Senate Vice President Donald M. Manglona listens during a budget hearing conducted last week by the Senate Fiscal Affairs Committee, which he chairs.
SENATE Vice President Donald M. Manglona has pre-filed Senate Bill 23-42 which would ban the importation, production, distribution and use of single-use plastic bags in the CNMI.
Similar measures were introduced in the House in the 21st and 22nd Legislatures, but the members didn’t act on them.
Manglona’s S.B. 23-42 stated that “discarded non-compostable plastic bags pollute the environment and pose significant threat to terrestrial and marine animals.”
According to the bill, “While the economic and social costs associated with plastic bags are high, attempts to mitigate the harms through recycling have proven ineffective because the price of recycling is prohibitively higher, or there are no recycling facilities on island, for the plastic bags.”
S.B. 23-42 proposes to impose a $250 fine per day from the date of the issuance of a notice of violation for the first violation; $500 for the second violation; and $1,000 for the third violation.
Four months after its enactment, the measure would authorize the Division of Customs to inspect shipments and seize prohibited plastic bags.
One year after bill’s enactment, it would also prohibit retail stores from providing customers with single-use plastic bags.
The bill however, would exempt plastic bags used for medicines, meat, vegetables, fish, poultry, bread and other items used to keep food fresh and unsoiled; frozen food such as ice cream; other products that are saturated, wet prone to leak or need to be immersed in liquid; products that are granular, powdery, dirty or greasy; and products that contain any herbicide, pesticide, solvent, corrosive, automotive-type fluid or other chemicals that can be harmful to public health.
