Senate Passes Bill Allowing Nonprofits To Run Parks

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) -- A bill making it easier for 70 California state parks threatened with closures to enter into operating agreements with nonprofits easily cleared the Senate on Wednesday.

Democratic Assemblyman Jared Huffman of San Rafael said AB42 is not intended to be a "silver bullet" that will save all 70 parks, but gives at least some of the sites a possible way to stay open.

California Department of Parks and Recreation spokesman Roy Stearns said $33 million in budget cuts the Legislature passed in March would force 70 of California's 278 state parks to close by July 1 of next year.

Stearns said officials would try to arrange partnerships with nonprofits to keep some of the parks open, but the process is complicated and often requires special legislation. He said there are two parks that already have operating agreements with nonprofits, and both required separate legislation.

"These are times that call for some creative solutions and this is one of them," Huffman said.

Democratic Sen. Lois Wolk, who carried the bill in the Senate, said the bill minimizes the number of parks that are closed without imposing additional costs on the department.

Adam Keigwin, a spokesman for Sen. Leland Yee of San Francisco, one of the two Democrats who voted against the bill, said the bill gives control of a valuable state asset to nonprofits, potentially for decades.

"His concern was that there's no guarantee that jobs ... would be retained," Keigwin said. "The last thing we should be doing is not protecting jobs."

Huffman said park employees work in highly specialized jobs that require years of practice and experience.

"It's virtually inconceivable that a nonprofit would be able to utilize this bill in those types of parks because they're not going to have the capacity and they're not going to have the type of expertise," he said.

The bill passed in the Senate 32-2 with no debate and was sent back to the Assembly for a vote on amendments. It was passed unanimously in the Assembly in May.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)