal barn simply for getting them out of his sight. The Benton Harbor Meijer had a sign at the deposit counter that said all returns over $25 require manager approval, so I slipped right under that with my $24.80 bounty. That Stevensville guy's last name was the same as the name of the place he worked (no relation though) and the last four digits of his telephone number spelled his four letter last name. It used to be fun to return cans when stores first got automatic container return machines, about 1995? Now, the can return area reeks in every store I've been to with those machines. I don't remember the deposit area stinking that bad before the machines. I'm guessing people are less embarassed to return dirty, stinky cans when they just have to stick it in a machine, where as before a counter attendant manually counted up all your cans and you at least had an opportunity to feel guilty for returning unclean cans. Here in Kalamazoo, I try to return cans to stores off the city bus route, as those stores's can return areas are less skanky because you don't have people who ride the bus returning cans there.
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