BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 617
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CONCURRENCE IN SENATE AMENDMENTS
AB
617 (Perea)
As Amended September 4, 2015
Majority vote
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|ASSEMBLY: | 77-1 | (June 2, |SENATE: | 40-0 | (September 9, |
| | |2015) | | |2015) |
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Original Committee Reference: W., P., & W.
SUMMARY: Modifies last year's Sustainable Groundwater
Management Act (SGMA) to incorporate groundwater planning into
regional planning, allow public-private partnerships, provide
recourse for Groundwater Sustainability Agencies (GSAs) if state
agencies are acting inconsistent to an adopted Groundwater
Sustainability Plan (GSP), add the Public Utilities Commission
(PUC) to the list of entities receiving notice, as specified,
and make other clarifying and technical changes.
The Senate amendments:
1)Add groundwater planning under SGMA to the list of actions
that a regional water management group may choose to address
or incorporate into its integrated regional water management
planning.
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2)Delete language that would have modified the period during
which additional groundwater pumping is prohibited from
creating new prescriptive groundwater rights.
3)Delete the definition of in-lieu use as groundwater recharge
and instead define in-lieu use, separately, as the use of
surface water instead of groundwater in order to leave
groundwater in the basin.
4)Move, to a separate section, a provision allowing a GSA to
appeal to the State Water Resources Control Board (State Water
Board) if a state entity is not cooperating in the
implementation of the GSP.
5)Clarify that a GSA may implement its GSP while awaiting
evaluation and assessment of the GSP by the Department of
Water Resources (DWR).
6)Delete language allowing a mutual water company to join a GSA
using a Joint Powers Agreement.
7)Delete language that provided a GSA with SGMA powers and
authorities upon adoption of a GSP even if that GSP had not
yet been submitted to DWR for review and reverts back to
current law, which requires both adoption and submission.
8)Delete language that would have allowed DWR to extend the
deadline for achieving sustainable management from 20 years to
30 years if litigation prevented a plan or program from being
implemented.
9)Delete language that would have allowed multiple GSAs within
the same basin to use consistent data and methodologies and
instead reverts back to current law, which requires the same
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data and methodologies.
10)Add the PUC to the list of entities that a GSA must notify
regarding how it is going to incorporate the participation of
interested parties in GSP development but only when the
geographic area covered by the GSP includes a PUC-regulated
public water system.
11)Delete language that would have exempted the formation or
election of GSAs from the California Environmental Quality Act
(CEQA). Depending on how a GSA is formed, CEQA may or may not
apply under current law.
12)Address chaptering issues with SB 13 (Pavley), Chapter 255,
Statutes of 2015.
13)Make other technical conforming changes.
EXISTING LAW:
1)Requires DWR to evaluate groundwater basins and designate them
as high, medium, low or very low, according to various factors
including, but not limited to, level of dependence upon the
basin by municipal and agricultural users.
2)Requires that local agencies in high- and medium-priority
basins or subbasins subject to SGMA form one or more GSAs by
June 30, 2017.
3)Requires that GSAs in basins with chronic overdraft develop
and adopt GSPs for their basin or subbasin by January 31,
2020.
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4)Requires that GSAs in all other high and medium priority
basins subject to SGMA develop and adopt GSPs by January 31,
2022.
5)Requires that adopted GSPs utilize a 50-year planning horizon
that will achieve sustainability in a basin or subbasin within
20 years and include identified milestones at five year
intervals.
6)Defines sustainable groundwater management in a GSP as
avoiding undesirable results in the basin or subbasin from
groundwater pumping such as significant and unreasonable:
lowering of groundwater levels: reduction of groundwater
storage; seawater intrusion; degraded water quality; land
subsidence; and, depletions of interconnected surface waters.
7)Provides GSAs with optional tools for reaching sustainability
including, but not limited to, the ability to conduct
investigations, collect fees, limit pumping, require
measurement and reporting of groundwater extractions, monitor
compliance, charge civil penalties for violations, and
implement plans and programs to recharge a basin or subbasin.
8)Requires state agencies to pay the same groundwater extraction
fees as local agencies but does not otherwise subject
sovereign state agencies to local rule.
9)Authorizes the State Water Board to declare a basin in
probationary status and adopt an interim plan for a basin,
subbasin, or portion of a basin or subbasin, under three
circumstances: if there is no GSA for all or a portion of a
basin or subbasin by June 30, 2017; there is no GSP for all or
a portion of a basin or subbasin by the relevant deadline; or,
a submitted GSP is deemed inadequate by DWR and is either in
chronic overdraft or groundwater pumping is causing a
significant depletion of interconnected surface waters.
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FISCAL EFFECT: According to the Senate Appropriations
Committee, there are unknown costs, likely in the mid-tens of
thousands of dollars per notice, to the Water Rights Fund
(special) for the State Water Board to investigate notices that
a state entity is not cooperating in the implementation of a
groundwater sustainability plan.
COMMENTS: SGMA and its related statutory provisions were
developed in 2014 as a three-bill package of legislation after
intensive stakeholder input and involvement, including public
meetings facilitated by Governor Jerry Brown's administration.
SGMA took effect on January 1, 2014. Following SGMA's passage
it was recognized that there might need to be cleanup
legislation. Senator Pavley, one of the original authors of
SGMA, introduced SB 13 as legislation that would amend SGMA with
consensus technical changes. The author states that this bill
was introduced to amend SGMA to address some fundamental policy
questions.
The author engaged in significant stakeholder discussions to
refine this bill as it moved through both the Assembly and the
Senate. In addition, the author worked to remove any
duplication or conflict between this bill and SB 13. This bill
now makes six primary changes to SGMA:
1)Ensures that a regional water management group may coordinate
and incorporate SGMA planning in its regional water management
plan.
2)Clarifies the definition of surface water use in lieu of
groundwater pumping.
3)Authorizes GSAs to enter into public-private partnerships to
facilitate the implementation of GSPs.
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4)Provides local agencies with a notice process and State Water
Board remedy if there is a state entity that is not
cooperating in the implementation of the GSP and that action
or inaction is compromising the ability of the GSA to
implement the GSP.
5)Clarifies that GSAs don't have to wait for DWR to approve
their adopted GSPs before the GSPs can be implemented. Under
the existing deadlines applicable to all GSPs there could be
many complex plans submitted at the same time. Waiting for
all of the GSPs to be evaluated by DWR prior to implementation
could significantly affect attainment of the sustainability
goal in the 20 year time frame and leave the basin in
uncertainty.
6)Requires GSA's to notify the PUC as to how they will
incorporate interested parties in the development of the GSP,
if the geographic area covered by the GSP includes a
PUC-regulated water system. SGMA currently lists
PUC-regulated public water systems as interested parties.
Notifying the PUC as to how the GSA will consider and address
the interests of the public water system could help alert the
PUC if it needs to become involved with GSP development on
behalf of its regulated entity. In addition, as the PUC must
approve any charges to customers of a public water system that
it regulates, early notice could prevent later obstacles to
financing and implementing the GSP.
Following amendment of this bill on September 4, 2015, all
former opposition moved to neutral and there is now no known
opposition to this bill.
Analysis Prepared by:
Tina Leahy / W., P., & W. / (916) 319-2096 FN:
0002240
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