Extended producer responsibility (EPR) generally involves industry taking initiative or state and national governments enacting policies to encourage it. More recently, local governments are realizing the tremendous influence they can have on manufacturers taking environmental responsibility for their products and packaging. Big west coast cities such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and Portland are embracing a variety of projects and policies to get producer responsibility on the radar screen of industry, elected officials, and consumers alike. Other communities across the country -- including Duluth, Minnesota; Carrboro, North Carolina; and Columbia, Missouri -- have some type of EPR initiative in place. Techniques used to leverage EPR at the local level include:

• Networking with industry in a voluntary approach to promote EPR. Example: The City of Seattle, King and Snohomish Counties in Washington, and Portland Metro (a regional government agency in Oregon) formed the Northwest Product Stewardship Council to integrate product stewardship into the policy and economic structures of the Pacific Northwest.
• Passing local resolutions encouraging industry to take responsibility for their products and packaging. Example: Los Angeles has passed resolutions calling on the plastics industry to use more post-consumer recycled content in its products.
• Banning products that harm the environment and public health. Example: Duluth, Minnesota, and the City and County of San Francisco have banned mercury thermometers.
• Passing local deposit legislation for beverage containers. Example: Columbia, Missouri, has the nation’s first and only local bottle bill.
• Taxing disposables. Example: More than 30 German municipalities established a tax on non-reusable packaging and cutlery used at special events, restaurants, and institutions such as hospitals.
• Developing purchasing protocols that encourage environmentally sound products and restricting contracts to these products. Example: San Francisco passed a resolution restricting future contracts with beverage companies/vendors to those who provide containers with 10% recycled content by 2002.
• Addressing EPR as part of solid waste management plans and policy development. Example: The August 1998 City of Seattle new solid waste plan, On the Path to Sustainability, helped spur the creation of the Northwest Product Stewardship Council. The plan adopts zero waste as a guiding principle, and includes product stewardship as one of the programs for achieving future goals. Support for product stewardship in the solid waste plan allowed city staff to justify budget expenditures on work toward this goal.

This Facts to Act On describes examples of local initiatives to spur EPR and lists where the reader can view actual resolutions and ordinances, and find more information in general. Most of the policies and programs highlighted can be readily replicated by other jurisdictions.

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