2026-09-09 · California · Legislation · Pending — not yet law

A bill that would lower the court-approved threshold for amending CC&Rs from a majority to 37 percent — but only for a narrowly defined group of very large senior communities — is awaiting the Governor's signature. AB 2035 is not law. It was enrolled and presented to Governor Gavin Newsom on September 4, 2026 at 4 p.m.¹

The bill is authored by Assemblymember Diane Dixon and amends Civil Code section 4275. The Senate passed it 36–1 on August 27, after Senate Judiciary approved it 13–0 on July 1. It was last amended on April 22, 2026.

What section 4275 does now

Amending a declaration requires the approval percentage the declaration itself specifies, and in older California developments that figure is often high enough to be unreachable in practice. Section 4275 exists for that problem: it lets an association petition the superior court to reduce the required percentage where an amendment has failed for want of participation rather than opposition.

The statute's baseline is that the amendment must still have been approved by more than 50 percent of the votes cast in a single-class voting structure. AB 2035 does not change that baseline.²

The new 37 percent path

The bill creates an alternative threshold of more than 37 percent of the votes in a single-class voting structure, available only where all four of the following are true:

The development is a senior citizen housing development as defined in Civil Code section 51.3(b)(4); it contains more than 6,000 separate interests; more than 25 percent of the separate interests are occupied by tenants; and the declaration has not been amended in at least 35 years.

A petition would still require the governing documents, the text of the amendment, the notice materials, the rationale and supporting documentation, and the court must give members and relevant authorities at least 15 days' notice before ruling.

How narrow is narrow

Four stacked conditions, one of which is a 6,000-unit floor and another a 35-year amendment drought, describe a very small number of California communities. It is fair to read AB 2035 as targeted legislation, and worth saying so plainly rather than presenting it as a general change to Davis-Stirling amendment practice.

An April 2026 amendment removed an earlier criterion that would have required 25 percent of separate interests to have been owner-occupied for less than six months.

1. AB 2035, California Legislature — bill status and complete history (enrolled and presented to the Governor September 4, 2026) ↩
2. AB 2035, California Legislature — bill text and Legislative Counsel's Digest (amending Civil Code § 4275) ↩
3. 2026 Tentative Legislative Calendar, California State Senate (September 30 last day for the Governor to act) ↩