May

Our biggest Tournament of the year is the Member-Member on the 15^th and 16^th of this month, if you have not sent in an entry contact Rich Dennison ASAP. You do not want to miss this one, lots of prizes, pairings party and a chance to pick your favorite team. Come to the May Meeting for all the details.

We have started our summer schedule and many activities are planned on meeting nights.

The away trip to Jurupa Hills was a very pleasant surprise. I had not heard anything good about the course prior to the trip. We had a great time. Our group was 3^rd out and we were able to play in a little over 4 hours and the course was in great shape. Just goes to show that you cannot always believe what you hear! We have several additional trips planned this year, call Nick Zamora and get involved they are a lot of fun.

In addition to signs ups for the Men’s club June Tournament we will be taking names for groups that are interested in playing on Fathers day, June 20^th. This is a day when you can invite just about anyone that you want to play with, Wife, friend, mother in law, distant cousin. The men’s club makes a donation to Junior Golf each year and because of that we are given and extra day per year. If you are interested in forming a group or just want to play see Rich Dennison.

The monthly meeting was held April 13, 2004 under the El Dorado Park Golf Course restaurant auxiliary tent. The restaurant provided an offering of Cornish game hens tonight for your $6. President Tom Link called the meeting to order at 7:10 p.m. and led the membership in allegiance to our flag.

Past Presidents in attendance: Tom Conlisk, Steve Shure, Don Marmion, Ray McElhenney, Greg O’Brien, and Bob Livingstone.

Tom Burris, Bob Livingstone, Fred Gibson, and Tom McCutcheon represented our life membership.

The minutes from the last meeting and Treasurer’s report as printed in the newsletter were accepted.

Several new members were in attendance. They all took the microphone and gave their names, occupation, and presumed handicap. Bob Livingstone took them on the informational tour.

Pres. Link opened that we started having a Derby tonight matching handicaps hi – low for $20 per player; $13 prize fund, $7 green fees. We’ll host up to 20 teams for these Derbies. Tom then went on thank our Team Play captains and co-captains and all of the team players for a great year. Both teams made the playoffs. Thursday lost their first match, while Saturday lost to Meadowlark in the Quarterfinals. The Saturday team has gotten this far both of these last two years. Saturday captain, Jim Baber, took the microphone to thank Mez, Bill, Jorge, Jack, and the staff as well as Becky and the restaurant staff. Jim went on to thank Mark Miller for the website support plus Jerry Leininger and the rest of the Board of Directors for allowing him to serve the last four years as co-captain and captain.

Golf Commissioner – Tom Link noted our commissioner Ray McElhenney did not have anything new to report but did note that the rebuilt Skylinks is going to be a nice course. For those who will play it all the way back it’ll be 7,000 yards. October 1 is the anticipated opening date. Several greens are in.

Jerry Leininger – Handicap Chairman: Last month 42 members posted the monthly tournament as “T” scores. Please post as “Regular” rounds, not “T”. “T” scores stay with you for a full year no matter how many rounds you play.

Nick Zamora – Entertainment: March 26 is Jurupa Hills and the weekend after that is Soboba Springs. Jurupa will be a 3 better ball, and Soboba will be a 1-2-3 Waltz. The bus leaves El Dorado at 5:30 for Soboba. Cost is $65 per for each tournament. June 5 is drive trip to Oak Quarry and the field is full. Cost there will be $85 per player. Nick has a full field for it and is taking stand by sign up for that one.

Our course General Manager, Mez White, is running the Derby on meeting day. We will do this every meeting night during Daylight Savings Time starting at 4:30. The event will pay 3 places. Mez read off today’s winners. As for the course, the aeration went well. They are a bit bumpy, but they’ll be mowed this week to smooth them out.

Mel Collins – Rules: Mel did not have anything tonight. No one had any questions.

Mike Marmer – Director: Mike has the results of the G.O.M. and the Putting Contest. The Putting game was Aggregate today with a 5-way tie for first at 1 under par. The kitty was $60 so these 5 received $12 each. Next month it’ll be a Partners Alternate shot format (as a Member-Member warm up). Mike hopes everyone can get their M-M partner to team up and participate together. As for the G.O.M. we had a few more cards this month. 2 cards for Gross were Alex Gay and Mark Hansen. They both shot even par 72. Mark took the edge with a real nice finish of birdie-birdie-birdie to win on the card off. Three Net cards were submitted. Stan Faris won a nice 77 – 13 = 64.

