BILL ANALYSIS
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | SB 220|
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UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Bill No: SB 220
Author: Corbett (D)
Amended: 9/7/07
Vote: 21
SENATE HEALTH COMMITTEE : 6-4, 4/18/07
AYES: Kuehl, Alquist, Cedillo, Ridley-Thomas, Steinberg,
Yee
NOES: Aanestad, Cox, Maldonado, Wyland
NO VOTE RECORDED: Negrete McLeod
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : 9-6, 5/31/07
AYES: Torlakson, Cedillo, Corbett, Florez, Kuehl, Oropeza,
Ridley-Thomas, Steinberg, Yee
NOES: Cox, Aanestad, Ashburn, Dutton, Runner, Wyland
NO VOTE RECORDED: Battin, Simitian
SENATE FLOOR : 23-16, 6/7/07
AYES: Alquist, Calderon, Cedillo, Corbett, Ducheny,
Florez, Kehoe, Kuehl, Lowenthal, Migden, Negrete McLeod,
Oropeza, Padilla, Perata, Ridley-Thomas, Romero, Scott,
Simitian, Steinberg, Torlakson, Vincent, Wiggins, Yee
NOES: Aanestad, Ackerman, Ashburn, Battin, Cogdill,
Correa, Cox, Denham, Dutton, Harman, Hollingsworth,
Machado, Maldonado, Margett, McClintock, Wyland
NO VOTE RECORDED: Runner
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 44-33, 9/10/07 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : Vended water
CONTINUED
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SOURCE : Clean Water Action
Consumer Federation of California
East Bay Municipal Utility District
Latino Issues Forum
DIGEST : This bill enhances the Department of Public
Healths regulatory process governing water dispensed from
WVMs and the labeling requirements for bottled water.
Assembly Amendments (1) changed the telephone hotline
number that must be referenced in the bottled water report
required in the bill from the United States Environmental
Protection Agency's Safe Drinking Water Hotline to the
United States Food and Drug Administration, Food and
Cosmetic Hotline, (2) clarified that the changes in the
bottled water labeling requirements only apply to water
bottled on or after January 1, 2009, (3) clarified that the
changes made to the labeling section of the bill do not
take effect until January 1, 2009, and (4) made other
technical and conforming changes.
ANALYSIS :
Existing federal law:
1. Charges the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) with
regulating bottled water as a food. The Federal Food,
Drug, and Cosmetic Act provides the FDA with broad
regulatory authority over food.
2. Under the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), sets the
framework for regulation of drinking water quality in
the United States by the Environmental Protection
Agency. Under the SDWA, a state is authorized to assume
responsibility for managing the safety of its drinking
water quality if the state is certified as having a
program at least as stringent as, or more stringent
than, the federal program. California has been given
that authority.
Existing state law:
1. Defines a "water-vending machine" (WVM) as any
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self-service device that, upon payment, dispenses a unit
volume of water to be used for drinking, culinary, or
other purposes involving a likelihood of the water being
ingested by humans.
2. Prescribes various quality and labeling standards for
both bottled and vended water, including mineral water,
and also limits the levels of certain contaminants that
may be contained in those water products.
3. Establishes a fee schedule for bottled and vended water
licenses, and sets the annual fee for WVMs at $10.25.
Effective July 1, 2007, responsibility for the
administration of the above-mentioned provisions will be
transferred to the Department of Public Health (DPH).
4. Requires weights and measures sealers to inspect and
test packaged commodities and all commercially used
devices and to inspect the validity of transactions
derived from the use of such devices.
5. Requires bottled water, WVMs, and containers provided by
retail water facilities to contain specified information
and to be clearly labeled in an easily readable format.
6. Requires that WVMs, retail water facilities, and private
water sources that sell water at retail sites display
prescribed information.
7. Permits bottled water to be labeled "drinking water,"
notwithstanding the source or characteristics of the
water, only if it is processed pursuant to the FDA Good
Manufacturing Practices, and any other requirements
established by the Department of Health Services (DHS).
Any vended water and any water from a retail water
facility may be labeled "drinking water,"
notwithstanding the source or characteristics of the
water, only if it is processed pursuant to current state
law related to vending machines and any other
requirements established by DHS. Effective July 1,
2007, responsibility for the administration of the
above-mentioned provisions will be transferred to DPH.
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This bill:
1. Requires a WVM to be designed to remove turbidity,
off-tastes and odors, provide disinfection treatment,
and reduce or remove dissolved solids.
2. Requires, starting January 1, 2009, a WVM to be cleaned,
serviced, and sanitized at least once every 31 days,
requires WVM owners to keep inspection and consumer
complaint records and make them available to the DPH
upon request.
3. Requires DPH, starting January 1, 2009, to inspect at
least 20 percent of WVMs annually, allows DPH to conduct
more frequent and timely inspections of WVMs that
violate the above provisions, and allows DPH to embargo
a violating WVM and impose any penalty that DPH deems
appropriate.
4. Increases, from $16 to $40, the annual license fee paid
by WVM owners to DPH for each machine in operation.
This license fee is annually adjusted to reflect
inflation and other cost factors.
5. Requires the telephone number WVM owners and other
retail vendors of water must currently provide for
further information, service, or complaints to be
toll-free or local, and requires the applicable DPH
toll-free telephone to be posted.
