The meeting sparked lively debate on the subject of the golf course, but was also accentuated by an issue with the restaurant lessees at Pebble Creek and accusations hurled at the city administrator.

 

 

McMurchie is a lifetime member of the PGA and current golf manager at Inver Woods golf in Inver Grove. He told council that in any given year, he would have anywhere from a couple dozen to 40 different projects under his belt he would be working on.

 

McMurchie — like a skilled pathologist — completely examined every inch, every nook and cranny of Pebble Creek and gave his recommendations to the city on where to proceed with the future of the golf course.

 

“Remember, there are no magic answers,” he warned council as he began.

 

McMurchie said his final recommendations would come down to nothing other than what is most realistic, pragmatic and practical.

 

The city has been looking at either selling the golf course, leasing it out, hiring a management company or running it as is.

 

McMurchie suggests the city continue to self-operate the golf course.

 

McMurchie’s first recommendation is to avoid any future debt. He also recommended staff work towards a break-even in net operations, something he believes is achievable.

 

“Make it a good short term project, maybe five years to break even,” he said, “You’ll need to continue to increase, then protect your rates for a round of golf all the while maintaining a good operating expense trend. And you are already there, you just need to start exerting some patience monetarily as well as politically.”

 

McMurchie had mentioned earlier in his presentation that he saw Pebble Creek’s revenue per round trend upwards and said that was a very good sign.

 

“That part of your business is going in the right direction,” he said.

 

McMurchie also said the operating expenses are also going very well, in the downward direction.

 

“You are at 4.1% down and that is good management,” he continued. “You are in a pretty good stead there.”

 

McMurchie said if the golf course stayed on that trend over the next several years, the trend upwards in revenue per round will move faster than creating any further expenses.

 

Another recommendation McMurchie had for the future of Pebble Creek is to be conservative over the next 10 years on capital improvements. He suggested any such improvements should be focussed solely on equipment and suggested the current seven-year course renovations be scratched for the time being.

 

Another recommendation from McMurchie was to downsize. He told council he thinks they should consider eliminating one of the nine holes and make it an exclusive 18-hole championship course. He also said the clubhouse is way too big for its purpose and said to cut the square footage from 15,000 down to somewhere around 7,000 or 5,000 sq. ft. and cater to the golf community.

 

 

McMurchie went over all four scenarios the city is researching and said hiring a management company would not be a good option. 

 

First, he said there are only 125 to 190 days in a golf season in Minnesota and that represents a high risk to these companies. Any contract the city entered into with a company like this would have to share the bottom line with them and the company will treat the golf course just like it was an apartment building or a mall store.

 

“They would probably force a $75 green fee just to make it work for them,” said McMurchie. “They would do these kinds of things for their own benefit, not the city’s.”

 

Plus, McMurchie said, if capital improvements were deemed necessary, the management company would most likely not participate in any improvements made to the golf course over the term of their contract.

 

As far as selling the golf course, McMurchie thinks that option is not possible being the fact the golf course is in the red and only sensible people would make an offer to buy something worth millions and get nothing in return for it.

 

McMurchie said leasing the golf course to another party would fall into the same trap as having a management company take over. The city would lose all control over rates, programs, policies and product to some extent. Plus, the lessee or management company would want to see the cash increase so they’d make drastic cuts including reducing the condition and appearance of the golf course and personnel.

 

McMurchie liked the idea the city has a golf management committee that meets occlusionally and suggested they continue in that direction. 

 

 

“Bottom line is, I don’t think you guys are in as bad a situation as you think,” he said. “You have those upward and downward trends developing and if you tweak some things and the economy keeps improving, you look at the feasibility of downsizing the golf course and maybe eliminating nine holes, things could really get much better around here.

 

“This is a good community asset,” he concluded.

 

Mayor Lefty Kleis argued that McMurchie may be biased in his assessment of the golf course based on the fact he runs a golf course that he turned around.

 

“I don’t think I’m being biased but I have seen in a lot of communities, council will drag their golf courses through the mud and build an awful lot of bad will in doing so,” he said. “You have to be real careful about that.”

 

 

As the meeting continued after McMurchie sat down, council discussed when the next meetings should occur in order to give staff direction on how to proceed with the future of the golf course. 

 

Member Adam Oliver, who sits on the golf management committee, said the committee will likely be ready to present a recommendation to council by April 1.

