Open space groups have had a long relationship with rural San Mateo County.

The most prominent, the public Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District, is funded primarily through a portion of annual property taxes collected from residents in San Mateo, Santa Clara, and Santa Cruz counties.

In 1972, Santa Clara County voters approved Measure R, a ballot initiative that created the precursor to the modern district. The measure was a work of poetry. “Open space is our green backdrop of hills,” an excerpt reads. “It is rolling grasslands – cool forests in the Coast Range – orchards and vineyards in the sun.”

Today, the district oversees almost 62,000 acres within 26 open space preserves. The goal is to keep the preserves mostly untouched, with trails and parking often the only additions, and open to the public, as the vast majority are.

Open space and preserved land in the Bay Area.

The second, less high-profile group, is the Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST), a nonprofit founded in 1977. Where the district was a government entity, at times slow moving and bureaucratic, POST was intended to be quick and effective.

Funded by private donors, the trust can reach out to landowners who are considering selling and buy land faster than the district. It can also arrange conservation easements for landowners who want to maintain ownership but don’t want to see their land developed.

Later on, POST can partner with the district, the National Park Service or California’s state parks to add purchased land to existing preserves or parks, or keep the land on its own ledger.

In the late 1990s, public opinion was shifting among San Mateo County residents, as many more prioritized preservation of the Pacific coast. A decade later the district’s board voted to add coastal lands to its territory. The so-called Coastside Protection Plan expanded their borders from Pacifica to the Santa Cruz County line.

220
The number of square miles added to the district under their coastal expansion.

In addition to preserving land, the district wanted to help preserve the area’s rural character and agricultural economy.

One way of doing this was leasing open space back to farmers, which POST had begun in the late 1990s. Another way was leasing the land back to ranchers, but to do that district managers needed to adopt new, cow-friendly policies.

Kirk Lenington manages grazing policy for the district. He remembers a time when cows were frowned upon in open space preserves. The science and research behind conservation has changed since then, he said, as researchers look to history and see a new role for cattle — a method called conservation grazing.

“California grasslands evolved with historic grazing pressure” from animals like antelope and deer, he said, “and grass evolved to be able to tolerate grazing.”

When Europeans arrived with cattle, they also tracked in seeds from non-native grasses that overwhelmed the native species.

Traditional methods like controlled burns and mowing aren’t always feasible in the large acreage of open space preserves. Cattle became a good option. “Cattle grazing works really well, but you have to manage it,” Lenington said.

Controlling the number of cattle and the length of time they spend on a given piece of property are key. A well-managed herd can chomp through both non-native grasses and dead grass that would otherwise become fuel for wildland fires.

“It’s good for us on a number of levels,” Lenington said. “In addition to being a good land management tool, our tenants are our eyes and ears on the land.”

The district opened its first preserve to grazing in 2007, and now allows the practice on roughly 7,700 acres, with plans to reach 10,800 acres by next year. The trust also leases some of its property for grazing.

Percentage of permanently protected land in the Bay Area in 2012, by county.

Thanks to geography and low population density, open space in San Mateo County is still more likely to be found clustered along the Santa Cruz Mountains and westward.

Today, when Chris Pearson , a third-generation farmer in La Honda, gets off his tractor and looks around, he sees mostly preserved land. “Open space land is just across the road from my property,” he said. “I’m almost entirely surrounded by public land.”

The grazing program has plenty of company in Bay Area counties with large tracts of public land. Marin County, Santa Clara County and areas in the East Bay all invite grazing.

Denise Defreese oversees grazing operations on public land for the East Bay Regional Park District (EBRPD). The Park District has grazed their land since the early 1960s. She estimated that 37 ranchers lease and graze roughly 80,000 of their 112,000 acres of parkland.

“I can’t see how you can manage grasslands without grazing animals,” she said. “People thought if they removed grazing, they would get pristine meadows. But grass has evolved to be eaten, so if there is no eating, you get something else.”

