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Beautiful Brampton will begin charging retailers $100 per shopping cart that city staff finds abandoned on municipal property such as parks, waterways, transit stops, and parking lots.

Apparently, abandoned carts, according to city council, make for an eyesore and pose a “safety” issue, too.

Council noted the city has received an increasing number of complaints from residents about abandoned shopping carts. The motion, approved last month, also notes that abandoned carts can be hazards for pedestrians, cyclists and motorists.

(Sidenote: after decades of walking, cycling, and motoring, we can never recall an incident in which we were taken out by an abandoned shopping cart. But never mind…)

Yet, at the end of the day, isn’t this all about revictimizing the victim? Stores don’t want their shopping carts removed from their premises (or perhaps “stolen” is the more appropriate word.) These carts cost several hundred dollars after all.

Also, if the City of Brampton dings retailers for thousands of dollars in cart fines in the months ahead, does anyone think the stores will absorb those penalties as opposed to passing along those costs to consumers?

We ventured out to Brampton to ask shoppers at a No Frills supermarket about this proposal. We think the best comment was from a man who said the unspoken strategy idea behind the cart fines is about the city making up for lost revenue now that speed camera fines were deemed illegal by the province.

We also drove around Brampton. We found four Food Basics carts and a Walmart cart abandoned in a single snowbank near a transit stop. The Food Basics was nearby. We were able to retrieve one cart and returned it to the store. Inexplicably, the management was not grateful – which was weird. Check our encounter.

We also reached out to Loblaw Companies Ltd. Here’s what Canada’s biggest grocer had to say about the shopping cart fines:

“Grocery cart theft is an issue affecting the retail industry as a whole. It also creates additional costs for retailers, which can ultimately contribute to higher grocery prices.

“In response, we have introduced technologies such as Gatekeeper systems, which are designed to lock a cart’s wheels if it is taken beyond the store perimeter. These measures help prevent carts from being removed from store property while ensuring they remain available for customers.

“For broader industry insights on the legislation, we would suggest reaching out to the Retail Council of Canada.”

So it was that we reached out to the Retail Council of Canada, which provided the following statement:

“Retailers are very aware of the issue of cart loss and have been working for years to manage and reduce it. The loss of shopping carts is significant. In Canada, the cost of a single cart is estimated to be between $350 and $400, and some retailers may need to replace up to 35 per cent of their cart fleet each year due to theft, damage, or loss.

“To address this, many retailers have implemented mitigation strategies. These can include cart containment technologies such as wheel-lock systems that prevent carts from leaving designated areas, coin-lock systems that encourage customers to return carts, and electronic perimeter systems. Some retailers are also using cart tracking solutions, including GPS-enabled technology, to help locate and recover carts that have been removed from store property.

“Retailers continue to explore ways to reduce cart loss while maintaining a positive shopping experience for customers.”

Clearly, Loblaw and the Retail Council of Canada are being diplomatic. However, if we were the CEO of Loblaw, we’d play hardball. Which is to say, Loblaw’s massive headquarters is located in the City of Brampton. And a head office, like a shopping cart, is very mobile. Translation: we would inform Mayor Sneaky Patrick Brown to stop nickel-and-diming retailers – or Loblaw HQ shall simply relocate to another municipality that does not have such an asinine bylaw.

That ought to quash a bylaw that only penalizes the victims of theft…