In Reaction to Yesterday’s New Report, Harder Calls Out Water Resources Control Board for Failure to Clean Valley Drinking Water
Statement comes in response to Tuesday’s State Auditor Report that names Manteca, other Central Valley communities, as victims of Board’s poor performance
WASHINGTON – Today, in reaction to the new report published yesterday by the California State Auditor on the persistent failures of the State Water Resources Control Board to facilitate the cleaning of California’s drinking water, Rep. Josh Harder released the following statement:
“The Water Resources Control Board’s failure to take swift action on much needed protects that will help our poorest and most vulnerable communities clean their drinking water is simply unacceptable. The fact that the Board held up a project to clean the City of Manteca’s school water supply for more than a year because of their own incompetence is infuriating and unconscionable. They put our kids’ lives at risk – it’s as simple as that,” said Rep. Harder. “Today I’m calling on the Water Resources Control Board to shape up and do its job before they allow even more kids and families to drink toxic drinking water. Every community in the Central Valley deserves access to clean drinking water and we can’t let bureaucracy and red tape get in the way of making that happen.”
The new report from the State Auditor found:
- More than 370 of the State’s water systems, serving nearly a million Californians, exceed the maximum contaminant levels for substances that are harmful to human health.
- More than 150 of these systems have been failing for at least five years.
- Hundreds of additional water systems are currently at risk of failing.
- The State Water Board has not prioritized the processing of water systems’ funding applications so that the systems can improve their water quality.
- Over the past five years, the average length of time for water systems to complete their applications and receive funding nearly doubled, from 17 months to 33 months.
- The State Water Board has not established performance goals or metrics related to its cumbersome application process.
- Although the State Water Board provides water systems with technical assistance to plan their improvements and apply for funds, it has not adequately monitored the performance of the technical assistance providers with which it contracts.
- The State Water Board needs to better ensure that its staff and its contracted providers do not duplicate each other’s outreach efforts.
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