Council tees off on Boulder Creek

By Timothy Pratt (contact)

Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2003 | 9:33 a.m.

The city's two public golf courses seemed headed in decidedly different directions at the end of the Boulder City Council meeting Tuesday night, as the golf professional's contract was extended at the municipal course while cutbacks were announced for the Boulder Creek course.

The two items on each course dominated the time and attention of a packed room, taking up more than half of the nearly five-hour session and drawing the only participation from the members of community present.

The Boulder Creek item featured Tom Frost, consultant for course operator Triad Golf Management, facing frustrated council members after he revealed that the course's deepening financial problems included an operating deficit of about $128,000 in October.

The course opened in January and has lost about $3 million in operating expenses, depreciation, plus interest on the $22 million borrowed to build the course. Frost agreed to come up with a plan by next Tuesday to cut back on losses after a series of hard-edged questions from the council. The plan will presented by the next city council meeting Dec. 9, he said.

"We heard from you that ... October would be a good golf month," said Councilman Mike Pacini. "I'm banging my head against a wall over here ... and want to know, what has Triad done?"

Frost said that marketing is being done to attract more golfers, including offering promotions to 300 golfers visiting Las Vegas in December. He also spoke of other courses in the Las Vegas Valley lowering their rates, but said he "didn't want to chase their rates down."

This angered City Manager John Sullard, who said, "I don't care if you lower your rates to meet your costs. You're spending other people's money."

Frost said the course has also made cutbacks in maintenance.

"We can go deeper but this may involve ... the golf course deteriorating," he said.

Pacini said firing staff may be in order. Mayor Bob Ferraro said one place the management company should consider cutting back is in the $650,000 annual management fee it charges the city. A recent proposal to do this in exchange for certain concessions failed.

"In my opinion, the management fee is far too great for what we're getting," Ferraro said.

As for the municipal golf course, it was agreed to extend golf pro Anthony Fiorentini's contract with changes, which would give him more incentives to draw more people to the course.

Those incentives include the city picking up the tab for a yearly audit of the course and folding a cost-of-living increase into Fiorentini's contract, as well as an automatic five-year renewal of the contract -- "if both sides are happy with his work," City Attorney Dave Olsen said.

The salary increase was the only part of that item's discussion causing controversy. Ferraro noted that cost-of-living raises are included in benefits packages given to employees, not in arrangements made with contractors.