BILL ANALYSIS �
SB 1168
Page 1
SENATE THIRD READING
SB 1168 (Pavley)
As Amended August 19, 2014
Majority vote
SENATE VOTE :24-12
WATER, PARKS & WILDLIFE 9-4 APPROPRIATIONS 11-5
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|Ayes:|Rendon, Bocanegra, Fong, |Ayes:|Gatto, Bocanegra, |
| |Frazier, Gatto, Gomez, | |Bradford, |
| |Gonzalez, Rodriguez, | |Ian Calderon, Campos, |
| |Yamada | |Gomez, Holden, Pan, |
| | | |Quirk, Ridley-Thomas, |
| | | |Weber |
| | | | |
|-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------|
|Nays:|Bigelow, Dahle, Beth |Nays:|Bigelow, Donnelly, Jones, |
| |Gaines, Gray | |Linder, Wagner |
| | | | |
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SUMMARY : Requires adoption of a sustainable groundwater
sustainability plan (GSP) by January 1, 2020, for all high or
medium priority basins as determined by the Department of Water
Resources (DWR) according to specified criteria, unless the
basin is legally adjudicated or the local agency establishes it
is otherwise being sustainably managed. Specifically, this
bill :
1)Makes findings including, but not limited to, California's
high reliance on groundwater to meet its water needs; the
necessity of integrated surface and groundwater management in
order to meet the state's water management goals; and the
failed wells, deteriorated water quality, environmental
damage, and irreversible land subsidence that occur when
groundwater is not properly managed.
2)Establishes that it is the policy of the state that all
groundwater basins are managed sustainably for multiple
economic, social and environmental benefits and that such
management is best achieved locally based on best available
science.
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3)Enacts the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (Act) with
the stated intent of empowering local groundwater agencies to
sustainably manage groundwater basins through the development
of GSPs.
4)Defines sustainable groundwater management, among other terms.
5)Encourages the voluntary participation of California Native
tribes and federal agencies in sustainable groundwater
management while preserving and acknowledging the federally
reserved rights of federally recognized Indian tribes.
6)Specifies that groundwater basins are those identified in
DWR's Bulletin No. 118, as it may be amended, and includes
subbasins.
7)Requires DWR, by January 31, 2015, to prioritize each basin as
either a high, medium, low, or very low priority using factors
under the existing California Statewide Groundwater Elevation
Monitoring (CASGEM) program that include, but are not limited
to, population, extent of public wells, overlying irrigated
acreage, reliance on groundwater, and any documented impacts
upon the basin from overdraft, subsidence, saline intrusion
and other water quality degradation.
8)Requires that high and medium priority basins be sustainably
managed through a GSP but excepts:
a) Basins, or portions of basins, that were subject to a
groundwater adjudication; and,
b) Basins that a local agency can demonstrate are already
being sustainably managed.
9)Encourages low and very low priority basins to manage through
a GSP but, should they voluntarily choose to do so, exempts
them from any State compliance actions.
10)Allows any local agency or combination of agencies to
establish a groundwater sustainability agency (GSA) for the
purpose of developing and implementing a GSP.
11)Recognizes and lists special districts that were created in
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legislation for the purpose of managing groundwater and makes
those districts the exclusive entities within their boundaries
with authority to comply with the Act, unless they choose to
opt out.
12)Allows a city or county to be the GSA or, in the case of an
area where no local agency has assumed management, presumes
the county to be the GSA unless the county opts out. If the
county opts out and there is no other local agency, requires
reporting of groundwater extractions directly to the State
Water Resources Control Board (State Water Board).
13)Requires a local agency or combination of local agencies that
is electing to be, or forming, a GSA to notify DWR of the
intent to be a GSA and provide a notice to DWR that includes
the proposed boundaries of the GSA, among other information.
Requires DWR to post the notice to its website.
14)Following public notice, a public hearing, and final action
to become a GSA, requires the GSA to notify DWR within 30 days
and include copies of pertinent documents, as specified.
Requires DWR to post the final notice and documents to its Web
site. Ninety days following posting by DWR, the GSA is
presumed to be the exclusive GSA for its boundaries.
15)Provides for public involvement in the development of GSPs
and sets forth a diverse set of interests that should be
considered by the GSA during that process.
16)Empowers GSAs to collect information regarding the condition
of the basin and then develop and implement a GSP using, as
the GSA chooses, powers and authorities provided under the Act
including, but not limited to:
a) Acquiring land and water to carry out the plan,
including but not limited to spreading, storing, retaining,
percolating, transporting, or reclaiming water to recharge
the basin or provide water supplies in-lieu of groundwater;
b) Monitoring for compliance and limiting extractions;
c) Proposing, collecting, updating and enforcing fees,
consistent with all statutory and Constitutional
requirements; and
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17)Requires, by June 1, 2016, that DWR develop guidelines
regarding:
a) GSP components;
b) Coordination of multiple GSPs for a basin; and,
c) Alternative compliance, including submitting an existing
plan as a functional equivalent of a GSP or submitting an
analysis of basin conditions that demonstrates the basin is
being sustainably managed.
