Camarillo City Council
AGENDA REPORT
Date: May 13, 2026
To: Honorable Mayor and City Councilmembers
From: Greg Ramirez, City Manager
Submitted by: Carmen Nichols, Assistant City Manager
Subject: Legislative Platform Updates
BACKGROUND
The Legislative Platform serves as the foundation for the City’s legislative advocacy efforts, outlining positions on key policy areas and guiding staff and the City’s contract advocates when determining appropriate action to proposed local, state, and federal legislation.
The City Council last adopted its Legislative Platform on February 12, 2025. To ensure the platform remains current and responsive to evolving legislative conditions, staff recommends that updates be regularly made to allow the City to adapt more effectively to emerging issues and changing policy environments. Per City Council Policy 2.02, Legislation and Legislative Matters, the Policy Committee is responsible for reviewing the Platform and providing a recommendation to the City Council.
The Legislative Platform was presented to the Policy Committee during the February 4, 2026, and April 15, 2026, meetings. The Committee recommended that the Legislative Platform be forwarded to the City Council for review and approval.
DISCUSSION
City staff, in coordination with the City’s contracted lobbyists, Arc Strategies and Downs Government Affairs (DGA), conducted a review of the existing Legislative Platform, taking into consideration recently enacted legislation and refining language to better align with current City Council goals. Since the City Council last adopted the Legislative Platform, there have been several legislative efforts at the local, state, and federal levels that directly or indirectly impact municipal operations, service delivery, and local authority.
During the past year, staff monitored and responded to legislative proposals affecting city interests, including but not limited to fiscal stability, housing and land use authority, public safety, infrastructure funding, environmental regulations, and labor relations. Several of these legislative efforts highlighted areas where additional clarity, refinement, or
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expansion of the City’s policy positions would better support effective advocacy. In addition to reflecting lessons learned from the prior legislative cycle, the proposed updates also account for anticipated legislative activity in the coming year.
Staff is recommending the following changes:
Local Government Finance
State-Federal Mandated Programs
Addition: (A)(3) Oppose legislation that imposes new statewide data privacy or reporting requirements on local agencies without adequate funding.
Reasoning: The increasing prevalence of artificial intelligence and evolving cybersecurity standards is driving new data privacy and reporting requirements for local agencies.
While these requirements may be necessary, they create additional administrative and financial burdens. It is essential that any new mandates be accompanied by sufficient funding to ensure effective and sustainable implementation.
Long Term Financing of Local Agencies
Addition: (B)(3) Support regulatory and legislative efforts to expedite the review and approval of federal and state water-infrastructure financing programs—such as Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act and the State Revolving Loan Fund—and support increased appropriations to fully fund these programs to ensure timely, reliable access to critical project financing.
Reasoning: Critical infrastructure financing programs, including WIFIA and the State Revolving Fund, face potential funding reductions and delays in application approvals.
This position enables the City to advocate for maintaining or increasing program funding and improving administrative efficiency to ensure timely access to essential infrastructure financing.
General Government
Worker’s Compensation
Recent state activity has focused on expanding presumptive eligibility, increasing administrative requirements, and extending benefit coverage in ways that shift cost and risk to employers without corresponding funding. At the same time, claims duration, medical costs, and administrative complexity continue to be the primary drivers of workers’ compensation spending. These updates position the City to support targeted system improvements while opposing cost increases that are not tied to measurable outcomes.
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Addition: (A)(1) Oppose legislation that increases Workers' Compensation benefits or administrative requirements that will result in additional higher employer costs or unfunded mandates.
Addition: (A)(2) Support legislation that improves fraud prevention, strengthens return- to-work programs, and preserves local agency flexibility in managing Worker’s Compensation claims. reforms the Workers' Compensation system to eliminate system abuse, limit presumptive eligibility claims for benefits, and reduce employer costs.
Reasoning: These positions are intended to focus on the primary drivers of costs of the system-claims duration, medical utilization, and eligibility, rather that across the board expansion. Supporting fraud prevention, return to work programs, and flexible claims management at the local level will help to reduce long term costs and improve outcomes.
Opposing unfunded mandates or expanded benefits without any measurable impact ensures the city can manage its risk responsibly while maintaining levels of service.
Unemployment Compensation
Recent policy discussions at the state level have focused on expanding eligibility for unemployment benefits and standardizing administrative processes across employers.
While intended to increase access and consistency, these changes can reduce employer discretion and increase costs, particularly for the city as we rely on fact-specific determinations in claim adjudication.
