Ask your legislators to support TWRRA.
Not sure who your legislators are?
No worries - we got you covered!
What do I say?
The following script should take just 2 minutes to read through on the phone, or could be adapted for an email.
Introduce yourself.
Summarize the key points of the bill.
Ask for their vote.
Thank them for their time.
Part 1: Introduce yourself.
“Hello, my name is <your name>.
I have lived in <your city or neighborhood> for <number of years>.”
Part 2: Summarize key points of the bill.
Tennessee has a major packaging waste problem. We recycle only 12% of all potentially recyclable packaging, and send the rest to our landfills - which are rapidly running out of space.
Moreover, just 47% of Tennesseans have access to recycling.
The major barrier to expanding recycling in Tennessee - is funding.
The Tennessee Waste Reduction and Recycling Act creates a sustainable funding mechanism that provides the needed investment to expand recycling to 100% of Tennessee residents, increase recycling rates, and prevent valuable packaging from ending up in our landfills.
Taxpayers and municipalities will no longer fund recycling - it will be funded by the producers who make the packaging, through a system called EPR. EPR incentivizes companies to minimize their overall packaging volume, and makes recycling truly circular, by encouraging producers to use recycled materials in their packaging, and make sure their packaging can itself be recycled.
EPR will bring thousands of new jobs and economic development into Tennessee by investing into the existing recycling infrastructure to collect, process and recycle more recyclables.
EPR will convert 900,000 tons of packaging waste per year currently landfilled into a valuable commodity that Tennessee businesses need - turning our trash into cash.