JMEvensky,
You have to be careful to differentiate "conditioning", as in playing condition maintainance, from non-playing condition maintainance.
I'd be very happy to see the latter fall 20 % or more as long as the former was the object of the budget's focus.
One of my biggest complaints is loading the green budget with non-golf course line items, like club ground maintainance, tennis court maintainance, flower and shrub bed maintainance, etc, etc..
That's where I'd like to see the green budget get relief, or at least have the budget segregated into strictly golf course items and non-golf course items.
On my first visit to Lehigh, a wonderful golf course, I was struck by how many superfluous gardens/shrub/flower beds were scattered through out the golf course, at every tee, every cart parking spot, near every green and then some.
They had to represent a substantive portion of the maintainance budget, and they had NO impact on the play of the golf course.
Probably someone's idea for "beautifying" the golf course, which DOESN'T need beautification, it's a great golf course.
I label it part of the feminization of golf in America
Get rid of the flowers, shrubs and decorative trees and put the money where it belongs, in the golf course.
End of rant