AB 1583 New California Legislation Targets Pallet Theft - Reusable ...

Pal­let and con­tainer theft in Cal­i­for­nia has been an ongo­ing prob­lem, as we were reminded of with the most recent pal­let theft arrests by the plas­tic indus­trial theft task force. New leg­is­la­tion has been intro­duced in Cal­i­for­nia, pre­sum­ably with the intent to deter pal­let theft in that state.

Cal­i­for­nia state assem­bly mem­ber Roger Hernán­dez has intro­duced AB 1583. Accord­ing to the pro­posed leg­is­la­tion, “This bill would pro­hibit junk deal­ers and recy­clers from pur­chas­ing or receiv­ing mer­chan­dise pal­lets, as defined, marked with an indi­cia of own­er­ship, as defined, from any­one except the indi­cated owner, unless spec­i­fied infor­ma­tion is pro­vided to the junk dealer or recy­cler, and would require the junk dealer or recy­cler to main­tain a writ­ten record of that information.”

To reit­er­ate, if the seller is not the indi­cated owner, “a junk dealer or recy­cler may pur­chase or receive mer­chan­dise pal­lets only if the seller or trans­feror pro­vides a receipt from the indi­cated owner ver­i­fy­ing the seller’s cur­rent own­er­ship or a doc­u­ment indi­cat­ing that the seller or trans­feror is autho­rized by the indi­cated owner to sell or trans­fer the mer­chan­dise pallets.”

The intent of this leg­is­la­tion is good news for the many com­pa­nies that have pal­lets stolen in Cal­i­for­nia. It would, how­ever, cause paper­work headaches for legit­i­mate pal­let recy­clers who receive loads of used pal­lets on a daily basis from sources such as con­sumer prod­ucts dis­tri­b­u­tion cen­ters, includ­ing some pal­lets with com­pany names sten­ciled or branded.

Addi­tion­ally, if the new leg­is­la­tion turned out to be suc­cess­ful in dis­suad­ing pal­let pick­ers from recov­er­ing owner branded pal­lets, this could result in more pal­lets left stacked in alleys and lean­ing against walls – great for reduc­ing pal­let theft but not with­out other poten­tially expen­sive com­pli­ca­tions. Be care­ful what you wish for, as they say. With leg­is­la­tion or with­out, an effec­tive reusables man­age­ment pro­gram remains an essen­tial best prac­tice enhanced, but cer­tainly not replaced by leg­is­la­tion.

To read a copy of pro­posed bill click here CA AB 1583