CALIFORNIA WATER SERVICE GROUP

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Proxy Summary

Overview of Voting Items

California Water Service Group is the third largest publicly traded water utility in the United States, providing high-quality water and wastewater services to approximately two million people in approximately 100 communities. Our mission is to be the leading provider of sustainable water and wastewater services.

What We Do

The majority of our business consists of the production, purchase, storage, treatment, testing, distribution, and sale of water for domestic, commercial, industrial, public, and irrigation uses — and includes the provision of domestic and municipal fire protection services. Other services include wastewater collection and treatment. We also offer non-regulated services, such as water system operation, billing, and meter reading services under agreements with municipalities and other private companies. Additional non-regulated operations include the lease of communication antenna sites, provision of lab services to third parties, and the promotion of other non-regulated services.

Where We Operate

Headquartered in San Jose, California, the Group includes seven operating subsidiaries. California Water Service Company (Cal Water), Washington Water Service Company (Washington Water), New Mexico Water Service Company (New Mexico Water), Hawaii Water Service Company, Inc. (Hawaii Water), TWSC, Inc. (Texas Water), CWS Utility Services, and HWS Utility Services LLC. Cal Water, Washington Water, New Mexico Water, and Hawaii Water are regulated public utilities that also provide certain non-regulated services. CWS Utility Services and HWS Utility Services LLC hold non-utility property and provide non-regulated services to private companies and municipalities outside of California. Texas Water is a holding company with regulated and contracted wastewater utilities.

Our Priorities

We remain laser focused on executing our strategy and serving our customers. Our priorities include:

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Affordable, Excellent Service: Our user-friendly, technology-driven platforms enable clear and effective communication with our customers.

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Employees as Best Advocates: We promote a work environment that is safe, healthy, respectful, and a positive place to grow.

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Enhanced Stockholder Value: We have the infrastructure and strategy to be successful in the long term.

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Public Health and Safety: Our water quality testing, water treatment technologies, and emergency preparedness systems and procedures are best-in-class.

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Sustainability and Community Impact: We are committed to supporting our communities and being a responsible steward of our resources.

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The Group’s director nominees collectively contribute significant experience in the areas we believe to be the most relevant to overseeing the Company’s business and strategy.

Board Diversity

Based on the voluntary self-identification of gender, age, race, and ethnicity by our director nominees, the graphs below represent the diversity of the director nominees.

Board Experience/Qualifications/Skills/Attributes

Our Board and Nominating/Corporate Governance Committee regularly evaluate the Board’s composition to enable the Board and the Nominating/Corporate Governance Committee to assess the skills and experience that are currently represented on the Board as a whole, and in individual directors, and to update these skills and experience as necessary in light of Group’s anticipated needs, including its current and future business and operations. Key skills and qualifications of each director nominee that the Board considered important in its decision to nominate or re-nominate that individual to the Board are summarized below. For additional information regarding our director nominees’ qualifications, please refer to their individual biographies provided below.

Board Independence

Board Tenure

Our management and Board value the views of our stockholders and believe that maintaining an active dialogue with them is important to our commitment to enhance long-term stockholder value. For fiscal year 2024, we received 96% of the votes cast on the Say-on-Pay advisory vote taken at the 2024 Annual Meeting of Stockholders.

During fiscal 2024, we met with several of our largest investors representing approximately 22% of our total outstanding shares. We also participated in meetings with stockholders that were not among our top 25 that expressed an interest in engaging with us. Our stockholder engagement activities included participation primarily from our senior leadership and Investor Relations team and covered topics including strategy, corporate governance, Board oversight, executive compensation, human capital management, board and leadership refreshment, as well as sustainability efforts, like our GHG emissions reduction targets and reporting. We also engaged various stakeholders including regulators, proxy advisory firms, credit rating agencies, ESG rating firms, and subject matter experts.

We engage with stockholders and others through multiple mediums, including quarterly investor calls and other investor-led conferences and presentations, Group-hosted investor meetings, both in-person and virtual, our virtual annual meeting of stockholders, as well as with our periodic reporting and disclosures.

As illustrated in the table below, our Board has been responsive to stockholder feedback. Over the past several years, we have made numerous changes to our governance and executive compensation programs and related disclosures based on feedback from our stockholders and our annual review of market practices.

As a company, we have always stood for “doing the right thing.” We strive to make the world a better place and take pride in our long-standing efforts to provide a sustainable supply of safe water at affordable rates, be responsible stewards of the environment, invest in and give back to our communities, foster a positive and enriching work environment for our employees, and maintain high ethical standards. This commitment is instilled in our shared purpose, which is to enhance the quality of life for our customers, communities, employees, and stockholders.

Our Approach to Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG)

We are dedicated to understanding and leveraging the interdependence of ESG interests and critical aspects of our operations. We are proud of our contributions to improving resiliency and building a sustainable future. We aim to integrate our commitment to protecting public health and the planet, caring for people, and operating with the utmost integrity into the fabric of our daily business activities. We believe this will support the long-term resilience

of our Company, our communities, and our planet. We undertook a formal materiality assessment in 2020 to identify the ESG topics most important to our business and to our stakeholders. The assessment included researching the landscape of ESG topics, mapping impacts to our value chain, seeking internal and external stakeholder feedback, and validating our findings with company leadership. The results of the materiality assessment, shown below, directly informed our broader ESG program and priorities, including ESG reporting and disclosure, objective-setting, integration with our corporate strategy, and internal and external stakeholder engagement efforts. In 2025, we plan to update our ESG materiality assessment.

