Agenda Packets - 1997/03/03 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Golf Course Management By Contract • "How can they raise the green fees for a course in such poor condition?" "I have never seen any maintenance personnel working out here." "The city has no business operating the golf course." These are just some of the comments made by golfers today reflecting the state of many public golf courses. While a great majority of our public courses are fine facilities and provide a golfing experience worthy of their green fee, there are some courses,which for a number of reasons such as budget restraints,labor costs, or poor management,cannot and should not justify the price charged to play a round of golf. For many golf course owners and operators,and especially those of municipally-owned courses, the idea of leasing their course to a management firm which may have more expertise in operating a golf facility has been accepted in some locales with great relief. This report will examine golf course management and the trend to lease and contract out the responsibilities of managing golf courses. While many types of courses,both public and private, are operated by management firms,the concentration is on the municipal golf course. That is, a course which is under the control of a tax-supported agency such as a city,county,or species district providing recreation and park services.. Its primary goal is to provide a recreation facility for the greatest number of citizens at the most reasonable cost to the taxpayers. 1 HISTORY To begin with,how did the idea of contracting golf operations get started? Quite simply,it was and is a matter of dollars and cents. It is expensive to operate and maintain a golf course at a level that is satisfactory to the golfing public. Increasing expenses over the years have made it difficult for many municipalities to operate their courses without dipping into the city coffers and relying on an annual subsidy. Rising labor costs have been significant in the trend toward private management. National Golf Foundation studies found that the average maintenance costs for regulation 18-hole municipal course were S250,000 or more annually with ranges from $50,000 to as much as $700,000. Many muni courses are staffed with union labor which, generally, costs more than labor which might be used by a management company. Private management was further encouraged in the late 1970s when taxpayer revolts,led by the Jarvis-Gann Amendment in California, otherwise known as Proposition 13, dramatically cut the budgets in all levels of government. Recreation and park services in general, and gol courses directly,were hit hard by these so-called reforms. Budgets were cut and the philosop of"pay-as-you-go"was irtituted. This put pressure on city hall, and in many areas,subsidies to the golf courses were emphatically reduced if not ended.