Safe, affordable and sufficient water is not a luxury.
It is a necessity for life.
Support the human right to water!
Dear California Alliance members,
Please call your Assembly Member today and ask for an “Aye” vote on two bills vital to realizing the Human Right to Water in California.
This year the Safe Water Alliance sponsored four bills in the 2012 Human Right to Water bill package. However only two of these bills have made it to the Assembly for a floor vote. Thus it is urgent that your Assembly Member hear from you today, Wednesday, May 30. The floor vote will take place between Wednesday, May 30 and Friday, June 1.
In addition, AB 685 (Eng) Human Right to Water passed the Assembly June 1, 2011, but is still, after a year, pending in the Senate Appropriations Committee. This bill, part of the first Human Right to Water bill package introduced during the 2011 legislative session, would establish the human right to water as a statewide policy priority to ensure all Californians have access to safe, affordable, and sufficient drinking water.
Capitol office phone numbers are here. Ask for an “Aye” vote on:
AB 1830 (VM Perez) – Protections for Mobile Home Park Residents and Water Rates – This bill authorizes the Public Utilities Commission to order restitution to mobile home park residents where it finds that the park owner charged unjust or unreasonable rates.
AB 2238 (Perea) Consolidation – Through improved funding mechanisms, this bill would provide consolidation or extension of infrastructure and/or management services to better serve existing low-income communities that currently lack safe affordable water.
This 2012 Human Right to Water Bill Package was presented by the Safe Water Alliance, a dynamic group of faith-based, environmental justice, tribal, consumer, and public health advocates working across the state to realize the human right to water in California.
These bills are a vital step toward ensuring access to safe, sufficient, affordable water for daily human needs for the most disadvantaged and at risk communities in the state. With polluted water resources and aging and inadequate infrastructure, public water systems are challenged to provide residents with safe water at affordable rates.
The other two bills, now held up in the Assembly Appropriations Committee, that will not come to a floor vote, are:
AB 1669 (Perea) “At Risk Areas” – This bill would create the “Nitrate at Risk Area Fund” to fund drinking water projects in disadvantages communities which are designated as at risk for nitrate contamination by the State Water Resources Control Board and the Dept. of Public Health.
AB 2334 (Fong) Water Affordability – This bill would require the Dept. of Water Resources to conduct an analysis of water affordability every 5 years as part of the CA Water Plan Update and identifying factors contributing to high water rates and proposing programs to make water affordable in high-cost communities.
Thank you for your call, and for all you do for water democracy,
Nancy Price, Co-chair and Western Coordinator, Defending Water for Life
Safe Water Alliance partners: Alliance for Democracy; California Center for Public Health Advocacy; California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation; Catholic Charities Diocese of Stockton; Clean Water Action; Community Water Center; Environmental Justice Coalition for Water; Food and Water Watch; Pueblo Unido; Southern California Watershed Alliance; Unitarian Universalist Legislative Ministry Action Network, CA; Unitarian Universalist Service Committee; Urban Semillas; Winnemem Wintu Tribe, and Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.
Photo: Community Water Center, Visalia, California
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