State law already mandates that retailers stop using the plastic bags on Jan. 1. Friday’s settlement hits the manufacturers with $1.7 million in penalties, establishes that they violated state law by selling unrecyclable bags for years, and will result in many of the bags being removed from the market early, before the end of this year.
For the cat litter, I’ve started to save and use the plastic bags we get with our food anyways. Lots of things like frozen food, bread, chips, whatever, come in bags that can have a second use before being thrown away.