When most people think about pollution in the environment, they think about poisoned waters, toxic superfund sites, and air that is unsafe to breathe.
People understand that contaminated water, land, and air are dangerous to human health, but that message is harder to convey about another pollutant that is turning out to be quite a serious threat: plastic.
This is why we are so excited to see Montanans take action with a ballot ordinance in Bozeman this November that, if approved by Bozeman voters, will limit the most frivolous and polluting single-use plastics by doing the following things:
1. It will stop the distribution of single use plastic bags at the check-out counter of retail stores. Paper bags will still be allowed, and stores can sell sturdy reusable bags (with handles).
2. It will establish an “ask first” policy for drink stirrers and straws. Customers who want them can ask for them, a practice that saves restaurants money and prevents quite a lot of plastic from turning into instant trash and pollution.
3. Require retailers and food vendors to move away from the most toxic and persistent of all single-use plastics, polystyrene foam. The many alternatives to packing peanuts are cheap and abundant, and polystyrene foodware is easy to replace.
But those benefits will only be seen if voters turn out and vote yes. You can find it on page three of the ballot.
People can still purchase plastic bags, and they can still request stirrers and straws, but they will simply have to ask for them. And Bozemanites out for a bite will not be eating off of products made with styrene, a probable human carcinogen and a primary ingredient in plastic foam.
This is good for everyone and everything. Businesses save money by purchasing fewer disposable plastics, and there is no unfair competition since everyone is covered by the same rules. (All the supermarkets in Bozeman are inside the city limits and will all move away from plastic bags together.)
The ordinance is excellent news for the environment because it preserves Montana's beautiful and pristine landscapes. It's good for agriculture because it keeps plastic bags from blowing into pastures, where cattle can graze on them and horses can choke on them.
Most of all, the ordinance is good for people. Plastic is a health threat, more so than we might have anticipated even a decade ago. Plastic is manufactured out of fossil fuels and chemicals, many of which can leach into our food, water, and soil.
These chemicals include some very hazardous substances that we don't want our children or ourselves to eat, including bisphenols, PFAS, brominated flame retardants, and formaldehyde. Many of these additives are carcinogenic, damage brain cells, or hijack hormones. Quite a few can do all three.
And it turns out we can't really escape these threats except by taking action together, which is why Bozeman's plastic ordinance is such a game changer. Plastic never breaks down in the environment. It breaks up instead, into microplastics and then tinier nanoplastics, which can be smaller than a grain of sand.
These microplastics can enter our bodies when we eat, drink, or inhale them, or by passing through the tissue of our intestines and lungs. Once inside, they stick around. Microplastics have been found in almost every body part studied: heart arteries, testicles, kidneys, liver, brain, and the placenta, to name a few.
No matter what, one thing we can probably agree on is that we don't want plastics inside of our bodies, and we don't like seeing plastic trash in on our roads, trails, and pastures. There is broad bipartisan agreement on this. Nearly 80% of Americans feel this way.
There is also broad agreement on the fairest and most efficient way to solve the problem: We need to turn off the tap on single-use plastics.
Bozeman's Plastics Ordinance is the way to do this.
Twelve states, over 500 municipalities, and more than 90 countries have already adopted laws to reduce plastics, and all of them are better for it. Bozeman's own citizens put this initiative on the ballot, a tremendous exercise of direct democracy. Montanans can and are taking power to protect and preserve their beautiful state.
Join them by voting yes to the Bozeman Plastics Ordinance on the third page of the ballot this election day.
Judith Enck is a former EPA regional administrator, and the president of Beyond Plastics. Daniel Carty is retired from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and is an advocate for environmentally responsible development. June Safford is involved with Beyond Plastics Gallatin Valley and spent 27 years as a writing teacher at Bozeman High School.