SB 5029-S - DIGEST

(DIGEST OF PROPOSED 1ST SUBSTITUTE)

Recognizes that safe water delivered to a school can be adversely impacted by the plumbing in the facility, and finds that the best way to ensure that drinking water is safe in a particular school building is through testing water from individual taps and bubblers, setting action levels for drinking water quality, and developing and implementing corrective action plans when problems are found.

Declares an intent that the exclusive responsibility remains with the local school governing authority of the school institutions for: (1) Providing information to the public about water quality and other environmental health risks in their school facilities;

(2) Undertaking corrective actions to respond to exceedances of drinking water action levels in schools;

(3) Ensuring sufficient monitoring of drinking water in school facilities is conducted to identify where such exceedances are occurring;

(4) Ensuring test results are widely accessible to parents, students, staff, and local and state health departments; and

(5) Ensuring broad community participation with prioritizing and resolving water quality and other environmental health risks.

Requires the board to adopt rules for drinking water in school facilities by August 1, 2006.

Directs the state building code council to examine the uniform plumbing code for consistency with applicable state and federal standards for lead plumbing and solders, fixtures, bubblers, fountains, or other potential sources of lead contamination of drinking water, particularly regarding the application of the code to construction of school buildings. The council shall also examine the effectiveness of those standards in new plumbing construction projects to minimize the leaching of lead into the drinking water consumed at the tap.

Provides that, by December 1, 2006, the council must submit a report on its review to the appropriate legislative committees on their findings, with recommendations for actions to ensure the code is effective in its content, implementation, and enforcement to minimize in new plumbing construction projects the leaching of lead into the drinking water consumed at the tap.