I’m pleased to welcome you to the Spring 2026 edition of Insights & Perspectives. This issue reflects what community banking does best—helping our clients and communities navigate change with clarity, confidence, and trusted guidance.
In this edition, we’re proud to share a timely Washington update from Brian Gardner, Chief Washington Policy Strategist at Stifel. His analysis offers valuable perspective on the evolving regulatory, economic, and technology landscape shaping the banking industry and the broader economy—insight that helps inform how we continue to serve you today and plan for the future.
We also feature insights from Kevin Colombo, Executive Vice President at Colliers, who explores the rapid rebound of the Bay Area office market. His piece highlights how the accelerating adoption of artificial intelligence, renewed venture capital investment, and a broader return-to-office trend are driving demand and reshaping the commercial real estate landscape. While challenges remain, Colombo underscores a clear shift in momentum—pointing to growing leasing activity, rising investor confidence, and a renewed sense of optimism across the region.
You’ll also find a client spotlight on Cartelligent, a Sausalito‑based business that has reimagined the car‑buying experience by putting relationships over transactions. Their story highlights the power of personalized service, long‑term thinking, and fostering culture—values that strongly align with our own.
Finally, as fraud schemes continue to grow more sophisticated, we encourage you to visit the Fraud Prevention Resource Center on the Bank of Marin website. The hub offers practical tools, timely alerts, and education designed to help you safeguard your accounts and personal information.
Thank you for trusting Bank of Marin as your financial partner. We are honored to support you and look forward to continuing the conversation.
Tim Myers
President & CEO
Bank of Marin
Fiscal policy has recently balanced pro-growth initiatives with emerging economic and policy pressures. While deregulation and support for innovation continue to drive expansion, ongoing debates around trade, technology, and infrastructure underscore the challenges of sustaining growth in a complex environment.
Over the past 18 months, fiscal policy in Washington, D.C. has reflected a continual tension between policies that promote economic growth and populist impulses. The latter, in the form of tariffs and immigration policy, combined with the ongoing conflict in Iran and lengthy government shutdowns have created headwinds for the economy.
Despite these challenges, however, the Trump administration’s pro-growth, deregulatory framework has produced tailwinds for the economy that have overcome these significant challenges.
A central pillar of fiscal policy in Washington has been the effort to stimulate investment and economic expansion through regulatory relief. In the banking sector, this has meant a renewed push to right-size financial regulations that were implemented in the wake of the Great Financial Crisis. The administration has supported reducing capital requirements and easing compliance burdens on financial institutions, arguing that such changes free up lending capacity and support economic growth.
Regulators at the Securities and Exchange Commission and the bank regulatory agencies are in the process of implementing several steps which support the administration’s goals. Proposals by the banking regulators to implement the Basel III capital rules attempt to improve risk-sensitivity and eliminate duplicative rules which could free up lending by banks, particularly for residential mortgages. In addition, the banking regulators and the SEC are focusing their attention on material financial risks.
By placing less emphasis on process and procedural defects, the regulators are attempting to build a framework in which banks are freer to lend while also promoting financial stability by focusing on actual risks to a lender’s financial health.
The Trump administration has extended this deregulatory philosophy beyond traditional finance into digital finance and financial technology. Executive actions have sought to promote blockchain innovation and support dollar-backed stablecoins (the GENIUS Act). These policies reflect the administration’s preference for market-driven financial innovation over government-led approaches. From a fiscal perspective, such moves aim to reinforce the global dominance of the U.S. dollar while encouraging private investment in emerging financial infrastructure.
At the same time, Washington has faced mounting pressure to address the rapid rise of artificial intelligence (“AI”). Rather than imposing strict regulatory controls, the Trump administration has pursued a relatively light-touch, innovation-first approach. The 2026 National Policy Framework for Artificial Intelligence, issued in March 2026, emphasizes federal preemption of state laws, with the goal of creating a unified national standard that reduces regulatory fragmentation. This approach is designed to enhance U.S. competitiveness, particularly in relation to China, and to provide clarity for firms investing heavily in AI development.
However, several pillars of the framework need congressional approval which seems unlikely in the current political environment. In the absence of federal legislation, some states have enacted their own AI regulations, reflecting concerns about privacy, labor displacement, and consumer protection. The resulting tension underscores a recurring theme in Washington fiscal policy: the trade-off between innovation and economic growth on one hand and voters’ anxiety over privacy and job security on the other.
This tension is particularly evident in the regulation of data centers, which are critical pillars for AI infrastructure. The Trump administration has moved to accelerate data center construction by streamlining permitting and environmental reviews, framing these projects as essential to economic growth and national security. State and local governments, however, have pushed back.
Several state and local governments have considered legislation to regulate energy usage, water consumption, and community impact. In some cases, proposals have even called for temporary moratoriums on new data center construction due to concerns about electricity demand and environmental strain. The success rate of these initiatives has been limited, but more localities are expected to consider limits on data centers in the future.
Data centers present both economic opportunities and challenges. On one hand, they attract private investment, create jobs, and expand the tax base. However, they also impose substantial costs on energy infrastructure and local communities. In the wake of U.S. attacks on Iran, voters have become increasing anxious about energy prices which could translate into additional political pressure to protect the public from price hikes associated with data centers. The Trump administration proposed the “Ratepayer Protection Pledge” which is a voluntary program in which data center operators to fund their own power generation and infrastructure, effectively shifting costs from taxpayers to private developers. While this initiative is voluntary, legislation to enforce these arrangements might gain traction in the coming months.
