Cities across the nation are banning plastic bags in an effort save natural resources with the latest being Telluride, CO
Telluride has become the first town in the state of Colorado to ban plastic shopping bags. In a town council meeting, it was voted on 5-2 to approve the new law.
The new law that is in place will prohibit retailers from using plastic shopping bags at grocery stores and some retailers. The bags that will be exempt will be the ones that are used to bag meat and vegetables, bulk items, newspapers, prescription drugs and other such items.
The new law won’t go in effect until March 1, 2011. Until then, the town is trying to encourage residents to start using recycled bags. There will be a 10 cent per bag charge on paper bags that the town is requiring as an “advanced recovery fee.”
Telluride is not the first city to implement a ban on plastic shopping bags. Cities in California like Palo Alto, San Francisco, Malibu and Fairfax have all implemented a similar ban.
Other cities like Hawaii’s Kauai and Maui as well as Brownsville, Texas will be implementing the plastic bag ban starting in January.
Also in January we will see cities like Washington, D.C. start charging 5 cents per disposable shopping bag.
We should expect to see other resort towns in Colorado implementing the same law as these cities take every step they can to lower our carbon footprint.
