Drinking water.

The Calderon-Sher Safe Drinking Water Act of 1996 requires the State Department of Public Health to, among other things, adopt regulations relating to primary and secondary drinking water standards for contaminants in drinking water. The act authorizes the department to enter into primacy delegation agreements with local health officers for enforcement of these provisions. The act defines various terms, including human consumption, which means the use of water for drinking, bathing or showering, hand washing, or oral hygiene. This bill would include cooking, including, but not limited to, preparing food and washing dishes, in the definition of human consumption. The act provides that its provisions are not applicable to a public water system that meets specified conditions, including that the system sells water to users through a submetered service system if the water supply is obtained from a public water system to which the act applies. This bill would exempt public water systems that sell water, obtained from a public water system that is subject to the act, through a submetered distribution system if each user of the system is charged no more than the rate the user would be charged by the public water system. The act exempts from water quality requirements noncommunity water systems that meet specified criteria, including that the system does not provide water for human consumption, other than handwashing, unless bottled water from an approved source is provided. The act requires these exempted noncommunity water systems to be tested annually for specified bacteria. This bill would repeal this exemption. By adding entities to regulate, this bill would increase the duties of local health officers that have received primacy delegation, and would impose a state-mandated local program. The act allows the department to issue a citation if the department finds that a public water system is in violation of the act or any regulation, permit, standard, or order issued or adopted thereunder and specifies procedures for service and form of the citation. The act classifies citations according to the nature of the violation or the failure to comply and assesses penalties based on that classification. This bill would allow the department to issue a citation if it finds that a public water system is in violation of the act or any regulation, permit, standard, citation, or order issued or adopted thereunder. The bill would make specified changes to the process for service and the form of the citation. The bill would also set the penalty that may be set by the department at an amount not to exceed $1,000 per day for each day that a violation occurred and for each day that a violation continues to occur, and would eliminate the classification process. The bill would allow a separate penalty for each violation. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.