It's Not Even About Golf Anymore?

Election Day is December 13th 8:00am-4:00 pm at Lakeview - Social Hall #2
Online Voting and Absentee Ballots available starting November 7th

 

It's never too early to start right? This election will come down to one thing. Let me be succinct: Either you believe in electing those who would allow the management team to decide our fate; or, you want to elect candidates who believe we (the members) are the owners and they are there to serve OUR best interests. Forget the trash about loyalty to the general manager, it was never intended to be the end game. It became that when the GM had an agenda and convinced the board to embrace loyalty to the corporation. There is no corporation without the members.

Allowing outsiders into our community to golf for less than what members pay and adding insult to injury, allowing them equal or better access to prime time tee times would have never, NEVER been allowed by previous boards. Can i be any more clear?

 

Get your question in order and plan on participating and asking those questions at the upcoming Candidate Forums.

Everyone will have an opportunity to meet those running for office and ask those questions.

First Forum is October 19th 2:00-4:00pm
Second Forum is October 26th 6:00-8:00pm

Both Candidate Forums will be held at Sundial Rec Center.

The ability to meet the Candidates on a personal basis will be available 30 minutes prior to each forum!

Plan on attending! It's YOUR money that those Board Members are spending!

 

Thanks for posting the dates FYI. Those meetings will be critical to the future of Sun City residents. When the Sun City Advocates were born, we always understood everything hinged on this coming board election. Make no mistake, the RCSC knows that as well. They've had their way for so long, they have no interest in returning to the days where the membership matters. They like/love total and absolute control.

I'm no election conspiracy theorist kind of guy, but back in the day, Maricopa County used to oversee our (the RCSC board elections). Back then, it was all paper ballots with the single biggest event for gathering votes at the massive craft fair over Thanksgiving weekend. There was an outcry when that was taken away, but they cared not. The answer was, you can vote online.

I've never voted online, much like having a book in my hand, i like voting on election day (at least in the RCSC board election). I like drawing my black lines for given candidates. By the way, back in the day, they used to have at least three locations across the community. Not any more, one site, Lakeview social halls.

All of which leads me to ask this question: Who is tabulating the online ballots? Given what we know about the RCSC' technology capabilities, who in their right mind trusts them to get it right. Are we going to have another glitch like we did with recording the annual membership meeting? Who and how many folks will be counting ballots on election day? We all know how important this election is, hopefully we/they get it right.

I suspect this will be one of the biggest turnouts in modern day history.

 

I believe the online votes are being tabulated by a firm in North or South Carolina but I might be wrong.

The RCSC hires a CPA who sits in the Social Hall and tabulates the votes on election day.

 

Absolutely fascinating: I just went to the golf advisory committee meeting minutes from May and there wasn't a single solitary word about outside play. They did mention limiting tournaments, but nary a peep about outside full play passes. The other thing i found funny was all the comments about golf out performing their budget projections. So freaking what? They write their budgets, so when they beat them, it's meaningless.

You want to make this transparent? Show the committee the expense side of the ledger and then compare it to the revenue side. No wonder everyone thinks golf is doing so well. It's all slight of hand, watch the shiny object called budgets and ignore the reality of what is going on. They've been doing that for the past 15 years. The simple truth is this: Now that they are giving away prime time tee times, the golfing members of the RCSC are having a hell of time getting tee times.

Our golf revenue is up (even though rounds played is down) because of outside play and it isn't from the full play non-resident passes. It's because those living outside the walls that want to play golf are coming here and paying the full price to play. Better yet they are doing it after the members have the ability to book their play. That's the way it should be.

 

Rather than just telling you what they said, let me post a cut from the advisory meeting minutes, it's interesting and perhaps telling:

"Total revenue exceeded total budget by 25.2% and prior year by 3.5%. Merchandise sales missed budget slightly, with the other major categories all exceeding budget. For the first time this year we saw a reduction in rounds played, falling behind prior year by 710 rounds.

Through April, Year to date revenue is $734,576 ahead of budget and $419,617 ahead of prior year. Through April total rounds are 5,788 ahead of prior year, annual surcharge, staff and public daily fee play are the only categories to decrease from prior year. Annual no fee, cardholder and guest rounds were the biggest gainers to prior year, combining to be 6,480 rounds ahead of prior year."

When you read or heard that report, little wonder those in attendance felt pretty good about the state of golf. Revenue was up even though the rounds played was down. Someone actually asked that question and got the answer that higher golf rates made it possible. Is that true? They did increase fees for regular play for both members and non-members. In season we are looking at $35 (members) and $44 (non-members). Clearly that helps, but it's not the real story.

Hold on to your head, this gets a little bizarre: Not all revenue is created equal. Huh? We know from the April golf summary at the board meeting and from the June financials that the sale of full play resident and non-resident passes is up, way up. They pay in advance for the year long pass. That is revenue into the RCSC. For the remainder of the year, every time they step on a Sun City golf course, they do so without paying another nickle. All those passes they sold were revenue that showed on the books, but if you stretch it out over the year, it will actually result in worse financial figures for the remainder of the year.

Compound that with the fact rounds of play are down, and the golf figures will just keep getting worse. The RCSC knew the pandemic bump wouldn't last. Their solution to try and keep rounds of play up was to sell full play passes to anyone and everyone who would buy them. If you read between the lines, surcharge pass sales are down. Why? Because full play pass sales are up. Golfers understand the break point between buying the surcharge and spending $1,550 and not having to pay anything when they step on a green.

It gets worse, because when they do play in small groups of 30 or more, they then bypass the lottery which takes away from those paying the higher rates to play. Why do you think they have superseded their budgetary numbers? Because they knew the drop was coming and they started to soften the blow by dropping their projections. That additional pre-paid revenue is a false flag to cover the dropping rounds. Think i'm wrong? Watch the numbers by years end.

More importantly, why don't they have, why have they never shown the golf advisory committee the cost side of the ledger? Budgets and revenue are only half of the puzzles picture. The other half is what is it costing all of us to keep golf as cheap as it is. I can/could live with subsidizing our golfing community, i, and i expect most of you, have no interest in subsidizing outsiders filling our courses for less money than we would pay and having priority bookings for our tee times.

Just my opinion though. Hopefully, say what will come on and explain it to me/us.

 

Their budget is like the Law of Diminishing Returns!

I guess they budget golf the same way they budget anticipated home sales and PIF? Predict low and when your expectations are exceeded you look like a hero!

 

It's been their trademark the past 15 plus years, and its worked. Why change now? Here's the answer, simple and sweet...because the membership expects them to.

 

I

f you never show an actual income statement for the golf operation and only show projected income versus actual income and ignore expenses, it’s easy to fool people. Golf will never be profitable, so let’s see how much it really costs and go from there.

 

If only Larry. For the past 15 plus years, no one has seen the cost side of the equation. It's top secret. Golf will never be profitable. It was well intended to be, however that was never a reasonable assumption. Board members over the years, especially golfers knew it wasn't, but were always led to believe it was reasonably close. Even that was doubtful for some of us..

Golf is one of our most important amenities. It always will be. What it should never should be is sold to outsiders cheaply. Over the years, boards have always been steadfast about outside play. Back when i was on the board, the rounds they sold to Golf Now was argued it filled open tee times. We all agree lost revenue from unfilled tee times is bad business. But let's be very clear, these non-resident full play passes aren't about open tee times. They are taking those prime time tee times and allowing outsiders access ahead of members in some cases, and at a fraction of what members are paying to play their once a week round of golf.

By the way, this thread blew by 5000 reads. People paying attention?