Board reports declining reserve months, plans revenue changes and cost savings including special investigator hire

The Osteopathic Medical Board of California reviewed year‑end budget projections Aug. 14 and discussed steps the agency says will stabilize its fund over coming years.

DCA budget analyst Kayla Van Lint summarized the board’s fund condition and said the board closed fiscal year 2024–25 with about $4.61 million in reserve — roughly 11.9 months of operating funds — after $3.9 million in receipts and $4.34 million in expenditures. The board’s beginning base budget for the prior year was listed at about $4.41 million. Van Lint said the department uses a conservative 3% ongoing growth factor for personnel and retirement costs when modeling out‑year expenditures and cautioned that any new legislation or unanticipated events could create additional cost pressures.

Executive Director Erica Calderon outlined steps staff say will reduce costs and increase revenue. The board has used state Division of Investigation (DFI) sworn investigators to handle formal investigations and reported a dramatic increase in DFI costs—about $270,000 in FY 2021–22 rising to roughly $491,000 in FY 2024–25. OMBC has hired a special investigator with an anticipated start date Sept. 8, 2025; staff estimate in‑house handling of approximately 60% of formal field investigations could save a projected minimum of $150,000 per year versus outsourcing to DFI on comparable cases. Calderon said cases requiring criminal filings or search warrants would still be referred to DFI.

Calderon also told the board staff expects new rules adopted this year (continuing medical education site‑and‑find regulations) to produce citation revenue once the rules take effect Oct. 1, 2025; the board projects issuing about 68 citations annually at an average fine of $1,500, or roughly $120,000 in additional annual revenue. Another regulatory change — a fee tied to petitions, applications and a retired license status — is projected in staff materials to yield about $424,000 annually when implemented. Combined with the investigator savings, OMBC projects approximately $694,000 in recurring revenue and savings.

Board members and DCA staff discussed the mechanics of travel and hiring restraints imposed by recent executive orders and budget guidance. DCA noted travel outside California is restricted to mission‑critical needs and must be requested eight weeks in advance for state approval. The board’s exec team also discussed a retention‑schedule cleanup (a long‑underway ‘‘purge’’ of decades of unneeded records, now possible because a previously co‑located agency moved out) and clarified that some complaint types (including quality‑of‑care no‑violation closures) will be retained longer to permit reopening if new evidence appears.

Why it matters: The board’s fund stability and the pace of complaint investigations affect enforcement timeliness and public protection. Hiring an in‑house investigator and adopting regulatory citations (CME audits and petition/retired‑status fees) are measures the board put forward to reduce external costs and raise recurring revenue.