Credits:
Top image: A grazing herd on district land.
Images: Map courtesy of Geographicus/public domain.
Data: Map data courtesy of the Greenbelt Alliance. Expansion statistic courtesy of MROSD. Graph data courtesy of the Greenbelt Alliance.

As cattle are welcomed back onto the land, distrust of open space efforts is fading along the coast, but plans still sometimes meet a wary public.

Of all the district’s powers, one scares people the most: eminent domain. Even though, as far as Lenington can remember, the district has never condemned a property, the threat hung over residents for years.

Larry Hassett remembers the district’s expansion into San Mateo County in 1976, one year after he had moved to the Skyline area. “There was a real nervousness among residents,” he said. “The district had the big hammer. People who had been living in the area for two to three generations felt threatened- they didn’t want their land taken for parkland.”

Hassett and his neighborhood association sat down with district officials and asked them directly how they were going to use eminent domain powers. “Eventually we helped to develop a policy that was adopted by the board that in almost all cases, the district would only buy from willing sellers,” he said.

Hassett represents most of rural San Mateo County as a board member for the district. He believes that, with eminent domain off the table, “the peace pipe has been smoked,” he said. “Now we mostly deal with traffic impacts and little issues.”

His ward has more open-space preserves than any of the district’s other wards, yet one of the smallest populations. As a result, Hassett still feels that he’s the voice of “mountain advocacy,” as he calls it. “I offer that rural perspective,” he said. “I work on issues of how the district deals with neighbors and how it deals with being a neighbor.”

The district gave up its eminent domain powers for the 220 square miles of their coastal expansion, and, Hassett said, the concept is rarely discussed.

While the district and the trust are both actively leasing land for agricultural use, many of these efforts have come in the last two decades.

“If you have 20 years of locking it away and closing it up, people aren’t going to get over it in a day,” said Wendy Millet, the ranch director for TomKat Ranch, a privately owned ranch in Pescadero. “But they have turned the corner, so the community can help them.”

Bob Meehan was the ranch manager at Driscoll Ranch, which is now under management by the district. He’s seen changes, he said, but remains concerned about the slow pace of opening preserves to the public. “The district is trying to be more receptive to the farming and ranching community,” he said. “But I don’t think the public is going to be allowed to be on these properties any sooner than five or 10 years out.”

Chris Pearson, the farmer in La Honda, agreed. “I’d much rather see open space have the land than developers,” he said. “But they bought the McDonald Ranch years ago, and have done nothing with it until recently. There hasn’t been a cow on there since they bought it. And there’s little public access.”

Older residents are less circumspect. Wilbur Azevedo has run a feed store in Half Moon Bay since 1951. “I think this land should be farmed,” he said.

Aware the public wants more access to their land, district leaders say additional funding will help them open up properties faster. For years, the district was focused on acquiring lands at risk, as opposed to opening them up, said General Manager Steve Abbors.

But more money is needed, and the district is supporting Measure AA, a June bond measure that if approved would provide the district with up to $300 million.

The district has made 25 projects top priority in case the money comes through. “We want as many results as quickly as possible, so the public can see what they are getting for their investment,” Abbors said.

“Years ago, the district made the decision to eliminate grazing everywhere,” he added. “But we’ve learned a lot since then. One of the reasons they hired me was that I have a background in natural resources management, and I’ve managed grazing across the bay and in the Sierras. We’re reaching out to other agencies to make sure we learn from their experiences. How do we manage bicycles, cattle, dogs, and horses? It’s not easy.”

Credits:
Top image: The view of Half Moon Bay from the Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve.

One of the earliest experiments with conservation grazing in San Mateo County took place on hillsides tucked off State Route 84 in the early 2000s. The place was called Driscoll Ranch, and there were few county ranchers who didn’t know its name.

Rudy Driscoll, Jr., once a policeman and later a cattle rancher, always enjoyed his father’s motto for the ranch: “a place for strangers to meet and leave as friends.”

