By Jon Coupal – May 13, 2024

This is an important Action Alert regarding three bills in the Legislature that could restrict your rights and make it easier to raise the rates you pay for water. All these bills violate the California constitution, specifically Proposition 218, a taxpayer and ratepayer protection initiative sponsored by HJTA and passed by voters in 1996.

Please call your representatives in the state Assembly and Senate — you can look up their names and phone numbers at findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov — and urge them to vote no on these bills:

Assembly Bill 2257 (Lori Wilson)
Limits the right of ratepayers to challenge illegal water rates by reducing the time allowed to bring a challenge and by enabling water agencies to withhold the data and reports needed for a challenge until it’s too late to file one.

Assembly Bill 1827 (Diane Papan)
Allows rate hikes based on fictional or potential water demand, and allows higher rates for “peak” usage, which many water agencies can’t even measure.

Senate Bill 1072 (Steve Padilla)
Removes the right to a refund if property owners are overcharged for services such as water and sewer. Substitutes a credit on future bills, which cheats people who have moved and are no longer customers of the same agency.

Look up the names of your representatives at findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov, or if you already know your representatives’ names, you can find their contact information on these pages:

Assembly Members: assembly.ca.gov/assemblymembers
Senators: senate.ca.gov/senators

Thank you for helping to protect California ratepayers and taxpayers. We greatly appreciate you!

Jon Coupal is President of Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association