Bill Text: CA AB828 | 2023-2024 | Regular Session | Amended

NOTE: There are more recent revisions of this legislation. Read Latest Draft

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Bill Title: Sustainable groundwater management: managed wetlands.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)

Status: (Enrolled) 2024-08-28 - Senate amendments concurred in. To Engrossing and Enrolling. (Ayes 53. Noes 17.). [AB828 Detail]

Download: California-2023-AB828-Amended.html

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Amended  IN  Assembly  March 02, 2023

CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2023–2024 REGULAR SESSION

Assembly Bill

No. 828

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Introduced by Assembly Member Connolly

February 13, 2023

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An act to amend Section 10720.9 10721 of the Water Code, relating to water.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST

AB 828, as amended, Connolly. Sustainable groundwater management: state agencies. managed wetlands.

Existing law, the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, requires all groundwater basins designated as high- or medium-priority basins by the Department of Water Resources that are designated as basins subject to critical conditions of overdraft to be managed under a groundwater sustainability plan or coordinated groundwater sustainability plans by January 31, 2020, and requires all other groundwater basins designated as high- or medium-priority basins to be managed under a groundwater sustainability plan or coordinated groundwater sustainability plans by January 31, 2022, except as specified. Existing law defines various terms for purposes of the act.

Existing law requires all relevant state agencies, as described, to consider the policies of the act, and any groundwater sustainability plans adopted pursuant to the act, when revising or adopting policies, regulations, or criteria, or when issuing orders or determinations, where pertinent.

This bill would make a nonsubstantive change to the latter requirement. add various defined terms for purposes of the act, including the term “managed wetland.”

Digest Key

Vote: MAJORITY   Appropriation: NO   Fiscal Committee: NO   Local Program: NO  

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Bill Text

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

SECTION 1.

 The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:

(a) The Legislature recognized the human right to water in 2012 with the passage of AB 685. A decade later, communities still struggle to access safe and affordable drinking water.

(b) More than 85 percent of California’s community water systems are dependent upon groundwater for drinking water and sanitation. For hundreds of small water systems, groundwater is their only water source.

(c) Disadvantaged communities served by domestic wells and small community water systems are negatively and disproportionately impacted by unsustainable groundwater use and resulting dry wells and worsening water quality.

(d) Many groundwater sustainability plans fail to adequately consider or address the impacts of their plans on domestic well users and households served by small community water systems.

(e) Managed wetlands are an important public trust resource and beneficial user of groundwater because they provide significant habitat for migratory waterfowl of the Pacific flyway, for endangered species, and for many other resident wildlife and fish populations. Wetlands provide additional public benefits, including water quality improvement, groundwater recharge, flood protection, stream bank stabilization, wildlife dependent recreation, and opportunities for scientific research.

(f) Approximately 5 percent of historic wetlands remain in California. Consistent with Executive Order No. W-59-93, it is the policy of the state to assure that no net loss of managed wetland acreage or habitat values results from implementation of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act.

(g) Protecting managed wetlands that are subject to the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act will avoid a net loss of wetlands and allow groundwater sustainability agencies to prioritize groundwater sustainability for agricultural, municipal, and industrial water users.

SEC. 2.

 Section 10721 of the Water Code is amended to read:

10721.

 Unless the context otherwise requires, the following definitions govern the construction of this part:

(a) “Adjudication action” means an action filed in the superior or federal district court to determine the rights to extract groundwater from a basin or store water within a basin, including, but not limited to, actions to quiet title respecting rights to extract or store groundwater or an action brought to impose a physical solution on a basin.

(b) “Basin” means a groundwater basin or subbasin identified and defined in Bulletin 118 or as modified pursuant to Chapter 3 (commencing with Section 10722).

(c) “Bulletin 118” means the department’s report entitled “California’s Groundwater: Bulletin 118” updated in 2003, as it may be subsequently updated or revised in accordance with Section 12924.

(d) “Coordination agreement” means a legal agreement adopted between two or more groundwater sustainability agencies that provides the basis for coordinating multiple agencies or groundwater sustainability plans within a basin pursuant to this part.

(e) “De minimis extractor” means a person who extracts, for domestic purposes, two acre-feet or less per year.

(f) “Governing body” means the legislative body of a groundwater sustainability agency.

(g) “Groundwater” means water beneath the surface of the earth within the zone below the water table in which the soil is completely saturated with water, but does not include water that flows in known and definite channels unless included pursuant to Section 10722.5.

(h) “Groundwater extraction facility” means a device or method for extracting groundwater from within a basin.

(i) “Groundwater recharge” or “recharge” means the augmentation of groundwater, by natural or artificial means.

(j) “Groundwater sustainability agency” means one or more local agencies that implement the provisions of this part. For purposes of imposing fees pursuant to Chapter 8 (commencing with Section 10730) or taking action to enforce a groundwater sustainability plan, “groundwater sustainability agency” also means each local agency comprising the groundwater sustainability agency if the plan authorizes separate agency action.