Dennis Tramer – Director: Dennis ran the 9-hole tournament today. He wants to see more people get involved in that game. Tim Yee took top honors.

Rich Dennison – Tournaments: This weekend is 1-Gross and 2-Net. Rich has a couple of times open for play. If you’re not signed up and want to play see him. Member-Member is next month. Let him know if you have a need to play early or late on one of the two days. This must be to him NLT the 11^th. On Friday night we’ll have a Pairings Party, Bar-B-Q on Saturday, and snacks on Sunday. June is a 4-Club tournament. Let him know if you want this to be an individual or team event.

Bob Livingstone – Past President; It is time for us to select a person to recommend to the Mayor to serve as our Golf Commissioner for the next two years. We have to condense the normal 3-month announce, nominate, and election process to 2-months. Bob noted that the Commission meets on the 4^th Wednesday of each month at 3:30 pm at Heartwell. Bob then asked the membership if they had any questions concerning the position. Ray McElhenney has been serving in this capacity the last two years and he has chosen to run for re-election. Nominations were opened. Jon Monat was nominated and accepted. The election will be on next meeting night. Bob will provide more information in the Newsletter.

More raffle tickets were sold. Dennis Tramer pulled and read the tickets while Bob Livingstone handed out the prizes. As always, we gave away a lot of prizes that included cash, golf equipment, shirts, golf balls, range cards, and more.

50-50 was $114 tonight. The winner was Tom Bentele. That was a quick $57 for Tom and $57 for Jr. Golf.

The membership drawing tonight was for $70. The number of Robert Foley was drawn. Robert was not at the meeting. The prize will increase to $80 next month.

Mike Vaughn
Secretary

We got through the April Tournament without a drop of rain, even though the forecast was shaky all week. We where close to are tee times all day, and the pace of play was better. I want to thank everyone with there help with the speed of play, keep it up.

Four Tournaments in the books and my team still has not sniffed the pay window, Think my team may consider replacing me.

The-Flight was won by MEL COLLINS, GREG LESTER, KEVIN ORR, DOUG JONES and new member TIM BARNES. This is pretty impressive win, considering, they are a gross team.

The B-Flight was won by JIM BABER, RUBEN GONZALES, WAYNE SETINEK, BILL JOHNSON and DALE GREEN with an outstanding 199, we’re going to have to check there medications, great win, I knew it was only a matter of time.

The C-Flight was won by a group that had changed there team three times to come up with winning formula. BRIAN BALL, ERIC SASAKI, NICK FITZGERALD, JASSON MARTIN and ANAND ATUL, great job guys.

The MEMBER/MEMBER Tournament is almost full, just a few times left, get your money in by May 11^th remember you had to have played in at least 3 tournaments in the past year to be eligible to win. The Friday night partners party is a lot fun, bring your putter and wedge for the putting and chipping contest.

June Tournament is going to be a four club tournament. Team format. Count two balls on par threes, three balls on par fours and four balls on par fives. You can not each others clubs, you must play with the four you brought only. We will play to our full handicaps. Be sure to come to the May meeting to sign up. Also we have tee times for Fathers day, see me at the meeting for a time, and bring your family out for the day.

Beginning Balance			$19,831.91

DEPOSITS

Checking Interest	0.49
50/50	103.00
Jurupa	1,510.00
Dues 2004	1,170.00
Soboba	325.00
Raffle	507.00
Member Member	2,115.00
April Tournament	3,743.00
Hole-In-One	21.00
Ladies Club (software)	50.00
TOTAL CASH RECEIPTS	9,544.49

SUBTOTAL			$29,376.40

DEBITS

Seaside Printing		$ 639.97
Directors Meeting		$ 50.00
Los Altos Trophy		$ 155.16
Raffle		$ 337.35
Bus Trip		$ 647.00
SCGA Dues 2004		$ 340.00
Mar ISP		$ 15.00
Misc Tournament Exp.		$ 99.90
Away Trip Deposits		$ 986.00
April Tournament		$ 5,486.00
Oak Quarry		$ 1,824.00

