EVERETT – A Seattle company with wide experience in the golf arena in the region was tapped Wednesday to take over the city’s two popular yet deficit-running municipal golf courses.
The Everett City Council picked Premier Golf Centers LLC to run Walter E. Hall and Legion Memorial golf courses, ending four years of sometimes-turbulent management under Virginia-based manager Billy Casper Golf.
Premier was one of seven companies, including Billy Casper Golf, that bid on the contract. It will be paid a flat annual fee of $150,000 to oversee the operation of the two courses and will be eligible for revenue sharing.
The change, effective Oct. 1, will help pitch the courses out of the rough and toward profitability in the next few years, city officials say.
“The issue isn’t if we have too many or not enough golf courses, it’s how we’ve been running them” Council President Brenda Stonecipher said.
The city’s golf program was designed to be, and until the late 1990s was, self-sustaining.
But it has not been able to climb out of the red since it took on millions of dollars in bond debt to improve Legion Memorial at 144 W. Marine View Drive a decade ago.
Things were so bad at one point that Mayor Ray Stephanson said the city might close one of the courses as a last resort.
Two years after that threat, the courses still can’t stand on their own, even though Walter E. Hall, at 1226 W. Casino Road, is one of Washington’s most heavily played golf courses.
The city courses lost a combined $500,000 last year and are on pace to lose another $300,000 to $400,000 this year.
The new golf contract is designed to reward the management company for increasing the rounds of golf played and boosting the city’s revenue generated at course restaurants and pro shops.
Paul Kaftanski, director of Everett’s Parks Department, said the new contract should result in immediate savings of about $200,000 a year and help make the operation turn a small profit as early as 2010.
Refinancing bonds, recent tweaks to green fees and the transfer of a few groundskeepers to other parks operations are expected to also slash operational expenses by more than $200,000 a year, he said.
Bill Schickler, president of Premier Golf, said the changes will allow profits to stay with the golf operation rather than the “concessionaire’s pocket.”
“It really does put the city and manager on the same page so that we’re all pulling together in the same direction,” he said.
Premier Golf manages Seattle’s Jackson Park, Jefferson Park and Interbay golf courses, as well as Bellevue Municipal Golf Course and other regional public courses.
Mary Jane Anderson, chairwoman of the Everett Parks Board, said the company’s stature in the Puget Sound region should be an advantage for marketing the courses, a challenge some officials say the Virginia-based Billy Casper struggled with.
“Having that knowledge of the local community, and knowing the golfers in our area, will be a big help,” Anderson said.
Reporter David Chircop: 425-339-3429 or dchircop@heraldnet.com.
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