Courtesy Madison Parks
The Glen Golf Park reopened in July 2022 after a privately funded renovation.
Just a few years after staring down major deficits, Madison’s golf courses are seeing more golfers than ever before and bringing in record revenues. Since 2019, the number of rounds played on Madison’s four public golf courses has jumped by 50% and revenue has doubled for the city’s golf enterprise program, to nearly $5.2 million.
While the coronavirus pandemic put a dent in most leisure activities, it fueled the turnaround of Madison’s golf courses, which had been struggling financially for at least two decades, says assistant parks superintendent Lisa Laschinger.
“[Golf] was one of the few sports that people could safely do outdoors with friends close to home while other activities were put on hold,” says Laschinger. “People that hadn’t golfed in years returned to the game, and we also saw an uptick in people who started learning the sport at that time.”
Laschinger says that after a series of wet years in 2016-19, drier weather has allowed for longer seasons at the city’s courses in recent years. A privately funded renovation of The Glen Golf Park and non-golf programming has also brought in more revenue.
Golfers played more than 150,000 rounds at the city’s public courses in 2023, about 20,000 more than last year and up from about 106,000 in 2019.
After major flooding in Madison in 2018, the golf enterprise program reported losses of nearly a million dollars, with another half-million in losses in 2019, requiring emergency money from the city. The courses are expected to cover their own expenses and not rely on taxpayer dollars, but at that time, the program had lost money in nine of the previous 10 years and a task force was convened to decide the future of the city’s courses.
Today’s better financial footing will allow the program to think long-term and invest in infrastructure and staffing, among other priorities, says Laschinger. The program is currently trying to fill several vacant staff positions, including director.
Laschinger says the new director “will manage significant change during a period of major transformation within the program.” That includes the downsizing of the Yahara Hills course from 36 to 18 holes as a previously sold part of the course is turned into a landfill.
Laschinger warns that while the program has rebounded, it is “not yet in the clear. Our resource needs are great, and we need to prioritize and invest wisely in order to ensure the program is successful and both financially and environmentally sustainable for generations to come.”
