POUGHKEEPSIE – Unit pricing in Dutchess County supermarkets may be a thing of the past shortly as the Government Services Committee of the county legislature Monday evening approved eliminating it.
The full legislature must approve the measure.
Dutchess and New York City are the only two areas that still have unit item prices.
During debate in committee, Republicans supported doing away with it while Democrats wanted to keep it.
Democratic Minority Leader Mickey Strawinski would rather have had the issue tabled Monday.
“I think there is still a lot of controversy, a lack of education to the consumer and to the public on what this actually means if this were to go into effect,” Strawinski said.
Opponents to eliminating unit pricing said it would cost jobs, but supporters said there is no indication of that since no supermarket worker is assigned to only placing price stickers on items.
In place of the current method, pricing scanners would have to be located around the stores.
