The Chair of the Assembly Water, Parks, and Wildlife Committee talks about the current drought, Prop 1 funds, and what water legislation is on the horizon for the legislature in 2015
At the 2015 ACWA Spring Conference, the speaker for the opening breakfast was Assemblymember Marc Levine, who has been the representative for 10th Assembly District, comprised of Marin County and Southern Sonoma County, since November of 2012. He currently chairs the Assembly Committee on Water, Parks, and Wildlife, the committee which is responsible for overseeing Water Bond expenditures, implementing a long-term plan to protect the state’s parks, and protecting endangered species, migratory birds, and other wildlife.
During his speech, he gave his perspective on the current drought, and the what he hopes the legislature will accomplish in water issues in 2015.
Here’s what he had to say …
There are many words that we can use to describe the state of our water situation in California right now, but one of the words that really comes to mind is uncertainty. A number of questions that we also have that come to mind, when it will it rain or snow again? Is the current drought the new normal? How many times have we heard that. What will happen with water rights? What will happen with water deliveries? How will we come up with new solutions for the shortages that we’re experiencing? Will we come together on these solutions or will we devolve into some sort of water civil war?
Nevertheless, one thing is certain. No water agency can get through this water crisis in isolation. We must all come through this together. The alternative is unacceptable. Every water agency here today is tasked with the unenviable charge of delivering water to your customers in the midst of a statewide and historic drought. You’re customers don’t really care where the water comes from; they just want the water when they need it, and they don’t want to overpay for their water, either.
And yet, you all know that demand for water is far greater than the supply. And so I’m asked to be here today to talk about pending legislation dealing with water during this drought. I’m sure it comes as no surprise that all 120 lawmakers would love to offer legislation that would deal with the effects of drought on their communities. However, this is not a county-by-county or community-by-community problem. The entire state is suffering in this drought, and we need to deal with the drought through that perspective.
Every water agency in California needs to reach out to those who serve and ask your customers to take serious water conservation measures. Low flow toilets and short showers are just simply not enough. We need much more. Water users need to be encouraged to take aggressive steps in conservation. Your agencies have a vital role in that effort and our statewide success is directly dependent upon your efforts.
Beyond water conservation, we need to explore all alternatives to reuse every drop of our precious water. Recognizing California’s water crisis, last year was a landmark in California water policy. 2014 will be remembered as the year we passed the historic water bond and the year we began managing California’s groundwater. Last year the voters approved Proposition 1, the water bond, and the legislature passed the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act that we now call SGMA.
In my first few weeks as chair of the Assembly Water, Parks, and Wildlife Committee, I held an informational oversight hearing on Proposition 1 and on its implementation. I held that hearing because having a $7.5 billion bond to invest in water projects and programs is an incredible opportunity, but it is also a tremendous responsibility. Last November, the voters gave us trust when the water bond passed by a two to one margin. Now we have to demonstrate that the electoral support will translate into actions that will benefit all Californians and put us on a path towards water sustainability.
As we enter our fourth year of drought, the need for innovative, creative, and enduring water solutions could not be more apparent. We have an old and leaking infrastructure. We also have serious groundwater contamination issues in many parts of the state. In many small communities, many of them in economically disadvantaged areas, they can’t or shouldn’t be drinking the water from their taps. Other communities have no water at all. The water bond can’t solve all of these problems, but it can be a down payment on approaches that look towards maximizing multiple public benefits. For example, you can design a smart water project so it handles excess runoff that might do so by sending it to a wetland that filters the water, thus improving water quality, while also providing habitat for fish and wildlife and open space for nearby residents.
But in addition to creativity, we need accountability. That’s where the legislature comes in, and I take that oversight role very seriously. Most but not all of the bond dollars will have to move through the legislative appropriations process. In January, the Governor proposed a little more than half a billion dollars of water bond money to be spent this next fiscal year. This proposal acts on last year’s California Water Action Plan, which is the administration’s five year blue print for investing in integrated water solutions. All of the administration’s water-related funding proposals are tied back to that plan. So that’s a good start. But there are many details to be worked out. Are those the right amounts? How will they choose the projects? What weight will they give to criteria like whether the project provides multiple benefits, how will they track and measure success? These questions and many others were asked at our hearing, and to address them, we received testimony from the Legislative Analyst’s Office, the state agencies administering Prop 1 dollars, and stakeholders such as ACWA, representing a wide variety of interests.
There were some interesting takeaways. The LAO warned against unrealistic expectations that bond dollars would translate into cash for projects immediately and emphasized that there’s a lot of up front process that we need to do. In response, the agencies laid out their plans to develop their guidelines through the public process. These processes are taking place at this moment, and we are watching how they shape up. Stakeholders, many of whom had worked on Prop 1, including ACWA, have encouraged us to ensure the greatest public benefits would be achieved from projects.
