Climate resiliency: research farms: grant program.

Removed amendment history headers (dates of prior amendments), the 'Introduced by' line, coauthors, and original introduction date. Added passage dates: Assembly August 24, 2026 and Senate August 20, 2026.

Removed line-by-line numbering (line 1, line 2, etc.) that was used in the amendment markup format, replacing it with standard enrolled bill formatting.

Added Governor's receipt and approval signature blocks at the end of the document.

The Education Code section was renumbered from 33319.6 to 33319.1, likely to avoid a conflict with another bill.

The requirement for the State Department of Education to establish a grant program by July 1, 2026 was removed entirely from the bill text.

New authorization for the State Department of Education to advance payments for contracts or agreements with the Department of Food and Agriculture in fiscal years 2026-27 and 2027-28, creating a direct interagency payment mechanism for research farm work.

Contracts between CDE and CDFA under this provision are exempt from the requirement of approval by the Director of General Services (Government Code Section 11256), streamlining the process.

A new definition clarifies that 'developing a research farm' includes both constructing a new research farm and maintaining, altering, or improving an existing one previously built by the institution. The old version used the broader phrase 'develop or expand' without this explicit two-part definition.

The bill now amends Section 93570 of the Public Resources Code directly, not just adding a new Education Code section that references it. This gives the funding provision its own standalone statutory home with specific conditions.

The legislative digest changes 'biodiversity and nature-based climate solutions' to 'biodiversity protection and nature-based climate solutions,' adding the word 'protection' to more precisely describe the bond's biodiversity component.

A per-institution cap of $1,000,000 is added to the grant program, limiting how much any single Agricultural Experiment Station or Research Institute can receive from the $15 million pool.

Grants must be constructed and maintained with environmentally sustainable infrastructure practices, adding a new condition on how funded research farms are built and operated.

The amendment to Public Resources Code Section 93570 explicitly states that Agricultural Experiment Stations and Agricultural Research Institutes are designated by the University of California and the California State University, clarifying who has authority over eligibility.

The deadline for establishing the grant program is cleaned up to July 1, 2026 (the prior version showed a corrected 'January July 1, 2026' indicating an earlier date change).

The deadline for the State Department of Education to establish the grant program was extended from January 1, 2026 to July 1, 2026, adding six months of lead time.

Assembly Members Aguiar-Curry and Hadwick were added as coauthors of the bill.