The Alabama Senate on Thursday amended and passed a divisive bill changing the membership and qualifications for the Birmingham Water Works Board.

The board that serves customers in five counties would change into a regional board under that amended bill.

Senate Bill 330, sponsored by Sen. Dan Roberts, R-Mountain Brook, had initially sparked disagreement between senators who represent Jefferson County.

Republican senators who represent the suburbs supported the bill, saying that problems in the system would lead to unreasonably high rates and other problems and hurt economic development.

Democratic senators representing Birmingham opposed it, saying it was unfairly taking control of important assets away from the city and its residents.

SB330 had also drawn opposition from the BWWB, which will be replaced under the legislation.

On Thursday morning, the Senate amended the bill and passed it on a 30-0 vote, sending it to the House of Representatives.

The vote came quickly and with almost no discussion. But Roberts said Thursday’s result came after a lot of hard work behind the scenes.

“We sat down as a Jefferson County delegation and hammered it out in a back room, what it would take to get this bill to pass without creating lots of problems for the rest of our colleagues in the Senate,” Roberts said.

The bill would replace the current board.

Initially, it would have reduced the board from nine members to five.

Before passing the bill Thursday, the Senate added two more slots, for a total of seven.

Here’s how the seven members would be appointed:

• One appointed by Blount County Commission
• One appointed by Shelby County Commission
• One appointed by Birmingham City Council
• One appointed by Birmingham mayor
• One appointed by the president of the Jefferson County Commission
• One appointed by the lieutenant governor
• One Jefferson County resident appointed by the governor

Roberts said he would have preferred sticking with five appointments, but said adding the two slots was a necessary compromise.

“We ideally wanted a five-member board,” Roberts said. “A five member board is usually very, very effective.

“But after hard negotiations for several hours yesterday, till late last night, and then again this morning, it became clear that this is what needed to happen.”

The bill also adds new qualifications for most of those appointments, requiring backgrounds in finance, business, and, for one slot, engineering.

“We’re after a board whose goal is to work together to provide true, true loyalty to the customer base, not anyone else,” Roberts said.

“Their fiduciary duty will be to the customers of the Birmingham Water Works. And that’s what we were after.

“We’re after bringing in people – engineers, finance people, general business people who understand how to work together as a board to direct the general manager how to run a water system. And that’s really what the whole objective of this was.”

The bill moves to the House, where Roberts said it will be handled by Rep. Jim Carns, R-Vestavia Hills.

Sen. Rodger Smitherman, D-Birmingham, who strongly opposed the bill before the changes, voted in favor of the bill, as did six of the eight Democratic senators. Two did not vote.

Smitherman declined to comment after the Senate adjourned Thursday.

Smitherman said he would be ready to discuss the bill it if passes the House and is signed into law by Gov. Kay Ivey.