These are the Senate bills that passed in the 2023 legislative session.
SB 34 (1st Substitute) - Water Infrastructure Funding Study
Sen. Daniel McCay
Senate Bill 34 (1st Substitute) directs the Department of Natural Resources to study the use of property tax revenue to fund water infrastructure, treatment, and delivery. It also requests that recommendations be made for future funding and requires the Department make a written report to the Natural Resources, Agriculture, and Environment Interim Committee on or before October 30, 2024. No money is appropriated for this bill.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 53 (1st Substitute) - Groundwater Use Amendments
Sen. Evan J. Vickers
Senate Bill 53 (1st Substitute) amends Utah Code section 73-5-15 regarding groundwater management plans. The bill provides that in the context of groundwater management plans, the use of water from a surface source to artificially recharge an aquifer constitutes beneficial use of water (provided certain conditions are met). The bill also corrects a punctuation error that created potential confusion regarding aquifer storage as an exception to claims of nonuse.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 76 (3rd Substitute) - Groundwater Use Amendments
Sen. Scott D. Sandall
Senate Bill 76 (3rd Substitute) implements changes on the municipal, county, and state agency level to increase coordination in water-related planning. It requires municipal and county planning commissions to consult with the Division of Water Resources when drafting the water use and preservation element of their general plans. Water Resources will help the planning commissions determine how implementing the land use and water use elements of their general plans may affect the Great Salt Lake. County planning commissions are also required to notify and seek feedback from community water systems regarding water supply and distribution planning and to consider the potential opportunities and benefits of planning for regionalization of public water systems. In addition, the bill allows the Division of Drinking Water to change water source, storage, and system minimum sizing standards based on water use data and enforceable water conservation measures implemented by public water systems, and requires the Division to study how greater efficiencies can be found through improved coordination, consolidation, and regionalization of public water systems. In a different vein, the bill also modifies the shareholder change application statute to allow 60 days for an irrigation company to respond to a temporary change application submitted by a shareholder, rather than 120 days for a permanent change application.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 92 - Special License Plat Designation
Sen. Jen Plumb
Senate Bill 92 creates a Great Salt Lake specialty license plate. The purchase of this specialty license plate will provide funding to the Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands to “benefit and conserve the Great Salt Lake watershed and ecosystem.”
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 118 (5th Substitute) - Water Efficient Landscaping
Incentives
Sen. Scott D. Sandall
Senate Bill 118 (5th Substitute) creates landscape conversion incentive programs (commonly called “turf buyback” programs) in the state. The bill allows the Division of Water Resources to provide grants to water conservancy districts who initiate and operate a program for homeowners to replace lawn or turf with water efficient landscaping. The property must, however, be located in municipality that has implemented regional-based water use efficiency standards established by the Division. The bill allocates $3 million of funding to the initiative.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 119 - Per Capita Consumptive Use
Sen. Michael K. McKell
Senate Bill 119 provides direction for how per capita water use is determined in Utah. Such numbers are often quoted in news articles comparing Utah’s water use with neighboring states, but an issue has been that the states don’t all calculate water use in the same manner. The bill defines per capita consumptive use as “a valid representation of total water consumed divided by the total population for a given area.” The Division of Water Resources designates “reporting districts” that provide wholesale water to calculate the per capita consumptive use in the counties that they serve. The bill provides definition and clarification on determining population, return flow, conserved water, and other items that factor into the per capita calculations. The bill prohibits state agencies and political subdivisions of the state from calculating, publishing, or disseminating a statewide per capita consumptive use number.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 144 - Water Instream Flow Amendments
Sen. David P. Hinkins
Senate Bill 144 amends Utah’s instream flow statute (Utah Code section 73-3-30) to allow fixed time or temporary change applications to deliver water to reservoirs located partially or entirely within Utah’s portion of the Colorado River System. This bill follows the passage of federal legislation that gave Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Wyoming the opportunity to voluntarily conserve water and store the savings in Lake Powell and other reservoirs in the Upper Colorado River Basin. If needed, the conserved water could later be released if the Colorado River Compact requires mandatory reductions in Utah water use. Known as “demand management,” this concept would require the approval of Utah and the three other Upper Colorado River Basin States before it could be implemented. However, the bill is not limited to demand management and would also allow change applications to be filed pursuant to other water conservation programs funded by Utah or the Bureau of Reclamation.
