RPD Mishandles Harding Park Contract
Here are some excerpts from a Westside Observer story about Harding Park. It shows that SF Rec & Park lied and deceived the public AGAIN.
"The Recreation and Park Department’s (RPD) mishandling of golf money—misleading the public about Harding’s future, then making a bad deal for the city with a long-term contract—concludes RPD’s decade of deception.
THE DEAL Ten years ago an arrangement fell apart to have a private golf company provide the money to renovate Harding and Fleming golf courses. Subsequently, RPD, golfers, well-intentioned citizens, and politicians crafted a covenant and financing plan to refurbish both courses. The “Guiding Principles” for Harding’s future approved by the Recreation and Park Commission silenced the critics.
The clincher was the city’s “foolproof” self-financing plan: borrow money and repay it from future golf revenue. The “Golf Fund Ordinance” passed, requiring RPD to control all golf revenues and to use that money according to the new law’s clear list of spending priorities through a special city account.
RPD decided NOT to implement the city law protecting the Golf Fund money so it could take what it needed to rebuild Harding. Since RPD’s initial abuse of the Fund, it has continued to ignore the law’s inconvenient management requirements. Next, they claimed that “golf does not make money,” and manipulated the General Fund for subsidies to balance the budget! Recently, RPD decided it “must” create new fees to backfill that hole, ergo charging to enter Strybing Arboretum.
RPD was supposed to manage the Golf Fund to allow for repayment of a portion of construction capital into the Open Space Fund. It was agreed that $18 million ($15 million of State bond funds and $3 million from Open Space) would be borrowed for the project to be repaid with interest. Never mind that the State money was intended to support projects in the “most heavily populated and most economically disadvantaged areas” of the city, it was used instead to pay for the Harding golf project. RPD promised to use the repaid loan money for the original State-specified purposes to benefit the less fortunate, but RPD never did so. Instead this year, they raided this special reserve fund to hand $1 million to the Mayor to offset the deficit.
THE GIVE-AWAY In 2002 the city agreed to bring PGA Championship tournaments to the renewed Harding Park. At the time RPD emphatically stated “the PGA TOUR Championship is a means, not an end” and “the PGA TOUR has never suggested or offered to take over control of the Harding-Fleming golf complex.” But now RPD has invited them to take over managing the $8 million gross revenue Harding golf course by selecting the PGA TOUR as the winner of a contract bid.
RPD has awarded a sweetheart agreement to PGA TOUR Golf Course Properties, Inc. with lucrative incentive payments based on golf revenue. These payments are in violation of the priorities of the Golf Fund Ordinance. It commits the city to daily standards of grounds maintenance the PGA TOUR has yet to define, and the Golf Fund must finance them or suffer the consequences. There are many loopholes and conditions that benefit the contractor to the city’s detriment. The fox is now officially in charge of the chicken coop.
Real accountability in the contract is nonexistent, since the Recreation and Park Commission is noticeably absent from approving key financial decisions, as required by law. It is not even clear who the contractor is, since the PGA TOUR can hand over this Management Agreement to any of its “affiliates” with the mere consent of the General Manager or his designee."