Plastic bag ban legislation passes California legislature

The California State Assembly and the California State Senate have passed Senate Bill SB 270 on a vote of 44-29 and 22-15, respectively. The bill now goes to California Gov. Jerry Brown, who is expected to sign it into law.

SB 270 seeks to prohibit grocery stores, drugstores, and convenience stores from distributing single-use plastic bags starting July 2015. Stores can sell paper, durable reusable bags and compostable bags for a minimum charge of 10 cents each. The 10 cent charge is designed to encourage consumers to bring their own reusable bags with them. The bill also seeks to protect and create green jobs by creating standards and incentives for plastic bag manufacturers to transition to making reusable bags.

In promoting the bill, which it sponsored, the environmental group Californians Against Waste says that more than 120 cities and counties in the state, covering more than one-third of California’s population, have adopted a local bag ordinance. SB 270 provides a uniform, statewide solution to the rest of the state, modeled after the local ordinances already in place and successfully implemented.

“The state assembly spent a great deal of time debating the merits of this issue over the last several months, and especially this week,” said Mark Murray, executive director of Californians Against Waste. “In the end, it was the reports of overwhelming success of this policy at the local level that overcame the political attacks and misinformation from out-of-state plastic bag makers.”

Senate President pro Tempore-elect Kevin de Leon says, “In crafting this compromise, it was imperative to me that we achieve the goals of doing away with single-use plastic bags, help change consumer behavior, and importantly, support and expand California jobs. SB 270 is a win-win for the environment and for California workers.”

This legislation will implement a ban on single-use plastic grocery bags while promoting recycling and California manufacturing and provides financial incentives to maintain and retrain California employees in affected industries.

Senate Bill 270 will institute a plastic bag ban beginning in 2015 for grocery store carry-out bags and create a mandatory minimum $.10 fee for recycled paper, reusable plastic and compostable bags. The measure will also provide financial incentives for worker retraining and company retooling.

Specifically, Senate Bill 270 will:

• ramp up the use of recycled content for reusable plastic bags to promote recycling and California manufacturing. (In 2016, bags will be required to have 20-percent-recycled content and in 2020 will need to be made of 40-percentrecycled content.); 
• support recycling of agriculture plastic film, which is currently sent to landfills; 
• require large grocery store chains to take back used bags for continued recycling; 
• require third-party certification of reusable plastic bags to ensure compliance with bag standards which support California manufacturing; and
• grandfather existing local ordinances related to grocery bags.

The bill now advances to the governor’s desk for a signature. Brown has until the end of Sept. 30, 2014, to take action.