Show Me The Money! | Show Us The Plan!

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Manager Harden & City Council,
Al Angelone wrote a nice email stating that the golf course nice amenity for the community. He is correct it is a nice amenity that we should be proud of. When it was disclosed a few months ago that Port Orange purchasing rules were not followed in hiring the golf course architect you brought it to City Council to vote on. I asked at that meeting if we should first have a plan before hiring an architect. Your comment was that we would have the architect present the citizens with a plan.
My question is when are we going to get a plan? Is City Council going to be given a short summary, two days to review, and expected to vote their approval? Where is the money for the improvements? Just yesterday you commented on golf course finances “we know there are errors in the financial data, but we have not yet been able to determine the correct data so that an accurate report can be produced”.
This is very reminiscent of the YMCA improvements. We were told there was $300,000 available for YMCA improvements. I found a $200,000 error in that reserve fund. The former finance director pulled $600,000 from another reserve so that the YMCA improvements could be paid for by the city. Is something like this going to happen with funding golf course improvements? Can we get a full accounting of funds before a vote?
Let us hear the plan for golf course improvements. In fact, we should see two or three alternative plans and be given some time to evaluate the plans and get community suggestions on the best course of action.
Thanks,
Mark Schaefer
3606 Donna Street
Port Orange, Florida 32129
386-316-1206

From: DHebert [mailto:dhebert500@yahoo.com]
Sent: Friday, February 06, 2015 6:27 PM
To: Harden, David
Subject: Cypress Head Golf Course Renovations
Hello,
We own a home in the Cypress Head sub-division. We are writing to you to share our hopes and support towards the town of Port Orange approving the renovations being discussed for the Cypress Head golf course.
This course is a wonderful asset to this community and one of the deciding factors for us when we moved here from Orlando in 2004. Golfers from all over the area enjoy playing at this course. The course improvements are needed in order to maintain the amount of play this course receives and to avoid even higher improvement costs in the future. It would be a travesty to allow this course to decline and eventually loose players to other courses near-by.
As homeowners here and patrons of the Cypress Head golf course, we question whether Kemper has been managing this course appropriately. But there is no question in our minds that the course is a valuable and drawing asset to the town of Port Orange, and our sense is it could easily be a higher revenue generating asset if managed appropriately.
Sincerely,
Richard and Debra Hebert
6389 Longlake drive
Port orange, FL 32128