Taxing your drinking water is no solution

Unfortunately, some in the state, who live in small, rural, disadvantaged communities, do not have access to safe drinking water. While we support the goal of ensuring safe drinking water for all Californians, the latest proposal to impose new state taxes on our drinking water is the wrong solution to a problem that we agree must be solved.

A budget trailer bill backed by the Brown administration proposes a new tax on drinking water and closely resembles Senate Bill 623 by state Sen. Bill Monning, D-Carmel. The state should take a leadership role in solving this problem, but we believe that taxing Californians for something that is essential to life does not make sense — especially at a time when many people are raising concerns about the affordability of water and the overall cost of living in the state.

A recent survey commissioned by the Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA) revealed that out of 1,000 likely California voters interviewed, an overwhelming 73 percent were opposed to a statewide tax on drinking water.

There is a better approach. A package of funds comprised of ongoing federal safe drinking water funds, voter-approved general obligation bonds, the already proposed assessments related to nitrates in groundwater, and a limited amount of state general fund dollars already collected by the state makes more sense. This funding package, proposed by ACWA, is a far more practical way to make safe drinking water accessible for all Californians, without burdening our local agencies with yet another tax.

Another alternative proposed by ACWA is the development of an Irrevocable Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Trust that would establish a stable and perpetual source of funding. We believe that asking the Legislature to fund the creation of such a trust in this budget surplus year is a smart way to prioritize surplus funding. The fact that some communities in certain areas of the state do not have safe drinking water is a social issue for California. This problem can be solved without a tax on drinking water.

Other viable alternatives include lease revenue bonds, or allocation of a percentage of cap-and-trade funding for safe drinking water. A tax on drinking water simply isn’t necessary.

As MPWD’s board president, I recognize the need to keep costs as low as possible for our customers. That requires foresight — the anticipation of potential problems — instead of waiting to react to problems. Our ability to provide our customers with safe drinking water depends on this work. Through our partnership with the city of Belmont, at any given time our district is overseeing more than a half dozen projects that maintain and improve our local water facilities — 100 miles of water mains, 11 water storage tanks, 19 booster pumps, 810 fire hydrants, 2,715 valves and 8,200 water meters. The MPWD is also responsible for its share of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission’s Hetch Hetchy Regional Water System infrastructure and operations. These are significant investments and costs. Moreover, the MPWD has identified $52 million for its much needed and deferred capital improvements that will affect ratepayers. MPWD ratepayers are already burdened enough on their monthly water bill with operations, maintenance and capital costs to ensure safe delivery of drinking water to their homes, schools, churches, businesses and industries.

Having our agency and thousands of other water systems collect a tax for the state is inefficient and would also divert time and resources away from what we’re supposed to be doing — delivering safe water to you and solving water issues for our area. Furthermore, once a tax like this is put into place, it will likely remain forever and will likely increase in future years — as almost all taxes seem to do.

Please join me in opposing a drinking water tax and supporting a more appropriate funding solution. For more information, please visit watertaxfacts.org.

Dave Warden is the president of the Mid-Peninsula Water District board and the former mayor of Belmont.