Three dairies that departed Point Reyes this year will share nearly $950,000 in federal funds secured by Representative Jared Huffman to help them restart elsewhere in the North Bay.
The money comes from a $1 million appropriation Mr. Huffman called the San Francisco North Bay Dairy Community Transition Assistance project. After a 5 percent administrative set-aside, the operations will each receive $316,663. The recipients are the McClelland Dairy, which operated at L Ranch; the Spaletta Dairy, which operated at C Ranch; and Kehoe Family Farm, which operated at J Ranch.
The request was made nearly two years before the National Park Service announced in January 2025 that six dairies and six beef ranches would close in exchange for buyouts funded by the Nature Conservancy.
“The park service would not let me in the room during the mediation,” Mr. Huffman told the Light on Tuesday. “But I heard from some people who were closer to the settlement, and I began to worry about the potential loss of these dairies in our local food system.”
Mr. Huffman originally sought $2 million for the fund, which he described in a March 2023 letter would help organic dairies facing a “gutted market for organic milk, environmental conditions severely reducing on-farm forage production, feed cost increases from supply chain bottlenecks and inflation, and lease termination.”
Although his request did not specify that the money was intended for seashore dairies, the final program is limited to dairy operators leaving Point Reyes under the settlement.
All dairies in the region face similar pressures from feed costs and volatile milk prices. The number of dairy farms in the United States had fallen to fewer than 25,000 from a peak of nearly 700,000 in the 1970s, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In the 1950s, Marin had 200 dairies; today, it has 13.
Joe Deviney, Marin’s agricultural commissioner, said the transition money comes with restrictions. The funds are being distributed by the Natural Resources Conservation Service, an agency of the U.S.D.A., and must be used to design and implement conservation practices addressing water quality, soil health and nutrient management.
“The dairies had to write on their application forms the different practices they wanted to use related to manure management and protecting resources,” Mr. Deviney said. “They can’t use it to buy land or something.”
Jolynn McClelland, who runs a dairy with her husband, Robert, declined to comment, and Michael Kehoe and Ernest Spaletta did not respond to multiple inquiries. But in their application, the McClellands wrote that they are merging the L Ranch operation with a dairy they run in Valley Ford. They requested $460,000 to construct a loafing barn, $290,000 to build a compost barn and $200,000 to buy a manure separator.
Michael Kehoe wrote that he plans to start a dairy on 56 acres in west Petaluma. He proposed spending $700,000 to improve the manure management system, $75,000 to transition a conventional herd to organic and $14,000 to design a plan for applying fertilizer in ways that minimize environmental impacts.
The Spalettas, who did not specify a dollar amount, said they planned to relocate their organic farm to two sites in Valley Ford. One of the sites is starting from scratch, Mr. Deviney said, adding that such an effort can cost many millions.
“I hope these funds help, because it would be so good to have all three of these be successful and contribute to the local milkshed,” he said.