After what seemed like an eternity of discussions and proposals to the Monterey County Board of Supervisors, followed by a protracted legal challenge, Friends of Laguna Seca was finally able to announce on April 4 of this year that all the obstacles had been cleared. In the process of dotting i’s and crossing t’s, the non-profit group will assume a historic long-term agreement to take over operation of the Laguna Seca Recreation Area and its signature WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca.
Friends of Laguna Seca was formed by local business owners Ross Merrill (below, right), Bruce Canepa (below, left) and Jonathan Feiber in 2016 as an answer to a plea by the county to find a better solution to operating the facility. Since then, other business leaders like Ned Spieker and Gordon McCall have provided another layer of insight. What brought them to this point of becoming the custodians of Laguna Seca’s future is passion. What will see them succeed going forward is business acumen.
“We took a look at the county’s request for a proposal and thought that to preserve and save Laguna Seca for future generations, we should approach this as an all-volunteer non-profit,” said Merrill, an avid historic racer, as well as CEO of Merrill Farms LLC, a fourth generation produce-growing company based in Salinas, Calif. His earliest memories of the track stretch back to riding his bike to the back gate as a boy from the farm where he was raised.
“We pledge to invest in the facility, update the business model and do it all on our own dime and relieve the county of its burden,” he added.
In the run-up to the takeover, County Supervisor Mary Adams was quoted as saying of the venue: “It’s a precious gem and I don’t think it’s ever been properly managed.”
The reasons why are many and varied, but suffice it to say that Laguna Seca, along with Portland International Raceway and the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal, are the only municipally-owned race tracks in North America. In the case of Laguna Seca, that meant layers of bureaucracy and diverging priorities. Which isn’t a criticism, simply a reality.
“I can’t imagine having to run my business where every decision needed to be run through multiple committees, but that’s exactly what’s happened under all of the prior operating agreements,” says Canepa, who began racing sports cars at the track in the late 1970s, while also building his business into one of the world’s most respected dealers and restorers of pedigree sports cars and racecars.
“Our concession agreement contains three significant points,” he explains. “First, we have the authority to run the facility as we see fit without county oversight. Second, we have a 50-year agreement, which is unlike any of the previous agreements, and third, it locks the facility into being a race track, so there’s no chance it will be anything else.”
The fact that prior operating agreements for the track have been short-term (three to five years) has been a significant part of the problem historically, according to Merrill.
“SCRAMP (a prior operator) put all of the buildings on wheels because they didn’t know how long they’d be there. That’s what explains issues like all the deferred maintenance and lack in infrastructure investment,” he says. “We’re turning a new page, but we also don’t have the luxury of losing money. That means we have to run events – professional race series and more – that will put money back into the facility. We’re not about making a profit, but we do have to generate the revenue needed to be reinvested.”
To achieve that, Friends of Laguna Seca are poised to embark on a journey of renewal that will at last see the venue reach its full potential. As they do, race fans, enthusiasts and the County of Monterey will be the real winners.
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