Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California

Not if it is a party proceeding in pro per that is propounding the discovery requests

If the party propounding the discovery has an attorney of record, the attorney must sign it no matter who prepares it. If the party is self-represented, then the party must sign it. The one exception is discovery subpoenas. those must be signed by "an officer of the court." That is the only thing I know of that gives any real meaning to the saying that a lawyer is an officer of the court, because attorneys can sign subpoenas. Self-represented parties cannot. They must go to the court and have the subpoenas issued. Each court has its own procedures for that. Orange County I believe has pre-issued subpoenas you can just pick up. Other courts make you submit the completed subpoena to have it issued; some even review the subpoena and decide whether it should issue, though with how under-staffed and over-worked the courts are these days not many do that anymore.