18)Requires that a GSP be completed, adopted, and submitted to
DWR by January 1, 2020, in those high and medium priority
basins that require a GSP.
19)Exempts the preparation and adoption of a GSP from the
California Environmental Quality Act but does not exempt a
project or action to implement the GSP.
20)Requires GSPs to meet certain standards including:
a) Encompassing an entire basin or subbasin; and
b) Being designed to achieve sustainable groundwater
management within 20 years of adoption with progress
reports to DWR and the State Water Board every five years.
21)Requires a GSA to annually report to DWR its groundwater
elevation data, aggregated extraction data, use or
availability of surface water for recharge or in-lieu
supplies, total water use, and change in groundwater storage.
22)Allows DWR to adjust basin boundaries, as specified, and
re-prioritize low and very low basins according to criteria
that include adverse impacts to habitat and surface water
resources.
23)Provides that if a basin is reprioritized to medium or high,
it shall have two years from the date of reprioritization to
form a governance entity for sustainable management or submit
an alternate means of establishing the basin is sustainably
managed. If no alternate means is approved, allows five years
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to adopt a GSP in compliance with the Act.
24)Prohibits the adoption or renewal of existing groundwater
management plans that do not meet the requirements for a GSP
but allows such plans to remain in effect until a GSP is
adopted.
25)Allows a GSA to become a CASGEM monitoring agency.
26)Contains chaptering language that only allows this bill to
become operative if AB 1739 (Dickinson) of the current
legislative session, is enacted and becomes operative this
session.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Provides the State Water Board with broad powers to regulate
the waste and unreasonable use of water, including
groundwater.
2)Categorizes groundwater as either a subterranean stream
flowing through a known and definite channel or percolating
groundwater. Groundwater that is a subterranean stream is
subject to the same State Water Board water right permitting
requirements as surface water. There is no statewide
permitting requirement for percolating groundwater, which is
the majority of groundwater.
3)Encourages local agencies to work cooperatively to manage
groundwater resources within their jurisdictions and, if not
otherwise required by law, to voluntarily adopt GMPs.
4)Requires that a GMP contain components related to funding,
management, and monitoring in order for a local agency to be
eligible for groundwater project funds administered by DWR.
5)Allows a GMP to voluntarily contain additional listed
components.
6)Requires all of the groundwater basins identified in DWR's
Groundwater Report, Bulletin No. 118, to be regularly and
systematically monitored locally and the information to be
readily and widely available.
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7)Requires DWR to perform the groundwater elevation monitoring
function if no local entity will do so but then bars the
county and other entities eligible to monitor that basin from
receiving state water grants or loans.
8)Requires DWR to prioritize groundwater basins based on
multiple factors including, but not limited to, the level of
population and irrigated acreage relying on the groundwater
basin as a primary source of water and the current impacts on
the groundwater basin from overdraft, subsidence, saline
intrusion and other water quality degradation.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee:
1)Increased annual General Fund costs to DWR of approximately $4
million beginning in fiscal year (FY) 2019-20 to collect and
manage data, complete evaluations, and assist the State Water
Board in developing interim plans. DWR received $22.5 million
in the 2014-15 Budget ($2.5 million for FY 2014-15 and $5
million each year from FY 2015-16 through FY 2018-19 which
will fund Bulletin 118 updates and technical assistance.
2)Increased annual GF costs of between $200,000 and $600,000 for
two years for State Water Board to adopt a fee schedule and
develop evaluations guidelines. Increased out-year costs of
between $1 million and $2.5 million (special fund) including
state interim plans to be covered by fee revenues.
3)Minor, if any, reimbursable local government costs.
COMMENTS : As Benjamin Franklin warned over 200 years ago, we
know the worth of water when the well is dry. Unfortunately,
for many Californians that is a stark reality or a pending
calamity that has been coming in slow-motion for 50 years. In
its August 15, 2014, editorial the Sacramento Bee notes that it
was in 1962 that an Assembly Interim Committee on Water dodged
the issue of needed groundwater management by advising the
Legislature it should act if the situation got worse. It got
worse. Sixteen years later, in 1978, the Governor's Commission
to Review California Water Rights Law, a group commissioned by
Governor Jerry Brown, found the groundwater situation was
critical and that comprehensive local management had not been
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undertaken in many overdrafted areas of the state. Again, there
was no action.
