Community members packed Montgomery County Council chambers in Rockville on Tuesday to share both support and distaste for a proposed near-complete ban on plastic shopping bags in the county.
More than half of the 24 speakers during a public hearing said they supported the proposed ban for its positive environmental impact. A smaller group of critics cited concerns about a proposed increase in an existing tax on paper bags as well as the loss of convenience of using plastic bags.
The “Bring Your Own Bag” bill is sponsored by council President Kate Stewart (D-Dist. 4) and co-sponsored by Vice President Will Jawando (D-At-large) and councilmembers Natali Fani-Gonzàlez (D-Dist. 6), Evan Glass (D-At-large) and Laurie-Anne Sayles (D-At-large). It would prohibit retail establishments from providing plastic shopping and carryout bags, with some exceptions. Establishments would be allowed to provide paper bags at a 10-cent tax per bag, a 5-cent increase over the current tax.
Other Maryland jurisdictions, including Anne Arundel, Baltimore and Prince George’s counties and the cities of Annapolis, Baltimore and Frederick, have passed similar bans on plastic bags, indicating a growing trend within the state.
Tuesday’s hearing drew an unusually high number of speakers who testified in response to the legislation, which, if passed, would go into effect July 1. Supporters said it is vital to pass the ban in order to limit waste created by single-use plastics as well as the litter they create.
“[Plastic bags] are harmful to the environment. They’re unnecessary. People adapt to their elimination, and there’s no credible downside in banning them related to health,” said Diane Bild of Beyond Plastics Montgomery County, a local chapter of a national organization advocating for reduced use of single-use plastics. “Some estimates indicate that each resident in the U.S. uses [one plastic] bag per day on average. So for the 1 million residents of Montgomery County, that’s contributing a significant amount of waste.”
But critics of the proposed ban cited a variety of concerns, particularly opposing the potential increased tax on paper bags.
“We’re nickel and dimed enough. All our assessments are up. The tax base of Maryland is going down,” former state delegate Robin Ficker said. “Football teams go to other states. Come on, we don’t want to be nickel and dimed. We’re not an ATM anymore.”
The county currently imposes a 5-cent tax on plastic bags; that tax would be repealed under the proposed legislation. A June 2023 report from the county Office of Inspector General revealed the county lost up to a potential $8.2 million from not properly enforcing its plastic carryout bag tax that was enacted in 2012.
County businesses such as grocery stores, convenience stores and restaurants are required to charge a 5-cent tax on single-use plastic and paper bags since the council passed a bill in 2011 “to help fund the county’s stormwater management program to support the goals of a cleaner environment,” according to the report.
The tax also was created to encourage residents to use their own reusable bags when shopping and to limit plastic waste, according to the inspector general’s office.
According to the proposed bill, a retailer could provide a plastic bag for exceptions such as purchases of prescription drugs, drycleaning items and to hold perishable items such as meat. Newspaper mailer bags also would be allowed.
The proposed 10-cent tax on paper bags would not apply to those exceptions either and also would not apply to paper bags provided for restaurant leftovers, food delivery or fast food passed through a drive-thru window. Customers who receive Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) and/or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits would also be exempt from the tax.
Kit Gage is the advocacy director for Friends of Sligo Creek, a nonprofit community organization dedicated to protecting the ecological health of Silver Spring’s Sligo Creek Park and its surrounding watershed. She said Tuesday during the public hearing that the organization has seen a decrease in plastic bag litter since the initial tax was imposed, but that there is still a significant issue with plastic bags in the watershed. The proposed ban would benefit local parks, greenspaces and waterways, she said.
“If you go to the Anacostia River, let me say it’s a beautiful river, but it does have plastic bag litter, and we’re partly to blame,” Gage said. “We especially see them after a rainstorm.”
Lost revenue
Currently, retailers collecting the tax must remit 4 cents per bag tax to the county and can keep 1 cent to recoup administrative costs associated with complying with the tax. The tax revenue goes into the county’s Water Quality Protection Charge fund, which is overseen by the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). The fund is used primarily to clean county waterways of litter, according to the inspector general’s report. DEP is also responsible for managing the tax collection.
The inspector general’s office found that many county businesses were not collecting or remitting the tax — and the county didn’t have an efficient method to identify businesses that had never remitted taxes they may have collected.
The report’s results were partly why Esther Wells, president of the nonpartisan Montgomery County Taxpayers League, said she testified against the proposed legislation Tuesday. She said she wanted the council to instead focus its energy on other issues, such as public safety and lowering property taxes.
“Some retailers that are collecting the tax are not remitting the collective tax revenue to the county and have gotten away with not properly collecting and remitting the tax because the county does not have strong policies in place to collect and monitor data on retailers required to comply with the tax,” Wells said.
Some speakers encouraged the council to make the proposed ban stronger, limiting some of the proposed exemptions.
“Poor people around the world go shopping with reusable bags. I don’t understand why this should be any different in Montgomery County,” county resident Stu Simon said. “When I’m in a lower-income neighborhood in this region, the problem of plastic bag litter seems much worse than in the wealthy region. The potential benefits from a plastic bag ban would actually be greater in [lower income] areas.”
Other groups said they support the ban but want the exemptions to stay in the legislation.
“Montgomery County has an average of 75,104 SNAP participants monthly … providing an adequate supply of reusable bags for these participants would be an enormous logistical and financial challenge,” said Gabrielle Sanchez of Clean Water Action, a D.C.-based environmental advocacy group. “The current exemption in the bill acknowledges that regressive taxes disproportionately impact low-income communities and exacerbate income inequality.”
Retailers would be allowed to retain half of the 10-cent tax collected per bag to cover administrative and implementation costs and would be required to remit the remainder to the county.
Any retail establishment found in violation would first receive a written warning. An additional violation would be subject to a $500 fine and further violations would be subject to a $750 fine and potential legal proceedings.
Sarah Price, representing the Maryland Retailers Association, which advocates for commercial retailers across the state, says the organization supports the proposed tax structure that would allow retailers to retain a portion of the tax for expenses. However, she said she was concerned that it could be difficult for retailers to determine who is eligible for an exemption.
“Retail employees are prohibited from asking if you are shopping with food assistance, and businesses don’t all use the same point-of-sales systems. So that means that some computers may be prepared to identify those customers and apply the tax exemption, while others do not have that capability,” Price said. “Customers might have to self-identify every time they’re making a transaction in order to ensure that the tax exemption is applied.”
A Transportation and Environment Committee on the legislation is scheduled for Feb. 3. A vote has not been scheduled.
