City council recently voted to reopen a decades-old arrangement that has seen nine private golf clubs save about $33 million in deferred taxes over the years, in exchange for preserving the green space. Rosedale Golf Club is among them.
The motion, as approved, calls for the city to ask the clubs to do community outreach, to appeal their property tax assessments and to look at ways of challenging the legality of the old deal. Signed in perpetuity, it’s an arrangement that Coun. Adrian Heaps feels is outdated. The exclusive golf clubs are getting a subsidy, but there’s no public benefit, he said.
“People say, ‘You can look over the fence and see some green space, but that’s not the way the city should be working,” said Heaps.
Coun. Howard Moscoe, who has challenged the arrangement in the past, would like to see the private golf clubs pay back the deferred taxes in full. At the least, he believes, they should open themselves up to the community and, for example, give disadvantaged kids the opportunity to learn how to golf.
“I don’t think the ordinary guy, who sweeps the floor in the clubhouse, ought to be subsidizing or support the wealthy clubs,” said Moscoe.
He noted that past meetings with the private clubs have been unsuccessful.
“They have drawn into their shell and stood firm on their privilege, but it’s not the right thing to do,” he said.
What’s different this time around is that Coun. Heaps’s motion calls for legal action.
