Residents Say Developers Bailing Out On Golf Course Many In Prairie Falls Say Links Should Be Completed By Now
Three years after work began on the Prairie Falls Golf Course here, its owners have not finished work on the ninth hole and have put the course up for sale.
Residents in the community around the course say it shouldn’t have taken this long for it to open. Property values are linked to the golf course, residents insist, and they’ve got a lot more at stake than just a good golf game.
“A lot of us are here because of the golf course,” said Pat Kilpatrick, a homeowner in the Prairie Falls community. “I honestly wouldn’t have bought here if it weren’t for the golf course.”
Prairie Falls contains more than 100 homes, with another 300 planned by the time the subdivision is completed.
Kilpatrick recently found out about the golf course sale, which developers say was intended all along.
“It was unsettling to us because we heard about it secondhand” and later heard it from the developers, said homeowner Pat Kilpatrick.
Some residents hadn’t heard about the sale when asked about it this week, but others said the developers have been upfront with them, informing them of the planned sale several months ago.
Damon Caplan said he was told when he moved into the community in the spring of 1996 that the entire course would be complete within a few years.
“It should have been done by now,” he said. “I don’t see this whole thing being done for at least another five years.”
The asking price for the course is $999,999, but developers are advertising that they’ve invested $2.4 million in it so far and estimate its value at $3 million.
“We’re interested in seeing the golf course completed and seeing someone come in and running the golf course as a separate entity from the subdivision,” said Bill Radobenko Sr., one of the developers of the course and the surrounding Prairie Falls Community. So I think there’s some advantages for the company to sell it at that price.”
He admits that neither he nor the other developer, Bob Tomlinson, plays golf.
“I suppose that’s as good a reason as any” to sell, he said.
None of the developers wanted to run the golf course over the long term, said Fred Meyer, a broker and partner in Tomlinson Black, the marketing company for the course and community.
If someone else bought the course, it might be completed sooner, said Wayne Sweat, president of the Prairie Falls Property Owners Association.
“We’ve lived here three years and it’s been slow - slow’s not even the word,” he said. “Bill Radobenko doesn’t play golf. Bob Tomlinson doesn’t play golf. I’d rather have someone who’s a golfer taking care of it.”
The first nine holes should be open for play sometime next month, developers say.
Residents lament the subdivision being developed backward - with the golf course coming last.
Both Caplan and Sweat, for example, say the course should have been completed first as an attraction to potential home buyers.
The course’s first nine holes, although incomplete, are open to Prairie Falls residents. When work on the ninth hole is finished, the course will officially open.