An August 18, 2014, Los Angeles Times column asserts there is no
better time to act than now. The Times notes that the
recently-passed $7.545 bond for water-related projects and
programs that is scheduled for the November 2014 ballot contains
$100 million for planning and implementing groundwater
management, $800 million for cleaning up groundwater, $700
million for recycling and $2.7 billion for dam building. As the
Los Angeles Times column states, these are projects that can
help replenish underground basins but it will take pumping rules
to assure taxpayers that they're getting their money's worth.
The Times Los Angeles column concludes, the State has been
ignoring experts' increasing warnings regarding groundwater
depletions for decades and holding off on groundwater regulation
since statehood but together this bill and a related measure AB
1739, seek to empower local governments to manage groundwater
sustainably while allowing the state to step in if they fail to
do so.
While California uses more groundwater than any other state, it
is the last in the Union to lack an enforceable set of statewide
groundwater management standards. Groundwater informational
hearings in the Assembly Water, Parks & Wildlife Committee and
the Senate Natural Resources & Water Committee in March 2014
revealed disturbing statistics on the current degradation of
some of California's groundwater basins: between 2003 and 2009
the groundwater aquifers for the Central Valley and its major
mountain water source, the Sierra Nevadas, lost almost 26
million acre-feet of water - nearly enough water combined to
fill Lake Mead, America's largest reservoir. The findings
reflected the effects of California's extended drought and the
resulting increased rates of groundwater being pumped for human
uses, such as irrigation.
In response to the crisis two bills were introduced in the
Legislature, this bill and AB 1739. Following introduction of
both bills the authors began extensive stakeholder outreach
facilitated by both a nonprofit nonpartisan foundation and an
association of water agencies. During this time, the
Administration of Governor Brown also proposed statutory
language to manage groundwater, made it available on the
internet, and started a series of public stakeholder meetings.
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In July 2014, four professionally facilitated public meetings
were convened and led by representatives of both authors as well
as the Administration. Following those meetings language was
taken from each bill and the Administration's proposal and
crafted into one integrated statute. That language was amended
into both this bill and AB 1739, making them identical. Both
authors also became coauthors of each bill. When the integrated
statute came into print, another professionally-facilitated
stakeholder meeting was held to get additional input on
refinements.
The August 18, 2014 amendments to this bill and AB 1739 divided
the integrated statute into two logical pieces that must be
enacted together and included many of the stakeholder-suggested
refinements. This bill contains: the general policy of the
State regarding sustainable groundwater management; the Act's
general provisions, including the requirement for high and
medium priority basins to manage sustainably, as defined; basin
boundary adjustment language; requirements and authorities for
establishing GSAs; powers and authorities of GSAs; and, required
GSP components. AB 1739 includes provisions related to
coordination between local land use agencies and GSAs as well as
those provisions of the Act regarding: DWR technical assistance;
GSA financial authorities; GSA enforcement powers; State
evaluation and assessment of GSPs; and, State intervention
should the requirements of the statute not be met, including
authority for the State Water Board to require reporting of
groundwater withdrawals and charge fees for its interim
management activities. In many respects this bill contains the
actions related to establishing GSAs and planning GSPs while AB
1739 contains most of the complimentary implementation tools and
enforcement authorities, both State and local.
The author states that this bill is needed because California
faces a groundwater crisis. The author points out that the
cumulative overdraft of our groundwater basins is equivalent to
the entire amount of water stored in Lake Tahoe and that in many
areas of the state, local groundwater managers lack the tools
and authorities to manage the groundwater basins. The author
concludes that without improved local management the overdraft
in many parts of the state will get even worse over the next
several years. Other supporters add that a new statewide policy
for sustainable groundwater management is urgently needed and
that this bill addresses one of California's most pressing water
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management issues. Supporters point out that breadth of the
stakeholder involvement process that was used in order to help
ensure the right balance of provisions to empower local
groundwater management agencies with new tools and authorities
and to create an appropriate state backstop that will allow the
state to intervene only when needed.
Opponents state they share the author's interest in improving
groundwater management but are concerned about the broad scope
and specific impacts of this measure. Opponents believe this
bill is extraordinarily ambitious and comprehensive and that in
its current form it would substantially alter the California
landscape and economy for generations to come. Opponents are
concerned that this bill could require hundreds of millions of
dollars in implementation costs and are worried about potential
affects to existing groundwater rights and generate litigation.
Opponents maintain the legislation goes beyond the goal of
sustainable groundwater management and will adversely affect the
agricultural economy and the landscape that is dependent upon it
and cause a potential devaluation in some land thus affecting
property tax collections in some areas and the services and
programs that are dependent upon them. Opponents advocate
delaying action in order to avoid what they believe would be
unanticipated consequences.
Analysis Prepared by : Tina Cannon Leahy / W., P. & W. / (916)
319-2096
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