Solid waste: expanded polystyrene food service containers.

Existing law requires all rigid plastic bottles and rigid plastic containers sold in the state to be labeled with a code that indicates the resin used to produce the rigid plastic bottle or rigid plastic container. The California Integrated Waste Management Act of 1989, administered by the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery, requires every rigid plastic packaging container, as defined, sold or offered for sale in this state to generally meet one of specified criteria. This bill would enact the Ocean Pollution Reduction Act of 2017. The bill would prohibit a food vendor, as defined, that is subject to specified federal requirements for the posting of calories and nutrients imposed upon restaurants and other retail food establishments, on and after January 1, 2020, from dispensing prepared food to a customer in an expanded polystyrene food service container. The bill would prohibit all food vendors from dispensing prepared food to a customer in an expanded polystyrene food service container on and after January 1, 2022. The bill would authorize a city or county to grant a food vendor an exemption from these prohibitions, as specified, upon request of the food vendor, if the food vendor demonstrates to the satisfaction of the city or county that compliance with the prohibition would impose an undue economic hardship, as defined. The bill would authorize a city, a county, a city and county, or the state to impose civil liability on a person or entity that knowingly violates that prohibition, or reasonably should have known that it was violating that prohibition, in the amount of $1,000 per day for the first violation, $2,000 per day for the 2nd violation, and $5,000 per day for the 3rd and subsequent violations. The bill would require any civil penalties collected to be paid to the office that brought the action and would authorize these penalties, if collected by the Attorney General, to be expended, upon appropriation by the Legislature, to enforce that prohibition. The bill would require the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery to develop an Internet Web page with information on how to comply with, and how to file a complaint for a violation of, that prohibition. The act would also define related terms.