Mandates
Mandate Reform

The Governor's Budget proposes changes that will significantly impact the current determination process. Under the current process, determinations about activities eligible for reimbursement and funding levels are not made until after the activities have been performed and local governments have incurred costs. A significant backlog now exists, and this backlog has increased the elapsed time between when a new law takes effect and when a local agency receives its initial reimbursement. Absent a backlog, the Commission would determine within one year whether or not a claim is a reimbursable mandate and what activities are reimbursable. The backlog has increased this time frame to several years.

The Administration is proposing a process under which the Department of Finance will work with local agencies to develop a cost-efficient method of compliance with new laws and a reasonable and relatively simple way to determine the amounts to be reimbursed to local governments.

The Administration also proposes to repeal the Local Government Employment Relations mandate created by Chapter 901, Statutes of 2000. The statutes and regulations related to this mandate were established to provide a less expensive alternative to court proceedings related to unfair practice disputes; however, the County of Sacramento demonstrated in their test claim (01-TC-30) that, contrary to the original intent, this change in the appeal process cost more than the previous process. The Commission agreed that there were increased costs associated with this mandate and approved the test claim. The Governor's Budget is now proposing that this mandate be repealed so local governments can be relieved of this unnecessary cost and the state can be relieved of providing reimbursements for these additional costs.
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CHAPTER HIGHLIGHTS for Mandates Back to Top

 Funded Mandates
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PRINTABLE BUDGET DOCUMENTS Back to Top
Budget Summary - Mandates (pdf * - 39K) -
Provides this entire Mandates Chapter in pdf format.