ROSELAND SEES DEFICIT
Fair-weather finances
The city-owned Roseland Golf and Curling Club performed a financial submersion in 2016, reporting a $33,000 deficit one year after it boasted a $268,000 surplus.
That $301,000 slide is being blamed largely on weather. In 2015, the “shoulder seasons” in the spring and fall were ideal for golf, with people playing until two days prior to Christmas. The shoulder seasons were more average in 2016, when the course closed Dec. 1 and November was cold, resulting in less revenue.
“Golf carries the business,” at Roseland, says general manager Phil Roberts, “and weather carries golf.”
Roseland’s unaudited financial statement for 2016 was recently provided to city council, which overseas the golf course and extracts $100,000 annually from its operations in lieu of the property taxes a privately-owned golf course would pay. Almost everything was worse in 2016 than in 2015, according to the report.
Revenues from user fees dropped from $1.43 million to $1.39 million. Rental income went from $210,000 to $190,000. And food and beverage sales dropped from $785,000 to $714,000. Meanwhile, expenses rose. Golf and groundskeeping cost $1.24 million compared to $1.15 million, curling operations cost $103,000 compared to $68,000, and the clubhouse cost $822,000 versus $784,000. The clubhouse operation went from near-break-even status in 2015 to losing $108,000.
“I see where you can say the numbers are different, and they are,” said Coun. Fred Francis, who chairs the Roseland board. But he said the reason for the slide is that 2015 was such a banner year, one of the best in Roseland’s history.
When asked about the losses in the clubhouse in 2016, he said: “I’m not going to sugar-coat it, there are challenges with the clubhouse.” But he declined to go into detail, citing the need to be competitive with the many other courses in the region.
He said the Roseland operation is sound and stressed that the slide in 2016 is due largely to weather.
When he first joined the board three years ago, he didn’t believe weather could play such a big role. But now he’s convinced. “It really, really is,” he said. “That’s really your main determining factor.”
He said when more people are golfing, there are more people in the building buying food and beverages.
“If you have great weather within a season, everything flows from there.”
That 2015 season appears to have been a banner year, enabling the course to pay down its accumulated deficit. About a decade ago, that debt was as high as $1.5 million, but by the end of 2016 it was down to $480,000. Meanwhile, the reserve ($219,000) is higher than it’s been in “many, many years,” according to Francis. “And the course has never looked better.”
The course took money from its reserve to pay for the $33,000 deficit from 2016.
Roberts, who took over as general manager last fall after two years as executive director of parks for the city, said 2016 had a wet spring and cool fall. Curiously, when you have good weather in December, as was the case in 2015, golfers come out in droves.
“People don’t want to put their clubs away. They want to say they golfed in December, so you see a surge in attendance,” he said. For several days in December 2015, there were 100-plus golfers at $60 a pop.
He said clubhouses appear to struggle at many golf courses and Roseland’s clubhouse has some unique problems. It has a huge building where overhead — including rising electricity rates — has to be covered by the clubhouse sales. Because it’s a community building with group meetings, a curling club and other activities, it keeps regular hours year-round. And its clientele, many of them seniors, expect competitive prices on food and beverages.
Golfers this year are complimenting the many improvements made to the course, such as improving the bunkers. The club has also spent more on course rangers to increase the speed of play.
“When you’ve got a good course and good play and we can encourage people to come play, Roseland will do very well for a very long time,” Roberts said.