Two recent Freeport High School graduates asked the Town Council on Tuesday to consider prohibiting stores in town from giving customers disposable plastic bags.
A similar request by students led Freeport officials to ban plastic foam containers in 1990.
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The council decided Tuesday to have its Ordinance Committee review the proposal. Town Manager Peter Joseph said the committee will schedule a meeting and decide whether to recommend an ordinance to the council.
He said the council could enact an ordinance or submit a proposal for a townwide vote.
Last month, the Portland City Council voted to assess 5-cent fees on plastic and paper bags, and to ban polystyrene foam containers for food and drink – measures that will take effect April 15.
In Kennebunk, the town’s Energy Efficiency Committee has recommended asking voters in a nonbinding referendum whether they favor fees on plastic bags.
In 2012, an eighth-grader in Windham asked the town to ban plastic shopping bags. The Town Council instead passed a resolution asking the Legislature for a statewide ban on plastic bags.
The proposal in Freeport, which came from a senior project at Freeport High by Meredith Broderick and Elly Bengtsson, would exempt bags for flowers, baked goods, bulk items like candy and nuts, prescription drugs, newspapers and trash, among other uses.
The plastic bags used by many of the outlet stores in Freeport are not among the students’ proposed exemptions. Joseph said many of those stores, including the national chains, already offer paper bags.
Leslie Bridgers can be contacted at 791-6364 or at:
Twitter: @lesliebridgers
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