Two Towns, One Word: Plastic

"The race is on to become the first town in North America to ban plastic bags, and two small Canadian communities are leading the charge.

Leaf Rapids, in northern Manitoba, is already trumpeting itself the winner, thanks to a bylaw facing the final vote next week.

But the British Columbia mountain town of Rossland is hot on the Manitoba community's heels, surfing what the mayor says is just the crest of a national anti-plastic wave.

It will all be decided on Monday, when Leaf Rapids casts its final vote on local bylaw 462 and Rossland decides whether to join a local delegation's conservation crusade.

Five thousand reusable bags are ready to be handed out on April 2, when Leaf Rapids is scheduled to implement the plan that's been in process since September.

Under the proposal, no retailers in the town situated 975 kilometres north of Winnipeg — which already charges a three-cent levy for plastic shopping bags — will be allowed to sell or give away plastic shopping bags. Mr. Ryan said 50,000 plastic bags will be eliminated in the first year alone.

On the same day over in B.C., the Rossland council looks likely to back a voluntary ban on single-use bags.

The California-based Earth Resource Foundation said that if both votes are approved, the towns will end up streets ahead of their U.S. counterparts.

The closest to such a move in the United States is a proposal to ban plastic bags in San Francisco grocery stores, which will be put to the vote Thursday, ERF founder Stephanie Barger said."