AB362 - Water policy: California tribal communities.

Amended IN Assembly April 21, 2025 Amended IN Assembly April 02, 2025 CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2025–2026 REGULAR SESSION Assembly Bill No. 362 Introduced by Assembly Member Ramos (Principal coauthor: Senator Richardson) January 30, 2025 An act to amend Sections 13000, 13050, 13144, 13181, and 13241 of, and to add Sections 13142.1, 13170.4, and 13243.5 to, the Water Code, relating to water. LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST AB 362, as amended, Ramos. Water policy: California tribal communities. (1) The Porter-Cologne Water Quality Control Act establishes a statewide program for the control of the quality of all the waters in the state and makes certain legislative findings and declarations. Existing law defines the term “beneficial uses” for the purposes of water quality as certain waters of the state that may be protected against quality degradation, to include, among others, domestic, municipal, agricultural, and industrial supplies. This bill would add findings and declarations related to California tribal communities, as defined, and the importance of protecting tribal water use. The bill would add tribal water uses as waters of the state that may be protected against quality degradation for purposes of the defined term “beneficial uses.” The bill would require any project or regulatory program subject to approval by the State Water Quality Control Board or a regional water quality control board, within a specified environmental review, and in any findings and declarations presented for state board or a regional board approval, to describe, with both quantitative and qualitative information, how the project or regulatory program will impact tribal water uses, and would require, on or before December 1, 2026, and every 2 years thereafter, the state board to publish a report on implementation of this provision on its internet website. (2) Existing law requires the state board to consult with and carefully evaluate the recommendations of concerned federal, state, and local agencies during the process of formulating or revising state policy for water quality control. This bill would additionally require the state board to consult and carefully evaluate the recommendations of concerned California tribal communities. (3) Existing law requires the state board to formulate and adopt state policy for water quality control. Existing law requires each regional board to formulate and adopt water quality control plans for all areas within the region and prohibits a water quality control plan, or a revision of the plan, adopted by a regional board from becoming effective unless it is approved by the state board. Existing law authorizes the state board to adopt certain water quality control plans. Existing law requires a regional board to establish water quality objectives in water quality control plans that in its judgment will ensure reasonable protection of beneficial uses and the prevention of nuisance and requires each regional board to consider specified factors in establishing water quality objectives. This bill would require, on or before January 1, 2027, the state board to propose, and solicit tribal consultation and public comment on, water quality standards to achieve reasonable protection of tribal water uses into the water quality control plan for the San Francisco Bay and Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta watershed. This bill would add consultations with California tribal communities and environmental justice considerations as factors for a regional board to consider in establishing water quality control objectives. The bill would exempt adoption of tribal water uses within water quality control plans from the California Environmental Quality Act, and would require, upon the next triennial review of a water quality control plan after January 1, 2026, each regional board to define tribal beneficial uses in its water quality control plan and, where applicable, adopt water quality standards to achieve reasonable protection of tribal water uses into water quality control plans. (4) Existing law requires the California Environmental Protection Agency and the Natural Resources Agency, on or before December 1, 2007, to enter into a memorandum of understanding for the purposes of establishing the California Water Quality Monitoring Council, which the state board is required to administer. Existing law requires the monitoring council to review existing water quality monitoring, assessment, and reporting efforts and to recommend specific actions and funding needs necessary to coordinate and enhance those efforts. Existing law requires the memorandum of understanding to describe the means by which the monitoring council shall formulate recommendations to reduce redundancies, inefficiencies, and inadequacies in existing water quality monitoring and data management programs and to ensure that water quality improvement projects financed by the state provide specific information necessary to track project effectiveness with regard to achieving clean water and healthy ecosystems. This bill would require, on or before December 1, 2026, the California Environmental Protection Agency and the Natural Resources Agency to amend the memorandum of understanding to incorporate participation from California tribal communities in the actions of the monitoring council, and would describe these potential methods of participation. The bill would require the memorandum of understating to include recommendations on how to achieve and maintain tribal water uses through state board and regional board regulatory actions and other programs, as specified. (5) Existing constitutional provisions require that a statute that limits the right of access to the meetings of public bodies or the writings of public officials and agencies be adopted with findings demonstrating the interest protected by the limitation and the need for protecting that interest. This bill would make legislative findings to that effect. Digest Key Vote: MAJORITY Appropriation: NO Fiscal Committee: YES Local Program: NO Bill Text The people of the State of California do enact as follows: SECTION 1. Section 13000 of the Water Code is amended to read: 13000. The Legislature finds and declares all of the following: (a) People of the state have a primary interest in the conservation, control, and utilization of the water resources of the state, and that the quality of all the waters of the state shall be protected for use and enjoyment by the people of the state. (b) Activities and factors that may affect the quality of the waters of the state shall be regulated to attain the highest water quality that is reasonable, considering all demands being made and to be made on those waters and the total values involved, beneficial and detrimental, economic and social, and tangible and intangible. (c) The health, safety, and welfare of the people of the state requires that there be a statewide program for the control of the quality of all the waters of the state; that the state must be prepared to exercise its full power and jurisdiction to protect the quality of waters in the state from degradation originating inside or outside the boundaries of the state; that the waters of the state are increasingly influenced by interbasin water development projects and other statewide considerations; that factors of precipitation, topography, population, recreation, agriculture, industry, and economic development vary from region to region within