His father, Rudy Driscoll Sr, had purchased the initial land in 1967 and expanded it since, until it reached 3,681 acres- reportedly the largest working cattle ranch in San Mateo County. Rodeos and competitions hosted at the Driscoll Event Center, a rustic arena and cattle holding area, were part of local lore and attracted a diverse crowd, from gay bull riders to mounted search and rescue patrols.

Before his father’s death in 2001, the Driscolls negotiated a deal with POST. The land trust could purchase the property- a long-held dream of the family- and grazing could continue on the ranch land.

“From my side of it, I wanted to make sure cattle grazing was not treated as an evil,” Driscoll said. “It had gotten a bad rap at that point in time. My goal with POST was to create a model to show that cattle could be used as a strong management tool if proper practices were put into place.”

What Driscoll was doing with his cows got some attention in the media, and he felt the message was received by his conservation partners. “We tried to show that cattle made sense on these properties to bring back native species and get rid of exotics,” he said.

In 2006, the district purchased the ranch from the trust for $9 million, leaving the district responsible for assigning future grazing leases. Last year, the district entered into talks to lease and manage, but not buy, the Event Center and a related property on the ranch for the trust.

On a bright day last fall Bob Meehan and KC Andersen were preparing for one final event at the Event Center.

Meehan, who had managed the ranch for 10 years but worked the property for 18, was reflective. “This was the first ranch where cattle were accepted as a land management tool,” he said. “It was Rudy’s vision to help. Our goal here was always to keep the old western way of life going.”

Andersen, a local rodeo promoter and event planner, set out decorative cowboy boots. “This place was so beneficial to the coast,” she said. “The open space groups say that they are preserving this land, but this place preserved something, too: the rancher and cowboy way of life.”

Both were awaiting the results of the district’s bidding process for two new grazing leases, one of which would be awarded to Driscoll Ranch and the other to McDonald Ranch, a neighboring property. The district had merged both properties into their greater La Honda Creek Open Space Preserve.

The district had several of its properties open to grazing already, and had even been grazing Driscoll since 2006. But the thousands of acres in the Driscoll and McDonald ranches were the largest grazing lease they had offered, and it was complicated by the fact that the Driscoll property is expected to be one of their first preserves to combine public trails and grazing side-by-side.

In November, the district announced that they had awarded the leases. Driscoll was awarded to a rancher from San Benito County, and McDonald was awarded to the Markegards, both operators who had experience grazing on open space land.

But the results didn’t sit well with all five finalists. Some accused the district of changing the rules halfway through the bidding process, without allowing them to re-submit new bids. Paul Barulich, whose cattle company was one of the finalists and who had previously grazed on the Driscoll property, felt the process was unclear.

“The people who got the leases are very good ranchers. It was the process that was flawed,” he said.

He felt his concerns over the details of the lease- such as who should maintain control of the Event Center- were never answered during the process. In general, he worries that the District’s bureaucratic style is alienating ranchers. “When requests for proposals are at 26 pages, and you need a PhD to read them, then you have a problem,” he said.

Kirk Lenington, who was involved in the process, said his district only intervened to ensure a fair playing field for applicants.

“What we discovered was that inadvertently as we wrote the request for proposals, we had set it up in a way to favor large operators with a fair amount of experience,” he said. “That resulted in a disadvantage for the San Mateo coastal local grazers, because they are just not running as big of properties.”

To help address this imbalance, a coastal rancher was chosen for one of the two ranches. Lenington hopes that by doing this, coastal ranching will have a stronger presence in future bids.

Barulich also worries about the future of the Event Center, and that certain popular uses- such as rodeos- are being seen as incompatible with open space use. In mid-December, district officials announced that, in managing the Event Center, they would allow cattle transportation, group trail rides, roping competitions, and, for up to two more years, a gay and lesbian rodeo previously held on the site.

