Legislative & Regulatory News & Updates

The CSDVB is mission-driven to improve state contracting opportunities for small businesses through our highly effective education and advocacy efforts in working with the state legislature, regulators, agencies, boards and commissions on behalf of its members. The CSDVB has been responsible for securing over $1 billion dollars of contracts with the state.

Our mission is to ensure that ALL contracts are fairly and equitably awarded to Certified Small Businesses, especially when bidding against the large prime vendors, many of whom are located outside of the state.

The Coalition’s Steering Committee has been an active member of the Department of General Service’s (DGS) Small Business Advisory Council (SBAC) since 2009. We work closely with DGS to correct inconsistent contracting practices that result in the loss of contracting opportunities for small businesses throughout our state, including our rural and underserved communities. We continue to work with DGS in advocating for the unbundling of contracts so that more small businesses can participate in the solicitation process thereby creating more jobs.

The CSDVB will provide regular updates on the issues affecting Certified Small Businesses, including:

Legislative Front – New Bill on the Prompt Payment Act:

AB 2272 (Caloza) would require stronger enforcement of the California Prompt Payment Act for Certified Small Businesses. Under existing law, the California Prompt Payment Act requires a state agency that contracts with a Certified Small Business to make the payment to the business on the date required by the contract or be subject to a late payment penalty. Existing law requires state agencies to “encourage” claimants to promptly pay their subcontractors and suppliers, especially those who are small businesses. This bill would instead require prime contractors to pay their subcontractors and suppliers within 45 days of receiving payment from the state. This bill would also require DGS to enforce compliance with this requirement and give DGS the authority to impose a demerit system, in which noncompliant prime contractors lose eligibility for state contracts. For contracts entered into or renewed with the state on or after January 1, 2027, the bill would further authorize DGS to review and rescind a prime contractor’s existing contracts if the prime contractor repeatedly fails to comply. Additionally, the bill would require DGS to adopt rules and regulations to administer these provisions.

The Coalition’s current Legislative Report can be viewed at [link] It includes bills of interest to small businesses, microbusinesses and disabled veteran enterprise businesses that we are actively watching. This list will be updated regularly and made available to the Associate Members of the Coalition.

Regulatory Front – DGS and CSDVB Activity Report:

For 17 years, CSDVB has served as a lead member of DGS’ Small Business Advisory Council (SBAC) on behalf of all of the Certified Small and Disabled Veteran Businesses to make sure our concerns are heard and acted upon by DGS’ Director. This includes strengthening the enforcement of rules and regulations to ensure more contracting opportunities go to the Certified Small Businesses.

The CSDVB and DGS are working on the following projects important to all Small and Disabled Veteran Busineses:

We are working with DGS to consolidate the delegated purchasing authority tiers from four to three tiers, and every department in the first tier will receive an increase in their delegated purchasing authority. Purchasing tiers are published on the DGS website. Vendors can check departmental authority for direct procurement. DGS’ One-Time Acquisitions Unit handles procurement if the dollar amount exceeds the department’s purchasing authority. All tier-one departments can exercise this tiered Small Business option without going through DGS.

We worked on increasing the Fair and Reasonable threshold, increasing it from $10,000 to $20,000 to allow state departments to procure without full competition under $20K. This will create more opportunities for CSDVBs to begin contracting with the state.

Competitive Procurement expansions have been made to purchasing authority tiers authorizing departments with the lowest purchasing authority to obtain an increase in their authority. These departments can now conduct open market competitive procurements, where they previously could not do so. We believe that this will increase the competitive procurement opportunities CSDVBs see from the state departments.

We supported improvements to the E-Marketplace online punch-out catalog for state contracts. Phase one was launched in mid-November with enhanced search functionality. This will enable state departments to search by item code that is in a contract by vendor, location, and to access attachments related to those contracts more efficiently.

Cal eProcure remains active and is working on efficiency Improvements in Bid Documentation. This will likely require policy changes and potential legislation changes. DGS is working on reducing redundant documents in bids with the goal to consolidate or embed required documents into state standard terms and conditions thereby reducing paperwork during the bid process. The objective is to prevent bid rejections due to missing legally required forms. These changes are part of a broader push for efficiency and simplification, with more updates expected in 2026.

Finally, it is important to note that the end-of-fiscal-year buying cycle is expected to begin around February–April 2026. Departments will be reviewing budgets closely due to fiscal constraints, focusing on essential purchases. The new purchasing authority tiers and CSDVB options will be more actively used during this time.

The Coalition regularly advocates on your behalf before the following officials: Governor’s Office and his Senior olicy Staff on Procurement; CA State Senate and Assembly; Department of General Services; Department of Corrections; Prison Industry Authority; Department of Industrial Relations; Cal/OSHA; Labor Commissioner; Employment Development Department; Franchise Tax Board; and all other agencies, boards, and commissions whose actions affect our CSDVB Membership.