California Senate Committee Considers Plastic Bag Ban

Earlier this month, the Assembly approved a bill that would make shoppers buy paper bags or reusable totes.

June 23, 2010

SACREMENTO, Calif. - In early June, the California Assembly passed a measure that would make consumers who don??t bring their own shopping bags to buy paper bags or reusable bags. The statewide ban goes further than current bans on plastic bags in at least five California cities, including San Francisco. Gov. Schwarzenegger has expressed his support of AB 1998, which is set to go before the state Senate Environmental Quality Committee on June 28.

Groups opposing the ban include the American Chemistry Council (ACC), which has taken an "oppose unless amended" position on AB 1998. The council claims the legislation would, among other things, dismantle a statewide plastic bag recycling program that was established pursuant to AB 2449.

Considerable opposition remains to AB 1998, which would ban grocery and convenience stores from providing customers with recyclable plastic bags and require those stores to charge customers at least 5 cents for each paper bag.

Opponents of the bill say it will up Californians?? grocery bills by $1 billion and put close to 500 plastic bag manufacturing jobs in California at risk. The cost to implement this law would run approximately $1.5 million.

One concern opponents have is that the bill appears to give larger grocers and big box stores a competitive advantage over independent markets. "Large stores can use their buying power to negotiate a lower price for bags--and therefore offer a lower-priced bag to their customers," the groups said.

AB 1998 repeals an existing requirement that grocery stores provide recycling bins for plastic bags and other plastics like bread bags and dry cleaning bags. The groups would like the proposal to be amended to address these concerns.

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