Slide Ranch, the non-profit education center, is preparing to raise $4 million to completely renovate its facilities in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area south of Stinson Beach.

The 134-acre demonstration farm has become too ramshackle and cramped for the ranch's workers to adequately teach school children and visitors about living off the land, said Slide Ranch Executive Director Ross Herbertson.

Slide Ranch's new masterplan, which was approved two years ago by GGNRA officials and the park's citizen advisory commission, calls for demolishing the 100-year-old farmhouse and outbuildings that have sprung up over the last century.

In their place, the masterplan calls for campsites resembling a native village, a replica 19th-century farmhouse and dairy, and "green" homes built from environmental materials instead of the trailers and shacks where 18 staff members, interns, and their families now live and work.

While the masterplan would more than double the total floor area of the ranch's buildings from 7,400 to 15,300 square feet, Herbertson said Slide Ranch is not expanding as much as creating facilities that are appropriate for a center that accommodates 7,000 visitors a year by reservation.

"We have an outstanding educational program," Herbertson said, "despite the facilities."

Ranch manager Steve Penniman notes that the ranch's layout makes no sense with homes, campsites, and ranch buildings all jumbled together.

There aren't enough indoor common areas or office space, he said. Also, the tiny milking barn is located on the soggiest part of the property, and the geography of the place - it's called Slide Ranch for a reason - has caused nearly all the buildings to shift off their foundations.

Ranch staff spend an inordinate amount of time straightening crooked doorways and floors, battling termites and rats, and trying to keep the weathered structures from becoming unbearably drafty, he said.

Because the existing buildings are so dilapidated, and there has been so little continuity to the property's use over the years,

the GGNRA has determined that the site's buildings have no remaining historical value or cultural significance, Herbertson explained.

Although the GGNRA usually discourages construction on park property, Slide Ranch's plan to expand its facilities was closely scrutinized and overwhelmingly supported by the GGNRA citizen's advisory commission, said Amy Meyer, a commission member.

Meyer praised the ranch's plan as "modest," noting it will improve the educational program without increasing traffic to the site, which she said provides a unique service to the GGNRA by "allowing a hands-on appreciation of Marin and GGNRA lands that isn't available anywhere else."

While the non-profit ranch has already opened up a capital campaign office in Corte Madera and raised about $1 million, it is still seeking a campaign manager and new members to sit on its board of directors and supervise the pending construction, said Herbertson.

Any new construction is likely to be phased in and will be subject to approval by GGNRA staff, added Herbertson, who is also a Marin planning commissioner.

Azorean immigrants started the ranch as a dairy around the turn of the century, although when the land proved inadequate for dairy cattle they switched to dry stock. The Nature Conservancy acquired the property in the 1960s and eventually sold it to the GGNRA.

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