Our ESG objectives, informed by these topics, reflect our efforts to drive accountability, establish milestones, and measure progress. These objectives complement a range of other ongoing initiatives we have in place to manage environmental and social issues across our business. In 2024, we made progress toward our objectives, as discussed below and in more detail in our 2024 Sustainability Report, which we intend to make available in May 2025.

Our Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) program supports our efforts to effectively mitigate ESG risks by incorporating material ESG topics into our ERM process. Our material ESG topics are closely aligned with the enterprise risks we monitor through our ERM program. In fact, there is an approximate 85% overlap between our primary and secondary ERM risks and our material ESG topics. During our ERM review process each year, we analyze new and existing risks and develop and revise the mitigation controls. We also review and update the mapping across ERM and ESG areas and strive to integrate new and emerging ESG-related risks into our risk assessments and mitigation controls as appropriate.

For more information on our formal ESG governance structure, please refer to “Board Oversight of Risks Related to Environmental, Social Responsibility, and Governance Matters” in this Proxy Statement. Additional information on this topic is available in our latest sustainability report atwww.calwatergroup.com. We expect to publish our 2024 Sustainability Report and 2024 Sustainability Analyst Download in May 2025.

Annual Sustainability Report

Our annual sustainability reports and other relevant documents, like our CDP Climate Change questionnaire response, are available atwww.calwatergroup.com. Our annual sustainability reports align with the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) Water Utilities and Services Industry Standard, leverage the guidance of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), and reference the 2021 Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)

Universal Standards. We expect to publish our 2024 Sustainability Report and 2024 Sustainability Analyst Download, covering our activities from January 1, 2024 to December 31, 2024, in May 2025. Web links are provided throughout this Proxy Statement for convenience and are inactive textual references only. The content on the referenced websites does not constitute a part of, and is not incorporated by reference into, this Proxy Statement.

Performance Highlights

Protecting Our Planet

Our mission as a leader in the water utility industry requires us to deliver — and steward — the planet’s most precious resource. In our increasingly changing and interconnected world impacted by climate change, a global pandemic, social tensions, and technological innovations, it is more important than ever to build sustainability and resilience into everything we do.

Our climate change strategy, approved by the Board of Directors in 2021, aims to address the impacts of climate-related risks through mitigation and adaptation. The strategy includes the five core elements: (i) reduce Group and value chain contributions to climate change by striving to minimize our Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions footprint, working to reduce water consumption, and continuing to advance our value chain GHG emissions inventory, (ii) plan for potential climate change impacts on our business through adaptive planning pathways that develop timeframes and triggers for implementing projects while maintaining the flexibility to respond to changing climate, financial, and regulatory circumstances, (iii) ramp up collaboration and advocacy by engaging extensively with regulators, policymakers, customers and communities, and industry associations on climate priorities, (iv) set time-bound goals as detailed below, and (v) continue to mature disclosures by enhancing our data collection process and our climate change-related reporting.

Serving Our Customers and Communities

Safe, high-quality water service is critical to the health and well-being of our customers. In providing it, we also seek ways to promote its affordability, improve service, strengthen security, and prepare for emergencies. California Water Service Group is also committed to partnering with organizations that make a real difference in the communities we serve.

Engaging Our Workforce

Our more than 1,200 employees help California Water Service Group serve more than 500 communities across five states. To develop a workforce that performs at the highest levels and reflects the communities that we serve, we have made significant investments in hiring, training, engagement, and safety. We regularly update our human resources policies and processes to contribute to a stronger workforce, reflect our dedication to equal opportunity, diversity, and inclusion, and improve retention and satisfaction.

As part of our commitment to diversity and equality, our policy has been and continues to be to maintain a zero-tolerance approach to discrimination, harassment, and retaliation. We seek to provide equal opportunity regardless of age, sex, race, ethnicity, ancestry, religion, creed, citizenship status, disability, national origin, marital status, military status, sexual orientation, gender identity, socio- economic status, or any other characteristic protected by law or any other non-job-related factor or activity. Our public Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion Policy outlines our commitments to this topic and additional information, including data regarding the diversity of employees based on voluntary self-identification, will be available in our 2024 Sustainability Report, which is scheduled to be published in May 2025.

Governing with Integrity

California Water Service Group’s mission is to be a leading provider of sustainable water and wastewater services — and that starts with integrity as a core value. We hold our Board, employees, and suppliers to high ethical standards and follow best practices as we advocate for the interests of our customers, communities, employees, and future generations.

Additional Corporate Governance Information Available

Our corporate webpage includes the following:

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California Water Service Group Bylaws

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Corporate Governance Guidelines

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Audit Committee Charter

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Organization and Compensation Committee Charter

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Finance and Capital Investment Committee Charter

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Nominating/Corporate Governance Committee Charter

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Enterprise Risk Management, Safety, and Security Committee Charter

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Code of Business Conduct and Ethics Policy of the Board of Directors

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Business Code of Conduct for Officers and Employees

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Supplier Code of Conduct

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Sustainability Reports

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Annual Supplier Diversity Reports

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Environmental Sustainability Policy

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Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion Policy

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Human Rights Policy

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Political Engagement Policy

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Commitment to Providing Excellent, Affordable Service and High-Quality Water to All Customers

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Information Regarding Reporting of Financial, Audit, and Security Law Matters

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