By JOLENE OGLE
Cross club members say owner’s money grabbing is par for the course…
DEVASTATED, deeply saddened and fractured, these are the words used by community members to describe the impact of the Peregian Springs Golf Club closure.
The golf club has been vacated and is now sitting dormant while the owners of the land and clubhouse, Peregian Springs Golf Holdings Limited, decide the fate of the once prestigious golf course.
In a statement to media, Aveo said the course will be maintained while options for the future are considered but “it is highly unlikely that any such option would include a re-opening of a member-based golf club”.
Resident, former club member and shareholder Stanley Walker, who moved to Peregian Springs with his family for retirement, said he is deeply saddened by the closure and pending sale of club property.
“This is really depressing (my) family members,” he said.
“My retirement plan is just about shot.”
Mr Walker’s wife Mary is a former golf champion and representative for Papua New Guinea whose life revolves around golf.
“We are one of the many retirees who purchased on the golf course for such a life in retirement,” he said.
But Mr Walker is only one of many who have been affected by the closure of the club.
Local resident and mother of golf prodigy Cassie Porter, Diane Porter, is furious the club has closed its doors saying the community is broken.
“It’s fractured our community,” she said.
“It is just awful what they (Aveo) have done. There are people in the community who just think ‘well, what can we do’, but there are others who are trying to show this is worth fighting for.”
For Diane, moving to a golf frontage block in Peregian Springs from their home near Yandina was a big decision for the family and an important one for Cassie’s career as a golfer.
Cassie, 13, who already has a string of achievements including winning gold at the under 12 World Junior Olympic Games Gold Championships last year, trained of the Peregian Springs Golf Course most days.
“We used to live further away but we moved here for the golf course. This is the whole reason we moved here,” she said.
“Now we have to travel further to other golf courses. This is a huge disruption to Cassie’s training. But this doesn’t just impact golfers, the closure impacts everyone in the community.”
Local resident Maureen Carey said it’s hard to remain positive about the future of the community when there is no sign of a positive outcome.
“We are in limbo, not quite sure of which avenue to take from here on in,” she said.
Ms Carey blames greed for the closure of the club and said this is another case of “profiteering companies with scant regard for the people they have left in their wake”.
Mr Walker agrees with that sentiment and that he believes the developer sees the golf club has served its purpose of attracting buyers to the properties, especially premium properties with golf frontage, and now it is time for the course to be developed.
“The club actually went on to become a focal point of the rapidly expanding residential estate; the developers must have wrung their hands with glee,” he said.
“It is a great shame the developers have not been able to see past the financial benefits and actually look around at the human aspects of the society they helped create.”
Mr Walker and Ms Porter both said the club had been making a loss financially but was on the way to breaking even with the help of at least two years’ financial support from Aveo.
“Having been released from a vice-like grip of the developer’s subsidiary (Peregian Springs Golf Holdings Limited), the club was moving in the direction of self-sustainability which was looking like a two or three year achievement and, if given earlier the right of self-control, … the self-sustainability could have been achieved,” Mr Walker said.
In a statement to the media, Aveo said the club’s board has always been solely responsible for the management of the golf club and course.
“It is highly unlikely that any such option (for the future of the club) would include a re-opening of a member-based golf club that lost over $14 million since its inception,” the statement said.
“Aveo provided $14 million of financial support to the club … but it was the board of the club that determined strategy and financial management of (the) club.
“The financial support from Aveo pursuant to the prospectuses ceased in 2015.”
Noosa Today presented the community’s concerns to Aveo but it declined to comment.