 

Member Tracy Bertram said she didn’t like the idea the committee would be already ready to make recommendations since council has had very little time, if any, to discuss all the options.

 

After numerous debates on the topic, it was agreed by council to carry on the discussions and recommendations at the April 1 executive session meeting.

 

Furthermore, council will also consider a timetable for allowing public input on the subject before any final decisions are made.

 

 

Mayor Kleis wanted to give a report on an issue he recently discovered about the operations at Hunter’s Ridge at Pebble Creek.

 

“I was just informed a little while ago that our lessees (Shelly and Nick Mattson) have fallen far behind on their lease payments,” said the mayor. “What frustrates me more than anything is I was on the budget and finance committee a whole year and was never once informed of this situation.”

 

Kleis compared the non-compliance of payments to the non-shovelers of snow who get sent an invoice for the service and are issued a monetary penalty for being late.

 

“If this had been happening for quite a while, which it looks like it had, we should have nipped it in the bud a long time ago before it escalated to what, over $30,000?”

 

“$26,000 and some change,” said City Administrator Greg Pruszinske.

 

Oliver chimed in saying, “Our current lessees are now current in rent and actions are being taken to get a good faith forecast from the Mattsons for the remaining amount.”

 

Kleis pointed out he noticed a check had come into the city for the amount of $9,000 from the Mattsons on Feb. 17.

 

“How could that have occurred when the city offices weren’t even open that day?, asked the mayor.

 

“I went and picked it up,” said Pruszinske.

 

“But we were closed. I’m kind of puzzled,” said Kleis. “How do we let someone fall so far behind? We should have learned from the previous tenants. This is a lease, you have to comply with the lease.”

 

Kleis went on to say if it were completely up to him, he’d terminate the lease.

 

“You make an interesting statement right there,” Oliver said to Kleis. “If you decided to terminate the lease now, you would lose half the golf season because nobody can come in and get set up that quickly.”

 

“By not making current payments, the hole gets deeper and deeper and it’ll get harder to get out of that,” Kleis said. “We’re not a bank, we don’t borrow money. If we had known about this six to 10 months ago we could have nipped it in the bud back then.”

 

Kleis continued by saying he was “pissed off” that he was never told of this and asked council if anyone else was aware of the late payments.

 

“We were told in early February, late January and we met with Shelly in early February and we discussed the situation and said, ‘okay’, we’re in it for this much, what do we do?” said Member Rick Hendrickson who sits on the budget and finance committee.

 

Pruszinske, who was waiting for an opportunity to talk,  directed a question to the mayor.

 

“Your question to me was, ‘what was I doing picking up that check on the 17th?” he said. “I was working on the golf committee and taking their direction to get that rent money as soon as possible. It was ready on the 17th, so I went and collected it.”

 

“I don’t care if the offices were closed that day,” he continued. “I don’t care if the offices are closed on Sundays. I’m here on Sundays, closed office days and holidays. So please don’t imply some wrong-doing by me going to pick up a rent check for $9,000 on the 17th of February when the offices are closed.”

 

“You’re responsible,” said the mayor to Pruszinske. You’re our city administrator. Why didn’t you tell us that these bills were not being paid?”

 

“My direction by council was to find a restaurant and get them in, get them up and running, be patient and to work with them,” said Purszinske. “The city was to be a partner with them and make sure they got the first year under their belts so they don’t fail. That’s what I told you. That’s what my direction was. I never said my direction was to not collect rent. I never said it was to not collect utilities. So don’t put words in my mouth because I did not say that.”

 

Kleis tried to follow up with more contention but Oliver interceded.

 

“Hey Lefty, real quick, how is this moving us forward?”

 

“What I’m saying now and what I said earlier Adam, is we need to terminate that lease,” Kleis said.

 

“Okay, I’m not in favor of it,” said Oliver. “What you said to Greg sounded like a personal attack. I think if we check the minutes from when we took on Hunter’s Ridge, we would see city staff was asked to work with the new tenants and to be a partner. But for you to come across in an attack on our city administrator, that’s something you need to avoid.”

 

Kleis gestured to Pruszinske and apologized.

 

“Sorry Greg, if you think I was attacking you,” he said. “I was just frustrated I was never informed of this fact.”

 

Pruszinske ordered the meeting adjourned at 8:34 p.m.