California Legislature—2013–14 Regular Session

Assembly Bill No. 145

Introduced by Assembly Members Perea and Rendon

January 18, 2013

An act to add Sections 116271, 116272, and 116760.25 to the Health and Safety Code, relating to drinking water.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

AB 145, as introduced, Perea. State Water Resources Control Board: drinking water.

The California Safe Drinking Water Act (state act) provides for the operation of public water systems and imposes on the State Department of Public Health various duties and responsibilities. Existing law requires the department to conduct research, studies, and demonstration projects relating to the provision of a dependable, safe supply of drinking water, to adopt regulations to implement the state act, and to enforce provisions of the federal Safe Drinking Water Act.

This bill would transfer to the State Water Resources Control Board the various duties and responsibilities imposed on the department by the state act.

The Safe Drinking Water State Revolving Fund Law of 1997 establishes the Safe Drinking Water State Revolving Fund to provide grants or revolving fund loans for the design and construction of projects for public water systems that will enable suppliers to meet safe drinking water standards. Under that law, the department is responsible for administering the fund.

This bill would also transfer to the state board the authority, duties, powers, purposes, responsibilities, and jurisdiction of the department for the purposes of that law.

Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.  

The Legislature finds and declares the following:

(a) Drinking water is a necessity of human life, and
contaminated drinking water can lead to sickness and death:

(1) California law provides that every human being has the right
to safe, clean, affordable, and accessible water adequate for human
consumption, cooking, and sanitary purposes.

(2) Providing safe drinking water is one of the most fundamental
duties of any government. While Californians rely on public water
systems operated by local agencies and utilities to deliver drinking
water to their homes and businesses, the State of California has a
duty to ensure that water is safe and clean.

(3) Water for drinking is a natural resource that is inherently
public. The people of California own the water within our borders,
and the state grants water rights only for its reasonable use for
beneficial purposes including human consumption.

(4) The California Constitution requires that all diversions and
use of water be reasonable, while the California Supreme Court
has recognized that the state holds a public trust responsibility over
California’s water resources.

(b) Groundwater provides a significant portion of California’s
drinking water, in urban and rural communities alike. From the
earliest days of statehood, communities relied on pumping
groundwater. While not all Californians enjoy groundwater
underlying their communities, those communities that have
groundwater have maximized its use for human consumption:

(1) Of the 8,700 public water systems, 7800 rely on
groundwater, at least in part. These public water systems draw on
more than 15,000 wells, while individual landowners draw drinking
water from thousands more private wells.

(2) Overall, groundwater supplies one-third of the water used
in California in a typical year, and in drought years, as much as
one-half.

(3) Nationally, according to the United States Geological Survey,
51 percent of Americans rely on groundwater for drinking,
including 99 percent of the nation’s rural population. Groundwater
provides 22 percent of all fresh water.

(c) The governance of California’s groundwater resources is
diffused among many public agencies and private parties:

(1) Landowners enjoy a right to use water lying under their
lands for beneficial uses on the surface. When landowners in a
basin draw too much water out of their aquifer, commonly called
“overdraft,” they may go to a court to adjudicate how much water
each landowner may take out.

(2) Based on an adjudication of an aquifer or litigation over
groundwater contamination, a court may structure the management
of an individual aquifer to address overdraft or groundwater
contamination.

(3) Water agencies and groundwater users may voluntarily
establish a joint program to manage the aquifer on which they rely.

(4) Counties may exercise their police powers to address certain
groundwater issues, including the drilling and operation of
groundwater wells. County public health officers also may provide
oversight to or regulate the smaller public water systems in their
jurisdiction that rely on groundwater.

(5) In state government, the State Water Resources Control
Board (the board) has responsibility for protecting groundwater
quality and may adjudicate groundwater rights under certain
circumstances. The State Department of Public Health (the
department) has responsibility for overseeing the operation of
public water systems that use groundwater to provide drinking
water. The board may regulate drinking water source quality but
not the public water system. The department may regulate the
public water system, but not the water source.

(d) The Legislature has sought to address the difficulties of
communities that suffer poor drinking water quality, especially
those in communities that lack the financial resources to resolve
their drinking water problems:

(1) In 2008 the Legislature approved Senate Bill 1 of the Second
Extraordinary Session of 2008, to address nitrate contamination
in the Tulare Lake Basin and the Salinas Valley. That law required
study and development of pilot projects to better understand and
remediate nitrate contamination in those regions. As required, the
board studied and prepared a report addressing nitrate
contamination, which was delivered to the Legislature in 2013.

(2) In 2009, the Legislature adjusted the safe drinking water
program to maximize use of federal stimulus funds available to
communities that lack the resources to improve their water quality
to meet safe drinking water standards.

