Legal Question in Administrative Law in California

Re: Request for administrative record

"Judicial review of most public agency decisions is obtained by a proceeding for a writ of ordinary or administrative mandate, with the applicable type of mandate being determined by the nature of the administrative action or decision; usually, quasi-legislative acts are reviewed by ordinary mandate and quasi-judicial acts are reviewed by administrative mandate." Santa Clara Valley Transp. Authority v. Rea (2002) 140 Cal.App.4th 1303.

Based on the foregoing, if you are attacking a policy rather than a decision, I'd think you're right. I also assume the documents you're seking are ones relating to how the policy was formulated, not how it was applied in a particular instance. The latter would point to administrative mandamus.

In general, documents necessary to prosecute or defend a lawsuit are obtained by "discovery" and either by document-production demands under CCP 2031.010 et seq., or by subpoena, or deposition with document-production. It would be beyond the scope of a LawGuru reply to discuss which method is preferable with so little information available.

If you use a subpoena and are self-represented, you will have to get the court clerk to assist you; self-represented parties cannot issue subpoenas but the clerk can.

All of the discovery techniques require that a suit be on file. Pre-filing discovery rights are very limited.

If there are special discovery rules in mandamus cases that differ from those in lawsuits in general, I am not aware of them, but that is possible.