{"id":4947,"date":"2023-03-27T10:23:21","date_gmt":"2023-03-27T17:23:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/?p=4947"},"modified":"2025-09-22T13:27:51","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T20:27:51","slug":"new-blog-45-blog-developing-a-new-regulation-under-the-water-sustainability-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/2023\/03\/27\/new-blog-45-blog-developing-a-new-regulation-under-the-water-sustainability-act\/","title":{"rendered":"Blog Post #45 &#8211; Developing a new regulation under the Water Sustainability Act"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Water is one of BC\u2019s most important natural resources and must be managed appropriately to protect both human and ecosystem health. This is why the Province is pleased to be moving ahead with the development of a new regulation under the <em>Water Sustainability Act<\/em> (WSA). The regulation is an important tool that is broadly\u00a0utilized in other provincial legislation known as <strong>administrative monetary\u00a0penalties (AMPs).<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>WSA was designed to ensure a sustainable supply\u00a0of fresh, clean water to meet the needs of B.C.\u00a0residents today and in the\u00a0future.\u200b Violations under the\u00a0WSA are an issue\u00a0across multiple sectors\u00a0including residential development\u200b, agriculture and industrial sectors. Currently, the WSA relies on violation tickets, orders\u200b and prosecution through the courts. AMPs bridge the gap between tickets and prosecution and are already enabled through the WSA.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why now? <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>With 25% of the fresh flowing water in Canada, British Columbia appears to be richly endowed with clean water. However, the<strong>\u00a0increase in <\/strong>population<strong> growth, the expansion of industry and agriculture, and the ongoing threat of climate change<\/strong> all place enormous pressure on the province&#8217;s water supply. We are hearing from communities that water violations are an ongoing concern. Additional water enforcement tools such as AMPs will help to reduce the cumulative effects of authorized and unauthorized uses on water quantity and quality.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What\u2019s next? <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The WSA sets out the AMP framework and there are number of details to develop in partnership with First Nations including:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Comptroller\u2019s authority to determine a\u00a0contravention has occurred\u200b<\/li>\n<li>How a penalty is assessed and imposed\u200b<\/li>\n<li>How users are notified\u200b<\/li>\n<li>Requirement to provide for an opportunity to be\u00a0heard\u200b<\/li>\n<li>Recovery and payment of penalty amounts\u200b<\/li>\n<li>Authority to enter into Compliance Agreements\u00a0and how they may be applied\u200b<\/li>\n<li>Appeals of AMP decisions\u200b<\/li>\n<li>Other legal and procedural details<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The Province aims to have a WSA AMPs regulation in place by early 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Water is one of BC\u2019s most important natural resources and must be managed appropriately to protect both human and ecosystem health. This is why the Province is pleased to be moving ahead with the development of a new regulation under the Water Sustainability Act (WSA). The regulation is an important tool that is broadly\u00a0utilized in &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/2023\/03\/27\/new-blog-45-blog-developing-a-new-regulation-under-the-water-sustainability-act\/\">Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4947","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4947"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4947\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5386,"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4947\/revisions\/5386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engage.gov.bc.ca\/watersustainabilityact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}