Senate committee approves repeal of 2021 e-waste law after funding and data-security concerns

Senator Mark Johnson told the committee that Senate Bill 310 would repeal a problematic electronic-waste law passed in 2021 and is not intended to stop collection, recycling or reuse of electronics. "First of all, I wanna make sure that everyone present understands that this is not doing away with the process that would do it," he said.

The repeal was supported by the Department of Transformation and Shared Services, which said the statute created implementation confusion and potential conflicts with existing Title 25 provisions governing Marketing and Redistribution (M&R). Shannon Hollyon, chief legal counsel for TSS, said the act passed in 2021 (Act 839 of 2021) conflicted with Arkansas Code Annotated Section 25-5-34107 and that the department recommended repeal to resolve the legal tension.

Opponents and local recycling officials warned of practical consequences. Craig Douglas, director of a regional recycling district, said that grant funding that previously supported regional collection was discontinued and that without the current program "there is no e-waste program in Arkansas for the general public." He said that without the state program, districts currently funding collections will run out of money.

Philip Cole, manager of Marketing and Redistribution at TSS, said M&R sells used electronics and that last year his office sold "a little over $900,000 of used electronics." He said repeal as written would undercut that revenue stream and complicate logistics for statewide collection and resale.

Douglas also cited data-security concerns: he recounted a purchase of hard drives that contained UAMS data and said the 2021 law required custody tracking and scrubbing of drives before resale. "The program that was passed in '21 would ensure that there would be tracking of custody and also the elimination of all, and the scrubbing of all hard drives and memory of any electronic waste that was collected," he said.

After receiving testimony from TSS staff, recycling-district representatives and legal counsel, the committee voted by voice to repeal the statute as requested by the administration.