Barulich wonders if district planners might not understand the practical benefits of an event like a rodeo, and the consequences of restricting them. “Is rodeo agricultural use? That’s how you train cowboys, so they can hone their skills and tools,” he said.

Credits:
Top image: Bob Meehan surveys the grounds of Driscoll Ranch before turning over the property to the district.
Data: Timeline data courtesy of POST and interview with Rudy Driscoll, Jr. Timeline created with Timeline JS.

Tom Pacheco can rattle off the names of prominent coastal ranching families in one breath: the Moores, the Steeles, the Cunhas, the Gomeses, his own. Five generations later, most of these families have sold their ranches rather than tangle with messy inheritances- in his case, his father was one of nine.

“Most of my generation who grew up around ranches is still doing work around ranches,” he said, “but their families had to sell their places.”

So today, like most ranchers on the coast, Pacheco leases land from private and public landowners, including the trust and the district. He even ranches some of the land his family worked in the 1920s, now open space.

Pacheco is one of three ranchers who practice conservation grazing on district lands. He agrees with conservationists who see cows as management tools for open space ranchland. “You can’t let a grazed property go back to nature. When they do, the brush comes in, the poison oak comes in,” he said. “Pretty soon the fields are full of brush, and it chokes out wildlife.”

Pacheco has always leased land for his cattle. “How are you going to buy a 500-acre ranch around here?” Pacheco said. “Very few people around here could do that. You have to be in some other game to afford that.”

He’s also one of the few full-time cattle ranchers on the coast, but he’s held down a variety of jobs. “Most people do it part-time,” he said. “You have another job- construction, usually. I did many other things when I was first involved in cattle.”

Average head of cattle in San Mateo County, 1940-2012.

Pacheco is optimistic about the county’s ranching future, saying he knows young people who are eager to jump into the industry, even if only part-time. He also believes conservation grazing will keep some ranching alive for many more years.

“I think ranching will continue here because open space groups have discovered that the best way to maintain these places is to keep someone on the land,” he said.

Bob Meehan of Driscoll Ranch agrees, and hopes open space groups will continue to call on local ranchers for the job. “You can’t get some consultant who has read about this work in a book,” he said. “Unless you live on the land and you know it, you’re not going to get it. There will be a slow learning curve for anyone who isn’t familiar with the land.”

Erik and Doniga Markegard’s Toto Ranch, the open space property where they live and work, sits on sweeping hillsides overlooking Half Moon Bay. Erik is a sixth-generation rancher whose family immigrated from the Dakotas. His family managed land that would become Driscoll Ranch, as well as the ranch of musician Neil Young. Doniga is a naturalist and wildlife tracker who worked on conservation research before settling in California.

Erik grew up on a coast where ranching was viable. He started putting together his cattle herd while in high school. He first ranched cattle at the Toto Ranch in 1987, when it was still privately owned.

Today, the Markegards raise grass-fed beef, which means their cattle graze pastures as opposed to being fed grain or other feed. They also use their cows as land management tools, and Doniga said the results can be impressive.

“It’s like night and day,” she said. “You can have fields that are completely covered with Italian thistle and coyote brush, and with intentional grazing, giving the land time to rest and recover, you can see a huge diversity of plants and animals come back.”

Both Erik and Doniga have made peace with the fact that they likely will never own their own ranch in the county. But they do intend to keep ranching in their family. Leasing land from open space groups on a long-term basis has been a good fit. “We’ll never afford our own land, so the next best is land that’s never going to change,” Doniga said. “With a long-term lease, our kids can use this land.”

Leasing private land is trickier. “There’s no security with a private owner because of the outrageous value of private land,” Erik said. “I can’t blame owners for not wanting to lease their land because they could get four times the value selling it.”

In all, the Markegards have learned to adapt. “We’re not going to stop progression and change,” Erik said, “so we go with it.”

