Boulder Creek costs more closed than open

By Bill Erin

Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2009 | 12:51 p.m.

It is interesting to note that, while the Boulder Creek Golf Course is still a thorn in the side of many residents here, in Arizona, Las Vegas developer Jim Rhodes has won the fight to get approval for a golf course and the water to maintain it for his 25,000-home commuter development.

At the same time, the new owners of Lake Las Vegas recently won a court fight to close at least one and maybe two golf courses in that development. Strangely enough, it's the former owners who say the new owners should keep the golf course open because of an incomplete pump station on the course that would probably be lost if the course were closed.

The new owners contended Falls Golf Course will lose more than $1 million from August to next July. They claim the property is $15 million in debt and worth far less than that.

In Arizona, however, the problem Rhodes had to overcome was water. There was a move to stall the course until enough homes were constructed to generate enough effluent water to maintain it. The completion of the Hoover Dam Bypass bridge is expected to accelerate a building boom between Kingman and Las Vegas.

What about using effluent water at Boulder Creek? Is Boulder Creek losing money on its day-to-day operations? If so, how much? Has the city really invested $80 million in it and would it pay to close it?

I went to the one man I felt knew the real figures and didn't have an ax to grind, since he had no hand in its construction and nothing to personally gain or lose if it were closed. Since taking over Boulder City's finances two years ago, Tim Inch has done an excellent job of straightening out several of the city's monetary problems, including the discovery of $8.7 million the golf course owed the city that had somehow been lost in the shuffle.

Why doesn't Boulder Creek use effluent water? Because it has so much salt from people's water softeners and other minerals, Inch said. Grass and plants wouldn't tolerate it. And the cost of upgrading our waste water treatment facilities to eliminate the salt would be too costly.

Is Boulder Creek losing money on a day-to-day basis? The golf course is now barely making it, Inch said, for two reasons. First, the General Fund burden from the course has been reduced $400,000 a year by now charging the course the wholesale water rate. Second, we ordered the contractors to reduce expenses by 10 percent, and then another 5 percent effective in January. So we're just within the budget, which includes those $750,000 payments on the $8.7 million additional debt we uncovered.

How much does the city have invested in Boulder Creek? The first thing we have to do, Inch said, is refute the ridiculous claim that the course cost $80 million. The actual cost was a little over $20 million — $30 million with debt.

Would it pay to just close the course? No, Inch said. We can't just walk away from a $20 million investment. It's money already spent. The Finance Committee estimated we could get $10 million for it. And we'd still have $9-plus million in golf course bonds to pay off. Plus that $8.7 million to the Utility Fund would be lost, and we are now paying that out of golf course proceeds.

Inch agrees with the Finance Committee recommendation. It studied the problem from every angle and strongly recommended that the course be kept open with all 27 holes producing income. Inch also pointed out that the restaurant is now back in operation and has resumed evening hours.

Inch is a man you can believe and has proved his financial acumen. He believes Boulder Creek could, eventually, make it.

Bill Erin is a Boulder City News columnist.