{"id":9601,"date":"2010-12-30T20:34:57","date_gmt":"2010-12-31T04:34:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/?p=9601"},"modified":"2010-12-30T21:11:49","modified_gmt":"2010-12-31T05:11:49","slug":"riehl-world-the-crossings-on-life-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/?p=9601","title":{"rendered":"Riehl World: The Crossings on Life Support"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Thelossings-Tm-Tm-1\"<\/a>This year\u2019s $1.7 million bailout of Carlsbad\u2019s three-year-old golf course will bring the total amount of annual subsidies since its opening to $5.1 million. Four of the five council members who voted to tap city coffers again this time voted for each of the previous giveaways. Here\u2019s a small sample of what three of them have said to explain their votes to save a failing enterprise.<\/p>\n

The most creative justification came from newly re-elected councilman Mark Packard. \u201cWe\u2019re not subsidizing,” he claimed, “we\u2019re \u2018fronting\u2019 the money. None of us on the council play golf, so we didn\u2019t do this for our own benefit.\u201d For him, keeping the course on life support amounts to a misnamed and selfless act.<\/p>\n

In a variation of I\u2019m-from-the-government- and-I\u2019m-here-to-help, Mayor-elect Matt Hall assured his constituents, \u201cThe five of us manage the affairs of the city very well and I feel certain it will pay for itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Holding environmentalists largely responsible for the ballooning cost of construction from its $11 million estimate 18 years ago, Retiring Mayor Lewis sadly predicted, \u201cThis will pay, maybe not in my lifetime.\u201d<\/p>\n

Each year since its August 2007 opening, the number of budgeted rounds of golf has fallen. The number for 2008 was 52,000. This year\u2019s number of actual rounds is projected to be 42,000. That\u2019s a 20 percent decline. Reaching next year\u2019s budgeted goal of 44,000 seems unlikely, given the course\u2019s track record.<\/p>\n

Follow the jump for the rest of the story. . .
\nManagement blames the recession for the dwindling number of golfers, but the National Golf Foundation reports only a 2.4 percent decline in rounds played in the U.S. from 2007 through 2009.<\/p>\n

Fourteen percent of Americans played golf in 2000, falling to 12 percent today, according to the NGF. Is golf a dying sport? Jack Nicklaus worries about its future. In a recent interview with FOXSPORTS.COM, the golfing legend claimed young fathers are now so pre-occupied with other sports at the Little League level they have little time to hit the links or to teach their children the game. He also blamed the game\u2019s slow pace, suggesting kids don\u2019t want to go out and spend six or seven hours on a golf course.<\/p>\n

At a September candidates\u2019 forum, Hall was the only one of the four mayoral hopefuls indicating he\u2019d oppose selling the course. At the council\u2019s November 30 meeting he said The Crossings<\/a><\/strong> will be one of the strengths of the city, \u201cor perhaps<\/em> (my italics) a future swim complex and public subsidies for these will be necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the campaign trail he sounded much more committed to \u201cfinding the money\u201d for the swim complex. Now that he\u2019s been elected? Not so much, it seems.<\/p>\n

The prospects for completing the Alga Norte project seem brighter next year with the addition of Farrah Douglas to the council in January. As a candidate she consistently claimed the money was available, despite the vote last year by the council\u2019s good-old-boy majority of Lewis, Hall and Packard, to delay construction. Ann Kulchin and Keith Blackburn were the minority voices in favor of going forward with it. With those two and Douglas now in the majority, a second community swimming pool may at last become a reality.<\/p>\n

Dare we hope that Douglas will also create a new council majority that will consider a Plan B for the gaping money pit in the rolling hills above our Village By The Sea?<\/p>\n

Richard Riehl<\/a><\/strong> writes from Carlsbad. Contact him at fogcutter1@yahoo.com<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This year\u2019s $1.7 million bailout of Carlsbad\u2019s three-year-old golf course will bring the total amount of annual subsidies since its opening to $5.1 million. Four of the five council members who voted to tap city coffers again this time voted for each of the previous giveaways. Here\u2019s a small sample of what three of them […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,15,29,22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9601"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9601"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9606,"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9601\/revisions\/9606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.carlsbadistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}