State highways: landscaping and cleaning: groundwater.

Existing law vests the Department of Transportation with full possession and control of all state highways and associated property, and sets forth the powers and duties of the department with respect to the operation, maintenance, and improvement of state highways. Existing law requires the department to discontinue further water-intensive freeway landscaping, use drought-resistant landscaping whenever feasible, and eliminate any dependency on imported water for landscaping as soon as practicable. This bill would require the department to eliminate the use of potable groundwater from groundwater basins subject to critical conditions of overdraft for purposes of landscaping and cleaning highways except when a district director determines not doing so would threaten public health or safety.