The Land and Water Conservation Fund Act of 1965 established a federal reimbursement program for the acquisition and/or development of public outdoor recreation areas. The Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) is administered in Virginia by the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) on behalf of the National Park Service (NPS). The program represents a federal, state and local partnership. A key feature of the program is that all LWCF assisted areas must be maintained and opened, in perpetuity, as public outdoor recreation areas. This requirement ensures their use for future generations.
Virginia has received more than $80 million in assistance since the LWCF began. It has made more than 420 projects possible within the commonwealth.
The LWCF is a 50-50% matching reimbursement program. The grant recipient must be able to fund 100% of the project while seeking periodic reimbursements.
For further details about NPS LWCF program guidelines and project eligibility, please review the National Park Service LWCF State and Local Assistance Program Manual. Volume 73 is the current NPS LWCF Federal Financial Assistance Manual, as of Oct. 1, 2023. Please see Chapter 3 for project eligibility and Chapter 4 for proposal development and review requirements.
For specific regulatory requirements please refer to Federal Regulations: 2 C.F.R. § 200, 2 C.F.R. § 1402, 36 CFR 59.
The 2024 LWCF State and Local Assistance Program grant round closed April 2024.
To be added to our Grants Announcement email list please provide contact and affiliation to RecreationGrants@dcr.virginia.gov.
Entities eligible to compete for LWCF funding
Please refer to Common Ineligible LWCF Costs to determine if your park proposal elements can be considered for LWCF funding.
An informational webinar was held February 21.
These documents may be modified prior to any future grant rounds. The DCR LWCF 2024 Application Manual contains details about eligibility, match requirements, rules, regulations and application procedures.
The following templates and forms are required for this 2024 LWCF Grant Round:
Note: In order to view some of the pdfs you will have to download the document to your computer and open in Adobe Acrobat.
Download all files as a zip file.
All projects must go through full NEPA and Section 106 review prior to submission to the National Park Service. NPS has the authority to approve compliance or ask for further information.
Please note that some projects will not be simple Categorical Exclusions. Also, projects may need further Virginia State Review Procedures and local review, as applicable, depending on project scope and design.
The Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership Program (ORLP) is a 50-50% matching reimbursement program. The 50-50% matching reimbursement program supports outdoor recreation projects in underserved urban areas.
For ORLP, the park project must be located within an incorporated city or town with a population of at least 30,000 people. Based on the 2020 census, qualifying cities and towns in Virginia are the cities of Blacksburg, Charlottesville, Chesapeake, Danville, Hampton, Harrisonburg, Lynchburg, Manassas, Newport News, Norfolk, Petersburg, Portsmouth, Richmond, Roanoke, Suffolk, and Virginia Beach; and Blacksburg and Leesburg towns.
Within those cities and towns, the project must also serve disadvantaged communities lacking access to walkable outdoor recreation, in specific census tracts identified as disadvantaged by the federal Climate and Environmental Justice Screening Tool as the park tract itself must serve these communities.
Unlike LWCF State and Local Assistance Program grants, ORLP is a national competition and the NPS makes project selections. The minimum award amounts for the 2023-2024 grant cycle range from $300,000 to $15 million. An estimated $224 million in matching federal funds are available nationally in this grant round. Non-profit organizations are not eligible project sponsors.
Eligible projects can include acquisition, development, a combination of acquisition and development, or rehabilitation of parks and other outdoor recreation areas. Eligible project sponsors include localities, recreation authorities, tribes, and state agencies.
The NPS Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) posted on Grants.gov (funding opportunity number P24AS00498) details the program requirements. Project sites funded by ORLP must be preserved for public outdoor recreation uses in perpetuity. Please refer to the NOFO for specific merit ranking process. DCR’s role is to forward pre-applications to NPS for their review and selection. This program has specific eligibility requirements.
This competition will prioritize the selection of projects that: As green and blue spaces, and tree cover help to cool the air, reduce pollution, and have positive effects on mental and physical health, nature-based park projects will earn a 5-point bonus. Nature-based projects are those where nature is a major element of, or strongly supports, the proposed recreational activity.
Each Outdoor Recreation Legacy Program (ORLP) Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) has multi-step procedures for application. As this is a national competition for funds, it is up to the National Park Service (NPS) to score and award ORLP projects.
These resources were used for the 2024 ORLP grant round. These may change in future grant rounds, as determined by NPS.
Download all files as a zip file.
$40 million is available nationally through the federal National Park Service Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) combined with the Department of Defense (DOD) Readiness and Environmental Protection Integration (REPI) Program. This grant purpose protects the Nation’s military readiness, enhances relationships with communities, preserves the environment, and improves military installation and community resilience to climate change.
Eligible applicants as sub-recipients include state agencies and local governments only. Eligible REPI projects are for acquisition of lands and/or development of new outdoor public recreation facilities that support compatible land uses and avoid incompatible development in areas near a military installation or airspace to serve the general public and military. Projects must occur within a REPI Partnership Opportunity Area. Applicants must have a partnership developed with the Department of Defense (DOD) military base of potential project location.
The minimum grant award will be $250,000 with a maximum total project cost of $5 million. All information is included in the Notice of Funding Opportunity. The NOFO also contains a list of all required documents and criterion specifics.
Applications for REPI will be due via email no later than May 29 at 4 p.m. Applications must be emailed to recreationgrants@dcr.virginia.gov. DCR staff will submit complete applications to NPS staff directly, NPS has final authority on scoring and selection of projects.
Questions about REPI can be emailed to Kristal.Mckelvey@dcr.virginia.gov.All parks that have received funding from the LWCF State and Local Assistance Grant Program must maintain public outdoor recreation use in perpetuity. If your locality or agency is proposing or being presented with any non-outdoor recreation development or significant use changes on LWCF protected parks, please email RecreationGrants@DCR.Virginia.gov or mail information to:
DCR-Planning and Recreation Resources Division
600 East Main St. – 17th Fl.
Attn: Recreation Grants Team
Richmond, Virginia 23219-2094
Contact us at RecreationGrants@DCR.Virginia.gov or call Recreation Grants Manager Kristal McKelvey at 804-508-8896.