Being locked out of the Railroad was only the beginning. Below is the letter received this evening from Dean Thulin of Cal Poly College of Agriculture, Food & Environmental Sciences.
Please read the full letter and let us know what you think in the comments, now is the time for constructive conversation.

Swanton Pacific Ranch Railroad Volunteers,

I am writing today with an update about the Swanton Pacific Ranch Railroad.

First, please know that the work of the entire Railroad Society in helping with the recovery of artifacts and cleanup of the railroad facilities following the 2020 fire is greatly appreciated. As you know, we’ve spent the past two years working hard to clean up the ranch to get it up and running for future, ongoing use. I appreciate your patience as we focused on the ranch – getting our faculty, staff and students back on the ranch safely for research and learning remains our top priority.

As you’re more than aware, most all railroad facilities and equipment were destroyed.

While several physical structures specific to the railroad were covered by insurance policies in place at the time of the fire, the actual rolling stock, parts inventory, specialized equipment and railroad tracks were not covered by the insurance policy in effect at the time of the fire.

Current rolling stock repair estimates produced and reviewed by subject matter experts are more than $10M, and while FEMA reimbursement may cover a small portion of that, it will not cover it all, leaving a significant financial exposure to the university. Just to be clear, the funding we recently received from the state budget is restricted to building an education center on the ranch; none of these funds can be used for the railroad.

With our need to focus all of our efforts on the core educational elements of ranch operations and given the expected cost to restore the railroad, we no longer believe the university is the best steward of these unique artifacts of railroad history. Therefore, consistent with Al Smith’s wishes at the time of his gift we have made the decision to begin the process of transferring the railroad to an entity that can restore and care for these invaluable assets. We have already discussed this with the Smith family so they are aware of the decision

We have hired a consultant who has developed an inventory of assets including their valuation and repair status. As Al Smith spelled out in his gift, we will be contacting the California State Railroad Museum to see if they would like to receive any of these important artifacts of railroad history. Based on the outcome of that conversation, we may need to contact additional potential stewards of the assets. Our goal now is to be true to Al Smith’s wish that these artifacts are both preserved and made available to the public.

I know your passion for the railroad runs deep, and we hope through that passion you will help us find an organization that has the resources and mission that will ensure both the preservation and public access of the railroad artifacts. I recognize this is not the outcome for the railroad you had hoped for but hope we can count on your support and assistance as we move through this process.

I also want to address the financial donations to the railroad that came in post-fire. Our intent is to utilize those funds to safely transfer the railroad artifacts to their new owner to preserve the integrity of the original intent of those recent donations – to support the restoration of the Swanton Pacific Ranch Railroad assets.

I want to reiterate that this was a very difficult decision. The railroad was a unique part of Swanton Pacific Ranch. We all know that Al Smith got great pleasure in helping to preserve locomotives and providing the public the opportunity to learn about how important steam locomotives were to the building of this country. I firmly believe that getting these priceless assets into the hands of an entity whose core mission it is to restore and make them accessible to the public would be what Al wanted.

Thank you again for your patience as we navigated the post-fire disaster.
-Andy

Swanton Pacific Railroad Society

California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly)
Cal Poly Alumni

Of all the organization I have been involved with in the past thirty years not one single one had adequate coverage on their structures, equipment, tools and parts. The usual patter was to have one or two objects or categories with with some level of coverage and the rest was just "hangin out there." the one organization that had nearly everything listed hadn't adjusted the values for inflation or changing market values since they had acquired the asset, and when supplied with documentation to support adjusting the policy, they raised the amounts a minimal sum to prevent their rates from going up.

So not to detract from the end of what was probably one of the finest and most significant private railroads in the United Stated, please learn from that not only does your organization need to actively participate in disaster preparedness relevant to your location, but it needs to be reviewed on a regular basis alone with your insurance coverage for when the former fails.

Having crunched the numbers for a couple groups, I can tell you:

NO such non-profit can realistically afford "complete" coverage for their operation.

Does your auto or homeowners insurance REALLY cover the complete replacement cost for your car or house? Not really, unless you're paying through the nose.

We were extremely fortunate, when the B&O RR Museum suffered its roof collapse nearly 20 years ago, that they were insured almost as much as any such non-profit rail museum could be. Most importantly for them, they had "loss of business" insurance, which allowed them to pay critical staff and administrators to remain employed by the Museum during their long rebuilding period. My inquiries about at the time suggested they may have been the ONLY such non-government-administered rail museum in North America so well insured. This also mean, incidentally, that their admission was/remains several dollars more expensive than comparable state-administered and private museums. I remember hearing sticker-shocked patrons at the entrance, both before and after the roof collapse and subsequent rebuild, and thinking "if only they knew how their dollars REALLY helped keep this stuff until now and for years to come........."

The reality is that most such groups are but one tropical storm, one flood, one carbarn fire, or one Kinzua Viaduct collapse, etc. away from perishing.

The trick is to have enough public goodwill and sympathy to help you rebuild after such a catastrophe. And that's where your volunteers and administration come in.

Could the group that operated the Swanton Pacific have even obtained a policy for the buildings and assets which they used, but didn't actually own? Perhaps a loss of business policy or standard liability insurance for their own organization, but not insurance against the loss of what was there. That would have been CalPoly's responsibility, no?