groundwater; transporting requirements; technical correction

HB 2085 clarifies rules for transporting groundwater between water management areas in Arizona. It affects cities, towns, and private water companies that have signed Central Arizona Project (CAP) water delivery contracts. The bill requires these entities to first prove they have 95% system capacity to handle CAP water and have accepted 80% of their CAP entitlement for at least one of the past three years before using transported groundwater. It also includes a technical exception for groundwater from the Big Chino sub-basin. The bill makes no new policy changes but corrects existing statutory language.