The purpose of the bill is to provide express recognition under Utah law that water conserved for conservation programs in Utah’s portion of the Colorado River System has the legal protection needed to reach a reservoir such as Lake Powell. Water right holders seeking to file a change application under the bill’s new provisions, would need to obtain approval from the Director of the Colorado River Authority of Utah, who would be required to attest that the water can be used in accordance with one of the bill’s enumerated conservation programs.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 158 (3rd Substitute) - Local Government Water Amendments
Sen. Michael K. McKell
Senate Bill 158 (3rd Substitute) amends Utah statutes governing dedication/exaction of water rights or shares by municipalities, counties, water authorities, and local districts. In many ways it is a follow up to 2018 legislation which amended the Safe Drinking Water Act. The earlier 2018 legislation required community water systems and the Division of Drinking Water to establish system based minimum sizing requirements for source and storage. Systems serving a population of more than 3,300 were supposed to establish system-based standards by March 1, 2019. Systems serving between 500 and 3,300 were given until October 31, 2023 to establish system based standards for source and storage.
SB 158 specifically ties the dedication/exaction of water rights and shares to the system source and storage requirements in Utah Code § 19-4-114. Additionally, it requires that dedications/exactions be tied to the expected culinary water demand of a specific development. For example, for a multifamily or townhome development, which will likely have lower per residential connection water demand, the per connection dedication/exaction must reflect this lower demand. The determination of per connection water demand for different types of residential development is to be based on at least five years of water use data, within the water system, for similar developments.
SB 158 also requires that the water supplier make public the methodology used to determine the per connection water demand. If the dedicator disagrees with the calculation of the dedication/exaction there is a right of appeal to the governing body of the municipality, county, or district. In the appeal, the dedicator has the right to present data and information and the governing body must respond with due process.
Finally, SB 158 grants specific authority to third, fourth, fifth and sixth class counties (less than 175,000 residents) and municipalities in those counties, by ordinance, to adopt drinking water source protection zones for wells and springs. While this power likely exists, regardless of county size, it is now explicitly provided.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 236 - Legislative Water Development Commission Amendments
Sen. David P. Hinkins
Senate Bill 236 authorizes the existing Legislative Water Development Commission to open committee bill files related to the commission’s duties. Those duties include making recommendations to the Legislature on water needs for the state, funding and ownership of water projects, and water conservation programs.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 251 - Secondary Water Metering Requirements
Sen. David P. Hinkins
Senate Bill 251 exempts certain secondary water providers from metering every connection. Instead, these exempted providers can meter strategic points of their system. It also amends Section 73-10-34.5 to allow the Board of Water Resources to issue or convert a previous grant issued to secondary water suppliers who fall under the new exemption to fund projects that are alternative to metering, if it can be established that the project will conserve more water than expected through metering.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
SB 277 (2nd Substitute) - Water Conservation and
Augmentation Amendments
Sen. Scott D. Sandall
Senate Bill 277 (2nd Substitute) reorganizes the Agricultural Water Optimization program housed at the Utah Department of Agriculture and Food (UDAF). It dissolves the current Agricultural Water Optimization Task Force located at the Department of Natural Resources and creates a similar Agricultural Water Optimization Committee at UDAF. In addition to assuming the roles of the previous task force, the committee sets the eligibility requirements for agricultural water optimization grants, creates the grant application process, and develops the preliminary screening criteria for the grant applications. The committee reviews and ranks the grant applications, which are approved by the existing Utah Conservation Commission (which is also housed at UDAF). The bill also creates a new change application process by which a person implementing an agricultural water optimization project—whether within or independent of the grant program—can seek a quantification of the “saved water” created by the project, which can then be used for other purposes that do not enlarge the depletion or diversion amounts of the saved water. Finally, the bill adjusts the purposes for which the Water Infrastructure Restricted Account (WIRA) funds can be used, encompassing projects that “benefit the Colorado River drainage in Utah, including projects for water reuse, desalinization, building of dams, or water conservation,” subject to the adoption of certain water conservation policies and practices by the counties and municipalities seeking the funds.
To read the full text of the bill, click here.
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