Questions surface over Palo Corona grazing lease recommendation.

In a bid for a cattle grazing lease on a coveted parcel, five applicants were vying for the keys to Palo Corona Regional Park. Now, some bidders are questioning whether the recommended contract in the parcel’s first competitive selection process was selected fairly.

Following a request for proposals issued on Feb. 13, the Monterey Peninsula Regional Park District recommended Renz Livestock, a family-run cattle and rangeland management company based in San Benito County, for a five-year lease for $1/year. The lease would begin July 1, replacing Emily and Luke Gardner of Paddock Land & Cattle (also called L&E), whose family has operated at Palo Corona since the 1980s. The recommendation goes to the MPRPD board on June 3.

“There has been no transparency,” says Hannah Moon of Lonely Bull Cattle Company, one of the applicants. “The way it’s playing out, it looks like there’s some pretty significant inconsistencies with their stated scoring process.”

Each proposal was evaluated on criteria including technical experience, land stewardship and natural resources management, with applicants receiving scores out of 100. Top candidates advanced to an interview process.

In what Moon describes as a last-minute change, the District decided to not conduct on-site visits, placing greater weight on interviews – a shift she argues tipped the scale to favor Renz Livestock over Monterey County producers.

Questions over scoring and the omissions of one MPRPD panelist’s scores from the evaluations have also sparked confusion among bidders.

Luke Gardner, the current operator and also an applicant, says he’s concerned about finding new land for the 121 cattle currently at Palo Corona, saying the RFP came too close to the end of the lease. “The reality is, most of our cows will probably go to auction and be slaughtered, which is sad,” he says.

At a time where beef prices are at record highs and grazing land is shrinking, more ranchers are chasing good grazing land, Gardner adds.

The Park District has maintained that the process was fully transparent, adding that interviews and site visits were entirely optional elements.

District officials say one of the panelists withdrew due to a conflict before the final evaluation, and an internal audit found the final selection remained unchanged with or without that panelist’s scores.

“We’re directed by our board to open it up and get proposals to do something special out there,” MPRPD General Manager Eric Morgan says. “It was a competitive process.”