Cheyenne City Council To Consider Single-Use Plastic Bag Ban

A proposal that would ban most single-use carryout plastic bags in Cheyenne has been put forward in the Cheyenne City Council.

You can read the proposed ordinance here. The proposed law would also impose a 10-cent per bag fee on reusable paper bags. Half of the money collected by the dime fee would be kept by the merchant, with the other half going to the city.

Sponsor Councilman Richard Johnson says the city would not go looking for stores violating the ordinance if it becomes law but would investigate any complaints it receives from members of the public. The ban on plastic bags would include numerous exclusions. For example, trash bags would not be banned. Johnson says plastic bags pose numerous issues.

One is the volume of the bags going into the City of Cheyenne landfill, estimated by the city at 250 tons per day. Because the bags do not break down naturally as paper does, they are also a trash problem. Johnson says local cleanups he has taken part in have invariably turned up large numbers of the bags.

The bags also present numerous environmental hazards, with scientists saying the bags can last for 1,000 or longer and emit dangerous gasses into the environment. Johnson says he has also been told that the bags are a livestock hazard because when cattle eat them they can pose serious issues to their digestive systems. Johnson was told that the bags have an odor that makes them enticing to cattle.

The proposal is slated for consideration by the Council Finance Committee. It would have to go through three readings in the full City Council before a deciding vote would be taken on the third reading. It could also be amended by the council.

Johnson was on the ''Weekend in Wyoming" program last Saturday.

Here is the portion of the interview where he discussed his bag ban proposal: