La dotation de fonctionnement minimale est attribuée aux départements ne répondant pas aux conditions démographiques mentionnées au premier alinéa de l’article L. 3334-6-1.
Departments whose per capita financial potential is more than twice the average per capita financial potential of the departments determined in application of the first paragraph may not be eligible.
A decree in the Conseil d’Etat will set out the procedures for distributing the allocation among the départements, taking into account, in particular, their financial potential and the length of their roads.
For 2005, eligible départements may not receive a minimum operating allocation of less than 106% or more than 130% of the amount received the previous year. For 2005, the amount to be taken into account corresponds to the amount of the equalisation allowance received in 2004 by each department, increased, where applicable, by the minimum operating allowance received in 2004.
From 2006, eligible departments may not receive a minimum operating allowance lower than that received the previous year or higher than 130% of the amount received that same year. By way of derogation, in 2007, eligible départements may not receive a minimum operating allowance that is less than the amount received the previous year, indexed according to the rate of increase in all the resources of the global operating allowance.
The allowance allocated to départements that cease to meet the conditions for benefiting from the minimum operating allowance is equal, in the first year, to two-thirds of the allowance received the previous year, and in the second year, to one-third of that same allowance. This provision does not apply to départements that cease to meet the demographic conditions set out in the first paragraph from 2008 and that receive an allocation under the urban equalisation allocation in the same year.
If the sum allocated to metropolitan départements as part of the minimum operating allocation is insufficient to finance the guarantees provided for in the second sentence of the penultimate paragraph of Article L. 3334-4 and in the fifth paragraph of this Article, the aforementioned sum is increased by an amount enabling these guarantees to be financed. This increase is financed under the conditions provided for in II of Article L. 3334-3.