SDMGA: Report of City Council Natural Resources and Cultural (NR&C) Committee May 17, 2006 Meeting on Golf Issues
This City Council NR&C Committee meeting was to have been a voting meeting where their options normally would have been to send the golf staff's five-year plan forward as is, or to ask for changes before it goes to the full City Council next month. That was not to be. Because there was no vote taken on any of the key issues; all issues remain open and we will need to turn out in even larger numbers at the City Council meeting. The date of that meeting is tentatively set for June 19 but we can start organizing now. You can help by agreeing to serve as an SDMGA volunteer by sending us an email at sdmga.org@adelphia.net. SDMGA volunteers will help organize our members to contact city council members, get out the word by phone to other SDMGA members of the upcoming city council meeting and encourage others to attend the meeting. Please include your phone number.
We want to thank all of you who attended the May 17 NR&C meeting for your help in convincing the committee members that we care and will continue our fight to a just resolution.
A summary and full report of the May 17 meeting is given in the following.
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SDMGA Report on May 17 Natural Resources and Culture Committee Meeting
Summary:
As reported in the Union Tribune, the Natural Resources & Culture Committee (NR&C) of the City Council made few decisions last Wednesday, but seemed swayed to support the public’s opposition to the City’s plan to end senior and county discount rates, charge weekend rates on Fridays, institute a new charge for advanced reservations, and severely limit tournament play at Torrey Pines by the community’s Men’s and Women’s golf clubs. It is not clear whether the NR&C will vote on anything further before sending the matter to the City Council. Even if it does, there will probably be no more public hearings before the NR&C. The issue will thus come to a head before the full City Council tentatively set for June 19. SDMGA will continue to meet with City Council members, prepare position papers, and appear as your spokesperson at the City Council Meeting.
Full Report:
This City Council NR&C Committee meeting was dominated by a public united in its opposition to the City’s plan to end senior and county discount rates, charge weekend rates on Fridays, institute a new charge for advanced reservations, and severely limit tournament play at Torrey Pines by the community’s Men’s and Women’s golf clubs.
After 4 meetings at which no one but special representatives of business interests spoke in favor of the plan, proponents of the City's plan finally had two people who claimed to be members of the general public to speak in its favor. One person speaking in behalf of the City’s plan was Barbara Warden. The 2006 Buick Invitational program lists her as "an active member" of the Century Club; something she did not disclose when speaking at the meeting. SDMGA was informed that she had been lobbying council members with the absurdity that “the Men's Club is run by rich white men from La Jolla.” The truth of the matter is pure irony because as almost everyone knows, it is not the Torrey Pines Men’s Golf Club that is run by rich white men, it is the Century Club. Barbara Warden is one of 3 women out of 65 members pictured in the 2006 Buick Program; 2 are black. All 19 past presidents and honorary members are white.
A second woman spoke as a member of the public in favor of the plan and then spoke about her interest - lower rates for the Community Hospital charity tournament. There were also four or five others who said they supported the plan, but declined to talk or identify their affiliation, if any.
According to Tod Leonard’s column, there were over 200 people at the hearing and virtually all opposed the plan. The opposition to the plan was broad and impressive. SDMGA Co-founder John Beaver made a presentation to the Committee in which he outlined SDMGA’s Plan and compared it to the Mayor’s Plan. He presented an SDMGA Analysis of Projected Revenues that showed SDMGA’s Plan could yield as much revenue as the Mayor’s Plan while preserving senior, Friday, and county rates and holding increases in rates to under 4%. John also advocated an auditable system of distributing tee times so that residents got at least 70% of tee times including prime tee times.
SDMGA co-founder Paul Spiegelman called attention to the large surpluses in the projected budget which left plenty of room to hold the line on resident, senior and county rates He explained that the City must raise non-resident fees to market levels so that the City rather than private interests will receive the revenue that results. Paul also noted that the plan to institute an advanced reservation system was a “back to the future” solution that would pave the way back to the days when accusations of favoritism, abuse and corruption were constantly leveled at city staff before the phone lottery system was instituted. Spiegelman also asked for answers to SDMGA’s twenty-one unanswered questions about the City’s Plan.
Representatives of the Torrey Pines Men’s and Women’s Clubs and the Balboa Women’s clubs emphasized the need to allow tournament play for community members and retain senior and county rates. The clubs presented a plan in a letter to Mayor Sanders and the City Council which is very compatible with the SDMGA plan.
Private Citizen Michael Jakes made an illuminating presentation showing that the hours between 7:30 a.m. and 1:00 pm were a “rush hour” in which almost all of the hotel and tournament tee times were booked and that residents were getting less than half the tee times during this rush hour. Jakes suggested requiring hotels and tournaments to take some afternoon tee times to keep the proposed 70 – 30 resident to non-resident “rush hour” ratio intact.
Perhaps most eloquent of all were the dozens of seniors and other community members who spoke against pricing residents off the golf courses.
Although the committee members, Toni Atkins, Kevin Falconer, Ben Hueso and chair Donna Frye seemed swayed by the outpouring of community opposition to the City Plan, they only took two concrete actions:
To put the clubhouse as a separate line item (This was viewed as a prelude to possibly lowering fees because if the clubhouse is off the table, the soft costs and debt service associated with it could be eliminated)
Affirm the 70-30 “rush hour” ratio of resident to non-resident tee time allocations.
Questions from council members made it clear that committee members were not going to support an end to senior fees, were skeptical about city claims that it cost over $56 per round to prepare the South course for a round of golf and were not inclined to raise resident fees as much as the City proposed. Council member Atkins also asked that staff to answer SDMGA‘s Twenty-One Unanswered Questions.
Where do we go from here? It is not clear whether the NR&C will vote on anything further before sending the matter to the City Council. Even if it does, there will probably be no more public hearings before the NR&C. The issue will thus come to a head before the full City Council tentatively on June 19. SDMGA will continue to meet with City Council members, prepare position papers, and appear as your spokesperson at the City Council Meeting. We need to turn out in even larger numbers at the City Council meeting. You can help by agreeing to serve as an SDMGA volunteer by sending us an email at sdmga.org@adelphia.net - please include your phone number. SDMGA volunteers will help organize our members to contact city council members, get out the word by phone to other SDMGA members of the upcoming city council meeting and encourage others to attend the meeting. We will provide you with all of the necessary information.
San Diego Municipal Golfer’s Alliance
John Beaver, co-founder
Joe Burwell, co-founder
Paul Spiegelman, co-founder