Sparing one of Half Moon Bay’s last remaining farms from being developed into luxury homes, the Peninsula Open Space District announced it’s keeping the Andreotti family in business.
The nonprofit POST reached a deal to purchase 18.5 acres of farmland along Kelly Avenue for $3.95 million from an Andreotti family trust. The land is perhaps best known by the public for its quaint barn built in the late 1800s, which the family operates as a produce stand. The sun-stained wooden structure backdropped against farmlands and a field of sunflowers is a popular destination for beachgoers and the community.
The agreement will allow Dino and Terry Andreotti, longtime farmers of the property, to continue their trade. The family sold the land to POST with the condition it remains used for agriculture. In the near term, Dino and Terry Andreotti will lease the property from the nonprofit to continue the farm stand and plant fields for fall harvest, according to POST.
“The coast has a long history of agriculture but finding a farm within the Half Moon Bay City limits, like this one, is now very rare,” POST President Walter T. Moore said in a press release. “This project allows a legacy of farming to continue not only for Andreotti family but for the community. This is exactly why we started our Farmland Future Initiatives — to ensure farming continues to be part of the coastal character and way of life.”
POST’s initiative seeks to preserve half of the remaining farmland on the San Mateo County coastside by 2030. Since starting in 2015, it’s preserved 178 acres and invested $1.1 million toward infrastructure to make farming more viable in the future, according to POST. It’s an important mission to the nonprofit as local farmlands have been disappearing at an alarming rate with the county having lost 35 percent of its agricultural lands over the last 30 years, according to POST.
The Andreottis’ nearly century-long history of working the Half Moon Bay farm was also thought to be at risk.
Following the death of the Andreottis’ matriarch in 2013, the family began to sell off land it owned across the street from their farm. Previously, the family would allow for a small fee visitors to park on the lots just down the street from the popular Half Moon Bay State Beach. Now, much of the open space is being transformed into housing.
The Half Moon Bay Review reported there was a dispute amongst family members over what to do with the inherited property, with some interested in selling it to developers. Several once-vacant lots zoned for residential developments immediately south of the farm stand have been sold off over the last few years for about $365,000 to $425,000 each, according to county records. Now, at least three are in various stages of development with single-family homes slated for the lots, according to the city.
Apparently concerned about the prospect of the family farm being sold off to luxury developers, POST and those working the land arrived at a deal. Dino Andreotti plans to continue farming the 18 acres his family has worked since the 1920s. The property has prime soil that produce a variety of vegetables available at the barn stand and local farmers’ markets, according to POST.
“This land is why we are here. My goal in life is to keep this farm going and the legacy of my dad alive. It is my hope that it never leaves the family,” Dino Andreotti said in the press release.
The easement placed over the land as part of POST’s purchase will ensure it permanently remains available for agricultural production. The agreement is also slated to protect more than 1,500 feet of the nearby Pilarcitos Creek, which is habitat to endangered and threatened species, according to POST.
“The Andreottis and this farm have been a cornerstone of this community for decades,” Jo Chamberlain, executive director of the Coastside Land Trust said in the release. “We are thrilled that POST has been able to protect this open space in the middle of Half Moon Bay as well as to keep this farm in production. It is important to the rural character of our town.”
With the Bay Area’s skyrocketing housing costs and the Peninsula’s limited land at a premium, proponents of preserving farmland are pleased with POST’s most recent purchase.
“Everything around here is getting built up, but we want to continue to tend this land the way we have been doing it all our lives,” Terry Andreotti said in the press release. “This farm isn’t just for us, it is for all of us to enjoy. If it wasn’t for POST, this would never have happened.”
Twitter: @samantha_weigel
(2) comments
Let's get real about the reason behind this purchase. This completely conforms with the plan to change the entire face of the Bay Area called Plan Bay Area. A great deal of that plan relocates people to a transit-oriented strip of land and gets people out of rural areas. High-density housing will be saved for these transit-oriented strips, it will not be built in places like Half Moon Bay. While POST's previous conservation efforts have been a plus, they are now merely working jointly with Plan Bay Area to take over and control lands. You are kidding yourselves if you believe anything else. I once brought this up to a POST speaker, later made sure to Corral me at the back of the room because evidently I knew things I shouldn't know. One simply needs to look at the map overlay of Plan Bay Area where their endgame is Illustrated with two regions and two regions only. The first is Priority Development Areas (the strips of land I mentioned), and Priority Conservation Areas (in their view, nearly 95% of property in the Bay Area both public and private). This is real stuff and you should know more about it. I highly recommend the following website:
www.nine-county-coalition.squarespace.com/plan.bay.area
Bogus headline. What luxury housing?...... It's prime agricultural land, you can't build on prime ag soil. PERIOD.... Check out the local coastal program for Half Moon Bay and the County...This is an inside deal between POST and the farmer....There's no building boom in HMB and never has been....even the so called lots to the "south" (3) that were bought some "years ago" ...haven't been built on yet...Seriously, most of the town of Half Moon is unbuildable due to restrictions that have been written into the local Coastal Plan, even in areas of town where housing was planned....
So now POST owns 70,000 acres in San Mateo County plus 18 acres more (a third of the County) .... No wonder there's no affordable housing in the County...
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