The National Links Trust sent out a newsletter this morning reporting the great news out of California as Assembly Bill 672, the "Public Golf Endangerment Act", failed to advance from the Appropriations Committee to the Assembly floor yesterday — effectively killing the bill in its current form.
Introduced a year ago, the purpose of the legislation was revealed right up front: “Upon appropriation by the Legislature, the Department of Housing and Community Development shall administer a program to provide incentives in the form of grants to local agencies that enter into a development agreement to convert a golf course owned by the local agency into housing and publicly accessible open space.” In other words, the California bill offered “incentives” (a proposed $50 million) to convert publicly owned golf courses into public housing and open space. And no, golf courses don’t count as publicly accessible open space.The Southern California Golf Association (SCGA) deemed this proposed legislation the “Public Golf Endangerment Act” and launched a vigorous campaign to alert the public to the devastation the bill would create. Kudos to the SCGA as well as the thousands of individuals who wrote letters, signed petitions, and contacted lawmakers in order to defeat the bill.
Friends of Muni Golf obviously need to remain vigilant given the sustained flow of misinformation from critics and politicians that ignore the benefits affordable public golf delivers to local communities.