Proposals that would have made a range of changes to Connecticut’s bottle redemption law have been reduced to just one: criminal charges for beverage sellers participating in fraud.

Legislators had hoped to create a distributor stewardship program, add Connecticut-specific labels and reduce the redemption rate to 5¢. But a strike-all amendment to SB 457 last week scuttled most of those plans.

“We’ve been meeting over and over and over and over, and I wanted a consensus bill going forward. So the one piece that had consensus was this thing,” said Sen. Rick Lopes, D-New Britain, co-chair of the Environment Committee.

Senate Bill 457 represented a “full menu of ideas,” said Rep. John-Michael Parker, D-Madison, the Environment Committee’s other co-chair. But he said he realized they “didn’t make sense of where we are this year given the [emergency certification bill], and the reality of where we are in the session.”

Connecticut’s bottle redemption rate was up to 97% by the end of 2025, which state officials say is due in part to fraudulent returns.

Legislators passed an emergency certification bill in February that increases fines for fraudulent redemption, requires redemption centers to keep track of bulk drop-offs and allows local police to go after out-of-state violators.

House Minority Leader Vincent J. Candelora, R-North Branford, said he thinks the measures won’t be enough to meaningfully reduce fraud.

“The simple solution is to go back down to 5 cents,” Candelora said.

SB 516, which would set the rate at 5 cents if redemption exceeds 100%, passed out of committee, but it is unlikely to move forward this session, Candelora said.

SB 457 is scheduled to head back to the Senate.