AN ACT Relating to public water systems; amending RCW 43.20.050, 80.04.010, 80.04.110, 80.28.030, and 80.28.040; and adding a new section to chapter 80.28 RCW.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

Sec. 1. Section 43.20.050, chapter 8, Laws of 1965 as last amended by section 1, chapter 213, Laws of 1985 and RCW 43.20.050 are each amended to read as follows:

(1) The state board of health shall provide a forum for the development of public health policy in Washington state. It is empowered to hold hearings and explore ways to improve the health status of the citizenry.

(2) In order to protect public health, the state board of health shall:

(a) Adopt rules and regulations ((for the protection of water supplies for domestic use, and such other uses as may affect the public health, and shall adopt standards and procedures governing the design, construction and operation of water supply, treatment, storage, and distribution facilities, as well as the quality of water delivered to the ultimate consumer;)) necessary to assure safe and reliable public drinking water and to protect the public health. Such rules and regulations shall establish requirements regarding:

(i) The design and construction of public water system facilities, including proper sizing of pipes and storage for the number and type of customers;

(ii) Drinking water quality standards, monitoring requirements, and laboratory certification requirements;

(iii) Public water system management and reporting requirements;

(iv) Public water system planning and emergency response requirements;

(v) Public water system operation and maintenance requirements; and

(vi) Water quality, reliability, and management of existing but inadequate public water systems.

(b) Adopt rules and regulations and standards for prevention, control, and abatement of health hazards and nuisances related to the disposal of wastes, solid and liquid, including but not limited to sewage, garbage, refuse, and other environmental contaminants; adopt standards and procedures governing the design, construction, and operation of sewage, garbage, refuse and other solid waste collection, treatment, and disposal facilities;

(c) Adopt rules and regulations controlling public health related to environmental conditions including but not limited to heating, lighting, ventilation, sanitary facilities, cleanliness and space in all types of public facilities including but not limited to food service establishments, schools, institutions, recreational facilities and transient accommodations and in places of work;

(d) Adopt rules and regulations for the imposition and use of isolation and quarantine; and

(e) Adopt rules and regulations for the prevention and control of infectious and noninfectious diseases, including food and vector borne illness, and rules and regulations governing the receipt and conveyance of remains of deceased persons, and such other sanitary matters as admit of and may best be controlled by universal rule.

(3) All local boards of health, health authorities and officials, officers of state institutions, police officers, sheriffs, constables, and all other officers and employees of the state, or any county, city, or township thereof, shall enforce all rules and regulations adopted by the state board of health. In the event of failure or refusal on the part of any member of such boards or any other official or person mentioned in this section to so act, he shall be subject to a fine of not less than fifty dollars, upon first conviction, and not less than one hundred dollars upon second conviction.

Sec. 2. Section 1, chapter 229, Laws of 1987 and RCW 80.04.010 are each amended to read as follows:

As used in this title, unless specifically defined otherwise or unless the context indicates otherwise:

"Commission" means the utilities and transportation commission.

"Commissioner" means one of the members of such commission.

"Competitive telecommunications company" means a telecommunications company which has been classified as such by the commission pursuant to RCW 80.36.320.

"Competitive telecommunications service" means a service which has been classified as such by the commission pursuant to RCW 80.36.330.

"Corporation" includes a corporation, company, association or joint stock association.

"Person" includes an individual, a firm or partnership.

"Gas plant" includes all real estate, fixtures and personal property, owned, leased, controlled, used or to be used for or in connection with the transmission, distribution, sale or furnishing of natural gas, or the manufacture, transmission, distribution, sale or furnishing of other type gas, for light, heat or power.

"Gas company" includes every corporation, company, association, joint stock association, partnership and person, their lessees, trustees or receiver appointed by any court whatsoever, and every city or town, owning, controlling, operating or managing any gas plant within this state.

"Electric plant" includes all real estate, fixtures and personal property operated, owned, used or to be used for or in connection with or to facilitate the generation, transmission, distribution, sale or furnishing of electricity for light, heat, or power for hire; and any conduits, ducts or other devices, materials, apparatus or property for containing, holding or carrying conductors used or to be used for the transmission of electricity for light, heat or power.

"Electrical company" includes any corporation, company, association, joint stock association, partnership and person, their lessees, trustees or receivers appointed by any court whatsoever (other than a railroad or street railroad company generating electricity solely for railroad or street railroad purposes or for the use of its tenants and not for sale to others), and every city or town owning, operating or managing any electric plant for hire within this state. "Electrical company" does not include a company or person employing a cogeneration facility solely for the generation of electricity for its own use or the use of its tenants or for sale to an electrical company, state or local public agency, municipal corporation, or quasi municipal corporation engaged in the sale or distribution of electrical energy, but not for sale to others, unless such company or person is otherwise an electrical company.

