LYNNWOOD — Upgrades and improvements for the Lynnwood Golf Course are in the business plan for the future.
Now that the facility’s $6 million bond is paid off, parks and recreation director Lynn Sordel suggests reinvesting revenue into making improvements. The last $400,000 bond payment was made in December 2011.
Adding a hitting area and cart storage, improving parking and the car entry, plus upgrading the pro shop and food service areas are being proposed as future projects over the next five years.
The plan calls for using proceeds from the city’s sale of property, to Edmonds Community College, to establish a $500,000 line of credit-style account for the golf course. Funds would be drawn upon as proposed elements move forward and funds would be paid back with course fees.
Basically, the golf course would get enough seed money to mount improvement projects, said Lorenzo Hines, finance director. “There is a good plan and a strategy to repay funds that will set the golf course up for success.”
“There are business measurement tools with every step in concert to attack the deficit,” Sordel said. “Those tools were put in place to make the course better while attacking the deficit. This is a strategy that is sustainable.”
Throughout the past three years the golf course operated on a deficit, relying on loans from the city’s utility fund to break even. Sordel attributed those shortfalls to bond payments.
“There was an inability to generate enough money to pay bond payments in the three-year period marked by bad economic conditions and bad weather,” Sordel said.
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