Golf Course Update: Adopt the Principle of "First Things First"

One Ogden citizen suggests Boss Godfrey emulate a locally successful business model

Since March of this year, the Big Spending Boss Godfrey has asked for citizen suggestions on how to improve the revenue picture for the Mt. Ogden Golf Course. Godfrey characterizes the situation as dire. He proposes drastic solutions, his obvious favorite being a golf course redesign, which could cost the taxpayers upwards of $10 million.

In the intervening period, numerous citizen ideas have flowed in, all of which would inflict far less pain to the public purse than the option which Godfrey prefers. For review, several of these can be found within our WCF Golf Course Article Collection. The latest helpful citizen suggestion is provided in this morning's Standard-Examiner, within a fine guest commentary by Ogden resident Frank McFarland.

Mr. McFarland reports that he met recently with Todd Brinkman, managing pro of the El Monte and Mount Ogden golf courses, Jeff McFarland, greens manager of Mount Ogden, and Jon Fister, golf pro at Mount Ogden. Together they arrived at some "inexpensive modifications to the course were presented in order to make the course more playable for the 'average' high handicapper."

McFarland has neatly packaged his resulting suggestions within a few short contiguous sentences, which we incorporate below:

Our suggestion is: Fund now whatever money is requested by Brinkman, McFarland and Fister, and do the work now to minimize the impact on the course. The longer the delay, the less likely it will ever happen since the debt load will continue to rise.
This course is a rare jewel and should be treated as a possible summer attraction for Ogden, as Snowbasin resort is a major winter attraction. Our further suggestion is to live with the clubhouse and the irrigation system as they are now, until the course can be made to pay its own way — then think about replacement. Do first things first.

As the article subtitle suggests, "Maybe Mt. Ogden could learn from Schneiter's Riverside course in Riverdale." Boss Godfrey often gives lip service to the concept of running Ogden City like a business. Perhaps he should therefore emulate Riverside's business model, and manage the purported revenue problem according to the example of one local golf course which has found success by handling problems on a "first things first" basis, fixing things up within realistic budgetary constraints, rather than throwing massive amounts of cash at perceived problems. As McFarland points out:

Schneiter’s Riverside course in Riverdale has been there for maybe 25 years, and is just now building a new (remodeled) clubhouse. The irrigation system is in a continual state of repair, yet the course continues to operate full bore! Take a lesson in how a minimal facility operates in a profitable manner.

Godfrey has some considerable golf course expertise right there on his staff, in Brinkman, McFarland and Fister. Would it be asking too much for Godfrey to listen to them?

And what say our readers about all this?