Plastic Bag Ban

Single-use plastic bags are a growing problem. These bags are made from petrochemicals (polyethylene) and are often used only once and for a few minutes or seconds then thrown away (on average, 12 minutes), but stay in our landfills, rivers, streams, lakes, oceans, and environment for centuries. In 2010, 4 to 12 million metric tons of plastic entered waterways. These bags break down into thousands of plastic pieces and are now found in our drinking water as well as in the fish and seafood we eat. With the current use, by 2050, it is estimated that there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish. Additionally, these plastic bags contaminate the land, kill wildlife, gather rainwater offering a perfect spot for mosquitoes that transmit diseases to reproduce, and pose a threat to machinery at recycling centers.

We the undersigned, support the adoption of a local ordinance that will ban the use of single-use plastic bags with a long-term solution not to shift from plastic to paper, but to shift to durable reusable bags in the Town of Bennington, VT