Rainfall has still found its way into our daily golf schedule but things have really picked up at the muni this past week. The sunshine and warmer weather have provided some great golf weather for all to enjoy. The upcoming days continue to look great.
Over the past week, the golf course has really come to life. The grass is turning a beautiful shade of dark green, new seed is sprouting in the water quality project area, and our sod is flourishing. I am very pleased with the course condition right now. This coming week our mowing equipment will be going full throttle.
The irrigation system has been one of the high priorities of my work week. The pumphouse has been put together but I am experiencing electrical issues around the course. This repair process can be very time consuming trying to find the faulty decoder or solenoid.
I have spent about 16 hours on this repair process with no results. I will continue to work through the field and eventually I will find the faulty area causing the short. Fortunately the rain has reduced the need for the irrigation system at this time.
The delayed golf season has really put a damper on the 2017-18 budget. In comparison to the end of April 2018 to 2017, our revenues are down $39,000. The slight positive is our expenses are down $22,000 for the same time comparison. We will not likely be able to make up the $17,000 difference but I am optimistic we can still balance the budget before the fiscal period ends.
This past week I was able to finally sell two of our old Toro fairway units. I have held onto these for several years refusing to sell or trade them to a vendor for next to nothing. The wait paid off and we received $5000 from Fonda Golf Course for the units.
I was back and forth on whether to sell them because we could actually still use the mowers if necessary. However, I hope to use this money to purchase a golf simulator for the clubhouse. This money spent will pay off big dividends in comparison to keeping the mowers.
There has been continued discussion with Matt Hagedorn in regards to adding tile around the 16th green surrounds. There is also some damaged tile in Waterway Park that needs to be addressed. We will have Matt tend to both of these projects in the near future.
I am happy to report we have new spot-o-potties on the golf course. This might not be a big deal to most reading this update, but the golf course customers will be very happy with this news. The old ones had been at the course for five years and were showing some age. Ladies league will most likely be the happiest of all our guests.
Spencer Municipal Golf Course 