Tunitas Creek Beach was a village site for the Ohlone people, who lived in connection with and took responsibility for the land for millennia. By the late 1800s and early 1900s, this section of the coast had become a thoroughfare for moving goods by rail and sea. Local landowner, Alexander Gordon, built a giant wooden chute to send sacks of grain from the blufftop to ships waiting below.
More recently, illegal gatherings at the beach impacted the creek and beach, and community members called for the area to be protected. San Mateo County and Peninsula Open Space Trust collaborated to purchase the site and created a beach park. Amenities on the bluff were designed in collaboration with community members over many rounds of public review and feedback.
Don Horsley Park
In 2024 the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors voted to honor former Supervisor and County Sheriff Don Horsley, who passed away in November 2023 after a lifetime of public service, by naming the new park after him.
Supervisor Horsley took seriously the concerns of residents who had observed throngs of beachgoers, unsafe routes cut through private land, huge piles of trash left after days of partying, and environmental damage to the beach and creek. To protect Tunitas Creek Beach and make it available to the public, Horsley brought together San Mateo County leadership, Peninsula Open Space Trust and the California State Coastal Conservancy, to secure funding to purchase the property and build visitor facilities.
For more background see the now completed Don Horsley Park at Tunitas Creek Beach Improvement Project