the state; and that the statewide program for water quality control can be most effectively administered regionally, within a framework of statewide coordination and policy. (d) California tribal communities have special ties to the bodies of water that have sustained their people, who have suffered from genocide, disease, displacement, and discrimination dating back to European colonization, and therefore tribal water uses must be protected through the statewide program for the control of the quality of all the waters of the state. (e) Furthermore, allowing for tribal water uses should be a primary factor in determining the highest water quality that is reasonable in all regulatory decisions. SEC. 2. Section 13050 of the Water Code is amended to read: 13050. As used in this division: (a) “State board” means the State Water Resources Control Board. (b) “Regional board” means any California regional water quality control board for a region as specified in Section 13200. (c) “Person” includes any city, county, district, the state, and the United States, to the extent authorized by federal law. (d) “Waste” includes sewage and any and all other waste substances, liquid, solid, gaseous, or radioactive, associated with human habitation, or of human or animal origin, or from any producing, manufacturing, or processing operation, including waste placed within containers of whatever nature prior to, and for purposes of, disposal. (e) “Waters of the state” means any surface water or groundwater, including saline waters, within the boundaries of the state. (f) “Beneficial uses” of the waters of the state that may be protected against quality degradation include, but are not limited to, domestic, municipal, agricultural, and industrial supply; tribal water uses; power generation; recreation; aesthetic enjoyment; navigation; and preservation and enhancement of fish, wildlife, and other aquatic resources or preserves. (g) “Quality of the water” refers to chemical, physical, biological, bacteriological, radiological, and other properties and characteristics of water that affect its use. (h) “Water quality objectives” means the limits or levels of water quality constituents or characteristics that are established for the reasonable protection of beneficial uses of water or the prevention of nuisance within a specific area. (i) “Water quality control” means the regulation of any activity or factor that may affect the quality of the waters of the state and includes the prevention and correction of water pollution and nuisance. (j) “Water quality control plan” consists of a designation or establishment for the waters within a specified area of all of the following: (1) Beneficial uses to be protected. (2) Water quality objectives. (3) A program of implementation needed for achieving water quality objectives. (k) “Contamination” means an impairment of the quality of the waters of the state by waste to a degree that creates a hazard to the public health through poisoning or through the spread of disease. “Contamination” includes any equivalent effect resulting from the disposal of waste, whether or not waters of the state are affected. (l) (1) “Pollution” means an alteration of the quality of the waters of the state by waste to a degree that unreasonably affects either of the following: (A) The waters for beneficial uses. (B) Facilities that serve these beneficial uses. (2) “Pollution” may include “contamination.” (m) “Nuisance” means anything that meets all of the following requirements: (1) Is injurious to health, or is indecent or offensive to the senses, or an obstruction to the free use of property, so as to interfere with the comfortable enjoyment of life or property. (2) Affects at the same time an entire community or neighborhood, or any considerable number of persons, although the extent of the annoyance or damage inflicted upon individuals may be unequal. (3) Occurs during, or as a result of, the treatment or disposal of wastes. (n) “Recycled water” means water that, as a result of treatment of waste, is suitable for a direct beneficial use or a controlled use that would not otherwise occur and is therefor considered a valuable resource. (o) “Citizen or domiciliary” of the state includes a foreign corporation having substantial business contacts in the state or that is subject to service of process in this state. (p) (1) “Hazardous substance” means either of the following: (A) For discharge to surface waters, any substance determined to be a hazardous substance pursuant to Section 311(b)(2) of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act (33 U.S.C. Sec. 1251 et seq.). (B) For discharge to groundwater, any substance listed as a hazardous waste or hazardous material pursuant to Section 25140 of the Health and Safety Code, without regard to whether the substance is intended to be used, reused, or discarded, except that “hazardous substance” does not include any substance excluded from Section 311(b)(2) of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act because it is within the scope of Section 311(a)(1) of that act. (2) “Hazardous substance” does not include any of the following: (A) Nontoxic, nonflammable, and noncorrosive stormwater runoff drained from underground vaults, chambers, or manholes into gutters or storm sewers. (B) Any pesticide that is applied for agricultural purposes or is applied in accordance with a cooperative agreement authorized by Section 116180 of the Health and Safety Code, and is not discharged accidentally or for purposes of disposal, the application of which is in compliance with all applicable state and federal laws and regulations. (C) Any discharge to surface water of a quantity less than a reportable quantity as determined by regulations issued pursuant to Section 311(b)(4) of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act. (D) Any discharge to land that results, or probably will result, in a discharge to groundwater if the amount of the discharge to land is less than a reportable quantity, as determined by regulations adopted pursuant to Section 13271, for substances listed as hazardous pursuant to Section 25140 of the Health and Safety Code. No discharge shall be deemed a discharge of a reportable quantity until regulations set a reportable quantity for the substance discharged. (q) (1) “Mining waste” means all solid, semisolid, and liquid waste materials from the extraction, beneficiation, and processing of ores and minerals. Mining waste includes, but is not limited to, soil, waste rock, and overburden, as defined in Section 2732 of the Public Resources Code, and tailings, slag, and other processed waste materials, including cementitious materials that are managed at the cement manufacturing facility where the materials were generated. (2) For the purposes of this subdivision, “cementitious material” means cement, cement kiln dust, clinker, and clinker dust. (r) “Master recycling permit” means a permit issued to a supplier or a distributor, or both, of recycled water, that includes waste discharge requirements prescribed pursuant to Section 13263 and water recycling requirements prescribed pursuant to Section 13523.1. (s) “California tribal community” has the same meaning as “tribal community” as defined in Section 13149.2. SEC. 3. Section 13142.1 is added to the Water Code, to read: 13142.1. (a) In addition to any other policies regarding water quality established pursuant to this division, the policies of the state with respect to water quality as it relates to Calif [Text truncated for display. Full text available on Congress.gov.]