Lots of people take on causes. Some of the causes are global in nature, such as raising money for cancer research. Other causes are more localized, such as trying to save the Black Forest or running the Little League in your community. People take on specific causes because of their beliefs, their ability to donate their time, and because they have a skill that is useful toward promoting their cause.
I am the same way. While others around me might choose to Save the Whales, I”ve tried to commit some of my free time to the advancement of junior golf. I have a great affinity for the game, I appreciate all that if offers as far as sportsmanship, etiquette and personal responsibility, and I have this overall dream to expose the game to kids in Lake County.
I started playing golf as a 13-year-old, but the circumstances were far different from those experienced by Lake County youth in 2008. I grew up in the urban jungle of Chicago”s South Side. My elementary school playground was all concrete. We waited for the first snowfall before we could play tackle football during recess.
Yet a mere four city blocks away sat storied Beverly Country Club, a Donald Ross design that is the site of the 2009 U.S. Senior Amateur. Beverly has hosted leading amateur events as well as PGA Tour tournaments, and its century-long listing of champions include Chick Evans, Francis Ouimet, Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus.
I caddied at Beverly and worked in the pro shop for eight years. Every Monday, the course was closed. Every Monday morning throughout the summer, approximately 120 caddies would grab their Toney Penna MacGregor woods and Sam Snead Blue Ridge irons and take to the links, playing golf along with their looping buddies. It was my first exposure to the game while learning to play on one of America”s top 100 courses with hand-me-down clubs from the members.
My game quickly developed and by the time I got the pro shop job, I was playing golf every day. I made my high school golf team and started collecting golf courses, playing at upscale public courses like Cog Hill and Big Run, where the green fees for kids in 1970 were $1 for the entire day.
Fast forward to 1980 when I first arrived in Lake County. The Coastal Mountain Conference didn”t have a golf league, schools didn”t have formal golf programs, and the only kids playing golf regularly on a golf course were the three Lyndall brothers at Buckingham. I became Kelseyville High School”s golf coach in 1983 and Bob Norris took over Middletown”s program in 1984. There were exactly two teams in the CMC. I began a junior golf league in the autumn of 1986, and the junior golf series that is now under the umbrella of the Lake County circuit began some 15 years ago.
Kids no longer caddied with the popularity of the motorized golf cart, and I wanted Lake County youth from all sorts of backgrounds to get exposed to the great game of golf. Lots of people jumped on the bandwagon. Golf courses offered junior rates and found summer jobs at local golf courses for kids. Les Russo, the pro at Hobergs (now Rob Roy), and Adams Springs” manager, Ruby Gibson, let kids play in the afternoon for free. Suddenly golf was becoming more popular in Lake County, long before the Tiger Woods phenomenon. The CMC swelled to 14 teams in two divisions, and local youth were playing college golf, getting good jobs in the golf industry, and joining the PGA of America.
Local golf course management and the PGA professionals saw the big picture. Open your doors to kids and assist this next generation with the values offered by the game. They will become your next generation of consumers as well as a group who will have benefited from all that the game has to offer.
With this in mind, it came as a great shock to me when the CMC had its annual league match at Hidden Valley Lake last month and we received last-minute notice that HVL was charging the league $10 per player for green fees. The CMC has competed once each year at Hidden Valley since 1983 and until this year, green fees have always been complimentary. While school teams do pay fees to enter invitational tourneys at places like Ukiah, San Leandro and Lompoc, and while the CMC does pay a fee to use a neutral site course like Windsor for its league championship, teams don”t pay when Tomales High School hosts its annual match at Bodega Harbour or when St. Vincent does the same at Adobe Creek. If schools had to pay for every match, the vast majority of high school teams in the Redwood Empire would close up shop and a whole lot less kids would be exposed to the game.
This past Tuesday, Record-Bee sports editor Brian Sumpter penned a tongue-in-cheek essay about charging the high school kids to play this year at Hidden Valley Lake. Later that same morning, I received a phone call from HVLA board president Don Dornbush. I have known Dornbush for a number of years as he is the longtime junior high basketball coach at Middletown Middle School and an all-around good guy.
Dornbush said he and other board members weren”t aware of the green fee charge to the CMC golfers and he apologized profusely on behalf of the board. He stated that the HVLA board did not authorize the green fee charge and he added that he and board would be oppositional to any such fee. He added that he would work to have the green fees refunded to the CMC coaches, said he wanted Middletown High School”s golf team to continue to practice and play at Hidden Valley Lake, and wanted the Coastal Mountain Conference to continue to play its annual early April match there.
So, for the sake of junior golfers, it looks like all”s well that ends well. In future years, kids will still be able to walk in the same footsteps as Middletown golfers Doug Quinones and Lisa Copeland, two current youth linksters who have greatly benefited from their golfing experiences at Hidden Valley Lake. The CMC will play at HVL next April for the 27th consecutive year. The Billy Bell-designed golf course with its signature 15th hole will continue to open its doors to junior golfers who play on the local high school teams.
As for me, I keep getting older, but my cause remains the same. Let”s all of us do what we can so that Lake County kids can get exposed to the great game of golf, one they can play with family and friends for a lifetime.
Editor”s note: Efforts to reach Hidden Valley Lake general manager Jim Johnson were unsuccessful at the time this article was finalized).
