Golfers aren’t just swinging in opposition to the city’s five-year plan; they have their own proposals for the municipal courses.

Forget a new clubhouse at Torrey Pines; freeze rates; give residents 70 percent of the playing time each hour; and maintain county and junior rates, golfers demanded at the Feb. 21 Golf Advisory Council (GAC) hearing, when the council rejected the city’s five-year business plan for Balboa, Mission Bay and Torrey Pines municipal golf courses.
First and foremost, the Torrey Pines course needs to cater to local players and not to profiteers, an audience of more than 80 people cried.
Former District 2 City Councilman Michael Zucchet pointed to recently deleted language in the plan that signifies the city’s mindset towards Torrey Pines.
“Local golfers who have played the facility for years have to understand that Torrey Pines has a mystique about it that puts it in a class with Pebble Beach and St. Andrews (in Scotland and the birthplace of golf),” the draft document stated. “This reputation causes conflict with the resident golfer who thinks Torrey Pines should remain as their local ‘muni’ golf course and the non-resident golfers who view Torrey Pines as a magical place in a world-class setting.”
Torrey Pines is a municipal course, Zucchet emphasized, adding that “anybody who thinks differently should go back and check the charter amendment that the citizens passed in 1956 designating the land as such.”
Golfers decried spending $7 million to build a new clubhouse, especially one that doesn’t include public meeting rooms. Instead, the nonprofit Century Club will raise $3.2 million to build a tournament support building with meeting rooms, lockers and offices.

Paul Spiegelman, co-founder of San Diego Municipal Golfers Alliance (SDMGA), gathered 650 signatures to oppose the clubhouse by asking golfers: “Do you know they want to pay for a $13 million clubhouse and want to raise your green fees to pay for it?”
While the clubhouse costs approximately $7 million, parking lot upgrades and constructing two new putting greens near the first tees brings the total to approximately $13 million, according to the Golf Operations Fact Sheet.
Instead of building an expensive clubhouse, freeze rates for residents, demanded Steven Roberts, vice president for Torrey Pines Men’s Golf Club.
San Diegans should reap the benefits of fee hikes in the past five years that rebuilt Torrey Pines’ South Course to bring the U.S. Open here in 2008, Roberts said.

The Golf Enterprise Fund, comprising golfers’ fees, has doubled from $3.3 million in 2003 to $6.3 million due to increased fees under the 2001 business plan, according to Roberts. Golf operations brought in $2.6 million this year for the general fund.
The city’s Golf Operations division pays the city rent to lease the land, which goes into the general fund.
“Golf operations is making money hand over fist,” Roberts said.
Residents aren’t getting a cheap deal, either. Compared to other municipal courses at Coronado, Oceanside, Chula Vista and Bethpage, rates at Torrey Pines run on the high end, Roberts said. For the North Course on weekends, players currently pay $34 and will pay $40 if the plan passes.
The weekend resident rate at Coronado is $25; at Oceanside, $28. San Francisco’s Harding Park Golf Club, the most comparable facility to Torrey Pines, charges $48, despite its recent $15 million renovation debt, according to Roberts. Bethpage State Park ” the first municipal course to host the U.S. Open in 2002 ” charges $49.

After Torrey Pines hosts the 2008 U.S. Open, the South Course expects to increase its weekend rates by 67 percent from $45 to $75 by 2010.

The resident fee is based on maintenance and operational costs only; capital improvements and subsidizing the Balboa course are paid through non-resident fees, according to the Golf Operations Fact Sheet.
Residents aren’t opposed to the city making money, however. Locals call for the city to charge non-residents market rates that compare to other for-profit courses. Tee time brokers are charging $225 to play the South Course on the weekend, whereas the city rate is currently $135, according to Roberts.

“You’re leaving money on the table,” Roberts said.
Reselling city tee times may come to a halt if City Attorney Michael Aguirre pursues the matter. At a stakeholders’ meeting, Aguirre indicated that this was the number-one issue he would take from the meeting, according to the Golf Operations Fact Sheet. Aguirre was scheduled to hold a community forum to discuss the plan on Wednesday, March 1, after the Village News went to press.
As for tee-time allocation, everyone agrees that the system is skewed.

Seventy percent of tee times are supposed to go to residents, but the city acknowledges that is not the case. In order to improve accountability, the city has hired three new staff people to facilitate the auditing process and ensure that policies are met.
Golfers have a simple solution. Pre-book golfers and allot 70 percent of the hour to residents and 30 percent to non-residents. Ban tournaments that allow lessees to pre-book large chunks of sunlight hours, depriving residents of playing a full round of golf, Spiegelman demanded.

“(Hotels are) pre-buying tournaments but they’re not tournaments,” Spiegelman said. “It’s a phony device to get tee times for guests.”
Junior golf players will experience the greatest hike in fees in 2007 under the five-year plan. The junior monthly ticket will triple from $10.50 to $32.

High school golf teams would be financially crippled by the increase, said Jeremy Martin, head golf coach at San Diego High School, who said he spoke for all public high schools. The cost would be passed on to families, most of whom could not afford the fee, especially when 80 percent of students qualify for free or reduced lunch at San Diego, Hoover, Crawford and Kearny high schools, Martin said.
“(It would make) golf at San Diego High School an exclusive sport only for those who can afford it,” Martin said.
Redefine junior rates and raise the junior age from 15 to 18, Roberts demanded. He also suggested that every junior get a discounted rate, not just locals.
Finally, golfers called for reinstating the county rate, so that county players would pay resident rates, not non-resident fees as the plan proposes.