The city’s efforts to find a private operator to take over management of Greenbelt Golf Course did not result in any responses to a request for proposals. The request for proposals was released Aug. 3 and closed Aug. 28, with no offers.
Columbus Parks and Recreation Director Mark Jones said two individuals and one group came to a site visit as part of the process.
“There were a lot of questions asked during the day of the site visit, as well as days afterwards,” Jones said. “At the end of the day, these individuals (and the) group thanked us for the time spent answering their questions, but they just didn’t think it was the right fit for them. Nothing more was really said.”
Columbus Mayor Jim Lienhoop said he found the lack of proposals somewhat surprising.
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“I expected that we would receive a response,” he said. “The community engagement process that we had indicated a desire for golf at Greenbelt, and we thought that the private sector would be able to respond to that. But in the end, there was nothing.”
The city hopes to be in a position to make a recommendation regarding golf courses at the parks board’s Sept. 10 meeting, Lienhoop said. The parks board meeting will likely include discussion of the lack of response to the request for proposals, as well as information from an updated version of the Community Golf Report.
The updated report will include data on alternative solutions not discussed in the original report. This includes the option of closing both Par 3 and Otter Creek’s east nine, which was discussed at a parks board meeting in July.
“We’re sort of back to where we were, before the proposal process,” Lienhoop said. “We’re still grappling with the notion that our community’s, our city’s, commitment to golf is rapidly approaching $400,000. And we think that’s higher than it should be. … We’d like to find a way to reduce that to a number that’s probably closer to $200,000. But we will continue to review the alternatives that we had expressed before, in terms of the closure of one or more of the properties we’ve got.”
Lienhoop said that as the city is currently looking at budgets for 2021, any decision regarding golf courses would likely be folded into the 2021 budget, rather than being a specific resolution.
“It’ll be a joint process,” he said. “The budgeting is spread over different funds. The funds for Greenbelt, for example, are spread over the parks’ non-reverting fund and the parks’ general fund. The parks board has to approve the budget for both of those funds, but the city council only approves the parks’ general fund budget. And the funding that the city provides for Otter Creek comes from the Economic Development Income Tax fund, which the city council reviews based on a proposal that the mayor gives them.”
Lienhoop said he doesn’t anticipate any changes being made before the golf season starts to “wind down” in mid- to late-October.
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The Columbus Parks Board’s next meeting is scheduled for 4 p.m. Sept. 10. Mayor Jim Lienhoop indicated that the city will make a recommendation regarding golf courses at this meeting. A meeting agenda has not yet been released.
Livestreams and archived footage of city meetings can be viewed at www.columbus.in.gov/video/live-streaming/.
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