Early numbers are in from Montgomery County

Montgomery County's bag fee earned $154,000 for the county's Water Quality Improvement Fund in January. This figure is based on tax receipts from many county retailers, and is the remainder after the retailers kept their portion (one cent from every five).

But what does this number really mean? At this point, not much. One month is nowhere near enough time to measure behavior change; there is a learning curve for shoppers and businesses. Not all businesses have even submitted tax receipts yet because their collections haven't reached the required threshold. It's just too early. Washington, DC, never intended to scientifically measure the before-and-after until two years in--that study will occur later this year.

In the meantime, we can compare it to early results in DC and make some hypotheses, as the laws are quite similar. In January 2010, the DC bag fee generated $150,000 for the Anacostia River Cleanup Fund--approximately the same amount. But Montgomery County's population is more than 50% larger than DC's, approximately 970,000 residents to DC's 600,000. Granted, the daytime (employee) population is higher than the resident population in DC, but generally speaking we can interpolate that fewer plastic bags were used per capita in Montgomery County in January 2012 than were used in DC in January 2010.

We know in DC that 75% of residents ultimately say they have changed their behavior and use fewer plastic bags. The quick adoption of reusable bags meant that the fee did not generate as much revenue as was originally expected--less than $2 million the first year compared to the expected $3.5 million. This is a success, because it meant more people used reusable bags, having a greater impact on litter reduction and waste.

Montgomery County subsequently scaled back their revenue expectations even further, estimating only $1.2 million in revenue the first year. They expected that behavior would change even more quickly since people are already familiar with the program in DC. Since we also expect monthly revenues to decline over time, this first month's amount is on track with the estimate and shows that Montgomery County consumers are indeed beginning to make the switch from single-use disposable to reusing--or even refusing--bags when shopping.

Prince George's County one big step closer to a bag fee

This morning delegates that represent Prince George's County in the Maryland General Assembly voted 12-9 in support of HB895, which would give the County the authority to enact a five-cent fee on disposable plastic and paper bags. The bill now moves to the Environmental Matters Committee of the House, and then to the floor of the full House of Delegates. In considering local bills like this one, though, those committee and floor votes are for the most part a formality, as the current legislature prefers to support the counties' wishes.

The County's senators must also support the bill, but it passed easily last session and no senators are known to have changed their position.

This vote has been the biggest hurdle in the process so far. Opponents of the bill--namely the manufacturers of plastic bags--have paid a fortune in public affairs and outreach expenses, with thousands of robocalls misleading citizens and flooding delegate offices. The County Affairs subcommittee was unable to reach constitutional majority on either a favorable or unfavorable recommendation (and even on "no recommendation"), but after three such votes it was eligible to move up to the full delegation anyway.

The bill's supporters withstood the pressure and protected home rule, allowing the County Council to now take up the bag fee this fall. The authority will take effect in October. The Council voted 8-0, with one abstention, last month to support this measure. Should the statewide bag fee bill also pass, the Council will have six months to pass the county's program in order to be exempt from the statewide system.

The supporting delegates were sponsor Barbara Frush, Ben Barnes, Dereck Davis, Tawanna Gaines, Anne Healey, James Hubbard, Jolene Ivey, Doyle Neimann, Joseline Pena-Melnyk, Justin Ross, Michael Summers, and Kris Valderrama. Delegate Ivey attended despite being on bereavement leave following the death of her father last week.