Addition: (B) Oppose legislation that increases employer liability for unemployment compensation costs or that restricts would reduce local discretion in determining eligibility, administration, or appeal process.
Reasoning: Preserving local discretion in eligibility determinations and appeals is essential for ensuring claims are evaluated based on actual circumstances rather than uniform standards that may not reflect our operations. Limiting that discretion, or expanding eligibility without clear controls, increases liability and creates a higher risk of improper or non-meritorious claims, directly impacting the City’s financial exposure.
Labor Relations
Legislative proposals have increasingly introduced standardized labor processes, expanded reporting requirements, and, in some cases, expanded the use of binding arbitration in the public sector. While intended to create consistency, these changes can reduce control over employee relations, discipline, and operational decision-making— particularly for Camarillo which does not operate in a labor organization environment.
Deletion: (C)(1) Oppose legislation that impedes local administration of labor relations and legislation that would require, impose, or expand compulsory binding arbitration for public employees.
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Addition: (C)(2) Oppose legislation that impedes local administration of labor relations, disciplinary processes, or operational requirements.
Addition: (C)(6) Oppose legislation that imposes or creates new restrictive and over burdensome reporting, tracking, or administrative mandates of employee benefits, payroll or compliance without funding support.
Reasoning: These updates respond to state-level efforts to standardize labor relations processes and expand administrative requirements without accounting for differences in agency size, structure, or operational needs. For a non-labor organization public agency, maintaining control over discipline, performance management, and labor administration is critical to effective operations.
Workforce Management
Legislation has introduced new mandates related to workplace safety, employee wellness, reporting requirements, and data governance. While these initiatives are well- intended, many are implemented without funding, clear standards, or consideration of administrative capacity. These updates distinguish between supported, funded programs that improve workforce outcomes and mandates that create operational or fiscal strain.
Addition: (M)(1) Support legislation that provides funding and flexibility for compliance with state-mandated workplace violence prevention requirements.
Reasoning: State workplace violence prevention requirements are already in effect and expanding in scope. Compliance requires ongoing training, documentation, and program administration. Supporting funding and flexibility ensures these requirements can be implemented effectively without diverting resources from core operations.
Addition: (M)(2) Oppose new workplace safety, wellness, or mental-health mandates that impose unfunded training or reporting requirements.
Reasoning: Training, reporting, and program requirements have been recommended or enacted without funding or implementation guidance. These mandates increase administrative workload and compliance risk while providing limited measurable benefit.
Opposition will ensure employee support initiatives are implemented through funded, effective programs rather than unfunded compliance obligations.
Addition: (M)(3) Support legislation that incentivizes employee wellness, resilience, and mental-health programs through grants or cost-sharing opportunities.
Reasoning: Support the City Council’s goal of maintaining an optimum work environment by promoting funded wellness, resilience, and mental health initiatives.
Addition: (M)(4) Support legislation clarifying acceptable and responsible uses of Human Resources technology and artificial intelligence in recruitment, evaluation, Legislative Platform Updates
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and workforce planning.
Reasoning: Regulatory scrutiny around the use of AI in hiring and workforce management is increasing, with evolving and often unclear standards. Clarifying allowable uses reduces legal risk and ensures the City can adopt technology tools responsibly while maintaining compliance, transparency, and fairness.
Addition: (M)(5) Support legislation that strengthens local workforce pipelines, including public-sector internships, apprenticeships, and programs that enhance recruitment for hard-to-fill municipal positions
Reasoning: Public agencies are facing sustained recruitment challenges, particularly in technical and hard-to-fill positions. Strengthening internships, apprenticeships, and early- career pathways addresses a shrinking candidate pool and supports long-term workforce stability.
Addition: (M)(6) Support legislation that clarifies public-sector exemptions under the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA) and protects agencies from litigation risk tied to employee data management.
Reasoning: Employee data protections under CPRA have created ambiguity in how public agencies manage internal workforce data. Clarifying exemptions and requirements reduces litigation risk and ensures the City can carry out standard HR functions without conflicting compliance obligations.
Addition: (M)(7) Support legislation that provides reasonable timelines, funding support and technical assistance for any new Human Resources reporting mandates.
Reasoning: New reporting requirements are increasing in volume and complexity, often without funding or realistic implementation timelines. Support will ensure new Human Resources reporting mandates are practical, funded, and do not disrupt public services.
