There’s a progression to water conservation in a place such as Pasadena, Calif., and for a golf course surrounding an iconic sports venue the beginnings of an era-defining project extends to 2003.
Brookside Golf Course started repositioning itself for a dry future by switching from a block to a single-head irrigation system and realigning 4½ acres of lakes. The water dispensed from the adjusted irrigation system then started hitting kikuyugrass fairways. Transitioning to kikuyugrass saved water by eliminating the need to overseed.
Three tunnels damaged by a fire in the 1920s carrying non-potable water extend above the 36-hole municipal facility as well as the adjacent Rose Bowl. Capturing water from the tunnels, dropping it into ponds along the course and blending the non-potable water with Brookside’s potable supply was examined as a long-term option in 2008. The tunnels, though, went dry.
Discussions in 2010, a year now considered a bridge period between California droughts, included a proposal to eliminate 42 acres of turf. It was deemed drastic for the times. Operators even considered trimming the number of holes from 36 to 27. This was also deemed too drastic.
Another discussion involving turf removal, this one beginning in 2013, yielded action: Brookside removed 20 acres of turf, reducing the two-course total of irrigated acreage from 186 to 166. As soon as the turf left the ground, additional water-centered conversations ensued.
“Do we take out more turf?” director of golf course operations David Sams says. “Right now, we are at a standstill. We don’t want to take more turf out. We think we have done enough so it doesn’t impact play.”
A ground-parching, political-juxtaposing, mandate-ordering, rebate-giving drought has forced dozens of California golf courses to take away the surfaces that separate them from other businesses. Once a dirty concept in the industry, turf removals are now a norm. Golf courses are becoming leaner as water escalates in price and decreases in availability.
Well-heeled Southern California clubs are generating attention for participating in a Metropolitan Water District cash-for-grass program that has been suspended because of its instant success. Those clubs are hardly visionaries. Turf removals are part of an evolving water ethic among Western courses. Southern Nevada operators discovered a decade ago cooperation with a water authority yields financial and public relations rewards.
More than 800 acres of turf has been removed from Las Vegas-area courses since the Southern Nevada Water Authority introduced a rebate program in 2003, according conservation services administrator Patrick Watson, a former golf course superintendent. Watson has experienced both sides of the turf removal process. He spearheaded a 30-acre project at Canyon Gate Country Club before joining the SNWA, which places golf courses on a water budget of 6.3 acre-feet of water per irrigated acre each year. Las Vegas averages 4.19 inches of rain per year, according to the National Weather Service.
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Doing the math Even world-class irrigators need help, especially when it comes to altering their golf courses. Turf removals performed on a whim can increase a crew’s workload, frustrate customers and, in extreme cases, destroy a property. Like any major changes to a golf course, they must be approached with caution. Whether one is driven by a rebate program or water pricing and availability, the first phase of a project involves determining return on investment, according to architect Andy Staples. “You have to quantify it up front,” he says. “It’s pretty easy to do that. Every plant material, turf, trees, the spray irrigation, the drip irrigation … Those have pretty quantifiable precipitation rates. So you can essentially do it by square foot and acre.” Mike Huck, a principal of Irrigation and Turfgrass Services and former USGA agronomist, performs frequent assessments about the ROI of irrigation-related projects. One of the myths involving turf removals are that affected areas will not need future irrigation, but Huck’s assessments are based on using two-thirds less water to keep new plants in those areas “flowering at a level a private club would probably desire.” Staples says, “You don’t go from one acre of irrigation to zero gallons.” Practical questions also shape a project. Architect Forrest Richardson says maintenance, playability, pace of play and aesthetics must be addressed early in the process. Using GPS technology to track crew member movement is a way to quantify potential labor savings, according to Richardson. The same technology can also be used to determine where golfers hit shots while playing the course. “We don’t have to guess,” Richardson says. “I don’t have to get in front of a committee and say, ‘You know, I think it’s good to remove turf over here on the left of 14.’ I can say, ‘It’s not only good to remove turf on the left of 14, but you have a guy mowing it who’s spending nine hours a month in that area and you have two golfers who have been there in 30 days.’”
“It’s kind of like a bunker,” Sams says. “People will say, ‘Put a bunker there. It’s cheap.’ But the cheapest thing to do is throw grass in there, irrigate it and mow it, and be done with it.” At the current price of water, Brookside will save $90,000 on its annual bill. Sams estimates chemical costs to maintain the waste areas could reach $60,000. “It’s more about availability vs. pricing,” he says. “We know if we continue to use domestic water in Southern California, the water districts are going to continue to say you need to use less, less, less.” |
“Turf removals are so easy to defend,” Watson says. “I have people come up and say, ‘Why do you allow golf courses in Southern Nevada?’ Well, No. 1, they have professional irrigators. No. 2, they use weather-based data to irrigate. They have taken out 800-some acres of turf and they are on a water budget. People don’t attack them anymore. They don’t come here and say, ‘You shouldn’t have a golf course in the middle of a drought in the middle of the desert.’ These guys know what they are doing. They are the best in the world at it, I think.”
