Why The Trump Administration Is Taking Over Washington D.C.’s Public Golf Courses

What's up everyone, I'm Joe Pompillano and this is the Joe Pomp Show. I hope everyone had a great holiday break, enjoys some time with their family and friends and is ready to get back after it this week. For today's podcast, we're going to be talking about something that happened over the holiday break. And that is the Trump administration retaking control of three public golf courses in Washington DC. Now, I think it's fairly obvious at this point that Donald Trump is in legacy building mode. With three years left in the nation's capital, Trump has spent his second term focused on the physical legacy that he will leave behind. demolishing the east wing of the White House to contract a $400 million fall room is the most obvious example, but there are others. Trump renovated the Rose Garden and Lincoln bathroom. He recently announced plans to build a massive arch between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery. The Kennedy Center's board has added his name to the building and the UFC is scheduled a hosting event on White House grounds this June. coinciding with Trump's 80th birthday. Then there is golf. Trump has tried to play peacemaker by brokering a deal between the PJ Tor and live golf. He has met with Tiger Woods multiple times at the White House and even delivered the PJ Torch talking points directed to Saudi Arabian current Pence, Mohammed Vince Alam during his trip to the Middle East in May. But with the PJ Tor and live golf seemingly no closer to announcing a deal, Trump has turned his attention to a new project, renovating DC's public golf courses. Last week, the Trump administration terminated the lease agreement for three public courses in Washington DC. These taxpayer owned golf courses, rock creek, East Potomac and Langston Hughes are currently managed by National Links Trust and L.T. A non-profit that was awarded a 50 year lease in 2020 during Trump's first term. The Trump administration says National Links Trust lease was terminated because the organization owes $8.8 million unpaid rent and failed to make capital improvements on time. On the surface, that sounds reasonable. However, after reviewing the 28 page lease agreement and National Links Trust annual tax filings, the details tell a different story. National Links Trust has done everything it promised and the Trump administration isn't retaking control of DC's public golf courses to make them nicer and more affordable for taxpayers. They are doing it to create an upskill venue that can host a rider cup, replacing the promise of affordable golf with prices most taxpayers cannot even afford. Now, first, I want to start by going over the old model, which involved the National Park Service. Each of DC's three primary public golf courses has a unique place in history. East Potomac's primal location and reversible design made it one of the country's nicest municipal golf facilities when it was built in the early 1900s. Local leaders then doubled down with a redesign of rock creek in the 1920s. And Langston Hughes was only one of 20 golf courses that welcomed African Americans when it opened in 1939. These courses are listed on the National Register of Historic Places and have been managed by the Department of the Interior's National Park Service for more than 75 years. While this structure has helped maintain the promise of affordable accessible golf, it has also turned these courses into shells of their former selves. The National Park Service oversees more than 85 million acres of land and has a $23 billion backlog of repairs. They literally don't have a time, money or experience required to run these golf courses. Historically, the National Park Service solved this problem by hiring an operator to manage the property state of it. But the problem with this approach is that there is no incentive for capital repairs. Operators were always working on short-term contracts. And since the National Park Service owned the land, nothing got fixed or updated. The National Park Service eventually realized this was an unsustainable model and decided to try something new. In 2019, they asked potential operators to submit proposals for a long term lease for its three golf courses in DC. Effectively acknowledging that the federal government lacked the capacity to serve these courses. In October 2020, the National Park Service signed a 50-year lease with a newly created nonprofit called National Length Trust, or NLT. Co-founded by Mike McCartan and Will Smith, NLT's executive team played these courses growing up and brought extensive experience in the golf industry, from hosting tournaments to designing world-class courses. NLT was awarded the lease by positioning itself as a vision keeper, recognizing they were not course-operators. NLT agreed to subcontract daily management to truth the world's largest golf management company. Not only would this immediately bring institutional great standards to the facilities, but it would also enable NLT to focus on fundraising and capital improvements. In fact, as part of NLT's proposal, the group convinced architects, Tom Doek and Gil Haynes, to help renovate the courses for free. NLT began its lease by fixing the obvious stuff. We're talking pot-full of zero-gayson systems and more. NLT also spent a million dollars renovating the country's oldest mini-golf course at East Potomac. The nonprofit installed top-trades of technology at both East Potomac and Langston. Length launched a paid internship program for more than 30 students and has implemented several community programs, including free-less and Friday, a student-cati program, and a cleanup project that recently removed 8,000 pounds of trash from a lake adjacent to Langston. As a result of these changes in programs, NLT says the number of rounds at its courses has doubled over the last five years. And financially, the numbers are even better. According to NLT's 990 file, the organization's revenue increased from $10.7 million in 2021 to $15.1 million in 2024. Total assets have also grown from $2.85 million in 2020 to $18.3 million today, with NLT's total liabilities still under $4 million in total. Perhaps the most impressive part of NLT's financial performance is that nearly 65% of its total revenue last year came from program services. This is green fees, car rentals, and range buckets. This indicates that golf operations are not dependent on donations to keep the lights on. Donations at $3.6 million last year are now effectively profit for reinvestment. As a bystander, NLT's lease agreement with the National Park Service appears to be going exceptionally well. More people are playing golf at nicer facilities for the same price. Improve financials have enabled the organization to start larger, multi-year renovation projects at Rock Creek, and soon the other