HB 2300 Virginia House of Delegates · 2025 Regular Session

Drinking water; maximum contaminant levels, water treatment or filtration systems.

Summary

Drinking water; maximum contaminant levels; water treatment or filtration systems; Residential Well Water Testing and Treatment Program and Program Fund established. Directs the State Board of Health to adopt regulations to utilize point-of-use or point-of-entry drinking water treatment or filtration systems to remove or significantly reduce concentrations of contaminants of concern that meet or exceed any maximum contaminant level or health advisory for the same contaminant adopted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The bill also establishes the Residential Well Water Testing and Treatment Program and Program Fund to allow the Department of Health's Office of Drinking Water to test and treat contaminated drinking water through grants for the use of eligible treatment or filtration systems in private residential wells.

Issues: ✓ Environment ✓ Healthcare

Bill status in committee 3 of 5 stages cleared

Introduction

Jan 2025

Committee Review

Jan 2025

House of Delegates Passage

Jan 2025

Senate Passage

Governor

Introduced Jan 8, 2025 Last action Jan 31, 2025

Maddy AI version diff · 2 comparisons

What changed between versions

HHS Sub: Health Substitute → Health and Human Services Substitute · 2 edits

MINOR

The bill was reformatted from a House substitute to a House substitute version, with the committee name updated from 'House Committee on _____________' to 'House Committee on Health and Human Services' and the date updated from an unspecified date to January 30, 2025. The substantive policy content regarding the Residential Well Water Testing and Treatment Program remains unchanged.

TECHNICAL

Committee name was specified as 'Health and Human Services' instead of blank, and the date was updated to January 30, 2025

Document formatting was restructured with different line breaks and spacing, but no substantive policy content was altered

Introduced → HHS Sub: Health Substitute · 9 edits

MAJOR

The bill was amended from its original introduction to a House substitute version, shifting focus from broader water supply oversight to specifically targeting residential well water contamination. The substitute version simplifies the bill by removing the existing § 32.1-169 amendment and concentrating solely on establishing a Residential Well Water Testing and Treatment Program with a dedicated fund. Key changes include modifying the definition of 'economic need' to remove the low-income threshold requirement, changing the program administrator from the Department's Office of Drinking Water to the Department broadly, and renumbering subsections to accommodate the removed content.

Scope change

The bill's scope narrowed from amending two separate code sections (32.1-169 and adding 32.1-248.5) to only establishing the new Residential Well Water Testing and Treatment Program section (32.1-248.5). The original provision giving the Board supervision over all water supplies was removed.

SCOPE

Removed the amendment to § 32.1-169 that gave the Board general supervision over all water supplies and established maximum contaminant levels for specific contaminants in public water systems.

ELIGIBILITY

Changed the 'economic need' definition by removing the option for owners who are 'low income' as defined in § 2.2-234, leaving only the criterion of being unable to pay or having significant difficulty paying for treatment systems.

REQUIREMENT

Removed the requirement that professionally installed systems must be installed by a 'qualified third-party professional' (licensed plumber or water well provider).

Modified the Program description to explicitly include 'purchase, installation, and maintenance' of eligible systems, whereas the original only mentioned 'testing and treatment'.

DEFINITION

Changed the definition of 'Eligible treatment or filtration systems' from 'treatment or filtration systems' to 'treatment and filtration systems' to clarify the scope of covered equipment.

Changed the definition of 'Fund' to reference subsection D instead of subsection C, reflecting the renumbering of program subsections.

Changed the Program administrator from 'Department's Office of Drinking Water' to simply 'the Department' to broaden administrative authority.

TECHNICAL

Removed the $3 million annual operating cost cap from the original bill text.

Changed the program subsection numbering from B, C to C, D to accommodate the removal of the original § 32.1-169 amendment.

Floor votes · House of Delegates Jan 30, 2025

How they voted

20–0

Passed · 2 other

Total votes 22

Jan 30, 2025

D Democratic12

11 Yea 1

91% Yea

R Republican10

9 Yea 1

90% Yea

Vote distribution

All Yea All Nay Mixed No data

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Jan 30, 2025

Committee

Assigned Approps sub: Health & Human Resources

lower

Jan 30, 2025

Lower · Passed

Reported from Health and Human Services with substitute and referred to Appropriations (20-Y 0-N 1-A)

lower

Jan 30, 2025

House Of Delegates · Passed

House of Delegates Vote: pass (20-0-2)

house of delegates

Jan 20, 2025

Committee

Assigned sub: Health

lower

Jan 8, 2025

Committee

Referred to Committee on Health and Human Services

lower

1 primary · 2 co-sponsors