{"id":220194,"date":"2025-05-03T04:22:56","date_gmt":"2025-05-03T04:22:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/alabama\/alabama-house-passes-bill-to-reshape-the-birmingham-water-works-board\/"},"modified":"2025-05-03T04:22:56","modified_gmt":"2025-05-03T04:22:56","slug":"alabama-house-passes-bill-to-reshape-the-birmingham-water-works-board","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=220194","title":{"rendered":"Alabama House passes bill to reshape the Birmingham Water Works Board"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Alabama House of Representatives has passed SB330. This contentious bill overhauls the governance structure of the Birmingham Water Works Board, shifting control from the City of Birmingham to a newly created statewide board.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The measure passed the House 66-27 after more than two hours of debate. It had previously cleared the Alabama Senate unanimously. The bill now awaits Gov. Kay Ivey\u2019s signature.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Under the new law, the BWWB will be restructured from a city-dominated board to a statewide one with eight appointed members. Previously, the nine-member board was largely appointed by Birmingham officials, with the city mayor and council selecting six members and only one representative each from the Jefferson County Mayors Association, Blount County and Shelby County.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The new board composition will include one appointee each from the Birmingham mayor, Birmingham City Council, Jefferson County Commission, Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Blount County and Shelby County. The Governor\u2019s appointment must be a resident of Jefferson County.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Birmingham-area lawmakers and city officials have fiercely opposed the bill, viewing it as a politically motivated takeover.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin released a statement shortly after the bill passed, stating the bill weakens the voice of Birmingham\u2019s ratepayers, who make up a significant majority of the system\u2019s customer base.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u201cWhile I have raised concerns about BWWB over the years, the current board has taken steps to improve. That momentum has now been halted by this power grab from state lawmakers in Montgomery who clearly did not consider the best interest of our residents,\u201d said Woodfin.<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"code-block code-block-6\" style=\"margin: 8px auto; text-align: center; display: block; clear: both;\">\n<div class=\"zox-post-ad-wrap\"><span class=\"zox-ad-label\">Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Democratic lawmakers from Jefferson County argued that the BWWB primarily serves their constituents, more than 90 percent of its customers reside in Jefferson County, with over 40 percent in Birmingham itself. Critics contend that the bill gives disproportionate control to surrounding counties with significantly fewer customers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Throughout the debate, several proposed amendments aimed at rebalancing representation or limiting political influence on the board were introduced and subsequently defeated.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Rep. Ontario Tillman, D-Bessemer, proposed reassigning Blount County\u2019s appointment to Birmingham, citing its relatively low customer count, while Rep. Jim Hill,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> R-Odenville, <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">sought a seat for his growing constituency in St. Clair County, which contributes substantial revenue.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Both amendments failed, despite bipartisan acknowledgment of the growing needs in other underserved areas, like Lowndes County, which struggles with severe sewage infrastructure issues.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The bill\u2019s sponsors, Sen. Dan Roberts, R-Mountain Brook, and Rep. Jim Carns, R-Vestavia, defended the legislation as a necessary step to address long-standing issues with BWWB governance and customer dissatisfaction. Carns referred to the bill\u2019s passage as \u201cthe miracle on Goat Hill,\u201d referencing its unanimous support in the Senate despite its controversial nature.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The debate also touched on deeper historical and racial dynamics. Birmingham, a majority-Black city, has long had tensions with its predominantly white suburbs, and some lawmakers argued that this move continues a pattern of power being shifted away from Black-led institutions.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Rep. Neil Rafferty, D-Birmingham, called the bill an attack on local governance and an imposition by the Republican supermajority, which bypassed Jefferson County\u2019s delegation by introducing the bill as a statewide measure instead of a local one.<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"code-block code-block-6\" style=\"margin: 8px auto; text-align: center; display: block; clear: both;\">\n<div class=\"zox-post-ad-wrap\"><span class=\"zox-ad-label\">Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">In the end, SB330 passed and is set to reshape the control of one of Alabama\u2019s largest water utilities. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><!-- CONTENT END 1 -->\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Alabama House of Representatives has passed SB330. This contentious bill overhauls the governance structure of the Birmingham Water Works Board, shifting control from the City of Birmingham to a newly created statewide board.\u00a0 The measure passed the House 66-27 after more than two hours of debate. It had previously cleared the Alabama Senate unanimously. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":220195,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11763],"tags":[33526,12750,6795,13518,82781,76921,2295,594,76922,82782,22185,20014,638,1232],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-220194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alabama","tag-2025-legislative-session","tag-alabama","tag-bill","tag-birmingham","tag-birmingham-mayor-randall-woodfin","tag-birmingham-water-works-board","tag-board","tag-house","tag-jefferson-county","tag-local-government","tag-passes","tag-reshape","tag-water","tag-works"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Alabama House passes bill to reshape the Birmingham Water Works Board - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=220194\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Alabama House passes bill to reshape the Birmingham Water Works Board - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Alabama House of Representatives has passed SB330. This contentious bill overhauls the governance structure of the Birmingham Water Works Board, shifting control from the City of Birmingham to a newly created statewide board.\u00a0 The measure passed the House 66-27 after more than two hours of debate. It had previously cleared the Alabama Senate unanimously. 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