(k) “Groundwater sustainability plan” or “plan” means a plan of a groundwater sustainability agency proposed or adopted pursuant to this part.

(l) “Groundwater sustainability program” means a coordinated and ongoing activity undertaken to benefit a basin, pursuant to a groundwater sustainability plan.

(m) “In-lieu use” means the use of surface water by persons that could otherwise extract groundwater in order to leave groundwater in the basin.

(n) “Local agency” means a local public agency that has water supply, water management, or land use responsibilities within a groundwater basin.

(o) (1) “Managed wetland” means a publicly or privately owned wetland that receives seasonal, semipermanent, or permanent flooding to simulate natural processes that promote food production, habitat for the benefit of wetland dependent species, and is designated as, or administered as, any of the following:

(A) State wildlife area.

(B) National wildlife refuge.

(C) Central Valley Project Improvement Act wetland habitat area.

(D) Conservation easement held by a federal or state resource agency, a local agency whose primary function is managing land or water for wetland habitat purposes, or a nongovernmental conservation organization.

(E) Wildlife habitat contract or other conservation agreement of no less than 10 years in duration administered by the Department of Fish and Wildlife, Wildlife Conservation Board, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, or Natural Resources Conservation Service.

(2) The term “managed wetland” does not include land managed for commercial crop production, or an artificial wetland constructed primarily as a groundwater bank or recharge basin, tailwater recirculation or sedimentation pond, evaporation pond, irrigation or stock watering pond, area that filters urban or industrial stormwater runoff, or wastewater treatment pond.

(p) “Managed wetland extractor” means a person who extracts groundwater solely for managed wetland purposes.

(o)

(q) “Operator” means a person operating a groundwater extraction facility. The owner of a groundwater extraction facility shall be conclusively presumed to be the operator unless a satisfactory showing is made to the governing body of the groundwater sustainability agency that the groundwater extraction facility actually is operated by some other person.

(p)

(r) “Owner” means a person owning a groundwater extraction facility or an interest in a groundwater extraction facility other than a lien to secure the payment of a debt or other obligation.

(q)

(s) “Personal information” has the same meaning as defined in Section 1798.3 of the Civil Code.

(r)

(t) “Planning and implementation horizon” means a 50-year time period over which a groundwater sustainability agency determines that plans and measures will be implemented in a basin to ensure that the basin is operated within its sustainable yield.

(s)

(u) “Public water system” has the same meaning as defined in Section 116275 of the Health and Safety Code.

(t)

(v) “Recharge area” means the area that supplies water to an aquifer in a groundwater basin.

(w) “Small community water system” means a system serving 3,300 connections or fewer.

(u)

(x) “Sustainability goal” means the existence and implementation of one or more groundwater sustainability plans that achieve sustainable groundwater management by identifying and causing the implementation of measures targeted to ensure that the applicable basin is operated within its sustainable yield.

(v)

(y) “Sustainable groundwater management” means the management and use of groundwater in a manner that can be maintained during the planning and implementation horizon without causing undesirable results.

(w)

(z) “Sustainable yield” means the maximum quantity of water, calculated over a base period representative of long-term conditions in the basin and including any temporary surplus, that can be withdrawn annually from a groundwater supply without causing an undesirable result.

(x)

(aa) “Undesirable result” means one or more of the following effects caused by groundwater conditions occurring throughout the basin:

(1) Chronic lowering of groundwater levels indicating a significant and unreasonable depletion of supply if continued over the planning and implementation horizon. Overdraft during a period of drought is not sufficient to establish a chronic lowering of groundwater levels if extractions and groundwater recharge are managed as necessary to ensure that reductions in groundwater levels or storage during a period of drought are offset by increases in groundwater levels or storage during other periods.

(2) Significant and unreasonable reduction of groundwater storage.

(3) Significant and unreasonable seawater intrusion.

(4) Significant and unreasonable degraded water quality, including the migration of contaminant plumes that impair water supplies.

(5) Significant and unreasonable land subsidence that substantially interferes with surface land uses.

(6) Depletions of interconnected surface water that have significant and unreasonable adverse impacts on beneficial uses of the surface water.

(y)

(ab) “Water budget” means an accounting of the total groundwater and surface water entering and leaving a basin including the changes in the amount of water stored.

(z)

(ac) “Watermaster” means a watermaster appointed by a court or pursuant to other law.

(aa)

(ad) “Water year” means the period from October 1 through the following September 30, inclusive.

(ab)

(ae) “Wellhead protection area” means the surface and subsurface area surrounding a water well or well field that supplies a public water system through which contaminants are reasonably likely to migrate toward the water well or well field.

SECTION 1.Section 10720.9 of the Water Code is amended to read:

10720.9.

All relevant state agencies, including, but not limited to, the board, the regional water quality control boards, the department, and the Department of Fish and Wildlife, shall consider the policies of this part, and any groundwater sustainability plans adopted pursuant to this part, when revising or adopting policies, regulations, or criteria, or when issuing orders or determinations, when pertinent.