BILL ANALYSIS
AB 83
Page 1
ASSEMBLY THIRD READING
AB 83 (Corbett)
As Amended June 2, 2003
Majority vote
ENVIRONMENTAL SAFETY 4-1APPROPRIATIONS 17-7
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|Ayes:|Laird, Chu, Hancock, |Ayes:|Berg, Berg, Kehoe, |
| |Lowenthal | |Corbett, Diaz, Firebaugh, |
| | | |Goldberg, Leno, Nation, |
| | | |Chan, Nunez, Pavley, |
| | | |Ridley-Thomas, Simitian, |
| | | |Wiggins, Yee, Laird |
| | | | |
|-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------|
|Nays:|Aghazarian |Nays:|Bates, Daucher, Haynes, |
| | | |Maldonado, Pacheco, |
| | | |Runner, Samuelian |
| | | | |
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SUMMARY : Requires bottled water and water vending machine
licensees to comply with provisions similar to those imposed on
public water systems regarding emergency notification plans,
consumer confidence reports, and annual inspections.
Specifically, this bill :
1)Transfers the provisions relating to the licensure and
regulation of persons engaged in the above bottled water
activities from the Sherman Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Law
(Sherman Law) to the California Safe Drinking Water Act
(SDWA).
2)Requires bottled water licensees to comply with provisions
similar to those imposed on public water systems regarding
emergency notification plans, consumer confidence reports
(CCRs), and annual inspections.
3)Revises the annual license fee schedule and creates the Safe
Bottled and Vended Water Account in the General Fund,
comprised of these fees, from which moneys would be expended
for purposes of administering the above provisions.
4)Maintains the federal requirements relating to bottled water
by requiring that any person who processes, packages,
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distributes, transfers, or stores bottled water or vended
water still comply with the good manufacturing practices
required by federal law.
5)Requires that bottled and vended water shall meet all maximum
contaminant levels (MCLs) set for public drinking water that
the State Department of Health Services (DHS) determines are
necessary or appropriate so that bottled water may cause no
adverse effect on public health.
6)Specifies that bottled and vended water shall not exceed 10
parts per billion (ppb) of total triahalomethanes or five ppb
of lead unless DHS establishes a lower level by regulation.
7)Requires a licensee to notify DHS, and notify consumers as
required by DHS, if specified standards are not met or the
licensee fails to take certain steps in compliance with the
act such as:
a) Exceedence of any MCL set for public drinking water
standards;
b) Failure to carry out any DHS required monitoring; or,
c) Failure to comply with the conditions of any variance.
8)Prohibits DHS from issuing a license or a variance to any
bottled or vending water operation unless it has an approved
emergency notification plan. DHS is authorized to exempt
operations from this requirement when the DHS determines that
it "will best serve the public interest."
9)Incorporates new or revised allowable contaminant levels or
monitoring provisions adopted for bottled water by the United
States Food and Drug Administration under the Sherman Law that
are more stringent than the state requirements for bottled
water. Such federal standards are incorporated into this
chapter and are effective on the date established by the
federal provisions unless otherwise established by regulations
of DHS.
10)Requires each licensee to establish, or utilize an existing
toll-free, multilingual telephone hotline for consumers to
request additional information regarding water quality, CCR,
and information from local health departments regarding the
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quality of bottled water, if applicable. A water vending
machine licensee may use a local telephone number instead.
11)Authorizes DHS to require a licensee or transporter of
bottled or vended water to test for any substance, including
organic chemical contaminants, at any time that DHS believes
the substance may be present in the water source and may
threaten the public health.
12)Authorizes DHS to order a licensee to reduce or eliminate the
concentration of any chemical that DHS determines may have an
adverse effect on public health. Until an enforceable
standard has been established for a chemical that may have an
adverse effect on human health, DHS may require treatment
techniques to reduce the concentration of the contaminants
that, in DHS's judgment, are needed to prevent known or
anticipated adverse effects on the health of persons.
13)Requires that all testing of bottled water, bottled water
sources, water distributed by water haulers, water from retail
water facility, and water from vending machines shall be done
by certified laboratories, as specified.
14)Specifies certain labeling requirements for bottled and
vended water containers or machines which shall include at a
minimum: a) the name and address of the operator; b) the
source of the water; c) whether the water is obtained from an
approved public water supply or licensed private water source;
d) any treatment process used; and, e) contact information and
place to locate or obtain CCR.
