A push by state and local officials in Prince George’s County to institute a grocery bag tax has come to a halt in the Maryland General Assembly.
The Gazette reports that on Wednesday the General Assembly County Affairs Subcommittee voted to put the proposal back on the shelf. The legislation would have required retailers to add a 5-cent tax to plastic bags.
Opponents of the legislation said that voters overwhelming opposed the tax.
Del. Carolyn Howard (D-Dist. 24) of Mitchellville, who voted against the legislation, said that she received 900 responses against the tax from constituents after sending out a letter.
The vote comes after the Prince George’s County Council endorsed the bag-tax earlier this week in legislation proposed by Mary A. Lehman (D-Dist. 1) of Laurel.
Council members said the bill would clean roadways and better protect waterways.
“I believe really strongly that this is split evenly between pro-environment and pro-business,” said Councilwoman Mary Lehman (D-Dist. 1) of Laurel in The Gazette.
NO Ms. Lehman is about everyday people like me fed up with politicians like you that want to tax everything.
He said the fee could be avoided by using reusable bags. Not the same thing.
And whether shoppers realize that they are ALREADY paying for the trashing of our communities as big grocers ALREADY pass the cost of bags on to them. The only group helped by this defeat for the county was plastic bag manufacturers--why else would would they pay the big bucks to generate these 100s of robo-emails to delegates?
That being said it is a travesty that the State Government took away our county's right to make our own decisions. The people of PG County should be up infuriated by that whether or not they supported the bag tax.
This is incorrect. The county residential recycling program explicitly DOES take plastic bags. For more information about what is and isn't recyclable in our county check here: http://www.princegeorgescountymd.gov/Government/AgencyIndex/DER/waste.asp?nivel=foldmenu(8)#2
I think they were giving the County Council political cover so the Council wouldn't be the ones making the decision. This way they can point to the big, bad State like they do with everything else and convince people that they should be voted in again and again.
As for recycling plastic bags, I do also see that it is a new item. Previously it was not. Notice in this link, it says "new". http://www.collegeparkmd.gov/recycling.htm#Curbside
Someone commented that by visiting a grocery store the least they could do is give her a bag. I disagree. The least we all can do is change this disposable mindset that says that we are entitled to free non-biodegradable products. None of this is free, actually. Living a disposable lifestyle just transfers greater costs to society in future years, kind of like living off of credit cards.
Instead of a bag tax, it would be a far better idea if the State of Maryland adopted a version of the TRIM amendment from P.G. County and applied it instead to the totality of the state's annual budget.
Of course a liberal Governor whose sight is set on the White House in 2016 will never consider anything but tax and spend in any ways that he can.
The reality is that plastic bags are far more convenient than we give them credit for, and if we're going to make any real progress on the issue, it will require more than a penalty-tax on consumers. We need to develop a new material that will retain all the advantages of the current plastic grocery bag, while eliminating their primary (and perhaps only) drawback: Their environmental indestructability. If a tax went to that effort, instead of filling-in the holes in some irresponsible government's budget, I'd support it. But I won't support the government pick-pocketing folks at the grocery store, in the name of "protecting the environment". Once plastic bags become a revenue stream for the government, there will no longer be any incentive to fix the problem. The environmental issues are real, but we insist on maintaining the illusion of caring, instead of responding to the challenge in a meaningful way. It's like buying renewable energy credits, instead of turning the computers and lights off at night. It's a guilt-offset, not a solution. The goal should not be to tax people out of using plastic bags: It should be to reinvent the bag, itself.
My question is, do we really want the gov to teach people using taxes? Whats next, diapers? Disposable diapers are a huge problem. Maybe we should put an extra tax on that so that people use cloth diapers? Where does it end?
We are taxed ENOUGH by: the Federal government, the State of Maryland, P.G. County and Greenbelt. No new taxes, period! It does not matter what they are called or how they are referred but the time has come to both cut taxes and freeze government spending at every level of it.
I appreciate the problems of people who say they are financially strapped and don't want to pay more taxes etc. On the other hand when I look at what people are buying at the grocery stores and other stores, i don't see these purchases as reflecting great poverty or deprivation. The simple fact is that our environment is being trashed in many ways by plastic bags. Perhaps, if bags are seen as such as terrible imposition upon people's freedom, what we need is stepped up enforcement of littering laws, with fines starting at $100 for the first littlering offense and/or some community service time picking up those wonderful plastic bags so dear to the hearts of freedom loving Americans, that these same patriots have casually tossed from thier vehicles as they ride down the highways..
So, now we'll have all the infrastructure costs as well as the social costs of "gaming" with damn little to show for it (obviously the existing sites haven't been fully developed or the revenue projected realized by the State). So no conservation, plenty of excess. Yay!
This will provide more: good, well-paying and secure jobs at multiple levels of educational and abilities for our county's residents. It cannot be approved, completed and open, fast enough!