(3) In each annual Budget Act, the Legislature has appropriated
funding available from a variety of sources, including
voter-approved general obligation bonds, to fix public water
systems that do not provide safe drinking water.

(e) In order to provide Californians with a comprehensive system
to protect their groundwater for drinking water, the state needs a
consolidated and comprehensive strategy and program for
protecting and improving the quality of California’s drinking water
resources, especially from groundwater. The state needs to improve
the quality and availability of groundwater for those communities
that rely on groundwater for drinking. State and local leaders need
to address the conflicts inherent in competing demands for
high-quality groundwater.

(f) The most effective way to create a consolidated and
comprehensive strategy to ensure safe drinking water for all
Californians is consolidating all water quality programs into the
one state agency whose primary mission relates to water quality,
the board. The benefits of that consolidation are numerous,
including the following:

(1) Greater focus of financial and staff support for the drinking
water program.

(2) More coordination and less duplication among programs
addressing drinking water quality.

(3) Greater efficiencies of scale and shared resources, resulting
in overall lower costs.

(4) Broader array of expertise concentrated on drinking water
quality, with agency experience in water quality science and policy.

(5) Coordination between water source protection and drinking
water treatment programs.

(6) More accountability for drinking water programs, with a
unified agency that has responsibility for oversight and funding
and a five-member expert board that makes decisions in public.

(7) Improved understanding and coordination between water
quality and water rights programs.

(8) Consolidated reporting of water use and quality in one
agency.

(9) Agency experience in fighting fraud, as part of the
Underground Storage Tank Cleanup Fund.

(10) Consolidated funding programs for related water resources,
including both source water protection and wastewater treatment.

(11) Combined agency experience in working with the private
sector to leverage public funds for public purposes.

(12) A board decision process that allows for public airing of
the conflicts inherent in managing critical and limited water
resources.

(g) Crafting the most effective management structure for
achieving a comprehensive strategy for protecting drinking water
quality requires broad public participation. It is the intent of the
Legislature to lead a public process that includes all stakeholders
and agencies that may be affected by these reforms to assess the
issues and options for fulfilling the state’s responsibilities to ensure
drinking water quality for all Californians.

SEC. 2.  

Section 116271 is added to the Health and Safety Code,
to read:

116271.  

The Legislature finds and declares the following:

(a) It is the intent of the Legislature to make the most effective
use of California’s limited water and financial resources to ensure
that all communities, regardless of socioeconomic status, enjoy
access to safe and clean drinking water, consistent with the human
right to safe, clean, affordable, and accessible water recognized in
Section 106.3 of the Water Code.

(b) The objectives of this 2013 reorganization of the state’s
drinking water program include the following:

(1) Maximize the efficiency and effectiveness of drinking water,
groundwater, and water quality programs in a single agency whose
primary mission is water quality as follows:

(A) Consolidate regulatory and financing programs into a single
state agency that is most focused on protection of California water
quality, the State Water Resources Control Board.

(B) Provide a one-stop agency where communities can obtain
comprehensive technical assistance that helps resolve all their
water quality challenges.

(C) Minimize administrative costs and interagency differences
on water quality issues.

(2) Create a comprehensive water quality program that addresses
water quality at all stages of the hydrologic cycle as follows:

(A) Connect source water protection and wastewater treatment
options to create a comprehensive strategy to protect water quality
throughout the hydrologic cycle.

(B) Provide comprehensive protection of groundwater quality
for drinking water purposes for all Californians.

(C) Improve the management of California’s groundwater
resources that are used for drinking and other human consumption
purposes.

(D) Focus heightened public attention and government resources
on protecting the particular groundwater aquifers that provide
drinking water.

SEC. 3.  

Section 116272 is added to the Health and Safety Code,
to read:

116272.  

The State Water Resources Control Board succeeds
to and is vested with all of the authority, duties, powers, purposes,
responsibilities, and jurisdiction of the department for the purposes
of this part. The Division of Drinking Water and Environmental
Management of the State Department of Public Health shall
become the Division of Drinking Water Quality of the State Water
Resources Control Board. All references to the department in this
part shall be construed to refer to the State Water Resources
Control Board. This section shall not be construed to impair the
authority of a local health officer to enforce this chapter or a
county’s election not to enforce this chapter, as provided in Section
116500. The State Water Resources Control Board shall accept
responsibility for enforcing this chapter pursuant to a contract, as
provided in Section 116500.

SEC. 4.  

Section 116760.25 is added to the Health and Safety
Code, to read:

116760.25.  

The State Water Resources Control Board succeeds
to and is vested with all of the authority, duties, powers, purposes,
responsibilities, and jurisdiction of the department for the purposes
of this chapter. All references to the department in this chapter
shall be construed to refer to the State Water Resources Control
Board.