AB 2671 changes a single phrase in Section 1505 of the California Vehicle Code: it replaces the gendered pronoun "he or she" with the neutral phrase "the director." The provision governs how the Director of Motor Vehicles organizes the Department of Motor Vehicles, subject to approval by the Governor and the Secretary of Transportation.
The amendment is explicitly technical and nonsubstantive: it does not add new powers, remove existing approvals, or alter any duties. Its practical effects are limited to modernizing statutory language, reducing gendered wording in the code, and triggering minor administrative updates to published codes and agency materials.
At a Glance
What It Does
AB 2671 amends Vehicle Code §1505 by substituting the phrase "the director" for the gendered phrase "he or she." The statutory grant of organizational authority to the Director — subject to the Governor's and Secretary of Transportation's approval — remains unchanged.
Who It Affects
Directly affected are the Department of Motor Vehicles, the Office of Legislative Counsel, state code publishers, and legal databases that maintain the Vehicle Code. Indirectly affected are attorneys, administrative staff who update official materials, and advocates interested in inclusive statutory language.
Why It Matters
The bill signals an ongoing move toward gender-neutral drafting across the code and reduces the small risk of awkwardness or perceived exclusion in statutory text. It creates no new regulatory duties but imposes modest editorial and administrative update work for state publishers and agency documentation.
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What This Bill Actually Does
Section 1505 currently authorizes the Director of Motor Vehicles, with the approval of the Governor and the Secretary of Transportation, to organize the Department of Motor Vehicles as "he or she" deems necessary. AB 2671 replaces that phrase with "the director." That swap leaves the scope and limits of the director's authority untouched: the director still needs the two approvals and retains the same organizational discretion.
The change is local and editorial: it does not create new compliance duties, alter approvals or decision-making processes, or change any standards the director must follow. The bill labels itself technical and nonsubstantive; in practice it standardizes language to match contemporary drafting norms and reduces reliance on gendered pronouns in the code.For implementation, the immediate work is administrative: updating the official code text, the DMV's online and printed materials that reproduce statutory language, and legal databases that serve practitioners.
No new forms, regulatory filings, or procedural rules are required. The bill is effectively a housekeeping item that maintains legal continuity while modernizing wording.Finally, while courts generally interpret gendered pronouns to include all genders under rules of statutory construction, swapping to an explicit neutral term removes any potential for awkward readings and aligns the Vehicle Code with broader state efforts to modernize statutory language.
That said, because the change is stylistic, it is unlikely to generate litigation or change administrative outcomes in practice.
The Five Things You Need to Know
AB 2671 amends only Vehicle Code §1505; it replaces the phrase "he or she the director" with "the director.", The amendment does not change the substantive rule that the director organizes the DMV with approval of the Governor and the Secretary of Transportation.
The bill is classified in the digest as a "technical, nonsubstantive change" and lists no appropriation, fiscal committee, or local program impacts.
Implementation requires editorial updates: official code publications, the DMV’s statutory citations on its website, and private legal databases must replace the old wording.
Although stylistic, the change removes gendered language that courts already often construe inclusively, making the text clearer and less likely to prompt construing questions.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
Every bill we cover gets an analysis of its key sections.
Textual amendment to Vehicle Code §1505
This section performs the lone textual edit: it substitutes the singular neutral noun "the director" for the gendered pronoun phrase. Mechanically, this is a find-and-replace at a single statutory locus. Practically, it leaves the sentence structure and legal effect intact while standardizing language used elsewhere in modern statutory drafting.
Confirms existing approval requirements remain
Section 1505 continues to require the Director to obtain approval from both the Governor and the Secretary of Transportation when organizing the Department. The amendment does not change any referential cross-references, approval thresholds, or delegation mechanics embedded in the section, so internal departmental governance and executive oversight remain as currently written.
Administrative updates and downstream edits
Because the statutory text changes, state offices responsible for publishing the code (including Legislative Counsel and the DMV) and private legal publishers must update the published language. These are editorial tasks with modest administrative cost. The change may also prompt similar cleanups elsewhere in the code if legislators or drafters use this as a precedent for broader language modernization.
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Explore Government in Codify Search →Who Benefits and Who Bears the Cost
Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Department of Motor Vehicles leadership and staff — they get clearer, gender-neutral statutory language that avoids awkward pronoun constructions when citing their authority.
- Legislative drafters and the Office of Legislative Counsel — the bill advances consistent, modern drafting standards and reduces the need to reconcile gendered pronouns during future edits.
- Practitioners and courts — clearer text reduces minor interpretive questions that occasionally arise from gendered phrasing, streamlining statutory reading and citation.
- Civil-rights and equality advocates — they gain another instance of inclusive language in the code, reinforcing statewide modernization efforts.
Who Bears the Cost
- State publishing and administrative units — the DMV, Legislative Counsel, and state printers must update code copies and online materials, incurring modest editorial and staff time costs.
- Private legal publishers and database managers — firms that maintain statutory text must push updates to their systems and clients.
- Legislative staff — small additional workload for processing a technically minor bill through drafting, analysis, and enrollment procedures.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The central tension is between the value of modern, inclusive statutory language and the cost and risk of using legislative time and administrative resources to make stylistic edits; the change improves clarity and alignment with drafting norms but yields little practical legal effect while consuming modest government and private updating effort.
Labeling the amendment "technical" signals intent that no substantive change is occurring, but the legislative process still imposes administrative cost: drafting, committee review, enrollment, and publication resources are used for a single-word modernization. For agencies and private vendors, the update is small but nonzero — especially if such cleanups are done piecemeal rather than as part of a comprehensive code modernization plan.
A second tension is procedural risk. Minor wording changes can mask unintended effects if made without careful cross-checks.
Here the edit appears safe because it merely clarifies reference to an officeholder, but repeated or broader stylistic edits across statutes require diligence to ensure no implicit responsibilities, references, or cross-references change meaning. Finally, because courts already often construe gendered language inclusively, the amendment is largely symbolic: its value lies in clarity and inclusivity rather than correcting an identified operational problem.
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