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SUNY Professor Sherri Mason met with the first municipal board on her list as she seeks local interest for her elimination of plastic bags initiative.

Mason, who presented before the Dunkirk Rotary Club back in April about the initiative, met with the Village of Fredonia Board of Trustees last week to share the idea and garner support.

"Single-use disposable bags which are predominantly disposable bags litter our countryside. You can walk down Vineyard Drive and there are five of them stuck there even though they cleaned it up last week," she said. "Some places are banning them, but more predominantly places are instituting fees. So in order to use a plastic bag a consumer has to buy them from the store, with the intent that hopefully instead of buying a disposable bag they will choose to buy a reusable bag."

The country of Ireland, she said, began this process in 2002, introducing a 10-cent fee and has seen a 93 percent reduction in plastic bag usage as a result.

"I'm trying to work with the village, the town of Dunkirk and city of Dunkirk to impose a similar fee here. I wanted to start at 10 cents but I want it to double every year until it gets to $1 in year five and then it would freeze at $1," she said. "You can spend $1 on a plastic bag or you can spend $1 on a reusable bag, and hopefully people would make that change."

Mason said she would like to educate people about the initiative and have a referendum on the idea.

"I think it's really important that we get a lot of community awareness and support for something like this, so I would propose a referendum. If we're going to get it to not only be implemented but to stay. I don't want us to pass something and then have it repealed," she said.