2019-050 -Adopting Local CEQA Guidelines

Home Browse Search

Local Guidelines for Implementing the California Environmental Quality Act (2019) INITIAL STUDY county board of supervisors must approve the water assessment prepared pursuant to this paragraph at a regular or special meeting. As per Water Code section 10910, the water assessment must include identification of existing water supply entitlements, water rights, or water service contracts relevant to the water supply for the proposed project and water received in prior years pursuant to those entitlements, rights, and contracts, and further information is required if water supplies include groundwater. The water assessment must determine the ability of the public water system to meet existing and future demands along with the demands of the proposed water demand project in light of existing and future water supplies. This supply demand analysis is to be conducted via a twenty-year projection, and must assess water supply sufficiency during normal year, single dry year, and multiple dry year hydrology scenarios. If the public water agency concludes that the water supply is, or will be, insufficient, it must submit plans for acquiring additional water supplies. The city or county may grant the public water agency a thirty (30) day extension of time to prepare the assessment if the public water agency requests an extension within ninety (90) days of being asked to prepare the assessment. If the governing body of the public water system fails to request and receive an extension of time, or fails to submit the water assessment notwithstanding the thirty (30) day extension, the city or county may seek a writ of mandamus to compel the governing body of the public water system to comply. If a water-demand project has been the subject of a water assessment, no additional water assessment shall be required for subsequent water-demand projects that were included in the larger water-demand project if all of the following criteria are met: (1) The entity completing the water assessment concluded that its water supplies are sufficient to meet the projected water demand associated with the larger water- demand project, in addition to the existing and planned future uses, including, but not limited to, agricultural and industrial uses; and (2) None of the following changes has occurred since the completion of the water assessment for the larger water-demand project: (A) Changes in the larger water-demand project that result in a substantial increase in water demand for the water-demand project. (B) Changes in the circumstances or conditions substantially affecting the ability of the public water system identified in the water assessment to provide a sufficient supply of water for the water demand project. (C) Significant new information becomes available which was not known and could not have been known at the time when the entity had reached its assessment conclusions. (3) The city or county shall include the water assessment, and any water acquisition plan in the EIR, negative declaration, or mitigated negative declaration, or any supplement thereto, prepared for the project, and may include an evaluation of the water assessment and water acquisition plan information within such 2019 City of Santa Ana Local Guidelines 5-15 ©Best Best & Krieger LLP