SB 623: Water quality: Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund.

Session Year: 2017-2018
House: Senate

Version:

(1)Existing law, the California Safe Drinking Water Act, requires the State Water Resources Control Board to administer provisions relating to the regulation of drinking water to protect public health. Existing law establishes the Office of Sustainable Water Solutions within the State Water Resources Control Board with the purpose of promoting permanent and sustainable drinking water and wastewater treatment solutions to ensure the effective and efficient provision of safe, clean, affordable, and reliable drinking water and wastewater treatment services. Existing law declares it to be the established policy of the state that every human being has the right to safe, clean, affordable, and accessible water adequate for human consumption, cooking, and sanitary purposes.

This bill would establish the Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund in the State Treasury and would provide that moneys in the fund are continuously appropriated to the office. state board. The bill would require the board to administer the fund to assist communities and individual domestic well users to address contaminants in drinking water that exceed safe drinking water standards, as specified. secure access to safe drinking water for all Californians, while also ensuring the long-term sustainability of drinking water service and infrastructure. The bill would authorize the state board to provide for the deposit into the fund of federal contributions and contributions, voluntary contributions, gifts, grants, or bequests. bequests, and settlements from parties responsible for contamination of drinking water supplies. The bill would require the state board to expend moneys in the fund for grants, loans, contracts, or services to assist those communities and individual domestic well owners that rely on contaminated drinking water to have access to eligible applicants with projects relating to the provision of safe and affordable drinking water consistent with a fund implementation plan adopted annually by the state board, as prescribed. The bill would require the state board annually to prepare and make available a report of expenditures of the fund and to adopt annually, after a public hearing, an assessment of funding needed to ensure all Californians have access to safe drinking water. assessment of funding need that estimates the anticipated funding needed for the next fiscal year to achieve the purposes of the fund. The bill would require, by January 1, 2019, the state board, in consultation with local health officers and other relevant stakeholders, to make available a map of aquifers that are used or likely to be used as a source of drinking water that are at high risk of containing contaminants. For purposes of the map, the bill would require local health officers and other relevant local agencies to provide all results of, and data associated with, water quality testing performed by certified laboratories to the board, as specified. By imposing additional duties on local health officers and local agencies, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. By creating a new continuously appropriated fund, this bill would make an appropriation.

The bill would state the intent of the Legislature to subsequently amend the bill to seek specific funding from agricultural operations to assist in providing emergency, interim, and long-term assistance to community water systems and individual domestic well users whose wells are located in agricultural areas.(2)The act provides for the operation of public water systems and imposes on the state board various duties and responsibilities for the regulation and control of drinking water in the state. The act generally does not apply to state small water systems, except that the act requires the board to adopt regulations specifying minimum requirements for operation of a state small water system, which are authorized to be less stringent than the requirements for public water systems, requires the enforcement of these requirements, and authorizes the reasonable costs of the local health officer to be recovered. The act, within 3 years after September 19, 1985, required the State Department of Public Health to, among other things, conduct training workshops to assist health officers in evaluation of small public water systems, as defined, for organic chemical contamination, and in sampling and testing procedures and required the local health officer, in consultation with the department, to conduct an evaluation of all small public water systems under their jurisdictions to determine the potential for contamination of groundwater sources by organic chemicals and to develop a sampling plan for each system within their jurisdiction. The act provided that these provisions were operative during any fiscal year only if the Legislature appropriated sufficient funds to pay for all state-mandated costs to be incurred by local agencies during that year due to these provisions.This bill would require the state board, by January 1, 2019, to promulgate regulations to require state small water systems and individual domestic wells to test their water supply wells for contamination. The bill would require testing to be prioritized based on local water quality conditions and would require the state board to review these regulations at least every 5 years. The bill would exempt these provisions from the above-described inoperative provision.

(2)Existing law, the Fee Collection Procedures Law, the violation of which is a crime, provides procedures for the collection of certain fees and surcharges.

This bill would impose, until July 1, 2020, a safe and affordable drinking water fee in specified amounts on each customer of a public water system, to be administered by the state board, in consultation with the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration, in accordance with the Fee Collection Procedures Law. The bill would exempt from the fee a customer that self-certifies under penalty of perjury the customers satisfaction of specified criteria relating to income. By expanding the crime of perjury, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would require, beginning July 1, 2020, the state board to annually determine the amounts of the safe and affordable drinking water fee not to exceed the amounts imposed until July 1, 2020, and not to exceed the anticipated funding need in the most recent assessment of funding need adopted by the state board pursuant to the Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund provisions, as prescribed. The bill would require the state board, by July 1, 2020, to adopt regulations, in consultation with the Public Utilities Commission, relating to an exemption from the fee for low-income households, as specified. The bill would require a public water system to collect the fee and to remit these moneys to the state board to be deposited into the Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund. The bill would authorize a public water system to apply to the state board to use an alternative method to calculate the fee. By expanding the application of the Fee Collection Procedures Law that imposes criminal penalties for various acts, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

