U.S. – March 2020 California Proposition 65 – 60-Day Notices Analysis

Vol. 1149 | 22 Apr 2020

The Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986, commonly referred to as Proposition 65 (Prop 65), is enforced by the California Attorney General’s office or any district attorney or certain city attorneys or by any individual acting in the public interest. Prop 65 requires that an individual acting in the public interest, to enforce the Act give notice of the impending action to the person alleged to be committing the violation, along with the Attorney General, district attorneys and certain city attorneys in which the violation is alleged to have occurred. The notice must be sent to these parties no less than 60 days before commencing the action; thus this notice is commonly referred to as the “60-day Notice of Violation”.

In March 2020, there were 348 60-day notices served for violation of Prop 65, up from 264 notices served in February 2020. The majority of the of the notices – representing 45% – were for exposure to phthalates, 31% of notices for exposure to lead and rest of them were for other chemicals.

The product categories that accounted for the majority of the notices were food with 39% (137 notices) and bags, cases & pouches with 12% (42 notices). This was the first time notices were served for the new product categories of hormone supplements (dietary supplements category) and meal replacers (OTC), with 11 and 1 notices, respectively. Also of note, there were three notices for BPA in clear food containers & thermal paper; three notices each for phthalates in vinyl tape & vinyl aprons; and 10 notices for lead in ceramic kitchen products with external decorations such as mugs, dishes and mortars. Additionally, one notice was issued for PFOA in ski wax.

A detailed analysis of the Prop 65 60-day notices for March 2020 is below:

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For questions, please contact Laxmi Ravikumar (laxmi.ravikumar@intertek.com, +1 630-209-9265) or Pratik Ichhaporia (pratik.ichhaporia@intertek.com, +1-847-212-8273).