STAFF REPORT
City of Lancaster
CC 6
10/13/2026
TN
Date: October 13, 2026
To: Mayor Parris and City Council Members
From: Andrea Alexander, City Clerk
Subject: Adoption of an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Lancaster, California, adding Chapter 2.64 (City Social Media Accounts) to Title 2 of the Lancaster Municipal Code to establish viewpoint-neutral, conduct-based standards for the moderation of official City social media accounts, and ratifying and continuing the city’s internal and external social media policies
Recommendation:
Adopt and conduct the second reading of Ordinance No. 1156, an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Lancaster, California, adding Chapter 2.64 (City Social Media Accounts) to Title 2 of the Lancaster Municipal Code to establish viewpoint-neutral, conduct-based standards for the moderation of official City social media accounts, and ratifying and continuing the city’s internal and external social media policies.
G.C. Section 84308: No
Fiscal Impact:
No immediate capital expenditures are anticipated. The ordinance requires initial and annual moderator training, quarterly audits, and an annual report to the City Council. Administrative costs associated with appeal review, documentation, and records preservation will be absorbed within existing departmental budgets.
Background:
The City of Lancaster operates official social media accounts and other digital communication channels to inform the public about City programs, services, meetings, and activities. The City opens the interactive portions of certain accounts to comment by members of the public.
On May 29, 2026, the City adopted through its Administrative Policies and Procedures Manual an Internal Social Media Policy and an External Social Media Policy governing the administration of City social media accounts, employee use, comment standards, and records practices.
Under controlling federal authority, moderation of the interactive portions of official government social media accounts is state action subject to the First Amendment, and the City may not remove, hide, restrict, or block expression on the basis of the viewpoint of the speaker. The United States Supreme Court has clarified the state-action framework applicable to public officials’ social media activity and emphasized that government actors exercising actual authority while using social media remain subject to First Amendment constraints. Lindke v.
Freed, 601 U.S. 187, 199 (2024), O’Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier, 601 U.S. 205, 208 (2024) The City Council now desires to codify in the Lancaster Municipal Code the standards governing moderation of public comment on City accounts, so that the grounds for moderation are fixed, public, exhaustive, and amendable only by ordinance, while operational administration remains in the administrative policies.
Discussion
The proposed ordinance codifies in the Lancaster Municipal Code the standards governing moderation of public comment on City accounts, so that the grounds for moderation are fixed, public, exhaustive, and amendable only by ordinance, while operational administration remains in the administrative policies.
The ordinance is adopted to secure substantial, viewpoint-neutral City interests in the orderly operation of its communication channels; protecting staff, officials, and members of the public from true threats, doxing, impersonation, and fraud; preventing automated spam, duplicate flooding, and account evasion that crowd out ordinary civic participation; and maintaining cybersecurity, records integrity, and operational continuity.
The ordinance establishes conduct-based, viewpoint-neutral standards, documentation requirements, appeal rights, training, and audits. It is not adopted to suppress, and shall not be applied to suppress, criticism of the City, its officials, or its policies; identical substantive standards apply to supportive and critical expression alike.
Key provisions of Chapter 2.64 include:
• Purpose and construction favoring lawful expression, including criticism, political advocacy, and recall advocacy
• Prohibited conduct categories limited to threats, doxing, impersonation, fraud, malware, unlawful targeted harassment, duplicate flooding, automated posting, account evasion, materially off-topic disruption, mandatory-referral content, coordinated inauthentic conduct, and lawful orders
• Graduated response requiring least-restrictive moderation actions • Documentation, records, and preservation requirements for every moderation action • Appeal procedure for any person subject to moderation action • City attorney approval requirements for specified high-stakes actions • Coordinated comment incident protocol distinguishing protected coordination from prohibited conduct
• Election-period suspension of comments beginning 90 days before any local election • Training, audits, and annual reporting to ensure compliance and viewpoint neutrality The ordinance directs the City Manager to present conforming amendments to the Internal and External Social Media Policies within 60 days of the effective date.
Environmental Review
Adoption of this ordinance is not a “project” subject to the California Environmental Quality Act because it is an organizational or administrative activity of government that will not result in direct or indirect physical changes in the environment (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15378(b)(5)), and, independently, is exempt under the common-sense exemption (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15061(b)(3)).
At the Lancaster City Council meeting held on September 08, 2026, the City Council approved the introduction and first reading of Ordinance No. 1156, an ordinance of the City Council of the City of Lancaster, California, adding Chapter 2.64 (City Social Media Accounts) to Title 2 of the Lancaster Municipal Code to establish viewpoint-neutral, conduct-based standards for the moderation of official City social media accounts, and ratifying and continuing the city’s internal and external social media policies, by the following vote: 5-0-0-0; AYES- Castellanos, Mann, White, Hughes-Leslie, Parris; NOES: None; ABSTAIN: None; ABSENT: None.
Attachment:
Proposed Ordinance No. 1156