Prince George’s County may soon get permission to charge a five-cent fee on plastic bags in stores, joining Montgomery County and Washington, D.C.

A local bill in the General Assembly would give the county authority to charge the fee, which is designed to reduce plastic bag use and raise money to restore local waterways.

In a 2019 study, volunteers observed 32,512 shoppers at 209 stores in Prince George’s County, finding that almost nine out of 10 used disposable plastic bags.

But things were dramatically different at two discount grocery chains with locations on the Route 1 corridor. As a cost-cutting move, Aldi and Lidl stores don’t offer plastic bags and charge for paper, leading 94 percent of shoppers to use reusable bags or no bags at all.

A 2008 study by the D.C. Department of the Environment found that plastic bags made up 21 percent of the trash in the Anacostia River and more than 40 percent of the trash in its tributaries.

A bag fee in D.C. was implemented and designed in 2009 to help clean up area rivers under a catchy slogan “Skip the Bag, Save the River.”

And the fee was effective. Several studies found that plastic bag use dropped in D.C. by 50 to 70 percent in the first five years after the bag fee was implemented, while the amount of bags found during river cleanups dropped by 72 percent.

Prince George’s County has tried to charge a disposable bag fee for several years, but it needs permission from the General Assembly.

Even if the county doesn’t get permission, the effort may end up boosting another proposal that would ban disposable plastic bags statewide. With various local governments charging different fees, large retailers increasingly say they would prefer a single statewide standard, even if it’s a ban.

With the Anacostia Watershed Society working to make the Anacostia River swimmable and fishable by 2025, through the Waterway to 2025 plan, a bag fee for the county or even statewide would help make this goal more attainable.