The city of Lemoore, Calif., has signed off on a deal to lease the local golf course to Sierra Golf Management for a period of 15 years. Lemoore Golf Course joins 18 other courses under Sierra Golf’s purview and will undergo a series of renovations to better serve the area.
The course itself has been running continuously since 1928. It began as a 9-hole course until it was remodeled in 1991 and nine additional holes were added. Sierra Golf took over the lease at the end of June and has closed the course until Labor Day to perform the necessary renovations. Chief among these is the addition of Champion Dwarf Hybrid Bermuda grass for the greens and practice greens. According to Sierra, this grass type is better suited to the climate of the San Joaquin Valley where the course is located while also offering smooth surfaces and playability. Other improvements to the course will include remodeling all of the sand bunkers, $500,000 in new maintenance and mowing equipment, and new irrigation and drainage.
The city stated that the impetus behind leasing the course was a lack of sustainable revenue. Precipitation, or the lack thereof, played a large role in whether the course made money and the course was some $800,000 in debt.
“We’re just not able to keep up with the expenditures of the course,” said city manager Nathan Olson. “With this lease agreement, we’re guaranteed income for the next 15 years off of the golf course.”
Sierra Golf COO Dan Bacci is optimistic about the course’s future.
“It is always exciting to us to add a golf course like Lemoore GC to our portfolio,” Bacci said. “Equally exciting is the opportunity to add a long-term lease structure that allows us to allocate large capital dollars back into the infrastructure and really set this golf course up for long term success. This is going to be an exciting project and we feel should be the gold standard for other public/municipal golf courses to follow.”