Los Angeles County Supervisors yesterday approved a ban on all plastic shopping bags in unincorporated areas. Cities within the county still have the ability to regulate, or not regulate bags, but for all those other areas in the county, the bags are going to be phased out. The Los Angeles Times estimates that this will effect about 1,000 stores. An estimated 6 billion shopping bags are used throughout Los Angeles County each year.

The proliferation of plastic bags has wreaked environmental havoc. A Pulitzer Prize-winning Los Angeles Times series in 2006 documented how plastics were choking the seas. In one region in the Pacific Ocean halfway between San Francisco and Hawaii, a garbage patch twice the size of Texas is swirling clockwise, filled with plastic debris that is ingested by birds and other wildlife.