Missouri City Council voted Monday night to take steps that could lead to the city’s acquisition of the troubled Quail Valley Country Club, for conversion into a city-owned facility.
After discussing the matter in an executive session prior to Monday’s regular council meeting, council members voted unanimously to hire a consultant to assist in developing a business plan for structuring an acquisition, and authorizing city staff to negotiate toward such a deal.
The club, owned by Renaissance Golf Group LLC of Dublin, Ohio, is essentially bankrupt, Missouri City Mayor Allen Owen said during a break in the meeting.
Quail Valley Fund, a homeowners association that had been in negotiations for months to buy the country club, informed the club’s owner that it was withdrawing from those talks to see whether the city could strike a favorable deal, QVF Board President George Everitt told FortBendNow last week.
The troubled country club includes roughly 400 acres and 36 holes, plus an “executive” 9-hole course and a par-3 9-hole course that Councilman Jerry Wyatt said “may or may not” be included in any acquisition deal.
Wyatt indicated the country club’s tennis center would be part of the deal, should the city decide to make an acquisition offer. Ironically, Mayor Owen said the tennis center “will be foreclosed on as of tomorrow.”
To complicate matters further, a packed house attending the council meeting learned that when Renaissance Golf Group acquired the club, for some unknown reason, it failed to buy between 12 and 13 acres that consists of a lake used for drainage, and much of the 7th fairway of the course. Owen said about $14,000 in back taxes are owed on that parcel, and a constable’s auction is scheduled for Tuesday to sell the property in lieu of the taxes owed.
The council passed a resolution authorizing the city to attend the auction and acquire the parcel.
Owen said there are also back taxes due on the country club itself, and on the tennis center, adding “there are lenders not being paid” and vendors not being paid.
If negotiations with the club’s owner were to fail, both Wyatt and Owen suggested the city could, if necessary, acquire the course through other means. The mayor said in an interview the city could do so through eminent domain. Wyatt said the city could use condemnation, which he called “a tool…something we may or may not use.”
No one among an audience of perhaps 125 people spoke against the idea, and spontaneous applause erupted occasionally as council members expressed support for trying to buy the country club.
Still, the move is controversial. Some council members hinted that acquiring and operating the country club would require a property tax increase.
Councilwoman Eunice Reiter said figures provided to council show the annual cost of operating the country club is between $3 million and $3.5 million, which doesn’t include debt service. However, revenue, according to an estimate Reiter indicated may be generous, was pegged at only $2 million.
“You’ve got a $2 million disparity,” she said, questioning whether greens fees and golf cart rentals could be sufficient to operate the club at a profit.
Also, Wyatt and Owen both said rumors have surfaced that they and council members Buddy Jimerson and Brett Kolaja may have a conflict of interest because the four all live in Quail Valley.
“Obviously some people in Quail Valley are going to reap some benefits because the club is in Quail Valley,” Wyatt said. “That’s just the way it is.”
Jimerson said he supports the deal, and although he lives in Quail Valley “I’m not a golfer.”
“I’ve played with you,” Owen interjected. “I agree.”
“I don’t want people saying ‘you’re taking care of your own subdivision first,’” Owen said later. “I don’t feel like I have a conflict of interest. If people want to criticize us…then they are not thinking beyond their back yard.”
The mayor said property values have been hurt by uncertainty over the future of the country club – something news reports show he was concerned with nearly two years ago.
Owen said today there’s probably not a street within Quail Valley that doesn’t have at least one house for sale. He said uncertainty over the fate of the country club has accounted for nervousness on nearby homeowners’ parts, adding, “people are afraid of what’s going to happen.”
“Quail Valley is the heart of this city. You can’t live without your heart, and that’s what this is about,’ the mayor said. “And that’s not to say it’s more important than any other part of the city.”
Said Wyatt, “We’re always getting accused of, well, ‘Sugar Land has this’ and ‘Sugar Land has that.’ Well, Sugar Land doesn’t have a golf course.”
