(a) The department shall allocate two-thirds of any funds appropriated for the purposes of this chapter to provide grants to urbanized or heavily urbanized local agencies or community-based organizations within these jurisdictions for the acquisition and development of properties for active recreational purposes, as defined. Eligible projects shall meet all of the following criteria:

(1) The amount of the grant applied for, together with any matching contribution, shall meet all of the cost of acquiring and developing the project, and when construction of the project is completed, the new urban park or facility shall have a management plan and demonstrate to the satisfaction of the department that the applicant agencies have sufficient means to ensure that the park or facility shall remain open and accessible to the public.

(2) The application includes a commitment for a matching contribution. The matching contributions may be in the form of money, including funds from other state or local assistance programs, gifts of real property, equipment, and consumable supplies, volunteer services, free or reduced-cost use of land, facilities, or equipment, and bequests and income from wills, estates, and trusts. The department may establish findings for hardships to waive the matching requirement when an applicant cannot meet the requirement.

(3) To the extent practicable, the project is a joint-use project between two or more agencies that share responsibility for ownership, development, or maintenance, or both, of the project.

(b) The department shall adopt guidelines to amplify or clarify the criteria specified in Section 5095.4 or this section, and may adopt additional criteria, to supplement those criteria.

(c) The department may develop a procedural guide for the administration of this chapter and the guidance of applicants.

(d) The department shall solicit written comments and hold public hearings at convenient locations throughout the state on any regulations, guidelines, or the procedural guide proposed to be adopted or developed pursuant to this section.

(e) The department shall adopt guidelines to implement this chapter.

(f) Any regulation, guideline, or procedural guide adopted or developed pursuant to this chapter is not subject to the review or approval of the Office of Administrative Law or to any other requirement of Chapter 3.5 (commencing with Section 11340) of Part 1 of Division 3 of Title 2 of the Government Code.

(g) A grant received pursuant to this section may be expended to acquire the fee title or other interest in real property. If an application proposes to acquire less than fee title, the applicant shall demonstrate in the application, to the satisfaction of the department, that the proposed project will provide public benefits that are commensurate with the type and duration of the interest in real property to be acquired.

(h) With the consent of an urbanized or heavily urbanized local agency, any eligible nonprofit organization that is tax exempt pursuant to Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code may apply for a grant on behalf of an entity for the purposes of either Section 5095.4 or this section. The application shall include a copy of any contract between the local agency and the nonprofit organization and the resolution or other authorization of consent. The contract shall specify arrangements for the long-term management and operation of the urban park or recreation area commensurate with the amount of the grant, as determined by the department.

(i) Every applicant for a grant pursuant to this section and the entity that will operate and maintain the property, if that entity is different than the applicant, shall agree to comply with all of the following requirements:

(1) To operate and maintain the property developed pursuant to this chapter so that it is usable by residents of the affected area. With the approval of the department, the grant recipient, or its successor in interest in the property, may transfer its property interest and the responsibility to operate and maintain the property, in accordance with the terms of the grant and any applicable law, to a public agency or nonprofit organization that is able to operate and maintain the property in perpetuity. Any attempt to make a transfer in violation of this subdivision is void.

(2) To use the property only for the purposes for which the grant was made and to make no other use or sale or other disposition of the property, except as authorized by statute. If the use of the property is changed to a use that is not permitted by the terms of the grant, or if the property is sold or otherwise disposed of, the grant recipient shall reimburse the department an amount equal to the amount of the grant, the fair market value of the land and any improvements constructed with the grant, or the proceeds from the sale or other disposition, whichever amount is greater. If the property that is sold or otherwise disposed of is less than the entire interest in the property funded with the grant, the grant recipient shall reimburse the department an amount equal to either the proceeds from the sale or other disposition of the interest or the fair market value of the interest sold or otherwise disposed of, whichever amount is greater.

(3) In lieu of seeking reimbursement pursuant to paragraph (2), the department may impose restrictions on the use of public park property identical to the requirements for the preservation of public parks set forth in the Public Park Preservation Act of 1971 (Chapter 2.5 (commencing with Section 5400)) with respect to any property used, sold, or otherwise disposed of in a manner not permitted by the terms of the grant.

(j) The recipient of a grant pursuant to this chapter may use the grant funds to pay for any portion of the cost of cleaning up, removing, or remediating any toxic materials or hazardous substances, if the amount used for cleanup, removal, or remediation does not exceed 20 percent of the grant allocated to the project.

(k) The amount allocated pursuant to this chapter shall be roughly divided 60 percent to the southern portion of the state (south of the Tehachapi Mountains) and 40 percent to the northern portion.

(l) Recognizing that some rural areas of the state have significant deficiencies of park facilities for active recreational purposes, the department shall consider allocating two hundred fifty thousand dollars ($250,000) pursuant to this section to nonurbanized local agencies. In awarding these grants, the department shall apply the same guidelines as those established for awarding a grant to a nonurbanized area pursuant to subdivision (e) of Section 5621.

(m) After all grants authorized under this chapter have been awarded, the department shall report to the Budget Committee of the Assembly and the Budget and Fiscal Review Committee of the Senate on the number of grant applications received, the total amount of funds sought by applicants, and the number of eligible applications that were not funded.

(n) Nothing in this section is intended to prohibit community-based organizations from acting in partnership with organizations that do not have tax-exempt status as a nonprofit organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the federal Internal Revenue Code.

(Amended by Stats. 2002, Ch. 975, Sec. 4. Effective January 1, 2003.)