AB 1998 Urgent Update
The California landmark bill that will eliminate the distribution of approximately 19 billion plastic bags from the checkout lines has reached a critical phase and needs our help.
Take a moment to contact your senator (list and contact info below), call a friend and share this video with them. The opposition is pulling out all the stops to prevent the passage of this bill, lets win this one! The Governor has indicated that he will sign the bill once it passes the Senate vote.
This is a list of senators who are still undecided. They need to hear from you!
1. Gloria Romero (Azuza, Baldwin Park, Covina, Duarte, El Monte, Irwindale, La Puente, LA, Monterey Park, Rosemead, West Covina) 916-651-4024
2. Lois Wolk (Davis, Fairfield, Manteca, Stockton, Tracy, Vacaville, West Sacramento) 916-651-4005
3. Ron Calderon (Montebello, Huntington Park) 916-651-4030
4. Lou Correa (Santa Ana/Fullerton) 916-651-4034
5. Tom Harman (Huntington Beach/Costa Mesa) 916-651-4035
6. Mimi Walters (Laguna Niguel) 916-651-4033
7. Roderick Wright (EQ) (Compton, Gardena, Hawthorn, Inglewood, Lawndale, Long Beach, LA, Rancho Palos Verdes, San Pedro) 916-651-4025
8. Leland Yee (San Francisco) 916-651-4008
9. Gilbert Cedillo (Alhambra, LA, Maywood, San Marino, South Pasadena and Vernon) 916-651-4022
10. Denise Ducheny (Brawley, Calexico, Cathedral City, Chula Vista, Coachella, Coronado, El Centro, IB, Indio, National City, SD, San Ysidro) 916-651-4040
11. Dean Florez (Bakersfield, Coalinga, Delano, Dinuba, Fresno, Hanford, Lemoore) 916-651-4016
12. Gloria Negrete McLeod (Chino, Montclair, Ontario, Pomona) 916-651-4032
13. Alex Padilla (Canoga Park, North Hills, North Hollywood, Northridge, Pacoima, San Fernando, Sun Valley, Sylmar, Van Nuys, Winneka) 916-651-4020
14. Curren Price (Culver City, Hancock Park, Hollywood, LA) 916-651-4026
About AB 1998
AB 1998 will eliminate the distribution of approximately 19 billion plastic bags in California by prohibiting grocery stores, pharmacies, convenience stores and similar stores from distributing single-use plastic bags for free. Plastic bags are a primary component of urban litter pollution and marine litter pollution. Government, especially city and county government, incurs significant costs to clean up plastic bag litter. And California families are unknowingly paying these costs in the form of higher fees and taxes, in addition to higher grocery costs to pay for the “free” single-use bags they receive at the store. AB 1998 will encourage reusable bag use. AB 1998 bill will also conserve paper resources by requiring retailers sell recycled content paper bags.
Please, please let’s stop this insanity. We have no need for this bain on our ecosystem and landscape. Even the Chinese where these bags are mainly produced are beginning to ban certain kinds!!
We need to stop using plastic bags now! There are other better options available to us instead of one-time use plastic bags that are harming our environment. Please support this bill. Your planet needs you!!
Amy Whittam
Plastic bags are a waste of resources when people can simply buy a cloth bag and reuse it. If we wish to wean ourselves of our dependence on foreign oil (particularly from the Middle East), we must cut our dependency on oil-based products of all sorts.
California uses 19 billion plastic bags every year! Instead of wasting our resources on litter collection, recycling and disposal of these inconvenient and damaging to our environment products, we should get rid of them. Plastic pollution threatens California’s wildlife, marine life and ocean economy. It is wrong to continue using plastic bags for 10 minutes and then leaving them in our environment for 500 years or more! We should ban plastic bags today and move on. The ban will save marine life, save taxpayers money and create jobs at the reusable bag companies. There could be jobs to be had in the making of cloth, canvas, denim bags, etc. rather than recycling!
i got the mail.whAT SHOULD I DO NOW?
Get rid of plastic bags, a relatively new invention, that we can live without. Our Earth should not pay for our wasteful conveniences.
This is a no-brainer. There is no time left, so let’s do it!
Our Mother Earth will be so grateful!
Just like to say i wish there was a worldwide petition for this as it`s a worldwide problem.
I live in the UK so i cannot help at this moment.
But i hope you have every success in getting your bill passed.
Plastic bags only do harm to the environment and wildlife, they are not good for anything. The poisionous chemicals used to create them are harmful and they cause wildlife to suffocate and die.
We should all be using canvas bags!
Enough Plastic ! This is not acceptable sustainable living practices.
please ban plastic grocery bags. All of us can bring our own cloth bags just like everyone has done in Italy for more than twenty years or so!!!
I’m 100% for banning plastic bags. And hopefully soon, plastic bottles.
It is simply archaic to use single use plastic in any case, and completely ridiculous to use plastic bags at all. There is no reason why we cannot train ourselves to carry reusable bags with us to the store. We need to change our patterns, our thinking and our habits, or they need to be changed for us.
Washington, D.C. has instituted a 5 cent fee for every plastic bag used in stores. Their use has plummeted. I agree with Chani. If we do not change our thinking and habits, they will be changed for us.
We use about 38 million barrels of oil to make those bags each year — roughly 10 times the volume of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. At $70 per barrel, that’s $2.7 billion in raw material costs alone. Taken together, the U.S. spends close to $20 billion every year on a product we think of as “free” and “disposable.”
There is absolutely no reason we need plastic bags. It is out of pure laziness on the consumers part and greed on the distributors part. When we leave the house, bring an extra bag for whatever you may be buying that day or even bring one just in case. It’s as simple as that. We don’t need to lessen the distribution of plastic bags, we need to completely terminate them.