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AlabamaSB3302025 Regular SessionSenate

Certain municipal water works boards reconstituted, operating procedures further provided for

Sponsored By: Dan Roberts (Republican)

Enacted

Telecommunications & Utilities

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Bill Overview

Analyzed Economic Effects

6 provisions identified: 3 benefits, 0 costs, 3 mixed.

Engineers Review Water Projects And Rates

Regional water boards must retain a nationally respected consulting engineer after a publicly posted nationwide search requesting proposals from at least five large U.S. providers. The engineer serves five years and can be selected once more for another five years. The engineer checks required reporting at least annually and reviews projects costing $2 million or more before approval. Project reviews assess need, design, and expected construction and operating costs; financing reviews assess repayment ability before financing approval. The engineer also reviews rate reasonableness annually and before any rate or service-charge increase. The engineer cannot provide project engineering services, but must review others’ plans and assess project engineers’ qualifications.

Water Boards Must Publish Spending Plans

Regional water boards must publish annual budgets broken down by month and monthly and annual financial statements comparing results with budgets. Annual statements require an independent audit. Boards must prepare five-year operating plans, update them annually, and compare plans with actual results. They also need 10-year capital funding plans and yearly rate projections covering operations, construction needs, and debt payments. Monthly and annual reports must show staffing, customer connections by major location, pipe replacement, water supplied and billed, and leaks repaired. They must also list professionals hired without public bidding, their work, and monthly, year-to-date, and 12-month payments. Before each annual budget, staffing reports must show job duties, headcounts, average pay, proposed changes, and comparisons with similar systems. Reports must include relevant assumptions and available historical context. Boards must post all reports online and send them to affected state legislators and the Department of Examiners of Public Accounts.

Water Customers Gain Rate Spending Safeguards

Regional water boards must operate only for customers’ benefit and provide efficient, safe, reliable service at reasonable rates. They must use surplus funds to reduce water rates. They must use recognized industry standards, including American Water Works Association standards, to assess operating practices. Payments to governments or other entities require reasonable payment for goods or services needed to run or manage the system. Only the Attorney General can enforce this payment ban, including suing to stop or recover improper payments. The law sets no exact customer rate, rate cap, or savings amount.

Water Board Leaders Face Ethics Limits

Regional water board directors and employees must follow Alabama’s ethics law. Directors must complete 10 hours of yearly training on governance, ethics, and reporting duties. Former directors cannot work for the board or firms doing its work for 24 months after leaving. Each board must hire a chief executive with full management authority under board policy; directors cannot order employees around. The chief executive recommends most contracts and senior appointments, including the finance chief, while executive contracts require board approval. The chief executive’s contract has a fixed term that can be extended by agreement. Termination for material failure to perform requires reasonable notice and a chance for a hearing.

Multi-county Water Boards Become Regional

Alabama water boards become regional when they serve customers or hold assets in at least four counties outside their authorizing municipality’s main county. Boards meeting this test when the bill was filed converted when the law took effect. Boards meeting it later convert after 30 days, but not before the effective date. Utilities running both water and electric distribution systems, and wholesale-only water providers, are excluded. Converted boards must update their incorporation papers; they may change names but must keep the authorizing municipality’s name. The regional rules take priority over conflicting enabling laws. The law took effect immediately and repealed Alabama Code sections 11-50-301 through 11-50-304.

New Leaders for Regional Water Boards

Conversion ends existing directors’ terms and replaces them with appointments across seven categories. The mayor and Lieutenant Governor each appoint a director with finance and business experience. The main county’s governing-body president appoints an engineer with business experience. Reservoir counties and the outside county with the most customer accounts appoint business-qualified directors. The Governor appoints a business-qualified main-county resident, and the municipality’s governing body appoints another main-county resident. All directors must live in a served county; elected officials may serve. People with board business ties, including through an employer, during the prior two years cannot serve. Terms last five years, initially staggered from one to five years, with a two-full-term limit plus a qualifying partial term. Directors receive $2,000 monthly, annual inflation adjustments, and reasonable expenses; a majority forms a quorum, and removal requires good cause and a hearing. Initial appointments are due within 20 days of the law taking effect; later openings generally require action within 30 days after notice or seven days after a term ends. Eligible area legislators and qualifying in-state economic-development groups older than five years may nominate candidates. If an appointment deadline is missed, the Secretary of State selects a submitted nominee. The Attorney General reviews qualifications, may issue advisory opinions, and may seek a Montgomery County Circuit Court ruling declaring an unqualified appointee’s seat vacant.

Sponsors & Cosponsors

Sponsor

  • Dan Roberts

    Republican • Senate

Cosponsors

  • J. T. 'Jabo' Waggoner

    Republican • Senate

  • Shay Shelnutt

    Republican • Senate

Roll Call Votes

All Roll Calls

Yes: 450 • No: 150

House vote • 5/1/2025

Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1145

Yes: 54 • No: 38 • Other: 8

House vote • 5/1/2025

Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1146

Yes: 69 • No: 29 • Other: 3

House vote • 5/1/2025

Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1144

Yes: 70 • No: 28 • Other: 4

House vote • 5/1/2025

Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1143

Yes: 71 • No: 28 • Other: 4

House vote • 5/1/2025

Motion to Read a Third Time and Pass - Adopted Roll Call 1147

Yes: 66 • No: 27 • Other: 8

Senate vote • 4/24/2025

Waggoner motion to Adopt - Adopted Roll Call 799

Yes: 30 • No: 0

Senate vote • 4/24/2025

Third Reading in House of Origin

Yes: 30 • No: 0

Senate vote • 4/24/2025

Roberts motion to Adopt - Adopted Roll Call 800

Yes: 30 • No: 0

Senate vote • 4/24/2025

Motion to Read a Third Time and Pass as Amended - Adopted Roll Call 801

Yes: 30 • No: 0

Actions Timeline

  1. Enacted

    5/7/2025Senate

  2. Delivered to Governor

    5/6/2025Senate

  3. Signature Requested

    5/6/2025House

  4. Sellers 1st Amendment Offered

    5/1/2025House

  5. Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1143

    5/1/2025House

  6. Tillman 1st Amendment Offered

    5/1/2025House

  7. Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1144

    5/1/2025House

  8. Hill 1st Amendment Offered

    5/1/2025House

  9. Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1145

    5/1/2025House

  10. Rafferty 1st Amendment Offered

    5/1/2025House

  11. Carns motion to Table - Adopted Roll Call 1146

    5/1/2025House

  12. Motion to Read a Third Time and Pass - Adopted Roll Call 1147

    5/1/2025House

  13. Ready to Enroll

    5/1/2025Senate

  14. Enrolled

    5/1/2025Senate

  15. Reported Out of Committee Second House

    4/29/2025House

  16. Read for the Second Time and placed on the Calendar

    4/29/2025House

  17. Third Reading in House of Origin

    4/24/2025Senate

  18. Waggoner 1st Amendment Offered

    4/24/2025Senate

  19. Waggoner motion to Adopt - Adopted Roll Call 799

    4/24/2025Senate

  20. Waggoner 2nd Amendment Offered

    4/24/2025Senate

  21. Roberts motion to Adopt - Adopted Roll Call 800

    4/24/2025Senate

  22. Motion to Read a Third Time and Pass as Amended - Adopted Roll Call 801

    4/24/2025Senate

  23. Engrossed

    4/24/2025Senate

  24. Read for the first time and referred to the House Committee on Commerce and Small Business

    4/24/2025House

  25. Pending Committee Action in Second House

    4/24/2025House

Bill Text

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