City squelches proposal for new management at golf course
WILLIAMS, Ariz. — Williams City Council members voted unanimously to kill a request for proposal (RFP) for new management at Elephant Rocks Golf Course Oct. 11.
The current contract expires Dec. 31. It has been held by Golf Pro Scott Little for the last six years.
On Oct. 5, an RFP was posted on the city website to solicit proposals to manage the 18-hole course. The proposal has been removed after city councilman Don Dent asked councilmembers to reconsider the RFP, which he said was not necessary.
“The only time we go to an RFP is when we need a replacement” Dent said. “It was not necessary to put an RFP out on this until we had a chance to discuss with our current operator about the contract and possible changes. I know there are pieces that the city manager doesn’t like (and) that he would like to see changed but that discussion did not happen.”
According to acting city manager and finance director Keith Buonocore, the RFP is an agreement to operate the golf course and based on the contract, allows golf course management to keep a portion of the revenue and the city to have a portion of it.
“Ideally, we want to make sure the city covers all our expenses plus debt and capital. That’s the thing we want in a proposal is that first off the revenue covers all the expenses of operating a golf course plus debt because we do have debt on equipment and carts … that’s what we’re looking for in a proposal — to cover all those things. Scott’s current contract covers revenues. It ignores expenses, capital, debt — it doesn’t even address that,” Buonocore said.
Dent said Little’s contract has given him the opportunity to earn interest and a bonus over the years.
“We created a new contract that gave him a chance if we ran total revenue of $750,000 to earn interest and a bonus of the amount of money over $750,000,” Dent said. “We knew that we needed to grow revenue.”
According to Dent, Little has grown the revenue every year and has earned a bonus the last several years.
“I’m tickled with that because if he earns 10 percent we’ve got the other 90 (percent),” Dent said.
Prior to the council’s decision not to move forward on the RFP, Buonocore said having a more comprehensive proposal would be vital for the course’s financial future.
“We are trying to do prudent management of the golf course,” he said. “It’s got to address everything. You can’t just say, ‘you take this much money,’ no, it’s got to be you split it up after you cover all those expenses. That’s the way it’s got to be.”
According to Buoncore, the golf course is not a large source of revenue for the city.
“It hasn’t covered all expenses for four out of five years. To me that’s not a great track record,” he said. “We probably should have done better than that.”
“The golf course through the course of let’s say a decade owes the electric fund $1.5 million dollars. It took electric funds to do things for the golf course so the golf course still owes the electric fund $1.5 million dollars. In money taken from the general fund, the golf course owes the general fund half a million dollars. So that’s $2 million dollars that’s owed from the golf course to other funds," Buonocore added.
“As far as supplementing the golf course with tax payer money, that is not good management. The golf course should cover itself,” Buonocore said. “A proposal should address those issues. If it doesn’t why would we select it? It has to be run in a prudent manner.”
According to Buonocore, the city could do better.
"Whether its through a new proposal with Scott or a new proposal with some other management company,” he said. “We need to address the long range plan of the golf course.”
According to Dent, sending out an RFP could change how business is conducted at Elephant Rocks. He said the RFP is asking for new management that would oversee both the pro-shop and the maintenance department at the course.
“Which means our employees like Marty (Yerian, golf course superintendent) could potentially lose their jobs,” Dent said. “Any of the golfers that are in the audience know exactly how vital Marty is to that operation. If Marty was here I’d apologize to him too, he shouldn’t be worried about whether his job is going to be replaced by this RFP.”
Dent said in the past when the golf committee was made aware of things like the RFP, they would discuss the matter and make a recommendation to the council.
“That’s worked well for us since the time we opened,” he said.
Dent suggested that city staff, the golf committee and Little sit down to discuss potential changes to the contract.
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