"LATA" means a local access transport area as defined by the commission in conformance with applicable federal law.

"Private telecommunications system" means a telecommunications system controlled by a person or entity for the sole and exclusive use of such person, entity, or affiliate thereof, including the provision of private shared telecommunications services by such person or entity. "Private telecommunications system" does not include a system offered for hire, sale, or resale to the general public.

"Private shared telecommunications services" includes the provision of telecommunications and information management services and equipment within a user group located in discrete private premises in building complexes, campuses, or high-rise buildings, by a commercial shared services provider or by a user association, through privately owned customer premises equipment and associated data processing and information management services and includes the provision of connections to the facilities of a local exchange and to interexchange telecommunications companies.

"Radio communications service company" includes every corporation, company, association, joint stock association, partnership, and person, their lessees, trustees, or receivers appointed by any court, and every city or town making available facilities to provide radio communications service, radio paging, or cellular communications service for hire, sale, or resale.

"Telecommunications company" includes every corporation, company, association, joint stock association, partnership and person, their lessees, trustees or receivers appointed by any court whatsoever, and every city or town owning, operating or managing any facilities used to provide telecommunications for hire, sale, or resale to the general public within this state.

"Facilities" means lines, conduits, ducts, poles, wires, cables, cross-arms, receivers, transmitters, instruments, machines, appliances, instrumentalities and all devices, real estate, easements, apparatus, property and routes used, operated, owned or controlled by any telecommunications company to facilitate the provision of telecommunications service.

"Telecommunications" is the transmission of information by wire, radio, optical cable, electromagnetic, or other similar means. As used in this definition, "information" means knowledge or intelligence represented by any form of writing, signs, signals, pictures, sounds, or any other symbols.

"Water system" includes all real estate, easements, fixtures, personal property, dams, dikes, head gates, weirs, canals, reservoirs, flumes or other structures or appliances operated, owned, used or to be used for or in connection with or to facilitate the supply, storage, distribution, sale, furnishing, diversion, carriage, apportionment or measurement of water for power, irrigation, reclamation, manufacturing, municipal, domestic or other beneficial uses for hire.

"Water company" includes every corporation, company, association, joint stock association, partnership and person operating as a business enterprise, their lessees, trustees or receivers appointed by any court whatsoever, and every city or town owning, controlling, operating, or managing any water system for hire within this state: PROVIDED, That ((~~for purposes of~~)) commission jurisdiction ((it)) shall not ((~~include~~)) be exercised with regard to the regulation of any water system serving less than one hundred customers where the average annual gross revenue per customer does not exceed three hundred dollars per year, which revenue figure may be increased annually by the commission by rule adopted pursuant to chapter ((~~34.04~~)) 34.05 RCW to reflect the rate of inflation as determined by the implicit price deflator of the United States department of commerce, except where the commission receives a copy of an administrative order from the department, or the city or county in which the water system is located, finding that the water delivered by a system does not meet state board of health standards adopted under RCW 43.20.050(2)(a). The department shall exercise jurisdiction until the water system is in compliance with those standards to the satisfaction of the department: AND PROVIDED FURTHER, That such measurement of customers or revenues shall include all portions of water companies having common ownership, regardless of location or corporate designation. However, water companies exempt from commission regulation shall be subject to the provisions of chapter 19.86 RCW.

"Cogeneration facility" means any machinery, equipment, structure, process, or property, or any part thereof, installed or acquired for the primary purpose of the sequential generation of electrical or mechanical power and useful heat from the same primary energy source or fuel.

"Public service company" includes every gas company, electrical company, telecommunications company, and water company. Ownership or operation of a cogeneration facility does not, by itself, make a company or person a public service company.

"Local exchange company" means a telecommunications company providing local exchange telecommunications service.

"Department" means the department of social and health services.

The term "service" is used in this title in its broadest and most inclusive sense.

Sec. 3. Section 80.04.110, chapter 14, Laws of 1961 as amended by section 11, chapter 450, Laws of 1985 and RCW 80.04.110 are each amended to read as follows:

Complaint may be made by the commission of its own motion or by any person or corporation, chamber of commerce, board of trade, or any commercial, mercantile, agricultural or manufacturing society, or any body politic or municipal corporation, or by the public counsel section of the office of the attorney general, or its successor, by petition or complaint in writing, setting forth any act or thing done or omitted to be done by any public service corporation in violation, or claimed to be in violation, of any provision of law or of any order or rule of the commission: PROVIDED, That no complaint shall be entertained by the commission except upon its own motion, as to the reasonableness of the schedule of the rates or charges of any gas company, electrical company, water company, or telecommunications company, unless the same be signed by the mayor, council or commission of the city or town in which the company complained of is engaged in business, or not less than twenty-five consumers or purchasers of such gas, electricity, water or telecommunications service: PROVIDED, FURTHER, That when two or more public service corporations, (meaning to exclude municipal and other public corporations) are engaged in competition in any locality or localities in the state, either may make complaint against the other or others that the rates, charges, rules, regulations or practices of such other or others with or in respect to which the complainant is in competition, are unreasonable, unremunerative, discriminatory, illegal, unfair or intending or tending to oppress the complainant, to stifle competition, or to create or encourage the creation of monopoly, and upon such complaint or upon complaint of the commission upon its own motion, the commission shall have power, after notice and hearing as in other cases, to, by its order, subject to appeal as in other cases, correct the abuse complained of by establishing such uniform rates, charges, rules, regulations or practices in lieu of those complained of, to be observed by all of such competing public service corporations in the locality or localities specified as shall be found reasonable, remunerative, nondiscriminatory, legal, and fair or tending to prevent oppression or monopoly or to encourage competition, and upon any such hearing it shall be proper for the commission to take into consideration the rates, charges, rules, regulations and practices of the public service corporation or corporations complained of in any other locality or localities in the state.

All matters upon which complaint may be founded may be joined in one hearing, and no motion shall be entertained against a complaint for misjoinder of complaints or grievances or misjoinder of parties; and in any review of the courts of orders of the commission the same rule shall apply and pertain with regard to the joinder of complaints and parties as herein provided: PROVIDED, All grievances to be inquired into shall be plainly set forth in the complaint. No complaint shall be dismissed because of the absence of direct damage to the complainant.

Upon the filing of a complaint, the commission shall cause a copy thereof to be served upon the person or corporation complained of, which shall be accompanied by a notice fixing the time when and place where a hearing will be had upon such complaint. The time fixed for such hearing shall not be less than ten days after the date of the service of such notice and complaint, excepting as herein provided. Rules of practice and procedure not otherwise provided for in this title may be prescribed by the commission.

The commission shall, as appropriate, exercise auditing and accounting supervision or initiate a complaint upon receipt of an administrative order from the department, or the city or county in which the water system is located, finding that the water delivered by a system does not meet state board of health standards adopted under RCW 43.20.050(2)(a) or standards adopted under chapter 70.116 RCW.

Sec. 4. Section 80.28.030, chapter 14, Laws of 1961 and RCW 80.28.030 are each amended to read as follows:

Whenever the commission shall find, after such hearing, that the illuminating or heating power, purity or pressure of gas, the efficiency of electric lamp supply, the voltage of the current supplied for light, heat or power, or the purity, quality, volume, and pressure of water, supplied by any gas company, electrical company or water company, as the case may be, is insufficient, impure, inadequate or inefficient, it shall order such improvement in the manufacture, distribution or supply of gas, in the manufacture, transmission or supply of electricity, or in the storage, distribution or supply of water, or in the methods employed by such gas company, electrical company or water company, as will in its judgment be efficient, adequate, just and reasonable. Failure of a water company to comply with state board of health standards adopted under RCW 43.20.050(2)(a) or department standards adopted under chapter 70.116 RCW for purity, volume, and pressure shall be prima facie evidence that the water supplied is insufficient, impure, inadequate, or inefficient.

In ordering improvements in the storage, distribution, or supply of water, the commission shall consult and coordinate with the department. In the event that a water company fails to comply with an order of the commission in a timely fashion, the commission may request that the department petition the court to place the company in receivership.

Sec. 5. Section 80.28.040, chapter 14, Laws of 1961 and RCW 80.28.040 are each amended to read as follows:

Whenever the commission shall find, after hearing, that any rules, regulations, measurements or the standard thereof, practices, acts or services of any such gas company, electrical company or water company are unjust, unreasonable, improper, insufficient, inefficient or inadequate, or that any service which may be reasonably demanded is not furnished, the commission shall fix the reasonable rules, regulations, measurements or the standard thereof, practices, acts or service to be thereafter furnished, imposed, observed and followed, and shall fix the same by order or rule.

In ordering improvements to the service of any water company, the commission shall consult and coordinate with the department. In the event that a water company fails to comply with an order of the commission in a timely fashion, the commission may request that the department petition the court to place the company in receivership.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 6. A new section is added to chapter 80.28 RCW to read as follows:

The commission may develop and enter into an agreement with a county to carry out the regulatory functions of this chapter with regard to water companies located within the boundary of that county. The duration of the agreement, the duties to be performed, and the renumeration to be paid by the commission are subject to agreement by the department and the county.