TOTAL CASH DISBURSEMENTS		$10,580.38

ENDING BALANCE			$18,796.02

Another month comes to an end. We had some interesting topics arise at out latest meeting. Let me start with the business as usual topics. The rounds of golf for March were up across the board. 5.22% to be exact. El Dorado was up 14.8%. Year to date the rounds are also up. 4.70% for all the courses, and 12.02% for our course. Course revenues are still going strong. Our course generated $444,467.19 during March. The city received $257,412.52 during this same time frame. The C.I.P. funds are at 142 grand. No improvements from this fund until the completion of the Legends Project. Junior Golf is doing fine, with over 71 grand in that account. The tournament rounds are in line. Tree trimming has begun at our course also. The Legends project is ahead of schedule. The entire north side of Wardlow road has been "grassed". What that means is that "stollens" not sure of that spelling, but they are basically a root that will spread into a very nice durable grass. The south side of Wardlow road will be completed by the end of May.

Several golf coaches were in attendance. They voiced a concern over a rumor they heard regarding Legends. They were under the impression that when Legends opened no Moore League golf matches could be played there?? Tom Shippy quickly put an end to that rumor. He informed the concerned coaches that the city has no intention of not allowing Moore League golf teams to play Legends as well as any Long Beach Courses. Good to see that support from the city.

The strategic plan has finally gotten off the ground. The committee has met several times and are putting things into place. American Golf has submitted their fee proposal to the city, It is currently being reviewed. Once they are finished they will submit to the fess and charges committee for their review and suggestions. Keep in mind the city still has the final say on greens fees, the commission can only recommend. Well that will do it for this month. See you at our next meeting.

We have 3 months of Away Trips, Monthly Tournaments and Team Play under our belts and I wanted to review a few items with you.

· POSTING – Make sure to post all your rounds in a timely manner – you have a 48 hour grace period before Penalty rounds will be given for not posting.

· Always post as a REGULAR Round unless instructed otherwise. In our last tournament we had 42 players post incorrect as Tournament Rounds . If there is any question, please check with the scoring table or read the signs before you post.

There have been several questions as to the Tournament Handicap policy. As a review, the Tournament Handicap is based on the following :

1. You must have a minimum of 6 El Dorado event scores to qualify. Monthly Tournaments, Away Trips , Team Play, and any other club events are the scores used.

3. The most recent 20 scores are used if a play has more than 20 scores for the last 12 months.

If your Tournament Handicap is lower than your current Handicap , You will play to your TOURNAMENT HANDICAP.

Play to you current Handicap if you name is NOT on the Tournament Handicap List.

We will a computer available at meetings and Tournaments if you would like to see your profile. I will also be happy to print out your profile if you give me a call or Email.

There are several reasons why I want to remain as the Golf Commissioner for the El Dorado Men's Golf Club. The first is certainly not for the free golf!! Since I have pretty much run the table in regards to being a board member, as Commissioner I can still assist the board and the membership without actually being a board member. Our golf club is very important to me personally so being on the Commission gives me the opportunity to make sure our club as well as the other clubs, and the city get a fair shake in all matters. I want to finish a least another term because the first was listen and learn. With the Legends Project absorbing most of everyone's energy, not much else was happening, therefore I want to get involved with the upcoming manual revisions.

As far as what I plan on doing as a Commissioner is fairly straight forward. I will remain active on the two sub committees I am currently on. I also will be the voice for our membership. I want the membership to understand that my position is to assist them as well as seeing that golf in Long Beach continues to prosper. Any concerns or questions will always be looked at in a positive fashion, and brought to the commission with the understanding that if it benefits the game of golf something can be done. American Golf also plays a big role in this picture, so I will be working hand in hand with them to assure that again our club receives a fair shake in any and all matters.

There are several issues which are of importance to El Dorado Men’s Club and Long Beach golfers in general. First and foremost, there is a need to protect the availability of daily fee golf on the Long Beach courses. Even though Skylinks is supposed to absorb some tournament play, there is some concern that the tournaments to be run there would be new tournaments at higher fees than paid by daily golfers. The question of businesses having access to the golf courses for tournaments came up many times in the recent focus groups.

Secondly, it is important to protect the status of the men’s and women’s golf clubs. The Men’s Club is a strong protector of the quality of El Dorado Golf Course and a strong advocate of quality golf for a fair fee. Without the clubs to protect the courses, golf in Long Beach would be different and more expensive than it is now.

We have a good working relationship with the course management, the City and American Golf. I would work hard to maintain that relationship while keeping the focus on accountability.

Mike Vaughn Secretary

Mike Vaughn
Secretary