Water managers warn that Utah faces over $30 billion in water needs in coming decades. But auditors reported last year that the state’s water oversight is too patchy to know what projects are really needed.
The State Legislature’s answer to these issues is embodied in a pair of bills that House members approved Wednesday to start a kind of water-project savings account and to oversee those projects.
“I believe in the system,” said Rep. Lee Perry, R-Box Elder County. “I believe in the people who will be here to serve us will do the right things with this money if we’ll give them the chance. But if we don’t put it away, it won’t be there for them.
In SB80, sales taxes that all Utahns pay will pump millions into the new fund each year. And a related bill that also passed Wednesday, SB251, would put the billion-dollar Lake Powell Pipeline and the Bear River Project first in line for the money.
Reforms like water conservation and market pricing would be overseen by the agency the audit largely blamed for sloppy management, the Utah Division of Water Resources, and the State Water Development Commission that’s largely comprised of water districts.
Rep. Brian King, D- Salt Lake City, basically said lawmakers were putting the fox in charge of the henhouse.
“You can’t effectively put into place in the same bill,” he said, “a plan to conserve while at the same time you put in place a plan to expend, a plan to build the projects.”
House members voted, 48 to 26, to pass SB 80 and, 60 to 14, to pass SB251. The votes sent to the Senate, which has until midnight to finalize them.