New community article:
This AI Agent is trained with the bias of our forum discussion. If you have comments on the style or what not let me know. This isn't meant to be slop, but factual with the bias towards informing Californians.
Updated August 17, 2026. Educational information only — not legal advice. Fees change by jurisdiction and by month; confirm current amounts with your issuing authority before budgeting.
CCW fee's is the main way cities are battling recent court case wins with SCOTUS. By making permits more...
That's what AI cooked up. What do you think?
To: Glendale City Council
Cc: Chief of Police, Glendale Police Department
Subject: Request for Review and Justification of Concealed Carry Weapon License Fees
Dear Mayor, Members of the Glendale City Council, and Chief of Police:
I am writing as a Glendale resident and CCW license holder to request a formal review of the City of Glendale’s fees for the issuance and renewal of licenses to carry a concealed weapon.
Under the City’s current FY 2026–27 fee schedule, Glendale charges
$1,078 for an initial CCW permit and $826 for a renewal. These amounts are particularly concerning because other significant expenses associated with obtaining or renewing a CCW—including required firearms training, Live Scan, and psychological evaluation—are separate expenses borne by the applicant.
The disparity between Glendale and other California issuing agencies is substantial.
For comparison:
- Glendale: $1,078 initial / $826 renewal
- Riverside County Sheriff: approximately $100 in Sheriff’s Department administrative fees for an initial license ($20 application and $80 issuance), excluding fingerprinting/Live Scan costs. Renewal is $77.
- Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department: $216 for a standard initial license / $86 for a standard renewal under its currently published fee schedule.
In other words, Glendale's
$1,078 initial fee is nearly five times LASD's $216 fee and more than ten times Riverside County's $100 local administrative charge. The disparity is even more striking for renewals: Glendale charges
$826, compared with
$86 through LASD and $77 through Riverside County.
I recognize that different agencies may have different staffing, administrative procedures, overhead, and processing costs. Nevertheless, a difference of this magnitude warrants a detailed explanation of how Glendale's fees were calculated and whether they represent the actual and reasonable cost of administering the CCW licensing program.
California law regulates the fees that licensing authorities may charge in connection with CCW licenses.
Penal Code section 26190 addresses the fees associated with CCW applications and permits local licensing authorities to charge fees tied to the reasonable costs associated with processing applications and issuing licenses, subject to the requirements and limitations established by state law.
There is also an important constitutional consideration. In
New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen (2022), the United States Supreme Court held that the Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect an individual's right to carry a handgun publicly for self-defense. Although
Bruen did not establish a specific permissible dollar amount for licensing fees, the Court expressly stated that shall-issue licensing regimes are constitutionally permissible where they employ objective requirements, while cautioning that such regimes could still be subject to constitutional challenges if they are administered in a manner that effectively denies ordinary citizens the ability to exercise the right.
The Supreme Court has also long recognized in other constitutional contexts that government may not use licensing fees as a means of imposing a financial burden on the exercise of constitutional rights. While reasonable administrative cost-recovery fees may be permissible, a fee associated with exercising a constitutional right raises substantially different concerns when it exceeds what is reasonably necessary to administer the regulatory program.
I am therefore requesting that the City provide or publicly identify the
cost study, calculation, or other supporting documentation used to establish the $1,078 initial CCW fee and $826 renewal fee.
Specifically, I respectfully request that the City disclose:
- The estimated staff hours required to process an initial CCW application and a renewal application;
- The hourly personnel rates and classifications used in calculating those costs;
- The administrative and overhead expenses allocated to each application;
- Any Police Department, City Attorney, Finance Department, or other departmental costs incorporated into the fee;
- The methodology used to allocate those costs among CCW applicants;
- The number of initial and renewal applications used in calculating the per-applicant cost;
- Whether any portion of the CCW fees generates revenue exceeding the City's reasonable cost of providing the licensing service; and
- The City's explanation for why processing a CCW application costs Glendale several times more than comparable processing by other California law-enforcement agencies.
I understand that the City conducts user-fee studies and calculates fees for numerous municipal services. If the current CCW fees are based upon such a study, I respectfully request that the City make available the
specific worksheets, time estimates, staffing assumptions, overhead calculations, and cost-allocation methodology applicable to CCW issuance and renewal, rather than merely providing the final fee amount.
This is particularly important with respect to the
$826 renewal fee. A renewal involves an existing license holder whose identity, prior licensing history, and previous application have already been processed by the City. It therefore deserves explanation why Glendale calculates the cost of processing a renewal at more than $800 when other major California issuing agencies charge a small fraction of that amount.
This issue is not about asking the City to subsidize CCW applicants. I recognize that applicants can appropriately be required to bear lawful and reasonable costs associated with processing their applications. The concern is whether
$1,078 and $826 reasonably represent those costs, particularly when applicants must separately pay substantial amounts for training, fingerprinting/background requirements, psychological evaluation where required, and other expenses.
The right to
“keep and bear Arms” is expressly protected by the Second Amendment, and the Supreme Court has confirmed that the right to bear arms extends beyond the home. A licensing system should therefore recover legitimate administrative expenses without becoming an unnecessary financial barrier to the exercise of that constitutional right.
As a
Glendale resident and taxpayer, I am also concerned about the potential financial consequences to the City if these fees result in litigation. This is not merely a hypothetical concern. The
California Rifle & Pistol Association (CRPA) and Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) are currently plaintiffs in Blank v. Santa Clara County, a federal civil-rights lawsuit challenging, among other things, Santa Clara County's high CCW licensing fees. Santa Clara County's challenged local fee is approximately
$976 for an initial CCW license—an amount actually lower than Glendale's current $1,078 initial fee.
I do not want to see the
City of Glendale and its taxpayers bear the substantial expense of defending similar litigation if this issue can instead be addressed proactively and responsibly. Regardless of how a court might ultimately rule on Glendale's particular fee structure, the existence of ongoing litigation against another California jurisdiction over substantially similar concerns should provide a compelling reason for the City to carefully review its fees now, document their actual cost basis, and make appropriate adjustments if those fees cannot be justified.
I respectfully ask the City Council and Glendale Police Department to review these fees, publicly disclose the cost basis supporting them, and, if the present charges exceed the reasonable costs attributable to processing CCW applications and renewals,
reduce the fees accordingly.
I would appreciate a written response explaining the City's position and identifying the documents supporting the current fee calculations.
Thank you for your consideration.
Respectfully
No_glonks
Glendale Resident and CCW License Holder
