Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed a bill to raise fines on illegal water diversions. The decision closes a contentious chapter in California's water wars and ends an attempt by environmental groups to pass aggressive reforms to the water rights systems.
By the time AB 460 reached Newsom’s desk last month, the bill had been scaled down to the point of dropping all opposition, reversing course after a coalition of more than 200 organizations — mostly agricultural associations and water districts — lobbied heavily against the controversial initial proposal.
The measure traces back to a white paper published at the peak of the last drought. In 2021 a cohort of environmental lawyers and one disgruntled former leader at the State Water Resources Control Board teamed up with the Planning and Conservation League (PCL), an environmental advocacy group and a mainstay in the Sacramento lobbying arena. The following February they published a set of recommendations for updating the state’s water laws to address extreme drought and climate change.
“This is not a ‘blow up the water rights boxes’ approach,” they wrote in the report. “It is a focused approach to updating existing laws, regulations and funding.”
Sen. Ben Allen, D-Santa MonicaWithin months, water managers and farm groups in the San Joaquin Valley were raising alarms over the proposed reforms. Aaron Fukuda, general manager of the Tulare Irrigation District, argued the authors “have never managed a molecule in their lives” and worried the court costs from the ensuing litigation would divert valuable resources away from implementing the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act.
The politics escalated after reports circulated of Siskiyou County ranchers illegally diverting water to sustain their livestock during the drought and paying just $4,000 for the violation.
At the start of the next legislative session, three urban lawmakers took up the call for reforms. Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, D-Orinda, organized an informational hearing as chair of the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee to review the findings from the PCL report and to build momentum for her new bill.
“This is not an easy conversation,” said Bauer-Kahan. “But it's long overdue.”
She had filed AB 460 to increase the state water board’s enforcement authority, enabling it to order an immediate halt to diversions and to fine violators up to $10,000 a day and $2,500 per acre-foot of water.
It’s easy to be “in the know” about what’s happening in Washington, D.C. Sign up for a FREE month of Agri-Pulse news! Simply click here
Senator Ben Allen, D-Santa Monica, meanwhile, authored Senate Bill 389 to investigate senior water right claims for upstream diversions. And Asm. Buffy Wicks, D-Oakland, introduced AB 1337 to enable the water board to curtail pre-1914 water right holders without the governor declaring a drought emergency and without the standard practice of providing due notice ahead of an order. The board could also levy penalties for each day and for every acre-foot of water diverted.
“The scope of this bill is nothing radical,” said Wicks during floor debate on her bill. “In times of shortage — made increasingly severe because of climate change — all water right holders would fall under the same rules.”
A swarm of water lobbyists raced to educate lawmakers on the complexities of state water codes and how California’s intricate water system works. Local districts argued that such “extreme measures” would erode their investments, ignore needed maintenance and limit their ability to deliver water. They worried about having a state agency with insufficient data on water use step in to manage local systems on a weekly basis, even in wet years.
“Increasing the frequency with which the state water board manages the system with antiquated tools is not modernization,” said Valerie Kincaid, an attorney at Paris Kincaid Wasiewski and representing several districts.
Months later Wicks pulled her measure and never returned to it. Allen significantly watered down SB 389 to simply clarify the board’s role with pre-1914 rights, dropping agricultural opposition, and the governor later signed the bill. Bauer-Kahan shelved AB 460 until the following year, granting more time for water interests to negotiate amendments.
Asm. Buffy Wicks, D-OaklandThis past June, nearly two years after the drought subsided, Bauer-Kahan returned to her bill.
“It's been a long year-plus working on this effort,” she said during a committee hearing. “[AB 460] doesn't do everything I dreamt it would do when it started, but we're moving the ball forward for California.”
Bauer-Kahan had removed language in the bill on expanding the water board’s authority and relaxing due process requirements — narrowing the scope to the proposed increases in fines for unauthorized diversions. The move dropped all opposition to the measure, granting it a clean passage through the Legislature, though Republicans still voted against it.
Agricultural groups and water providers wanted the bill to demonstrate their support for enforcing the existing water rights system to punish bad actors, rather than overhauling its foundational rules.
“We do hope the outcome of [AB 460 and SB 389] will provide more information or more enforcement, in terms of making sure the water board gets the information it needs to know who is using what out there,” said Alexandra Biering, a water policy advocate at the California Farm Bureau, during a board hearing last week to increase fees for the water rights regulatory program.
California Trout, a conservation group sponsoring the measure, celebrated Newsom’s signature on AB 460, saying it closed a loophole that incentivized water theft.
For more news, go to Agri-Pulse.com.
