In March testimony before a Rhode Island House committee (YouTube video), Jamie Rhodes of Upstream articulated the fairness and choice that extended producer responsibility (EPR) would bring to existing recycling systems:
"When you buy a product you pay for the raw materials that go into it, the labor and the manufacturing cost, the marketing, the distribution, but you're not paying a single cent into what to do with that material after you're done with it – that entire responsibility is put upon local governments. Managing that waste, from collecting it at your home, running a transfer station, is a burden on local governments. Right now we pay for it through our taxes.
What this bill proposes to do is when you buy it, you pay for the whole thing. It's about choice for consumers and fairness for manufacturers. Right now I have no choice that my tax dollars pay for and subsidize the recycling needs of all of my neighbors.
If we move to EPR, I pay for the recycling program that I use..."
According to an article in Recycling Today, the bill was held for further study (note that an EPR bill for mattresses was held for study in 2012 before passing the general assembly in 2013).