Substitute House Bill 1571 passed out of the House Environment Committee on Feb. 12, 2015 with an amendment to exempt the paint stewardship assessment from the B&O tax; watch TVW video of the Feb. 5 hearing (~40-minutes). On March 5, Engrossed Substitute House Bill (ESHB) 1571 was pulled from Rules and passed a House floor vote by 60-38, and now awaits consideration by the Senate.

The bill is a reasonable approach to implementing a paint recycling program led by the private sector paint industry. The paint industry is motivated to run the most efficient program possible and is best suited to manage paint which is a product they deal with on a daily basis.

ESHB 1571 creates an industry-run program, part of a uniform system operating throughout the country for the proper recycling, reuse and disposal of leftover paint. Eight other states, including Oregon, have passed similar legislation initiated by the paint industry.

Paint retailers in Oregon are pleased with their program and find that it brings business in the door when people drop off their paint. Steve Dearborn, CEO of Miller Paint Company, with stores in Oregon and Washington, called it a "retail driver of traffic to our stores" and went on to say that "if the state of Washington adopts this bill, Miller Paint would be interested in becoming a processor [of recycled paint]; it would add probably 25 to 30 jobs; it would keep all that recycling within the state and add jobs here in the state of Washington..." when explaining why he supported the bill.

Listen to three local business owners describe their support for the bill and the business opportunities it will create:

Dustin Wilson, owner of Flying Colors Painting Company in Olympia, talked about leftover paint, costs and why he supports this bill:

I'm a house painter in Olympia. I'm here because I see this [photos of leftover paint cans] in every single house. It is impossible to leave a job without leaving the touch-up paint; there is always leftover paint. As a purchaser of four-to-five thousand gallons of paint a year, I find that this [bill's] assessment would add about $10-15 to the cost of each job, and my average job cost is between $3000 and $4000. I would love it, our customers would love it, if something simple and easy like this [paint stewardship program] happened. –Dustin Wilson, Feb. 5 House bill hearing

Steve Dearborn, CEO of Miller Paint Company, on the business benefits of paint take back, and the job opportunities in paint recycling:

Miller is a manufacturing retailer, been around since 1890, we are 100% employee-owned, and have 26 stores in Oregon, 25 in Washington and one in Idaho. As a manufacturer I think it is important that we take on this issue [paint recycling]... I'd like to speak first as a retailer, the guy across the counter who's addressing the consumer's question as to why they are paying 70-cents in addition to the $30 they are paying to buy a gallon of paint: it gives us the opportunity to explain to the consumer that it's on the bill, it's itemized, it's not hidden and it gives us the opportunity to tell them this is a nonprofit organization, PaintCare, created for the purpose of collecting paint, recycling paint, and then putting it back into the market for sale. It's a positive message. It also gives us the opportunity to explain that 18 of our 26 stores in Oregon are also retail collection sites. As a retailer it's a traffic driver to have people that may not otherwise come back into our store, come back to our store to drop the paint off. The [take back ] process is clean, it's simple, and from our stand point it's a retail driver of traffic to our stores. We teamed up with Metro and we just sold our three-hundred-thousandth gallon of recycled paint [paint made from leftover, take back paint]. This 300,000th gallon of recycled paint means that 1.5 million containers that are about 20% full, are not going to the landfill. If the state of Washington adopts this bill, Miller Paint would be interested in becoming a processor; it would add probably 25 to 30 jobs; it would keep all that recycling within the state and add jobs here in the state of Washington.  –Steve Dearborn, Feb. 5 House bill hearing

Craig Lorch, owner of Total Reclaim and EcoLights Northwest in Seattle, explained the need for product stewardship:

Recyclers are savvy business people and we're willing to take risks but we don't go where we're going to lose money with every pound or gallon of material we process. Product stewardship programs belong where there are market failures, where the recovered materials do not have enough value to pay for the collection system... (TVs, fluorescent light bulbs, unwanted medicines...). The cost of managing paint is more than the value of the recycled product. We have an opportunity to build a robust paint recycling program through passage of this bill and I urge your support of the bill. –Craig Lorch, Feb. 5 House bill hearing

Visit the NWPSC's WA Paint Activities for more information.