WINDHAM – The Windham Town Council passed a resolution Tuesday night seeking a ban at the state level regarding the use of plastic and paper shopping bags that incorporate less than 40 percent recycled content.

The vote was 4-0. Councilors Matt Noel and Tommy Gleason were absent.

Unlike previous meetings on the matter, where public support for a ban was overwhelming, there was little comment except for Sierra Yost, the Windham eighth-grader who requested the bag ban. Yost thanked the council for drafting the resolution, which now heads to the state Legislature.

“I just have to say thank you for writing the resolution and for your time,” Yost said.

The council’s resolution also included language requesting Windham businesses to stop issuing plastic bags that use less than 40 percent recycled content.

Copies of the council’s resolution will be delivered to the Clerk of the House and Secretary of the Senate. To become eligible for discussion and a vote in the Legislature, a senator or representative would have to take up sponsorship of the bill.

State Sen. Bill Diamond, D-Windham, who is finishing his fourth term and is term-limited, said the possibility of the bag ban becoming state law depends on who voters elect in November.

And since Maine is a forest-products producer and manufacturer of paper bags – which would also be banned if the bags incorporate less than 40-percent recycled content, a point raised by Councilor Tommy Gleason at a previous discussion – the matter could have implications for Maine, meaning lawmakers’ discussion could get tense, Diamond added.

“It depends on the makeup of the new Legislature. I mean, it’s as simple as that. It would always be a very hotly debated issue,” Diamond said. “We’ve had it before, to some degree, as part of a supplemental discussion to other environmental issues. I don’t recall that it’s ever been a stand-alone item. But the fact is, it depends on the makeup of the Legislature, what the tone is. And I would fully expect to see it as one of the bills submitted.”

As town councilors have done in past discussions on the bag ban proposal, Diamond praised Yost’s passion and conviction.

“We have a middle school student get involved to the point where she’s impacting regulations and possibly state law,” Diamond said. “And I love the fact that she is showing an example of how young people can make a difference if they get involved with their local and even state governments. So I think she needs to be applauded. And I’m so excited someone at her age level is leading the way and showing other young kids that they can make a difference.”

While the Town Council has now forwarded the matter to the state level, it declined to impose a local ban, which Yost, her parents and other supporters requested in previous meetings. The ban would have impacted the major supermarket and home improvement chains in North Windham. Councilors were advised by town attorney Ken Cole III that an outright ban would likely draw legal action by stores that use plastic bags, as well as industry lobbyists.

One lobbyist, Sara Vanderwood, a government affairs consultant with Verrill Dana, a law firm in Portland, appeared at the Windham council meeting two weeks ago offering opposition to the bag ban. Though present, she decided not to speak at this week’s meeting, saying, “It seemed the direction of the council was pretty clear… and the opposition probably wasn’t going to change anything,” she said.

Vanderwood lobbies on behalf of Hilex Poly, a major manufacturer of plastic bags, which uses recycled content in its bags. She said the issue was broached at the state level three years ago and that Hilex Poly’s “Bag the Ban” effort is prepared to “continue that fight should it go on to a statewide level.”

Vanderwood said the alternative to single-use bags offer its own pitfalls such as potential harboring of harmful bacteria and viruses. She cites a recent case in Oregon in which a girls soccer team contracted the norovirus that was traced to the use of a reuseable cloth grocery bag that transferred the virus to cookies the girls ate.

Vanderwood also said plastic bags are recyclable and that Maine law already requires retailers to provide a recycling receptacle.

“It has to be at the store entrance or within 20 feet of where they give out those bags,” she said.

She also said the free market is where a natural shift toward the use of reusable bags should take place, rather than being imposed by government via a ban.

“I know the grocer’s association – Walmart, Hannaford, those types of larger retailers – did enter into a memorandum of understanding a few years back to try to do an education effort project about bringing in your own bags, so that’s why you see a lot of retailers selling reusable bags,” Vanderwood said. “So there is a campaign on behalf of those organizations to educate people to use their own reusable bags.”