METRO FILE PHOTO
At an open house Thursday, Metro staff will go over the process for selecting a new contractor for East Portland's Glendoveer Golf Course.
Officials in Metro's parks department have two messages for the March 8 Glendoveer Golf Course open house: The East Portland facility won't be changing, and the public needs to be involved in selecting Glendoveer's next operator.
Glendoveer open house
When: 6-7:30 p.m.
Thursday, March 8
Where: Glendoveer clubhouse, 14015 NE Glisan Street, Portland
Can't go?
Paul Slyman, the director of Metro's Parks and Environmental Services Department, said Thursday that the regional government's look at the contract has nothing to do with the layout of the course, nor the rest of the facility.
"We don't want to kid ourselves into thinking we should be designing how the course should be developed," Slyman said. "We're not golf course experts. This is really about contracts and community relationships."
Glisan Street Recreation has held the contract to operate Glendoveer since the late 1970s, when the course was owned by Multnomah County. The company makes about $200,000 a year on the contract, said general manager Joe Hickey in a 2011 interview, while sending Metro a portion of the greens fees, about $840,000 last year.
Slyman said the next contract will likely be less than five years long, but that number has yet to be determined by the Metro Council. What has been determined by the council, he said, is that "by and large, Glendoveer Golf Course is going to stay intact as it's presently configured."
That means two 18-hole golf courses, a tennis center, a restaurant and a fitness trail.
The contract could be similar to Glisan Street's deal, where Metro gets a share of the fees generated at the course. Or, it could be a concession agreement, where Metro pays an operator to run the course but collects all of the revenue from use of the facility. The contract could end up as a hybrid of the two, as well, Slyman said.
Metro drew the ire of Glendoveer fans last year after a Metro Council work session, in which Councilor Rex Burkholder asked staff to prepare a vision of Glendoveer with less golf and more open space.
Rumors of apartment blocks replacing the sylvan 242 acres of Portland's Hazelwood neighborhood led to a chaotic open house last August, where some of the 500 attendees reportedly hurled epithets at Metro staff and elected officials. The ruckus even led someone to print t-shirts that say "Save Glendoveer/Abolish Metro."
Any ideas of re-visioning Glendoveer are history, according to Metro staff. Now, it's simply a matter of picking the right operator for the course. That could be Glisan Street, or another bidder.
Golfers, tennis players, trail users and other stakeholders will be a part of a committee that advises the Metro Council on the operations contract. The council will have the final say on the contract, Slyman said.
The open house is scheduled for 6 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 8, at the clubhouse at Glendoveer, at 14015 NE Glisan Street in Portland.