“The thing that is of most con- cern to us is the recognition that with climate change and with the prospect of prolonged drought with a receding snowpack, greater fuel loading and greater risk of catastrophic fi re – we are so impacted right now – we really as a state need to recognize that and make that a priority,” Eggerton said. That priority means investment and taking a holistic approach to water management “from the crest of the system to the outfall of treatment,” Eggerton said, noting that the move- ment of the state’s drinking water program into the State Water Board exemplifi es “a comprehensive approach to water quality.”
The PPIC concludes that while water suppliers and wastewater treatment agencies “are performing reasonably well … a bigger concern is the potential for Prop. 218 to stymie local agencies’ ability to pursue the modern water management techniques needed to maintain reliable water ser- vice in the face of population growth, climate change, and increasing water scarcity.” Taxpayers are leery of vague, unsubstantiated funding proposals and have made their feelings clear that the lineage between the fees they pay and the services provided must be clear. “The [PPIC] report decries the state constitution’s ‘rigid requirements’ for differentiating between fees and taxes, but doesn’t note that the strict defi nitions were created in response to many local governments stretching the defi nition of ‘fee’ to absurd lengths,” said Kline with the California Taxpay- ers Association. “After years of watch- ing local offi cials mislabel taxes as ‘fees’ to avoid getting approval from the people who pay the money, taxpayers passed measures to close the loopholes and strictly defi ne legitimate fees and taxes.”
In a 2013 article published in the University of California, Berkeley’s Ecology Law Quarterly called “A New Water Accounting,” McGeorge School of Law Professor Gregory Weber wrote that “at cost” water pricing “fails to
May/June 2014
communicate water’s real value to consumers and those consumers do not receive pricing signals about water’s relative scarcity in a given year.” Furthermore, it “leads to waste, unnec- essary environmental degradation and ineffi cient allocation among competing uses.”
Weber advocates expanding the
defi nition of costs “beyond the tradi- tional fi nancial costs incurred for water system infrastructure and operations.” “At a minimum, ‘at cost’ pricing should include a charge to represent the costs of avoiding, mitigating, or restoring environmental impacts,” Weber wrote. “While such an expanded notion of ‘cost’ should apply across the country, it is particularly germane to California. Under California’s public trust’ doctrine, water suppliers have an affi rmative duty to protect public values in watercourses wherever feasible.” Whether the state’s relative sun- nier budget outlook means beefed up spending on water projects remains to be seen. Likewise, whether a revised water bond makes it to the November ballot is up in the air.
There is support for general fund spending on water projects instead of applying additional fees to dischargers, also known as “polluter pays.” Dis- charges view that as “permittee pays” and consider it a slippery slope toward increasing charges, said Roberta Larson, executive director of the California Association of Sanitation Agencies. “Each time you talk about fees,
it’s about who pays, how you get it and how it’s allocated,” Larson said. “It’s easy to say but far more diffi cult to implement.”
Finding an appropriate solution to fund mutually benefi cial water projects is a work in progress and must be done in a way that achieves buy-in from a skeptical audience. “It’s a pretty steep hill to get support for a water fee,” Tim Quinn, executive director of the Association of California Water Agencies, told the PPIC audience. “There is a huge fear of it being converted into a source for the state’s general fund.” ❖
“The thing that is of most concern to us is the recognition that with climate change and with the prospect of prolonged drought with a receding snowpack, greater fuel loading and greater risk of catastrophic fi re – we are so impacted right now – we really as a state need to recognize that and make that a priority.”
– Dave Eggerton, El Dorado County Water Agency
Hear more from El Dorado County Water Agency’s Dave Eggerton
13
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15