Water and Wastewater Loan and Grant Program.

Existing law, the Safe Drinking Water State Revolving Fund Law of 1997, establishes the Safe Drinking Water State Revolving Fund to provide grants or revolving fund loans for the design and construction of projects for public water systems that will enable those systems to meet safe drinking water standards. This bill would, to the extent funding is made available, authorize the State Water Resources Control Board to establish a program to provide funding to counties and qualified nonprofit organizations to award low-interest loans and grants to eligible applicants for specified purposes relating to drinking water and wastewater treatment. This bill would authorize a county or qualified nonprofit organization to apply to the board for a grant to award loans or grants, or both, to residents of the county, as prescribed. To fund this program, the bill would authorize the board to use funding appropriated in an item of the Budget Act of 2016 from the State Water Quality Control Fund, or to use any other funding source consistent with the purposes of the program. By expanding the purposes of an appropriation, the bill would make an appropriation.