6. Requires inspection information, container
recommendations, and the WVM license decal or seal to be
posted, and requires all information to be posted in
both English and Spanish.
7. Requires bottled water plants, as a condition of
licensure, to annually prepare a bottled water report
that includes various statements as prescribed and
requires the report be made available to consumers.
8. Requires bottled water sold in a beverage container to
include, on its label, additional label or on a package
insert, the name and contact information for the bottler
or brand owner, the source of the water in the bottle,
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contact information for obtaining a bottled water report
on the quality of the water and other related
information, as prescribed.
9. Requires bottlers who sell directly to consumers to
include, on each billing statement, contact information
for the bottler or brand owner and the how to obtain a
bottled water report on the quality of the water.
10.Requires DPH, in its annual budget report to the
Legislature, to provide information on WVM and bottled
water licenses, inspections, violations and corrective
actions, and fines levied.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: Yes
According to the Senate Appropriations Committee:
Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2007-08 2008-09 2009-10 Fund
Vendor inspections (DPH) $0 $142
$142General
SUPPORT : (Verified 9/10/07)
Clean Water Action (co-source)
Consumer Federation of California (co-source)
East Bay Municipal Utility District (co-source)
Latino Issues Forum (co-source)
Association of California Water Agencies
California League of Conservation Voters
California Trout
California Watershed Network
Culligan
Environment California
Environmental Justice Coalition for Water
Environmental Working Group
Food & Water Watch
Irvine Ranch Water District
Learning Disabilities Association of California
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California
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National Resources Defense Council
Planning and Conservation League
San Francisco Public Utilities Commission
San Jerardo Cooperative, Inc.
Santa Clara Water District
Santa Rosa Water District
Sierra Club California
Sonoma County Water Agency
OPPOSITION : (Verified 9/10/07)
California Bottled Water Association
California Chamber of Commerce
California Grocers Association
International Bottled Water Association
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : The East Bay Municipal Utility
District (EBMUD), the co-sponsor of this bill, writes that
bottled water quality information is not consistently made
available to consumers and that many vended water
facilities are not clearly labeled or regularly inspected.
EBMUD contends that this bill will provide improved
consumer protection so that consumers can make informed
choices about the drinking water they consume. The
Learning Disabilities Association of California writes that
this bill will ensure that purchasers of bottled and vended
water are getting a safer, toxic-free product and that
consumers have readable product information and phone
numbers to call if questions or problems arise. The
Environmental Working Group (EWG) contends that consumers
pay 100 times more for vended water than for tap water and
even higher prices for bottled water, and they have a right
to know what is in this water. EWG also writes that the
findings of their studies show that current laws governing
vended and bottled water are not properly enforced and that
this bill addresses this problem by setting up an
inspection program. The Sierra Club of California and the
Natural Resources Defense Council write that the state
agency currently tasked with enforcing bottled and vended
water regulations exercise limited oversight. They state
that, in the case of vended water, inspections are
conducted only when complaints are received and this puts
low-income communities, who rely on vended water as their
primary drinking water, at a disadvantage.
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ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION : The California Chamber of
Commerce writes that bottled water is regulated as a food
product under the FDA, which subjects the industry to
specific packaging, sanitation, and food processing laws
and that testing requirements, inspections and monitoring
rules are already in place. The Chamber contends that
since their members market products nationally and
worldwide, it is more efficient to have national standards
rather than state-only requirements, which add costs to
products and complexities to distribution systems. The
California Grocers Association (CGA) is concerned that the
requirements of this bill are unnecessary in light of
existing laws and regulations. CGA states that federal law
already establishes maximum chemical contaminant levels and
state law already specifies labeling requirements. CGA
further states that bottled water is considered a food
product under federal law and is subject to comprehensive
statutory and regulatory framework. CGA contends that
given this food product status, it seems impractical to
change the state regulation, as bottled water will still be
subject to federal packaging, sanitation, and food
processing requirements. The California Nevada Soft Drink
Association opposes this bill because existing state and
federal law(s) already provides for the licensure and
regulation of entities that produce bottled water, federal
law establishes requirements for maximum chemical
containment levels, and they fail to see the need for
distributing the kinds of information contained in the CCR.
The California Bottled Water Association writes that this
bill imposes added costs and regulations to the industry
but provides no greater consumer protections.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR :
AYES: Arambula, Bass, Beall, Berg, Brownley, Caballero,
Charles Calderon, Carter, Coto, Davis, De La Torre, De
Leon, DeSaulnier, Dymally, Eng, Evans, Feuer, Fuentes,
Hayashi, Hernandez, Huffman, Jones, Karnette, Krekorian,
Laird, Leno, Levine, Lieber, Lieu, Ma, Mendoza, Mullin,
Nava, Portantino, Price, Ruskin, Salas, Saldana, Solorio,
Soto, Swanson, Torrico, Wolk, Nunez
NOES: Adams, Aghazarian, Anderson, Benoit, Berryhill,
Blakeslee, Cook, DeVore, Duvall, Emmerson, Fuller,
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Gaines, Galgiani, Garcia, Garrick, Horton, Houston, Huff,
Jeffries, Keene, La Malfa, Maze, Nakanishi, Niello,
Parra, Plescia, Sharon Runner, Silva, Smyth, Spitzer,
Tran, Villines, Walters
NO VOTE RECORDED: Hancock, Strickland, Vacancy
CTW:mw 9/11/07 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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