U.S. – December 2019 California Proposition 65 – 60-Day Notices Analysis

Vol. 1138 | 13 Mar 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 December 2019, there were 211 60-day notices served for violation of Prop 65, up from 155 notices served in November 2019. The majority (132 total) of the of the notices – representing 62% – were for exposure to phthalates, 14% of notices were for exposure to lead and rest of them were for other chemicals.

Bags, which include cases, pouches and packaging, accounted for 30% (64 notices for phthalates), followed by food with 19% (40 notices). Hexavalent chromium continues to be a target in leather products, with five notices for gloves, while the presence of bisphenol-A continues as well, with notices to two polymeric products – one for a phone case and another for sunglasses. There were four notices for phthalates in footwear and 13 notices for lead in glassware and ceramic ware with external decorations.

A detailed analysis of the Prop 65 60-day notices for December 2019 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).