(3)Existing law requires every person who manufactures or distributes fertilizing materials to be licensed by the Secretary of Food and Agriculture and to pay a license fee that does not exceed $300. Existing law requires every lot, parcel, or package of fertilizing material to have a label attached to it, as required by the secretary. Existing law requires a licensee who sells or distributes bulk fertilizing materials to pay to the secretary an assessment not to exceed $0.002 per dollar of sales for all sales of fertilizing materials, as prescribed, for the purposes of the administration and enforcement of provisions relating to fertilizing materials. In addition to that assessment, existing law authorizes the secretary to impose an assessment in an amount not to exceed $0.001 per dollar of sales for all sales of fertilizing materials for the purpose of providing funding for research and education regarding the use of fertilizing materials. Existing law specifies that a violation of the fertilizing material laws or the regulations adopted pursuant to those laws is a misdemeanor.

This bill, until January 1, 2033, would require a licensee to pay to the secretary a fertilizer safe drinking water fee of $0.005 per dollar of sale for all sales of fertilizing materials. The bill, on and after January 1, 2033, would reduce the fee to $0.002 per dollar of sale and would authorize the secretary to reduce the fee as necessary to not exceed the anticipated funding need in the most recent assessment of funding need adopted by the board pursuant to the Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund provisions. The bill would require these moneys to be deposited into the Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund. The bill would authorize the secretary to adopt regulations relating to the administration and enforcement of these provisions. Because a violation of these provisions or regulations adopted pursuant to these provisions would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

(4)Existing law regulates the production, handling, and marketing of milk and dairy products and requires every milk handler subject to that regulatory scheme to pay specified assessments and fees to the Secretary of Food and Agriculture to cover the costs of regulating milk. Existing law governing milk defines handler as any person who, either directly or indirectly, receives, purchases, or otherwise acquires ownership, possession, or control of market milk from a producer, a producer-handler, or another handler for the purpose of manufacture, processing, sale, or other handling. Existing law defines market milk as milk conforming to specified standards and manufacturing milk as milk that does not conform to the requirements of market milk. Existing law provides that a violation of that regulatory scheme or a regulation adopted pursuant to that regulatory scheme is a misdemeanor.

This bill would require, beginning January 1, 2020, until January 1, 2035, each handler subject to that regulatory scheme to deduct from payments made to producers for market and manufacturing milk the sum of $0.01355 per hundredweight of milk as a dairy safe drinking water fee. On and after January 1, 2035, the bill would reduce the fee to $0.00678 per hundredweight of milk and would authorize the secretary to reduce the fee as necessary to not exceed the anticipated funding need in the most recent assessment of funding need adopted by the board pursuant to the Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund provisions. The bill would require these moneys to be deposited into the Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund. The bill would authorize the secretary to take specified enforcement actions and would require the secretary to adopt regulations for the administration and enforcement of these provisions. Because a violation of these provisions or regulations adopted pursuant to these provisions would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

(3)

(5)Under the Porter-Cologne Water Quality Control Act, the State Water Resources Control Board and the California regional water quality control boards are the principal state agencies with authority over matters relating to water quality. The act requires the state board to formulate and adopt state policies for water quality control and requires the regional boards to adopt regional water quality control plans in compliance with the state policies. Under the act, the state board and the regional boards prescribe waste discharge requirements for the discharge of waste that could affect the quality of the waters of the state. The act requires, upon the order of a regional board, a person who has caused or permitted, causes or permits, or threatens to cause or permit any waste to be discharged or deposited where it is, or probably will be, discharged into the waters of the state and creates, or threatens to create, a condition of pollution or nuisance, to clean up the waste or abate the effects of the waste, or in the case of threatened pollution or nuisance, to take other remedial action.

This bill would prohibit the state board or a regional board, until January 1, 2028, from subjecting an agricultural operation, as defined, to specified enforcement for causing or contributing to an exceedance of a water quality objective for nitrate in groundwater or for causing or contributing to a condition of pollution or nuisance for nitrates in groundwater if that agricultural operation demonstrates that it has satisfied certain mitigation requirements, including, among other requirements, the timely payment of any applicable fee, assessment, or charge the fertilizer safe drinking water fee or the dairy safe drinking water fee, as applicable, into the fund. The bill would prohibit the state board or a regional board, beginning January 1, 2028, until January 1, 2033, from subjecting an agricultural operation to specified enforcement for creating or threatening to create a condition of pollution or nuisance for nitrate in groundwater if that agricultural operation demonstrates that it has satisfied the prescribed mitigation requirements. The bill would require the state board, by January 1, 2027, to conduct a public review of regulatory and basin plan amendment implementation programs to evaluate progress toward achieving water quality objectives with respect to nitrates in groundwater and assess compliance with adopted timelines, monitoring requirements, and implementation of best practicable treatment or control.

(6)The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.

This bill would provide that with regard to certain mandates no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.

With regard to any other mandates, this bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs so mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.

Discussed in Hearing