15) Requires bottled water sold at retail or wholesale in this
state in a plastic beverage container, to also include on the
label, if any regulated contaminant is detected in the bottled
water (as reported in CCR for the previous year), the
following information: a) the range of the contaminant level
found in the bottled water; b) the corresponding MCL and
public health goal for that contaminant; c) any violations
that have occurred as a result of the presence of the
contaminant in the bottled water; and, d) an indication of the
health concerns that resulted in the regulation of the
contaminant. This labeling information is to be updated
annually and CCR is to be mailed by any bottlers or bottled
water distributors that distribute directly to consumers.
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16) Directs DHS to review all labels prepared pursuant to this
article, and may require any changes in order to comply with
this article prior to issuing a license.
17) Authorizes any duly designated DHS representative at any
reasonable hour of the day, to enter and inspect any licensed
facility or any place where bottled water or vended water
records are stored, kept, or maintained. DHS may also
inspect, copy any records, reports, test results, or other
information required to carry out this article. In addition
DHS is authorized to establish any monitoring equipment or
obtain water supply samples necessary to assess compliance
with this article.
18) Requires DHS to inspect each water-bottling plant
annually. DHS must inspect each retail water facility,
private water source and vehicle used in transporting drinking
water at least once every four years.
19) Specifies the contents for the annual CCR, which shall be
provided to the consumer as required by DHS and posted on
DHS's web site. The report shall include: a) the source of
the bottled or vended water; b) the definitions of MCLs,
primary drinking water standards and public health goals
(PHGs); c) a report on any regulated contaminant found in the
water over the past year; d) the contact information for
additional consumer information; and, e) a disclosure of any
variance granted to the licensee by DHS. The CCR must also
have information in Spanish, and any other language of a
population that exceeds 10 percent of the United States
population, stressing the importance of the report or offering
additional information, as determined to be necessary by DHS.
20) Make violations of these bottled water SDWA provisions
relating to fraud also punishable as a misdemeanor as are
those relating to public water supplies, as well as a failure
to comply with the inspection provisions.
21)Provides that the prevailing party shall be awarded
litigation costs, including, but not limited to, salaries,
benefits, travel expenses, operating equipment, overhead,
other litigation costs, and attorney's fees, as determined by
the court in any civil court action brought to enforce this
article.
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22)Makes certain findings relating to the differences between
the way drinking water is regulated by DHS under the SDWA and
the Sherman Law.
EXISTING LAW , under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act (federal
act), sets the framework for regulating drinking water quality
in the United States. Under the federal act, states are
authorized to assume responsibility for managing the safety of
its drinking water quality if it is certified as having a
program at least as stringent as, or more stringent than, the
federal program. California has been given that authority.
Imposes various functions and duties on DHS, under the state's
SDWA, with respect to the administration of the act, and
requires public water systems (PWSs) to comply with recommended
public health levels for contaminants in drinking water
established by DHS.
Requires PWSs to have an approved emergency notification plan,
to issue CCRs, and to comply with annual inspections.
Provides for the licensure and regulation by DHS of persons
engaged in activities relating to bottled, vended, hauled, and
processed water, pursuant to the Sherman Law.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee analysis:
Significant upfront costs, in the range of $1.2 million in
fiscal year (FY) 2003-04 and FY 2004-05, to DHS to expand its
current program of regulating bottled and vended water
companies. These costs are potentially covered by increased
fees imposed by DHS to cover the department's ongoing costs.
Significant ongoing increased costs, in the range of $750,000
annually, to administer and enforce the expanded regulatory
program. These costs are covered by revenue generated by fees
imposed on licensees.
COMMENTS : This bill would essentially transfer the provisions
relating to the licensure and regulation of persons engaged in
bottled and vending machine water activities from the Sherman
Law to the SDWA. This modification would require bottled water
licensees to comply with provisions similar to those imposed on
PWSs regarding emergency notification plans, CCRs, and annual
inspections.