Rebate programs are spurring the recent flurry of turf removal projects, says Andy Staples, ASGCA, president of Staples Golf. On May 12, the MWD, a consortium of 26 Southern California water districts and cities, suspended funding for a rebate program offering businesses $2 per square foot of removed turf. Craig Kessler, the director of government affairs for the Southern California Golf Association, says around 40 courses completed projects or received approval to start work before the program was suspended.
The scope of the recent work in Southern California is extensive. El Niguel, Glendora, Oakmont, North Ranch, Santa Ana and Wilshire are among the private courses that have removed or plan to remove 20 or more acres of turf. “The major rebate program was so wildly successful that it had to be cutback or it would have bankrupted the Metropolitan Water District,” Kessler says. The MWD’s current rebate for turf removal projects is capped at $25,000, although Kessler envisions the return of a more lucrative program. Earlier this year, the Coachella Valley Water District, which serves a golf-crazed part of California’s Low Desert, worked with industry leaders to create funding for turf removal rebates. The CVWD is capping the rebate at $105,000, and Kessler says 18 courses are participating in the initial program.
The SNWA has adjusted rebate amounts and caps multiple times in the past 12 years. Current rebates include $1.50 per square foot for the first 5,000 square and $1 per square foot after that up to $300,000 per fiscal year. One acre is equivalent to 43,560 square feet. “Courses are doing five acres here, six acres there,” Watson says. “They are fine-tuning conversions they have done in the past.”
Facilities using well water are also pursuing turf removals. Santa Ana Country Club is in the middle of a multi-phase renovation led by architect Jay Blasi. A recently completed phase resulted in the removal of eight acres of turf. The project expands in 2016 with the re-routing of all 18 holes. When the renovation is complete, Santa Ana will have replaced 30 acres irrigated acres of turf with what Blasi calls a “sandy topdressing” and a sparse collection of “wispy grasses.” Mike Pettit, the board chairman of the project, says the changes are part of a master plan and that the club was going to pursue the redesign even before learning of the MWD rebate program. “We had the advantage of doing the right thing for the long term and then learning that there were financial incentives to doing what we were already going to do,” Pettit says.
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Articulate it Superintendent, architect, irrigation consultant, board chairman, owner and publicist? One doesn’t fit with the other critical pieces of a renovation team, but it might be just as important when executing a turf removal. Arizona-based architect Forrest Richardson suggests adding somebody adept at public relations to the project roster. “If you’re going to remove turf and reduce water, I would say that’s a key person to have in a room because you’re going to want to tell the story so that there’s good public relations,” Richardson says. An effective communicator will also help a golf course deal with Homeowners Associations and neighbors, groups Richardson says should be engaged early in the process. “We are doing one right now – I will not name names – where there are neighbors who love the idea of removing turf and then there are ones that are vehemently opposed because they have lived there 60 years and they love grass and they don’t want any change,” Richardson says. “Then there are people who don’t live on the course who live in the neighborhood who think it’s a great idea. You have all these competing viewpoints. Sometimes just getting all of them in the room helps.” |
It takes times – and money
Besides money, patience might be the most important ingredient for a turf removal. Following a 2005 renovation that included removing turf at the Wigwam Resort in Phoenix, Ariz., Forrest Richardson, ASGCA, principal of Forrest Richardson & Associates, says he heard rumblings about the size of the planted materials. “We simply said, ‘We could have planted more and we could have planted bigger specimens, but we had a budget,” he says. The plants have matured nicely and many point to the Wigwam as an early example of a successful turf removal.
Staples says keeping rough might be the best short-term financial option for courses. Peering into the future, though, changes the dynamic.
“When you start looking at drought conditions and looking at water as a resource, now all of the sudden, you’re looking into something for the future, not necessarily for today,” he says. “I have had clients make those kind of adjustments, look ahead and say, ‘Hey, this is flatout just the right thing to do.’”
Brookside received a $.60 instead of a $2 per square foot rebate from the MWD, because, according to Sams, “we didn’t put in the fancy drip system and the fancy grasses.” What might happen in the next decade ultimately led to Brookside removing turf.
“As we continued to watch our water bill double in the last 10 years, we were like, ‘OK, we have to do something,’” Sams says. “Now I tell our board it’s not really about pricing anymore, it’s about availability. I have fun with Pasadena Water and Power because I’m always making fun of the price. I did a presentation the other night and I said, ‘You got me now. I’m not complaining about the price. I’m complaining because I don’t have any water.’”
Guy Cipriano is GCI’s assistant editor.
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