I have never understood why the city has always claimed that their golf courses lose money. They should be GOLD MINES. I grew up, and learned to play golf, in a small city (population 20,000) in Ohio. The public courses there are privately owned. There are no municipal courses which are subsidized by the city or by tax dollars. They are only open maybe 3 months of the year and, if you're lucky, there might be 3 or 4 days a week when the weather is good enough to play. Those courses were never crowded and the greens fees were low. They have managed to stay in business until this very day. I looked up the current rates at the one course where I played most, and its 18-hole rate is the SAME as El Rio's SUMMER rate. Since it's near only a small city, the rate of play might be comparable to El Rio's in the summer. Yet, El Rio loses money in the summer? Really? Sure, courses in Ohio require less water, but they require more maintenance. The grass needs to be mowed much more often, weeds and poison ivy need to be cleared, excess water needs to be drained off and removed, etc.

Municipal courses in Tucson are open year-round. In the winter, golfers are packed in like sardines while the rates are at their highest, and even higher for the large number on non-residents who play in the winter. Surely, enough revenue must be generated during the winter to more than make up for the lower revenues during the summer. In fact, those courses must generate HUGE amounts of money for the city. Don't they? If not, why not?

Almost 20 years ago I heard allegations of gross mis-management, money mysteriously disappearing and certain people being overpaid and getting sweetheart deals like substantial portions of cart rentals. I don't know how accurate these allegations might be, but it would explain a lot. If money is ending up in people's pockets instead of going to the city or back into the courses, perhaps they do "lose" money on paper.