(a) Requirements for assistance. The County may provide maintenance funding assistance to a homeowners' association for a private maintenance road if the homeowners' association:
(1) grants an easement to the County for the general free public use of the private maintenance road, which must include a metes and bounds description of the easement certified by a registered land surveyor or a record plat or other legal description acceptable to the County Attorney; and
(2) signs an agreement with the County that the homeowners' association must build and maintain the private maintenance road to standards adopted by executive regulation for private maintenance roads.
(b) Contents of agreement. In each agreement signed under subsection (a) the homeowners' association must:
(1) acknowledge that:
(A) granting the easement does not relieve the association of the obligation to maintain the private maintenance road or to provide any other services, such as snow removal, which the association is required to provide by any association document or law; and
(B) the easement automatically reverts to the grantor if the homeowners' association does not comply with all terms of the easement and the agreement it signs with the County;
(2) indemnify the County against all claims arising from the use or condition of the private maintenance road; and
(3) certify that the homeowners' association has obtained and will continually maintain insurance or other surety, in an amount acceptable to the County, covering claims arising from the use or condition of the private maintenance road, and acknowledge that the County may withdraw funds allocated under this section if the insurance coverage lapses.
(c) Documents to be recorded. Any easement and agreement signed under this section must be recorded in the County land records.
(d) Costs of documents. The homeowners' association must pay all costs of preparing and recording any easement, agreement, or other document required under this section.
(e) Amount of assistance to homeowners' association. The County may allocate to a homeowners' association for maintenance of a private maintenance road an amount that does not exceed the net amount, less any inspection fee or any other County expense, of highway user revenues received by the County as a result of the inclusion of that private maintenance road in the State Highway Administration mileage inventory. The homeowners' association must use these funds to maintain that private maintenance road or place them in a reserve fund which can be used only to maintain that road. The County must not assist under this section any road for which it provides assistance under Section 24B-2 through 24B-5.
(f) Termination of easement. If the County finds that an easement granted under this section is not in the public interest, or that a homeowners' association has not complied with the terms of an easement or other agreement under this section, the County may, in its sole discretion, withhold or withdraw maintenance funds or reject and terminate the easement, and record documentation of the termination in the County land records. The abandonment procedures in Chapter 49 do not apply to the termination of an easement under this section.
(g) No County obligation. Granting an easement under this section does not obligate the County to maintain or pay for the maintenance of any private maintenance road. (1996 L.M.C., ch. 30, § 1.)