State Water Resources Control Board staff walk reporters through EAR sections 9–18, submission steps and deadlines

Gabriela Gutierrez of the EAR customer service team opened the State Water Resources Control Board’s brown-bag training and said the session would review sections 9 through 18 of the Electronic Annual Report for the 2025 reporting year and take audience questions.

Staffers front‑loaded guidance on where to find help in the portal and on the EAR website, including video tutorials, an EAR worksheet (spreadsheet of the portal questions), and links to Public Drinking Water Watch. They emphasized that many fields are prepopulated from prior submissions, that some fields are conditional and will only appear based on earlier answers, and that bulk uploads (for operators or storage‑tank inventories) must follow portal formatting.

Why it matters: the EAR collects system inventories, operator certifications, treatment and distribution information, and emergency‑preparedness details the Division of Drinking Water uses to review public water systems’ compliance and vulnerability assessments. The board’s EAR team flagged several items that commonly cause returns for revision—missing operator certifications, improperly formatted bulk uploads and conditionally mandatory complaint descriptions—so reporters and system operators should review the portal guidance materials before submitting.

Key takeaways

• Section 9 (regulatory reports and plans): Sydney Sally said systems must record dates for bacteriological sample siting plans, emergency notification plans and watershed sanitary surveys and contact their district/regulator to provide plan documents where the portal does not accept file uploads. She cited the California Revised Total Coliform Rule as the regulatory basis for some siting requirements.

• Section 10 (backflow and cross‑connection control): staff said the portal now better aligns question wording with the Cross Connection Control Policy Handbook and asks for information such as the total number of backflow prevention assemblies, the percentage of initial hazard assessments completed, and the cross‑connection control program coordinator.

• Section 11 (operator certification): systems must list certified operators and indicate chief/shift roles. Jonathan Schwady reviewed options to add operators manually or by uploading an operator table; the portal will accept an Excel bulk upload if it follows specified formatting.

• Sections 12–15 (improvements, complaints, treatment, distribution): presenters explained how to report planned improvements per the California Water Works Standards, how to enter complaint counts and descriptions for conditionally mandatory fields (for example, color or turbidity complaints), how to document chemical additives (materials must meet recognized materials standards), and how to record distribution problems, flushing, valve exercise programs and storage tank inventories.

• Section 16 (emergency preparedness): staff instructed community and noncommunity water systems to answer backup‑power questions appropriate to their system type; systems that cannot maintain continuous operations with current backup power are prompted to report estimated funding gaps, barriers and whether they want information about funding opportunities.

• Section 17 (conservation): applies to urban water suppliers only and requests conservation program elements and, where available, a budget breakdown (internal labor, external consulting, program costs).

• Section 18 (climate vulnerability and adaptation): Wendy Kalu said the climate vulnerability assessment was added to the EAR after a 2017 State Water Resources Control Board climate resolution and that a 2023 equity resolution expanded requirements to assess disproportionate climate impacts; Appendix I on the Department of Water Resources website was cited as guidance for adaptation measures.

Submission and post‑submission process

Wendy Kalu demonstrated the finalized section of the portal: the system flags entry errors in red and links back to the specific sections that need correction. After submission, reporters receive an email confirmation; Division of Drinking Water or LPA reviewers may approve the EAR or send it back with revision requests that must be addressed and resubmitted. The portal records each submission timestamp and the "report submitted by" field is prepopulated from the submitter’s account and cannot be changed after the first submission. Staff also showed how to print or save a submitted EAR to PDF for records.

Deadlines and data changes

Staff reiterated the portal deadline for EAR submissions: April 1 (reporting‑year 2025). They also explained that post‑approval data corrections are handled through an EAR data change request form on the EAR website and that the team accepts data change requests only for the 2025 reporting year through the deadline provided in the portal and on the EAR webpages; attendees were advised to check the EAR website for the authoritative date and to contact their regulator with any questions.

Audience questions and clarifications

During Q&A, staff clarified that Section 10 wording was updated to align with the Cross Connection Control Policy Handbook and that the portal now asks for an approximate percentage of initial hazard assessments completed. Wendy confirmed Section 11 should list every certified operator who works for the water system (chief operator is shown separately). When asked whether to leave non‑applicable fields blank or enter NA, staff advised entering 0 for numeric fields that do not apply where the portal requires a numeric value and leaving truly non‑applicable fields blank if the portal accepts that option.

What attendees should do next

Staff recommended reporters watch the short tutorial videos linked on the EAR resources page before entering data, use the downloadable EAR worksheet to prepare answers offline, and contact EAR customer service or their DDW district/LPA representative for technical issues. The training recording and slides will be posted on the EAR website shortly after the webinar.

Ending

The webinar closed with a reminder that EAR submissions are due April 1 for the 2025 reporting year and contact instructions for EAR customer service (ddw-ear@waterboards.ca.gov). The team thanked attendees and said the session recording and supporting materials would be posted.