Pittsburgh pushing back plastic bag ban by several months

PITTSBURGH — You see them at almost every store in the city of Pittsburgh. Single use plastic bags are a staple.

But this time last year, City Council voted to ban them impacting both business owners and shoppers. Now, that ban is being delayed.

“We are pushing it back about six months. It was meant to go into effect this month we are pushing it but I don’t anticipate any more delays past that, ” city councilwoman Erika Strassburger said.

The idea behind the ban came from a need to clean up the litter and improve the city’s recycling efficacy. There are some bumps in the legislation that have led to the delay in implementation and vote to stall the program by city council this morning.

“What we are really doing is giving more time for businesses and for residents to implement the bill. We knew we needed to push it back to October to have the inspectors and have the people educating especially on the rules of the bill because it’s a little complicated and to make sure residents have information and reusable bags we’d like to give out,” Strassburger said.

If you don’t have the reusable bags, there will be an option to purchase paper bags that are made from 40% recyclable material for 10 cents a bag.

“We’ve mostly heard positive stories. Some stores are already ready to go they are just trying to figure out what to do with the plastic bags they still have because they’ve stopped ordering them others still have questions so we need to go to the ones who haven’t contacted us and we haven’t heard from and make sure we are prioritizing those,” Strassburger said.

The new ban date is set to begin on Oct. 14.

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