two courses too. But despite this progress over the last five years, the Trump administration apparently has other ideas. The Trump administration has been planning to take over DC's public golf courses for months. During the summer, NLT's leadership team was approached by someone named William Duffermire, a solicitor for the US Department of the Interior with a proposal. NLT's renovation plans had already been delayed by several years due to the inevitable red tape that comes with any project taking place on National Parkland. So rather than continue to play that game, Duffermire presented a solution. NLT should leverage President Trump's ability to raise money and cut red tape to expedite the renovation plans. NLT was excited about the idea, but I'm not sure that they really had an option. By the time the plan reached the Oval Office in August, it was drastically different from what NLT and Duffermire had initially discussed. Rather than helping the nonprofit raise money and cut red tape, the Department of Interior Secretary Doug Burgham and Duffermire pitched Trump on transforming the East Potomac Golf Links into a high-end professional level course named Washington National Golf Course. The following month, Duffermire issued a formal default notice to NLT. Trump then sent dirt from his demolition of the White House's East Wing to East Potomac Golf Links, because it would be needed for the renovation anyway, or so they thought. And then last week, the Department of the Interior formally terminated its lease with NLT 45 years early. Now, the Trump administration says that it terminated its lease with NLT for three reasons. Number one, NLT failed to make the capital improvements on time that were necessary. Number two, NLT did not provide a quote "reasonable and credible" cure proposal after receiving the initial default notice. And number three, NLT owes as much as $8.8 million in unpaid rent to the National Park Service for its services from 2020 to 2025. But after reviewing the lease agreement, none of these allegations really contain any subsets. I'll go through them one by one. First off, while NLT's renovation timeline has been slower than anticipated, the nonprofit has already invested $8.5 million in capital improvements. The timelines NLT provided during lease negotiations were also estimates, subject to change depending on approval timelines. NLT has been trying to start its renovation plans for years, but operating on National Park Service Land triggers the National Environmental Policy Act. This has significantly slowed down the process. Number two, NLT didn't provide a quote "reasonable and credible" cure proposal after receiving the DOI's initial default notice, because the notice was only two sentences low on and didn't include specific reasons for terminating the lease. If NLT doesn't know why its lease is being terminated, how can they possibly put together a proposal to fix it? Number three, the allegation of unpaid rent directly contradicts the lease. According to the agreement, NLT must pay 16% of gross revenue as rent. However, the lease also includes a structured mechanism allowing rent offsets for capital improvements. In other words, if NLT spends money on fixing a irrigation system or removing trees, that payment is offset against the rent, reducing the amount of money that they owe NPS. Considering that the $8.8 million unpaid rent allegations almost exactly matches 16% of NLT's total revenue over those years, the DOI is essentially trying to argue that all of the organization's capital expenditures were unapproved and therefore shouldn't reduce rent. The only problem with that approach is that every rent offset must be pre-approved. NLT has also held monthly meetings with the National Park Service throughout the duration of its agreement, and no concerns were ever raised until the August default notice. So, what happens now? Well, if the Trump administration is successful in terminating its lease with NLT, all three public golf courses would return to government control. But let's not kid ourselves. The government has no interest in rock creek or Langston. East Potomac is the prize because of its views and close proximity to the White House and the National Mall. Trump would likely be able to raise whatever money is required to renovate the East Potomac course. People have even speculated that Trump might hire his own company to handle the renovation or manage the course once it is complete. But just because the course will be nicer than it is today, that doesn't mean it will be better. Trump says locals will get discounted rates, but the operating costs of a Tom Fazio Championship course require higher revenue per round to break even. That means the same person who is able to play that course for $48 today on the weekend might soon have to pay more than $200. There is also a chance this renovation will never be completed, even if we ignore the fact that hosting large events like the Ryder Cup would require a stadium seating and mass transportation. NLT decided to renovate East Potomac Glass because one, it was making money while Rock Creep was losing money. But two, East Potomac can't be renovated until the government completes a nine-figure Seval renovation project that will stop the course and park from flooding. If that extends the renovation by a few years, who is to say that the next political administration doesn't end the project altogether? The politicalization of this project is the most frustrating part. NLT's model was seen as the future of municipal golf, while public courses nationwide are shutting down due to financial land constraints. NLT used its 501(c)(3) status to access philanthropic funding for public infrastructure. Donors passionate about historic preservation were happy to give money because NLT secure renovation commitments from industry leading architects and national park status meant that the courses would never disappear. For five years, NLT did everything right. The collective compensation was low, with each founder taking home just $50,000 last year. Revolutions were reinvested back into the business, creating a nest egg to fund future renovations. NLT even spent five years and millions of dollars navigating government bureaucracy to obtain construction approval. But now, DC golfers might be looking at a very different future. If the Trump administration gets its way, the promise of affordable, accessible golf in the nation's capital, is on its way out. The course that replaces East Potomac may be a masterpiece capable of hosting a ride or cup. But does that really matter if most of the locals who enjoy playing the course today are boxed out from playing it in the future? Thank you so much for listening today's podcast. If you enjoyed it, please share it with a friend. Otherwise, I hope everyone has a great day and we'll talk later this week.