“We want to be ahead of the curve,” Doniga said. They have an active relationship with the distrct, and say they are completely aligned with their biologists.

“Whether private, public, or non-profit, stewards should live on the land and be connected to every season,” Doniga said.

Rudy Driscoll, Jr hopes that more landlords- both public and private- recognize that ranchers have value to bring to land management. “The old time ranchers here, they have been doing these practices for years but have not been given credit.”

Doniga agrees. “Ranchers have always been interested in the management of grasslands. You didn’t call it that, it’s just what you did.”

Credits:
Top image: Visitors look through photo albums of rodeos past at Driscoll Ranch.
Data: Cattle data courtesy of the San Mateo County Agricultural Commissioner.

Despite the changing face of ownership, some private landowners in the county are still in the ranching business.

Wendy Millet directs TomKat Ranch, a property that plays home to grass-fed cattle, conservation research and educational programs. Founded by retired hedge fund manager Tom Steyer and his wife Kat Taylor, the ranch acts as both a working cattle operation and an incubator for new ideas in agriculture, and has been getting positive national attention.

“We’ll try just about anything that seems reasonably likely to be either a game changer or a catalyst for change in the business of grass-fed producers,” Millet said. Past ideas have included solar-powered fences, water usage measurement, and inviting an ecologist to monitor the ranch.

One of the ranch’s goals is to encourage healthy production in a region where food is prized. “The San Francisco Bay Area foodshed just screams for well-managed land that produces a healthy product that goes to local consumers,” Millet said.

To that end, the ranch has hosted community conversations amongst ranchers to share best practices, and hosts events on the property to keep the dialogue going. In early December, TomKat partnered with the Markegards to host conservationist Allan Savory for a sold out talk on land management with cattle.

Allan Savory event at TomKat Ranch.

“We don’t need to change everybody. There’s probably going to be large-scale conventional ranching happening simultaneously, we just want to make sure there is a sustainable grass-fed alternative,” Millet said.

Millet hopes that one day the region will look something like New York’s Hudson Valley or other areas with “really healthy land management” and thriving local food systems.

Ed Weeks farmed land around Pescadero long before sustainability was a term anyone used in conversation. He agrees with Millet’s push for local agriculture, but worries that today’s generation of farmers and ranchers will struggle with land prices.

“We’re going to have to have food to eat,” he said. “But with organic farms, you have to farm more land to have more income. The stuff I was farming for six or seven dollars an acre, now it’s worth millions.”

Even as land prices rise, research is showing that the food grown in places like San Mateo County could, in fact, sustain the region as a whole.

A 2006 study from the American Farmland Trust said that, with the exception of some staple crops like corn and wheat, the region’s farms and ranches produce enough food to feed the entire Bay Area.

The percentage of local food consumption, if the Bay Area ate from only local suppliers.

Daniel Olstein directs land stewardship policies at POST. He says the trust wants to see the rural county remain agricultural and a part of the Bay Area food ecosystem. Like the district, the trust has focused on protecting not just land, but the agriculture that takes place on it. It is offering new types of easements for farmers to ensure their land stays in active agricultural use.

“The way we think we can help move the needle on agriculture is by increasing the number of active operations on our land,” he said.

For Millet’s part, she’s encouraged by the conservation grazing efforts in open space land, although she can see both sides of the debate. Recreational users need to understand the role that cattle can play on public land, she thinks. “When people give money to POST, they also need to smile when crossing a cow in the path, and understand that it is not destroying the landscape.”

But ranchers also need to see the value of the open space groups, she noted.

“Without POST and Mid-Peninsula there 30 years ago, people would be sorry to see what the coast would like today,” she said.

Credits:
Top image: Pescadero farmer Ed Weeks reviews his agricultural property maps from the 1950′s.
Images: Bay Area map courtesy of Arkyan. Data courtesy of the American Farmland Trust.

Want to learn more about cattle grazing in San Mateo County? Take a look at the Further Reading page.