A Tufts University professor who publicly endorsed a study that was cited by the campaign committee fighting the proposed bottle law expansion was paid $7,000 by the opposition group, prompting criticism on Thursday from an environmental organization that supports the measure.
Jeffrey Zabel, a Tufts economics professor, received the payment as a campaign subvendor from Goddard Gunster Inc., a public relations firm hired by the No on Question 2 group, which opposes the binding ballot question to expand the state bottle law, campaign finance records show.
In a statement last week from No on Question 2, Zabel backed a study from Westford-based Northbridge Environmental Management Consultants. The study found that expanding the bottle bill would cost state residents nearly $100 million annually.
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Northbridge was paid $2,800 by No on Question 2, state records show. The No campaign said that Northbridge has also done research for state and federal agencies.
“Under Question 2, Massachusetts consumers would absorb higher costs for a recycling rate increase that is likely to be less than 1 percent,” Zabel said in the statement.
Attempts to reach Zabel for comment were unsuccessful, but he defended his work in another statement provided by the opposition group on Thursday.
“I would like to state in no uncertain terms that the compensation that I received did not influence my analysis of the study,” Zabel said. “I told the campaign before I started that if they wanted someone to rubberstamp their report that they should go elsewhere. I reviewed the report with an open mind, and if I had found the report to be substandard I would have told them so and not endorsed it.”
But Phil Sego, an environmental advocate with the Massachusetts Sierra Club, one of the nonprofits on the steering committee of the Yes on 2 campaign, which supports the referendum, panned Zabel’s review of the study.
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“Professor Zabel should have realized that he was reviewing something that is simply propaganda,” Sego said. “And $7,000 bought an approval of bottling industry information — I’d like to say misinformation, actually.”
Nicole Giambusso, a No on Question 2 spokeswoman, fired back in a statement, accusing Sego and others of “stooping low enough to question the credentials of a 25-year professor who has been paid for similar work by the federal Environmental Protection Agency and the National Fish and Wildlife Service.”
She said it is common for an academic to receive payment for conducting or reviewing research.
“Our opponents can’t dispute the facts, so they’re resorting to personal attacks,” Giambusso said.
Sego, however, insisted that the study was compromised.
“To say that Jeffrey Zabel . . . reviewed a report that was prepared and paid for by the bottling companies and that somehow the massive amounts of data could be understood, gleaned, and then presented and verified is just absurd,” Sego said.
Kimberly Thurler, a spokeswoman for Tufts, wrote in an e-mail that faculty and staff who engage in political campaigns do so “entirely as individuals.”
“We [the university] are prohibited by federal law from participating in or attempting to influence campaigns for any elective public office or any political initiative, including ballot questions, and our university policies reflect this,” Thurler wrote.
If it passes, the bottle initiative will extend the state’s current nickel deposit to bottled water, sports drinks, and other noncarbonated beverages. Designed to encourage recycling and reduce litter, the 32-year-old law currently requires a nickel deposit on soda, beer, and malt beverage containers.
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Proponents of the initiative say the expansion would encourage more recycling, reduce litter, and save municipalities money on litter cleanup costs. Opponents say it would increase costs and expand an outdated and ineffective bottle redemption system.
The flap over Zabel’s compensation followed a dispute last week over television ads critical of the ballot question that contained inaccurate information.
Voters go to the polls on Nov. 4.
David Abel and Joshua Miller of the Globe Staff contributed to this report.