Emerging Technologies
Addition: (N)(1) Support legislation that provides clear legal frameworks and liability protections for local governments using artificial intelligence (AI) tools, including guardrails that limit agency exposure when AI is used in good faith to enhance public services, automate workflows, or improve decision-making.
Reasoning: Supports the City Council’s goal of enhancing cybersecurity and operational efficiency by enabling the responsible use of AI with appropriate legal protections.
Addition: (N)(2) Support legislation that provides grant funding and resources to assist local governments with AI readiness, including development of governance policies, staff training, data quality improvements, and secure, transparent AI Legislative Platform Updates
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deployment.
Reasoning: Recognizes that as AI adoption expands and becomes subject to regulation, state support is necessary to help local agencies meet new requirements effectively.
Public Protection
Public Safety
Addition: (A)(5) Support legislation that maintains public safety and provides additional tools and resources to address community challenges such as homelessness, mental health, domestic violence, drug rehab, ex-offender reentry, and human trafficking, as long as they provide the resources necessary for implementation and are not unfunded mandates.
Deletion: (A)(6) Oppose legislation that mandates local government's response to addressing community challenges, including, but not limited to, homelessness, mental health, domestic violence, drug rehab, ex-offender reentry, and human trafficking Reasoning: Combines related policy positions to improve clarity and conciseness while maintaining the City’s stance on ensuring that any mandated responses to community challenges are supported with adequate resources.
Homeland Security/Emergency Preparedness
Addition: (C)(1) Support legislation that provides funding to local agencies for cybersecurity, emergency planning and facilities, disaster training, preparedness, prevention, protection, mitigation, response, recovery, and resiliency to disasters and environmental threats.
Addition: (C)(3) Support legislation that provides sustained funding, technical assistance, and procurement flexibility for local governments to modernize information technology systems including cloud migration, legacy system replacement, cybersecurity tools, network redundancy, and digital public engagement platforms and oppose legislation that imposes new cybersecurity or technology mandates without corresponding, reliable funding sources.
Reasoning: Supports the City Council’s objective of strengthening cybersecurity and emergency preparedness to protect City operations and enhance resilience against evolving threats.
Transportation and Public Works
Vehicles
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Addition: (B)(5) Support legislation that provides flexible timelines, funding, and technical assistance to help local governments comply with State and Federal zeroemission vehicle (ZEV) and alternative-fuel fleet mandates and oppose legislation that imposes unfunded or infeasible fleet requirements without adequate financial support, infrastructure investment, or technology readiness.
Reasoning: Advances the City Council’s sustainability goals by supporting the transition to cleaner vehicle technologies while ensuring implementation timelines and requirements remain feasible and adequately funded
Resources and Environment
Water
Addition: (B)(6) Oppose legislation that imposes additional mandates, operational requirements, or compliance obligations on the city’s water system without full reimbursement or state funding to cover associated costs, particularly when the city has already implemented requirements under prior legislation.
Reasoning: Recent legislation has imposed unfunded requirements on water suppliers in Ventura County, including costly infrastructure and emergency preparedness mandates. Additional statewide proposals may further expand these obligations. This position enables the City to advocate for full funding to support compliance and protect critical water infrastructure.
Addition: (B)(7) Protect the City’s critical water supply and infrastructure by harmonizing state groundwater law with state water quality law.
Reasoning: Supports the protection of the City’s water supply and prior infrastructure investments by promoting alignment between groundwater and water quality regulations.
Energy
Addition: (E)(2) Oppose legislation that unfairly disadvantages or undermines Community Choice Aggregators (CCA) or CCA customers.
Deletion: (E)(3) Oppose legislation that reduces or undermines local decision-making authority by CCA or its governing board.
Reasoning: Combines related provisions for clarity and efficiency.
FISCAL IMPACT
There is no budget impact as a result of this action.
CITY COUNCIL STRATEGIC PLAN FY 2025/26
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The updates to the Legislative Platform support the City Council’s Strategic Plan Goal and Objective 10.2 - Intergovernmental Relations; be proactive in defending the City’s interests concerning proposed legislation and regulatory issues, including but not limited to legislative efforts to reduce local municipal control in land use and housing decisions.
The Platform provides guidance on how to respond to proposed legislation so that the City may proactively engage with elected officials and advocate on behalf of the community’s needs.
CEQA DETERMINATIONS
Not applicable
RECOMMENDATION
1. Review and approve the updates to the Legislative Platform.
ATTACHMENTS
1. Legislative Platform (Draft)
REFERENCE MATERIALS – AVAILABLE FOR REVIEW AT CITY HALL None