07 May Heads Up: It’s time to ban plastic bags in Austin!

On April 17, 2007, the Austin City Council asked staff to evaluate options to reduce the use of plastic bags. Then, in April 2008, the Austin City Council passed a resolution and set the goal of reducing the flow of plastic bags into the waste stream by 50% by June 2009. At the request of retailers, the resolution relied mostly on a voluntary program. This was approved as an alternative to a plastic bag ban proposed by supporters of the Bag the Bags campaign in 2007.

Click here to write a letter to Austin City Council and encourage them to ban plastic bags!

 Unfortunately, the voluntary program failed. Although reusable bags were made widely available, to the tune of more than 900,000 through giveaways or sales from January to June 2009, the pounds of grocery bags, newspaper bags and film recycled at retailers failed to double during the time frame, as promised. Sixty-six percent of the time, the goal to reduce the purchase of plastic bags was not reached. Retailers purchased 3,454,522 pounds of plastic bags from January 2008 through June 2009 and only recycled 915,882 pounds of plastic during the same time frame –retailers recycled less than 26.5% of the plastic bags from the participating retailers. The Austin Solid Waste Services Department conducted a survey on residents’ opinions and habits regarding plastic bag use and found that 60% of respondents felt that plastic bags are a significant source of litter in Austin and about 67% rated plastic bags as a medium to serious waste issue in Austin.

Write a letter to City Council to ban plastic bags, for good!