Slaughterhouse vital to ‘eat local' movement

<p>Petaluma is known for its agriculture and food production history, but many aspects of the agricultural scene have been in flux during the past few years.</p><!-- Nothing to do. The paragraph has already been output --><p>In particular, the last remaining slaughterhouse in the Bay Area is in Petaluma, and has nearly closed in recent years. While the slaughterhouse, Rancho Veal, is now still open and going strong, many in the local cattle ranching industry are pondering the impact the lone slaughterhouse would have on the region if it did close.</p><p>“The minute you eliminate Rancho, your options really narrow down,” said Mike Gale, owner of Chileno Valley Ranch, just outside of Petaluma.</p><p>Most local beef producers send their cattle to Rancho Veal for slaughter, but if the slaughterhouse closed, their closest available option would be to send cattle back and forth between the Central Valley, greatly increasing production costs. That would mean increased costs for consumers, and in some cases it could force ranches to close down, crippling the fast-growing “eat-local” and organic beef movements in the Bay Area.</p><p>Reached by phone this week, Rancho Veal owner Babe Amaral said that the more than 90-year-old slaughterhouse remains open as always and that there are no immediate plans to sell it.</p><p>“There have been no good bites,” he said about offers to buy the facility.</p><p>But just a few years ago, the slaughterhouse was all but sold when a plan advanced to build a 79-unit housing development on the property. Though the development never came to fruition because of failures in the housing market in 2008, many ranches were bracing for the worst.</p><p>Now, some have said they are interested in buying Rancho Veal if it is ever put up for sale in order to keep the local cattle industry going. A 2005 study found that 44 of 152 local ranchers use Rancho Veal for slaughter, and its closure would cause “significant fallout” in the industry.</p><p>“I'm planning to buy it if it closes,” said Samuel Goldberger, president of Northcoast Meats in Corte Madera. In 2007, Goldberger announced plans to build a brand-new environmentally sustainable slaughterhouse in the North Bay. His plans never came to fruition, and he said recently that buying Rancho Veal “makes much better sense than building a new one.”</p><p>“Our feeling is, we have a good slaughterhouse,” said Goldberger, referring to Rancho Veal. “It is well-respected in the community.”</p><p>Goldberger said if he buys the slaughterhouse, he would retrofit it to focus on “various kinds of recycling and energy efficiency.”</p><p>David Evans, the owner of Marin Sun Farms in Point Reyes Station, has also expressed interest in buying Rancho Veal if it is sold.</p><p>Gale, of Chileno Valley Ranch, said that mobile slaughterhouse facilities have been used successfully in Washington and other states, but have had less success in California. The mobile trailers, which cut out the middlemen between ranchers and slaughterhouses, are subject to strict regulations and costs here.</p><p>“As long as Rancho is here, nobody is going to spend twice as much money to mobile slaughter,” said Gale.</p><p>(Contact Philip Riley at philip.riley@arguscourier.com)</p>