Wat. Code, § 13198.2

(a) Subject to an appropriation in the annual Budget Act or another statute for these purposes, an implementing agency may make grants and direct expenditures for interim or immediate relief in response to conditions arising from a drought scenario to do any of the following:

(1) Address immediate impacts on human health and safety, including providing or improving availability of food, water, or shelter.

(2) Address immediate impacts on fish and wildlife resources.

(3) Provide water to persons or communities that lose or are threatened with the loss or contamination of water supplies.

(b) A contract entered into under this article by an implementing agency is exempt from Chapter 2 (commencing with Section 10290) of Part 2 of Division 2 of the Public Contract Code. An implementing agency may award a contract under this section on a noncompetitive bid basis as necessary to implement the purposes of this article.

(c) An implementing agency shall obtain approval from the Department of Finance before entering into a contract under this section.

(d) Actions of implementing agencies under this article shall be deemed to be within paragraph (2), (3), or (4) of subdivision (b) of Section 21080 of the Public Resources Code.

(e) Posting and dissemination of information related to drought emergency activities under this section is exempt from Sections 7405 and 11546.7 of the Government Code as they pertain to the posting of materials on state agency internet websites as part of responding to the emergency, provided that any state agencies failing to satisfy the requirements of Sections 7405 and 11546.7 of the Government Code shall make and post an accessible version on their internet websites as soon as practicable.

(f) Implementing agencies may adopt guidelines to implement this article. Those guidelines are not subject to Chapter 3.5 (commencing with Section 11340) of Part 1 of Division 3 of Title 2 of the Government Code.