Photograph by Lea Tauriello
Joseph Cono, a longtime volunteer at the Claravale Guernsey Farm, speaks in favor of the City Council's plan.
By Anne Gelhaus
A Feb. 6 public hearing to address Monte Sereno's quest to preserve the Claravale Guernsey Farm raised more questions than it answered, but farm supporters plan to appear before the City Council again this month to present a draft proposal.
The dairy farm at 18170 Bicknell Road has been owned and operated by Kenneth Peake since 1931. Peake has been operating on a deficit for some time and is looking to sell two of his three acres. The city is considering purchasing an option to buy the land in order to stave off residential developers.
Leo Himmelsbach, chairman of the Dairy Preservation Committee, told those who attended last week's hearing that the city does not intend to buy the dairy outright but would form a nonprofit corporation to hold on to the dairy until a buyer could be found. In the meantime, Himmelsbach said, the city would put up $5,000 a month to cover Peake's operating costs.
"The committee is not in a position to provide immediate cash," Himmelsbach added. "We must raise money as a nonprofit and that takes time. For this reason, we're asking the city to enter into a 90-day option agreement with a provision for extensions."
Himmelsbach also asked that the council delay any vote on the matter until its Feb. 20 meeting so that he could present them with a draft option agreement.
Barbara Allen told the council she was in favor of preserving the dairy but wanted "ironclad rules" in place to make sure no tax money was used to run it. Himmelsbach said the draft agreement calls for the city to hold the dairy for a maximum of three 90-day periods.
Committee member Sue Anawalt said her group has already secured $22,000 in pledges from people who read about the fight to save the dairy in Monte Sereno's newsletter.
When Himmelsbach said that these monies will go back in the pot for the overall fundraising campaign, a man in the audience questioned the logic of this and asked if it wouldn't make more sense for the committee to fund its effort through private donations. Himmelsbach replied that some of the money is earmarked for repairs to the dairy.
He added that the committee is negotiating a lease agreement with Ron Garthwaite, who is willing to operate the dairy until a buyer
is found.
"He's someone with experience and know-how in the dairy business," Himmelsbach said of Garthwaite.
"Over a period of time," added Peake's spokesman Larry Lynch, "Mr. Garthwaite can make a profit by using judicial marketing techniques."
Those who spoke against the committee's plan to preserve the dairy were largely against spending any city monies in the effort. But Paul Bernell, chairman of the Santa Clara County Historic Preservation Committee, pointed out that because the dairy appears on the National Register of Historic Places, the city would have to put up funds for an environmental-impact report if the property were to be developed as residential.
Peake operates his dairy with equipment that dates back to the 1930s. With its 25 cows and one bull, Claravale is one of two dairies in California licensed to sell raw milk. The other, Altadena, is headquartered in Southern California and is a much larger business.
At the public hearing, Anawalt urged the City Council to use public resources to preserve the dairy farm. Betty Peck of Saratoga recalled a similar meeting in 1956, when developers wanted to build a nursery school on the site of the Kennedy Farm. Peck said Adm. Thomas B. Inglis, who would found Monte Sereno the following year, said at that meeting that public money should be spent to save the Kennedy Farm.
"I speak for him tonight," Peck added.
This article appeared in the Los Gatos Weekly-Times, February 14, 1996.
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