Rancho Park Is Handing Its Kitchen to the Team Behind Venice's Penmar

"Weekend BBQs will feature tri-tip, smoked oysters and cast-iron grilled peach cobbler." That line comes from a September 17, 2026 report to the Los Angeles Board of Recreation and Park Commissioners. It describes the food planned for Rancho Park Golf Course over the next year or more. For Beverlywood, the course is a short drive west on Pico Boulevard, at 10460 W. Pico. Its clubhouse is about to close for a long restoration. The food is moving to the driving range and the halfway house, and the operator running it there is the one the city picked for the finished clubhouse.

That last point matters most. On September 17 the board approved two reports. One is an interim food deal with an operator called The Rancho. The other puts $28 million into restoring the clubhouse. Read together, they mean the range bar is not a holdover. It is the first public version of the restaurant Rancho Park expects to have when the building reopens.

The menu comes before the building

The previous food operator's agreement ended on July 7, 2026. Under a temporary right-of-entry permit, The Rancho began with vending machines while it got the halfway house and the driving-range bar ready for interim service. The short-term agreement approved in September makes that setup official. Its terms are specific:

• Term: three years, or until the 10-year concession agreement is signed, whichever comes first.
• Where the food is: the driving-range bar and the halfway house, plus mobile carts and kiosks. With board approval, The Rancho can also improve the halfway house, the outdoor bar and the driving-range restrooms, and build a patio next to the bar.
• Improvement budget: up to $500,000 in board-approved work, which can count against rent.
• Sound: house music or TV sound during operating hours, only with prior approval from Recreation and Parks.
• Menu: breakfast, lunch and a weekend brunch with California-style sandwiches, burgers, salads and traditional Mexican dishes. Weekend BBQs add the tri-tip and smoked oysters, with craft beer, curated wines and specialty cocktails.

The city's share also shows what kind of place this is meant to be. Recreation and Parks takes 2.5 percent of gross receipts on food and non-alcoholic drinks, 6 percent on alcohol and 4 percent on vending. Those terms suit a busy neighborhood bar on public land. They are not written for a snack window.

As of the September report, the outdoor bar and halfway house were still being prepared, and bar service depends on permits and licensing. The agreement requires daily service but leaves the hours to be worked out with the city's Golf Division. The Rancho Park course page on L.A. City Golf is the place to check before a Saturday visit.

Why the clubhouse is being restored, not rebuilt

The $28 million goes toward keeping the existing building. The September clubhouse report describes the work as renovating the existing clubhouse, improving the site around it, and making the building and grounds ADA- and code-compliant. The history explains why. In 2012, SurveyLA found Rancho Park eligible for the National Register of Historic Places and the California Register, and for designation as a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument. A Historic Resource Assessment commissioned by the city later called the clubhouse one of the contributing elements of the site's historic fabric. A qualified historic architect will oversee construction.

The money comes from golf, not the city's General Fund. All $28 million is drawn from Special Operations Golf Funds, and the total includes a $6.5 million contingency. The work will be bid through the department's list of pre-qualified on-call contractors.

The report also counts the trees. Five come out: a Breede River yellowwood, a Japanese black pine, a Mexican fan palm and two pygmy date palms, totaling 43 inches in trunk diameter. Ten go in, with 52.5 inches of combined caliper. The new trees include a Western sycamore, an island oak, a Mexican blue oak and an Oklahoma redbud.

Here is the schedule the board approved:

That schedule replaced earlier ones. A January 2026 report expected clubhouse work to start in March 2026. The construction updates page on L.A. City Golf is where the city has said it will post progress.

Who The Rancho is

The Rancho is 10460 Rancho, LLC. The board selected it on January 15, 2026 to design, manage and run the course's food and beverage concession for ten years. The long-term agreement was still being negotiated as of September. Its proposal calls for an open-fire steakhouse, a sports-oriented bar, a café and a space for community events. The city expects that operation to open in 2027 or 2028, after a buildout of a year or more.

The team has run this kind of place before. According to the proposal, all three principals come from The Penmar, the bar, restaurant and event space at Penmar Golf Course in Venice, which also operates under a concession with the City of Los Angeles.

• Oscar Hermosillo co-founded The Penmar. He also founded Venice Beach Wines on Rose Avenue and is behind Cerveteca and Clutch Roadhouse, which the proposal describes as West Coast BBQ inspired by California Highway 1.
• Mark Chesler co-founded The Penmar and calls himself a longtime Westside resident.
• Dan Spitz was an original investor in The Penmar. Since 2023 he has worked in its leadership group on events, growth and coordination with Recreation and Parks.

That background explains the interim menu. Clutch is a smokehouse, and the planned weekend BBQ fits it. A brunch built on sandwiches, burgers and Mexican dishes fits a group that has run a beer house and a neighborhood wine bar. At Penmar, the team has also already worked with the same city department and the same kind of agreement it now holds at Rancho Park. The January selection report includes the full proposal.

Up Motor Avenue, the park runs on a longer schedule

The same department is also working at Cheviot Hills Park and Recreation Center, and those projects overlap the clubhouse work for years.

At the tennis center, court replacement and fencing were done by April 2026. Still to come are LED lighting, renovation of the tennis pro shop and restrooms, removal of the breezeway roof, sewer-line work and accessibility upgrades. Total project funding is $2,072,330.97. Near the baseball diamond, a $2,012,251.80 project will tear down the field restroom and install a prefabricated replacement, along with ADA parking and path improvements. Its construction window runs from June 2026 to October 2028.

A third project is still on paper. A May 2026 report describes refurbishing three ballfields, adding accessible paths and parking, and building a new dog park. It has $1 million for design, but no total budget or construction start yet.

Put these on one calendar and the Pico and Motor corner is a work zone into 2028. The clubhouse is set to finish construction in November 2027, the field restroom by October 2028, and the dog park has no date yet. Through all of it, the Cheviot Hills Recreation Center still posts regular hours and fall 2026 programming.

The next event there is on Friday, October 30, when the center hosts a free Halloween event from 4 to 8 p.m. with games, crafts, bounce houses and contests. A 6 p.m. movie is aimed at ages 3 to 13, according to the city's 2026 Halloween activities list. A listing on Fun With Kids in LA names the movie as Young Frankenstein, says food will be sold, and gives the address as 2551 Motor Avenue. It also notes that details can change, so a call to the center before heading over is a good idea.

For Beverlywood, this public land matters as much as the private streets. Rancho Park's fairways and the Cheviot Hills fields are part of what the area around Beverlywood offers, alongside the Pico dining corridor and the Cheviot Hills boundary that shapes local pricing. On the current schedule, construction on the restored clubhouse finishes in November 2027, and The Rancho's steakhouse is expected to follow in 2027 or 2028.

Construction schedules like these can affect how a nearby home is timed and presented when it goes on the market. If you own near Rancho Park or Cheviot Hills and want to talk through what the next two years of park work could mean for your property, Farhad Yasharpour is available to help. Request an Instant Home Valuation or Schedule a Private Consultation.