On a warm July day, a steady stream of cars make their way down the gravel drive to Fox's Lobster House, not far from Cape Neddick Light.
Owner Phyllis Fox is reveling in the sunny weather that's kept her takeout stand and picnic area busy into the late afternoon.
"There's so many people that are on the go that just want to take their food and take it home, or take it down on the rocks and sit by the water's edge," she said.
But the plastic utensils and little condiment containers included in those takeout orders would have to go, under a proposed ordinance written by a group of local high school students. It would restrict the sale and distribution of single-use plastic straws, containers and utensils in restaurants, coffee shops, caterers, cafeterias and food delivery services operating within York.
Reusable foodware should be used in restaurants where washing facilities exist. And coffee shops would be required to create a program incentivizing their customers to bring their own cups.
"It's really a change of behavior that's necessary," said Chloe Whitbread, 16, a rising junior at York High School and a member of the school's Eco Club, which drafted the proposed ban. "So we just thought that an ordinance would be the best way to make the most change with the resources we had available as high schoolers."
The students' idea is not without precedent. In 2015, York voters approved a ban on single-use plastic bags, and later prohibited polystyrene foam containers, cups and lids. Statewide bans on both went into effect two years ago.
Whitbread said Mainers have since become used to bringing their own reusable bags to the grocery store, and believes they could go even further in reducing waste.
"People would come accustomed to bringing their own reusable fork instead of using a disposable one," she said. "Or when you go get coffee, you bring your cup."
But Fox said it's unrealistic to expect her customers, many of whom are on vacation, to bring their own cups and utensils to her takeout stand.
"I think that is a far-left liberal, utopian dream that's against the American way," Fox said. "We have choice here."
If reusable foodware isn't an option — or if washing facilities don't exist — restaurants would have to make compostable utensils or cups to their customers upon request.
"It would drive the cost of doing business up," Fox said. "Also, it's a sanitary issue. It's an issue of food cost management. All of the little plastic cups are a beautiful, wonderful way for everything to be sanitary and also to keep an eye on portion control."
The students' proposal could also mean changes for Hannaford, the town's only major grocery store.
George Parmenter, Hannaford's health and sustainability lead, said the grocery chain supports the proposed ordinance. The company is already trying to reduce the plastic packaging used on Hannaford brand items, he said.
And after meeting with the students, Parmenter believes the store wouldn't need to make too many difficult changes in the home goods aisle to comply.
"What we found is that we have good options there now for compostable flatware and obviously paper plates and paper cups," he said. "I think it would mean removing the plastic stuff, and just expanding our offering of those compostable and paper goods."
Parmenter said Hannaford's salad and hot bars are mostly free of plastic containers. But the store would need to replace the utensils with compostable ones, which he said are more expensive.
Whitbread acknowledges that businesses are worried about the costs, and that some items would be more difficult than others to replace. There are few alternatives, for example, for the plastic cups that businesses use for ketchup and other dipping sauces.
"As much as we would love to have everything be reusable and everything be perfectly environmentally friendly, that's not a perfect solution because we're not a perfect world," Whitbread. "I think we're just trying to tackle the items we know there's alternatives to."
But if the ordinance passes, Whitbread said she believes businesses will continue to look for and try out reusable or compostable products, and that eventually new alternatives will be introduced as restaurants and the public change their behavior.
And like York's plastic bag and foam container bans before it, Whitbread hopes that the ordinance will inspire other towns, or even the state of Maine, to eventually adopt similar restrictions.
"It can be hard to be the first ordinance in the field," she said. "That's scary for a lot of people. For us, it's kind of exciting, and this is something that needs to happen. It's a step that we need to take. It's exciting and kind of innovative from our perspective, especially as young high schoolers. We have our whole future ahead of us in this environment."
If the ordinance does pass, Hannaford said it will make the changes needed to comply inside the York store first. But the grocery chain isn't ruling out the possibility of adopting the changes at other Maine locations.
"If York is successful other communities will want to get on board," he said. "For us I think we see it as a sign of things to come, and we need to start our planning now."
But Fox's Lobster house owner Phyllis Fox said her plans are to vote against the ordinance, if it makes the fall ballot.
"I know best what it takes to run my business and to run it cost effective[ly]," she said. "No one else does."
The York select board is expected to decide later this summer whether to send the ordinance to the voters this November. If approved, York businesses would have a year to comply.