An example of that was the robust discussion over water storage. Some members urged that funds should be spent on surface storage projects; others favored groundwater storage projects. But one of the stakeholders pointed out that many times you can’t maximize the benefit from either surface storage or groundwater storage unless you include both in your planning.
Another thing the LAO touched on and we heard multiple times throughout the hearing, was that there is an inherent tension between wanting to act quickly and needing to be deliberative. You could say that the deliberative process was built into that one pot of money that is outside of the legislative appropriations process – the $2.7 billion for that surface water and groundwater storage that I had just mentioned. Those funds, the largest chapter in the bond, are continuously appropriated to the California Water Commission to fund up to 50% of a project based on public benefits it would provide. But the act prohibits the Commission from allocating any funds before December 15, 2016, and only after regulations on what constitutes a public benefit have been adopted.
Another of our stakeholder panelists sounded a note of caution about a push to act too quickly, and was concerned that shovel ready projects could become a major focus. He was afraid that such a push could leave economically disadvantaged communities who may have had trouble accessing planning dollars in the past, perpetually behind.
Another interesting point that emerged from our hearing was that most of the bond dollars require a local match, and in many case that can be reduced or waived for disadvantaged communities. Both the success or failure of many projects will depend on the ability of locals to come up with a cost share, and we are already aware there could be some variables to their ability to do so. The take home message from our hearing is that we all need to be actively involved if we’re going to get the greatest benefits out of this water bond.
On to SGMA, which is just beginning to be implemented. If anything, the drought has proven to all of us how important that work is. Groundwater should be our backup supply during drought, but for too long and in too many places, we have overdrawn our groundwater, even in normal water years. So now we have a difficult task of trying to get back on track and manage that resource sustainability. Continuing to mine groundwater gives an illusion of abundance. This is unsustainable. In the end, it will hurt communities, farms, and everyone if the well literally goes dry. So moving forward, if SGMA is to work then we have to work together in ways that we haven’t in the past. We can’t compete over the resource. Now we have to share it, and replenish it.
Different kinds of water agencies are going to have to collaborate, often with cities and counties because our land use decisions impact our water management. I suggest that we view those conversations as an opportunity. Until we grasp the scope of the problem, we can’t even begin to work out creative solutions like conjunctive use of surface water and groundwater, or groundwater recharge with recycled water or captured stormwater and conservation incentives to reduce overall water use. And importantly, you have to have a credible story to tell the public so you can get them to support it and invest in it. That’s where many of you come in.
And as we move forward, there may be some refinements to SGMA, but we are examining them cautiously. We don’t want to pull the rug out from under what folks are already beginning and planning to do. Streamlining groundwater adjudications is an example and it’s being discussed in two different bills by Assemblymember Luis Alejo and Senator Fran Pavley with bills that are entering and going through the legislative process. But we’re watching those efforts to make sure that they complement SGMA and not conflict with it.
We’re also looking at other refinements to SGMA. Besides general cleanup, we’re looking at ways to ensure that state agencies abide by local groundwater sustainability plan, or at least locals can turn to the State Water Board if they don’t. There are also ongoing discussions about the proper role of mutual water agencies, and groups that are forming groundwater sustainability agencies. Like investor owned utilities, mutuals are private organizations. So they should be able to participate, but they shouldn’t have state powers because they don’t have state agency regulation.
Importantly as we move forward, we’ll be looking at how to get funding for groundwater planning out to those that need it. The Department of Water Resources is currently developing guidelines for the $100 million in Proposition 1 that is available for planning grants, so we are watching that process, too.
There are, of course, questions about Prop 218, especially in light of the court ruling in San Juan Capistrano. The court upheld the water fees to repay the capital costs for rebuilding a recycling plant, but struck down the tiered water rates. However, it is interesting that what the court said is that the water agency here did not try to calculate the cost of actually providing water at its various tier levels. It merely allocated all of its costs among the price tier levels based not on costs but on predetermined usage budgets. That leaves open the door for a tiered water rate to be okay if the agency does a better job of showing its homework on why the higher tiers are higher.
As an example, the Orange County Water District could justify its higher tiered rates for excessive groundwater pumping because they are tied directly to imported water supplies that the district must then buy to recharge the basin when pumpers exceed the amount of groundwater pumping that they’ve been allocated as sustainable. This is also by way of saying that it’s clear that the way that we manage water must change.
Thank you for inviting me to join you today. The challenges ahead of us in this drought are tremendous, and I look forward to working with ACWA in part of the solutions to these challenging problems, and as I finish my speech, which I have technically finished my speech, I want you pay attention to one last thing.
Today is a special day in the capital. It’s a day where foster youth shadow a legislator, and I have a foster youth who is with me today, Frank Anderson … We deal with a lot of issues and obviously water is the most pressing one that many people talk about in our state, but also our foster youth are incredibly important for California.
Thank you, everybody.
Help fill up Maven’s glass!
Maven’s Notebook remains only half-funded for the year.
Click here to find out how you can help
