If Richland ever wanted to televise its township meetings, an appropriate place might be The Golf Channel.
For those duffers who missed the April 12 Board of Supervisors get-together, it was a six-putt nightmare. New Supe Mike Zowniriw made a special presentation, and if a golfer played a round with as many bad mistakes as Z made, it would be time to try horseshoes.
Z teed off by stating that Richland needed to find other ways to raise money beside developers' fees. So far so good. He had an innovative way to do this, AND add more open space to the township. We're still with you, Mike. And this idea was SO GOOD, it would reduce the pressure to develop in the whole township. Brilliant! Er, what is it?
A GOLF COURSE!!! Greens from the Green Party. Z's Tees. Brilliant! All we need to get started is 120-130 acres of land and $3.5 million. And - get this - Z said it will eventually produce enough money for Richland to attract the professional tour! And enough extra cash so the township can build its own indoor tennis center. And enough profit to construct and outfit a recreation center. Brilliant!
So, how do we do it, Mike? Well, that's a little fuzzy. Let's start with the land. He took a map of the township and colored in a few large tracts. Any of them would be OK for Z's Tees. Oops, they are all under contract. Well, Mike's new at this supervisor thing. Lets move on.
How about the money to pay for it? Z had a brainstorm: take the $3.5 million bond money which the voters approved for open space and use it for the course. Brilliant! We get the best of both worlds, open space and an income-producing, publicity-producing, development-reducing golf course. Oops, more problems. The plan had more holes than the course itself....
1 st stroke: Z told the meeting that the golf course would be considered as open space. It would not. Almost every square foot of "natural beauty" would have to be torn up for the buildings, fairways, greens, sand traps, driveways, and cart roads.
2 nd stroke: Remember the squawking about the proposed YMCA on Station Road? Opponents carped endlessly that open space had to be open, free, and accessible to everyone. Z's Tees would, of course, charge greens fees. That's how it would raise enough money to replace developers' contributions, right? And, even with a full course, only 72 people can play at once. On 130 acres. Hardly open, free, and accessible to everyone.
3 rd stroke: Z had a full page of cost breakdown, gathered from another course in suburban Philadelphia. He claims it is making hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. Maybe so, but the town has owned and operated that course for 40 years. It has twice our population, and is in a MUCH more densely populated area.
4 th stroke: My quick check of the costs of recently completed golf courses showed Carslbad, California $26 million; Norfolk, Mass. $10.5 million; Boulder City, Nevada $22 million; North Charleston, S. Carolina $11 million, and Stony Point N.Y. $20 million. Closer to home, Lackawanna, Pa $8 million (on abandoned mine land which was donated). A far cry from Z's $3.5 million guestimate.
5 th stroke: Richland actually took a survey of citizens in the spring of 2000, asking if they wanted a local golf course. Fifty-six percent responded NO.
Final stroke: Two days later, Z conceded to area newspapers that the plan wouldn't work.
All right, so golf may not be the answer to alternative revenue for Richland. Everyone has ideas that don't fly. Shouldn't we be giving Z credit for trying? Not on my scorecard. I give "credit for trying" to Keene Yong, a citizen at the meeting, who presented his thoughts on reducing Richland's sewer charges. It is not Yong's job to solve Richland's problems, so HE gets credit for TRYING.
It is different for elected, paid officials. They have access to a professional staff, including an attorney, manager, zoning code officer, and land planner. When a supervisor makes a public presentation, he should do it AFTER the research, not before. Visiting attorneys, developers, and engineers, and local citizens, should not be treated to the sight of our representative floundering through an amateurish display, which concludes with the idea being unworkable eight ways from Sunday.
What I DO give Z credit for is being perceptive. In the middle of his speech he looked up to the audience and said "I'm really boring you, aren't I?"
And to cap off this 18-hole 3-ring circus, Zowniriw tried to get the other supervisors to agree to a trade: accept the revenue from his golf course, and in exchange, do away with all age-restricted zones in the township. This, of course, is as illegal as it is bizarre. Three developers (one using land I currently own) are nearing the approval stage of their age-restricted projects, having spent years in the process. The law forbids changing the zoning once that development process has begun. But Z either did not know this, or did not care. The result was the embarrassing spectacle of one supervisor asking the other two to openly violate the law right in a public meeting! Brilliant!
Back in the real world, the Preservation Board has a well-researched plan to determine how Richland will spend the $3.5 million. It has identified 135 potential open space tracts, visited them, and created a ranking system. There will be public hearings in May. THAT is the way township business SHOULD be conducted, and taxpayer money allocated.
Mike Zowniriw may still be learning, but some lessons should not require teaching in public. He still consults with his friends in the Richland Citizens Alliance, with their personal agendae, rather than the experienced, expert staff. The result is a black eye for the township. Residents have a right to expect professionalism from their leaders. Mike, please don't make this behavior par for the course.