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1)According to the sponsors, Clean Water Action, Natural
Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and East Bay Municipal
Utilities District, SDWA establishes a statutory framework for
the regulation of the quality of "tap water" in the state
through drinking water quality standards, requirements for
consumer reporting of drinking water quality, and regulatory
oversight by DHS. They want to make sure that the same
protections for consumers that are contained in the SDWA
relating to tap water also apply to bottled and vended water
products. By moving the regulation of bottled and vended
water distribution from the Sherman Law to SDWA, the primary
state regulatory agency remains DHS, but, the author feels
that the consumer will have greater certainty as to the
contents of bottled water products and will better ensure
consistent state oversight of drinking water.
2)With an estimated, 70% of California's consumers consuming
some or all of their drinking water needs from bottled or
vending machine water, the sponsors contend that the general
public perception is that bottled water and vended water
products are safer, or are of higher quality, than tap water
even though the water quality requirements for bottled water
are, in some cases, less stringent than tap water.
Particularly, they want to make sure that bottled and vending
water suppliers are inspected regularly, to provide the same
"right to know" information to their consumers that PWS
provide and to cover the departmental costs associated with
protecting consumers health.
3)The sponsors cite the findings of a report published in 1999
NRDC, Bottled Water: Pure Drink or Pure Hype . This report
examined the public perception that bottled water is safer for
babies and one's health generally. The NRDC study included
testing of more than 1,000 bottles of 103 brands of bottled
water. While most of the tested waters were found to be of
high quality, some brands were contaminated - about one-third
of the waters tested contained some level of contamination,
including synthetic organic chemicals, bacteria, and arsenic.
In at least one sample, allowable limits under either state or
bottled water industry standards were exceeded. While the
report does not claim there is a widespread "acute" health
risk, it notes that public concern about tap water quality is
at least partly responsible for the growth in bottled water
sales, which have tripled in the past 10 years.
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4)The Consumer's Union cites an example of how the United States
(U.S.) Environmental Protection Agency requires tap water
suppliers to monitor for asbestos, while the U.S. Food and
Drug Administration (FDA) does not. The sponsors are trying
to bring these standards together by unifying all water for
drinking purposes in the state SDWA. For example, the County
of Los Angeles feels that it is important that consumers know
about potential levels of lead, aluminum, arsenic and salt,
whether it comes from the tap or a vending machine.
5)The sponsors also assert that existing levels of fees for the
bottled and vended water regulatory program are insufficient
to fund adequate oversight of bottled water and vended water
products when compared to funding that is generated by
drinking water program regulatory fees paid by PWSs.
6)The author of this bill thinks that it is important that
bottled and vending water providers consistently meet at least
the same standards that PWSs have to meet and that this
measure will provide the consumer with necessary data to make
an informed choice and assure that adequate oversight is in
place through consistent inspection and reporting
requirements.
7)The opponents to this measure feel that imposing another set
of requirements on the bottled water purveyors is redundant in
most areas and conflicts with federal regulations in others.
Ultimately, the California Chamber of Commerce feels that this
will "serve no purpose other than to increase costs to the
industry and ultimately the consumer."
8)The International Bottled Water Association believes that the
regulations, which treat, bottled water as a "food product",
are sufficient and that these regulations are required by law
to be as stringent as standards for PWSs. It says that PWSs
regulations, drawn up for "nonpackaged, continuous
distribution systems," are different and should stay that way.
9)Opponents contend that the consumer should be confident in
their bottled water because, as a food product, it simply
cannot be sold legally if it violates the laws that cover it.
They assert that the enforcement mechanisms of the FDA are
more stringent than those under the SDWA.
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10)Opponents also contend that CCRs are not really used by the
public in the way the sponsors contend and so it would be a
waste of time and dollars. Also they say that the CCR
information will not necessarily reflect existing conditions
in the bottle because it is from the previous year. Lastly,
they assert that the labeling requirements will conflict with
federal labeling requirements and be preempted. In 1995, they
point out that FDA considered and rejected a requirement that
bottled water labels specify the water source.
Analysis Prepared by : Michael Endicott / E.S. & T.M. / (916)
319-3965
FN: 0001512 AB83 - Bottled water. Sponsor: Ellen Corbett / 2003-2004 Legislature
- Summary
- This bill requires bottled water licensees to comply with provisions similar to those imposed on public water systems regarding emergency notification plans, consumer confidence reports and inspections, and creates the Safe Bottled and Vended Water Account in the General Fund.
- Status
- This bill passed the Assembly, but did not pass the Senate. It did not become law.
Contribution data provided by the
National Institute on Money in State Politics
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