Reusable Bag Law Considers Limiting Plastic Bags, Fee for Paper

New Castle officials are considering Reusable Bag Initiative that would severely limit single-use plastic bags and impose a 10 cent fee for paper bags.

The Sustainability Advisory Board has proposed a new ordinance that would limit the number of single-use plastic and paper bags in New Castle.

Single use plastic bags are poisoning our waters, our food supplies and our atmosphere, board members argue. They also very harmful to wildlife. While paper can be recycled, it uses many more resources to create than even plastic bags.

According to Riverkeeper, a University of Georgia study in 2015, based on data from 2010, estimated that about 8 million metric tons of plastic entered the world’s oceans in 2010 from people living within 50 kilometers of the coastline. That’s equivalent to finding five grocery bags full of plastic on every foot of coastline in the 192 countries examined. A February 2016 report from NY/NJ Baykeeper found at least 165 million plastic particles are floating within NY-NJ Harbor Estuary waters at any given time.

The Reusable Bag Initiative would promote the use of eco-friendly, multi-use, reusable shopping bags. The legislation would ban plastic bags in supermarkets, pharmacies, and a few other categories of businesses, and also include a 10-cent fee for paper bags to encourage more reusable bags.

The ordinance would still allow plastic bags to be used for meat and produce, dry cleaners and newspapers. Prescription drug and greeting card bags would also remain in use. The 10-cent charge for a paper bag, which would be kept by the merchants, would not apply to restaurants, delis or liquor stores. Stores that provide decorative paper bags, such as jewelers and gift shops, could also continue to give those bags away without a charge.

A public hearing on the proposed law is scheduled May 24.

Nearby, the City of Rye was an early adopter and Mamaroneck, Larchmont, Hastings-on-Hudson, Ossining, and Pleasantville have banned or limited plastic bags.

Taking an even wider lens, plastic bag bans exist in varying forms in communities in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, North Carolina, and California. Some places, like Boulder, Colo., have instituted a fee for the use of plastic bags (10 cents for each bag there).