This morning the Environmental Matters Committee of the Maryland House of Delegates passed HB1086, the Community Cleanup and Greening Act. It was amended from the original bill and now will enable all counties in the state to pass a disposable bag fee in order to reduce bag litter in their neighborhoods and streams.
Under current law, only Montgomery County, Baltimore County, and Baltimore City can establish this type of program. This proposal will allow all counties to establish a fee like Montgomery County has, where revenue is used for environmental purposes and to establish a program to assist low-income and elderly residents. Montgomery County residents have reduced their use of disposable bags by 60-70% since the fee took effect a year ago.
The committee voted 17-4 for a favorable report on the bill. Economic Matters must now also give it a favorable report before the bill reaches the House floor.
Friday, March 22, 2013
Friday, March 8, 2013
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
The DC bag fee is cleaning up the Anacostia River
Nash Run is one of the dirtiest streams in the Anacostia River watershed. However, thanks to D.C’s 5-cent disposable bag fee, one major source of pollution is finally on the decline.
“Astronomical levels of trash” and “dirtiest of all streams” -- these are phrases used to describe the humble little Nash Run, a small tributary of the Anacostia River. Nash Run starts in Fairmount Heights, MD, and runs through the Deanwood neighborhood of DC before emptying into the Anacostia near the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens. It is one of the biggest contributors of the litter pollution impairing the Anacostia River. But a study on this stream over the past 4 years offers hope that the litter problem can be reversed.
Before the bag fee, and for a short time after, the number of bags in the Anacostia seems to have actually been increasing. Data from a 2007-2008 yearlong survey by the District Department of the Environment show that the total number of bags found in eight tributary streams doubled in a single year. Of course, the absolute numbers of bags (and all litter) varies a lot depending on the weather, but this survey showed an increasing trend:
Chart from Anacostia River Trash Reduction Plan, referring to monitoring study results from Summer 2007 to Spring 2008, before the bag fee. “Number” is the total # of plastic bags found during surveys of 8 stream tributaries of the Anacostia River.
In 2009, the Anacostia Watershed Society installed a trash trap on Nash Run and began collecting data on the types of trash it collected. The trash trap is a special device placed in the stream that allows water to pass through, but catches litter. Once a month for the past four years, volunteers have cleaned out the trap and counted the number of bottles, styrofoam, bags, and other debris.
The amount of trash collected depends on how much rain has fallen during the month -- heavy rainfall carries more trash to the stream and thus the trap. So in order to have a more objective measure of the change in plastic bag use, we use the number of bags found compared to the total amount of trash collected -- expressed as bags per kilogram of trash.
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As you can see, similar to the DDOE chart above, this chart also shows an increasing trend in plastic bag litter from March 2009 to June 2010. However, the overall trend is a decrease in plastic bags polluting the stream over the 3-year period after the bag fee was implemented, from January 2010 to November 2012. Why didn’t decline didn’t start immediately after the bag went into effect? We can see several reasons why this might be the case: First, about one third of the Nash Run watershed is actually in Prince George’s County, MD, where there is no bag fee. So, the number of bags entering the stream from Maryland was presumably still increasing according to that 2007-2009 trend. Secondly, it takes time for litter to make its way from neighborhood streets to local streams. Third, compliance and understanding of the bag fee was not 100% right away. So, it’s not too surprising that the number of bags in the stream didn’t drop immediately.
What is clear is that the number of bags is declining, and that this decreasing trend matches the experience of other stream cleanup groups in the DC region. The Alice Ferguson Foundation, which runs cleanup events throughout the Potomac watershed, reported a 50% decline in plastic bags in Montgomery County in the first year after the the Montgomery bag fee went live. The faster decrease may be due to a faster adoption rate in Montgomery County and streams that are fully within the county, unlike Nash Run.
The Anacostia Watershed Society will continue to tally monthly data from the trash trap on Nash Run. Based on these initial results, we expect to see the decline in plastic bags continue, especially if Prince George’s County and/or the state of Maryland implement their own 5-cent bag fees.
Friday, March 1, 2013
Statewide Bag Bill Sails Through Senate Committee Hearing
On Tuesday afternoon, the Senate’s Education, Health, and Environmental Affairs committee held its hearing on the statewide bag fee. This was the first public hearing on the bag bill in 2013, and if it is any indication, the bill might just have a fighting chance in the legislature this year. As Senator Jamie Raskin (D-Montgomery), the bill’s sponsor, explained: the fee is neither experimental nor controversial, and presents an easy opportunity for Maryland to be a national leader on this issue. We couldn’t agree more.
After a very long day of hearing other bills, the supporters for the bag fee kept our testimony brief and to the point. Julie Lawson, of the Trash Free Maryland Alliance, introduced the bill and outlined why the 5-cent fee is the best solution to dealing with the known problem of plastic bag litter. Kate Judson, representing the District Department of the Environment, spoke about the success of DC’s bag fee and offered the District’s official support. Jen Brock-Cancellieri came from the Maryland League of Conservation Voters to highlight the correlation of litter with crime, and how the bag fee will help counties comply with looming federal water cleanup mandates. Additionally, the Maryland Department of the Environment and the Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce submitted written testimony in favor of the bill.
Many opponents of bag fees argue that recycling is the solution to the bag problem. This was clearly refuted by testimony from the Prince George’s County Department of Environmental Resources (DER). Desmond Gladden, who directs the County’s recycling facility, said that it costs $110,000 annually to clean bags out of the facility’s machinery, requiring 4 hours of daily staff time and lost productivity. The low price he gets for the bags does not offset the costs of dealing with the problems they cause. Adam Ortiz, the Department’s Acting Director, noted that the County also spends millions annually on litter cleanup, and that utilities such as WSSC and DC Water also spend resources cleaning plastic bags from their systems. In other words, plastic bags aren’t free -- we are all paying to clean them up!
There were some questions and confusion on what happens to the revenue generated from the fee. Lawson clarified that the first purpose of the revenue is to buy reusable bags -- as many as needed -- to be distributed to low-income and elderly residents through existing outlets with the Department of Health and Human Resources. Leftover funds will be distributed back to the counties for environmental cleanup projects through the Chesapeake Bay Trust. Neither CBT nor the Comptroller take a cut of the revenue -- 100% will be spent on reusable bags and environmental projects.
The last part of the hearing was testimony from the bill’s opposition, including representatives from the paper bag industry, the plastic bag industry, and a citizens group. Most of their arguments were built around misunderstandings of the bill or inaccurate facts about plastic bags, and based upon the response, it seems that most of the committee saw through them. Senator Paul Pinksy (D-Prince George's), one of the bill’s cosponsors and a committee member, singlehandedly refuted many of the statements made by the opposition.
Tuesday’s hearing was a promising 2013 debut for the bag fee for Maryland. The next hurdle will be the committee hearing on the House side, on Friday, March 8. After that, each committee will vote on the bill, and hopefully send it to the full House and Senate floors!
-By Bradley Kennedy
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