From the Bench

City Leaders Forgot About Golf Course’s Biggest Use

Robert Shields

With the Masters ending on Sunday, golf is on my mind. Not necessarily playing the game, but the existence of certain golf courses, to be exact. And I fear Little Rock may be on the slippery slope of destroying a great one in War Memorial Golf Course.

Make no mistake, War Memorial serves really only one purpose, and everything else is ancillary -- and the quicker Little Rock city leaders get that memo the better. The biggest annual use that golf course sees is to provide space for the best tailgating in the nation for Razorback football games when the Hogs’ busses make their way down Markham twice a year.

The rest of the time it serves as a park and a golf course for hacks like me who can brag about the time they hit it across University or bounced a ball off a Volkswagen on Fair Park. The city needs the course as another public course for the golfers it has served for so many years. It is an affordable place to play and I don’t feel bad when I divot up the place like I do at Rebsamen.

What I hate hearing is when some city leaders say that it does not make money. I never knew the government to ever make money except when it takes my tax dollars, so I don’t know why they are worried when some venture of theirs is not operating in the black.

What park for any city does? I doubt New York City ever complains about Central Park not making a dime.

If it’s the bottom line we are worried about, though, War Memorial Golf Course makes tons of money for the city for those two Razorback games. I think the Exxon station at the corner of Van Buren and Markham makes enough in tax sales on beer during game day to justify the park’s existence. The golf course is one of the main reasons that helps keep the games anchored in Little Rock.

I had a discussion with another Little Rock resident about this issue of what to do with the golf course, and his comment was he was just surprised Little Rock has not sold it to North Little Rock already.

Currently, the city has found some money to move some greens to rework the course and make it smaller. However, I fear there are still other plans in some minds to drastically alter the park. I doubt whatever they do with the park that it in the end it makes a dime unless they turn it over to parking for UAMS.

And to be honest, I really don’t care what they do with the golf course. They can turn it into a Frisbee course, equestrian venue, graveyard, or whatever, provided they leave the trees, grass, and greenbelt so cars can tailgate on it when the Hogs come to town.

If Little Rock messes it up, I say Jeff Long, who always seems willing to make a buck anywhere he can find it, should sell the two games Little Rock gets every year to the highest bidder. Maybe they can convert the infield at Oaklawn.

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Spring Practice Round-Up

I heard Tyler Wilson took a snap. Spring practice lacks the same excitement that existed under the previous coach. It seems like Bobby Petrino is very capable of keeping everything under wraps. I miss the circus environment from the last regime (from a writing standpoint) because there was always something to talk about from quarterbacks having to throw over ladders to black tarps being put up to block everyone’s view.



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