An effort to stiffen Oahu’s contentious checkout bag ban came down to agreement on a single issue before City Council members Wednesday — charging shoppers a minimum 10-cent fee for each bag.
Councilman Brandon Elefante had sought stricter regulations than Oahu’s existing plastic checkout bag ban, which went into effect in July 2015, by introducing Bill 59. The bill would ban the distribution of compostable plastic bags at checkout counters and increase the required thickness of reusable plastic bags to 3 mils (3/1,000 of an inch) thick, instead of the allowed 2.25 mils.
The Council’s Public Works, Infrastructure and Sustainability Committee had deferred the bill last month to give environmentalists and the food industry more time to work on a proposal that would encourage shoppers to bring their own reusable sacks. At that time there was some agreement that charging shoppers a minimum 10-cent fee for each single-use bag would be a viable solution.
At a Wednesday meeting, the committee advanced the bill for second reading with an amendment that furthers discussion on the 10-cent fee.
Committee Chairwoman Carol Fukunaga, who proposed the amendment, said after the meeting that the move “was sort of to get the discussion of the 10-cent per bag proposal on the table. That is not intended as a final draft.”
She added, “We just did that because there’s so much disagreement about various components of it. So we just said, ‘Let’s take the one thing we know that people are in agreement on.’ It was just to get the ball rolling.”
Elefante had proposed an amendment Wednesday that included a 10-cent-fee for reusable bags and recyclable paper bags, with an effective date of January 2018, which generated support from the city Department of Environmental Services and the Surfrider Foundation, which seeks to protect beaches and coastlines.
“The whole intent … was to strengthen our plastic bag bill,” Elefante said after the meeting. “I hope we can arrive on further amendments.”
The city’s existing ordinance allows businesses to hand out compostable plastic bags and reusable plastic bags that are at least 2.25 mils thick, as well as plastic bags of all types for prepared and baked goods, newspapers and other specific items. Hawaii became the first state to ban single-use plastic grocery bags in all counties.
At Wednesday’s meeting, Stuart Coleman, the Surfrider Foundation’s Hawaiian Islands manager, said that although he would prefer increasing the thickness of the reusable plastic bags to 4 mils, the bag fee would be a good compromise.
But Lauren Zirbel, executive director of the Hawaii Food Industry Association, which represents more than 200 food retailers statewide, said the law should remain the same to minimize additional costs to businesses with the addition of the fee. She said she is not in favor of repealing the existing ban at this point.
David Hong, owner of Island Plastic Bags Inc., said he would like to see the ban repealed to give shoppers more options.
But Dean Otsuki of the Beach Environmental Awareness Campaign Hawaii called for a ban on all types of plastic bags, saying that the 10-cent fee would not be enough to encourage shoppers to bring their own reusable bags.
