California Turns Down Ban on Plastic Shopping Bags

California turns down ban on plastic shopping bags

Lawmakers in California have rejected a measure that would have been the first ban on plastic shopping bags to be implemented state-wide.

The bill, sponsored by the Democrats, was defeated on a 14-21 vote on Tuesday. It has met stiff opposition from the plastic bag manufacturing industry, which released costly ads criticizing the bill as an employment killer.

Assemblywoman Julia Brownley (D-Santa Monica), said, “This is a sad day for California. Communities across the state were waiting for the state to adopt a uniform, statewide ban on single-use bags before they adopt their own ordinances. The state failed them.”

The failed legislation would have banned stores, pharmacies and big retailers like Walmart and Target to use plastic bags starting in 2012, then extended to include convenience stores in 2013. Consumers would have needed to use reusable bags or recycled paper bags.

Currently only local city bans are enforced by Malibu, Fairfax, Palo Alto, and San Francisco. The state of North Carolina last year banned single-use plastic and non-recyclable bags in the Outer Banks.

The proposal had gone further than in any other state partly because of the support given by the California Grocers Association.

“The bill has been amended tremendously,” said the industry group's Chief executive officer Ronald Fong, noting that the revisions preempted local jurisdictions from passing their own local bans. He said that having no uniform state-wide bag ban would cause “chaos and customer confusion” because of the different bans being enforced.

“This issue is not going away,” Fong said. “The future is in reusable bags. It's the right thing to do.”

Posted by Melanie Mendoza on Thursday September 02 2010, 10:11 AM EST. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under Featured News, Shopping. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0