An Act To Reduce Truck Travel Caused by the Bottle Redemption Laws
Sec. 1. 32 MRSA §1866, sub-§5, as amended by PL 2003, c. 499, §7, is further amended to read:
The obligation of the initiator of the deposit under this subsection may be fulfilled by the initiator directly or through a party with which it has entered into a commingling agreement.
The initiator of deposit has the obligation to pick up any empty, unbroken and reasonably clean beverage containers of the particular kind, size and brand sold by the distributor from dealers to whom that distributor has sold those beverages once every 30 days and from licensed redemption centers once every 30 days. The initiator of deposit is not obligated to respond to a request to pick up additional containers from a dealer or licensed redemption center unless or until the dealer or licensed redemption center has accumulated beverage containers with a minimum total refund value of $750.
summary
This bill removes the current obligation in rule that requires a distributor to pick up a redemption center every time the distributor makes a delivery of product to any dealer or retailer that has an agreement with that redemption center. It replaces that obligation with a statutory obligation to pick up beverage containers at every redemption center every 30 days and to make additional pick ups when the redemption center has accumulated $750 worth of beverage containers.