Pending Legislation - Ban on Plastic Checkout Bags

Legislation Banning Plastic Checkout Bags

woman carrying plastic bagsI am proposing legislation (Ordinance O-27-07) that will totally prohibit the distribution of all plastic checkout bags in all retail outlets (large or small) within the City of Annapolis. They will be replaced by reusable bags or 100% recycled paper bags (requiring no deforestation). The City of Annapolis will conduct a campaign to encourage reusable bags of all sorts.

Read the legislation

Why are we doing this?

After more than 30 years of encouraging recycling, still greater than 95% of all plastic checkout bags in the United States (about 100 billion distributed annually) either end up in landfills or blowing in the wind. Many eventually clog storm drains or wash into our creeks, rivers and the Chesapeake Bay. If they don't fill with silt and sink to the bottom, then they eventually get washed out to sea. And it is there that they do great harm to marine life. According to the Environmental Protection Agency the bags will remain in the environment for years and years; by some estimates up to 1,000 years!

Environmental organizations in favor of this legislation:

Alice Ferguson Foundation

Alliance for Sustainable Communities

National Audubon Society

Chesapeake Bay Foundation

Sierra Club

On Monday, July 23, a public hearing was held in City Council Chambers. Speaking against this legislation was Giant, Safeway, the American Chemical Association, the Progressive Bag Alliance, and the Maryland Retail Association. Speaking in support of the ordinance was the Sierra Club, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, numerous other environmental groups and leaders, Whole Foods (Recently Whole Foods, though not located within the city limits, took the lead and eliminated plastic bags from its store.), Annapolis retail shop and restaurant owners and individual citizens.

When the final vote takes place on Monday, October 8, at 7:30 p.m, national media will descend on City Hall to watch. It will be Annapolis’s opportunity to show leadership to the nation as we might very well become the first U.S. municipality to say no to plastic checkout bags.

Read the legislation:
Prohibition on Distribution of Plastic Checkout Bags
(O-27-07)

To view the complete agenda of legislation currently being considered on First and Second Reader click here.

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