Country Club of the South sues itself
Well, not exactly - but sort of. The Country Club of the South is a very exclusive, high-end subdivision in the Atlanta suburb of Alpharetta. Home of singers, athletes and other well-to-do folks, the subdivision is also the location of a Jack Nicklaus golf course bearing the name, you guessed it, Country Club of the South.
Well, a fight has broke out between the non-profit homeowners association and the Board of Trustees of the club - who are also homeowners. The problem - the golf course is more than $9 million in debt and growing. The solution, at least for the Board of Trustees, is brilliant. Get the 50% of the homeowners who aren’t members of the club to pay for the club’s debt.
Looking to allay some of that debt, the complaint continues, the club board and that of the homeowners association, called the CCSHA, in 2004 “began informal, behind-the-scenes discussions regarding means by which the Board of Trustees of the CCSHA could force the members of CCSHA to assist with the financial difficulties faced by the club.”
The suit says “the vast majority” of the CCSHA board were also members of the country club.
Now that’s a plan - get into trouble, then get somebody else to pay to get you out of trouble.
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Hey,
Nice site. I like the design and the content is interesting. I obviously just discovered it so I apologize.
Regarding this CCSO subject, the Board should jsut find a quality entity (Heritage Golf, etc) to basically GIVE the course to. Probably not many takers for $9M in debt.
This would ensure that this entire community does not die out at CCSO.
Again, nice site.
Rob McCance - Realtor
http://www.realtorsgeorgia.com/
Rob, thanks for the kind words. I apologize that I haven’t been keeping up the past couple of months. Expect that to change going forward.
That’s a good idea, but you’re right - I doubt there’s many takers. I haven’t kept up with what’s going on at CCSO, but I’ll see if I can find out.
The link “a fight has broke out ” in the original post has been taken down by the Daily Report Online. I wanted to send this to someone this evening, but of course, it’s now a goner. Good ole internet.
Rob
A similar situation occurred at the Fountaingrove Golf & Athletic Club in Santa Rosa, California. In that case, the club’s original 18 owner-investors had initially planned to make their investments back via membership initiation fees and operations. However, those funds had been spent on club operations instead, and the investors decided to try to recoup their losses from the members–beyond the membership fees already paid.
The issue later became a hotly-debated topic with many members arguing that they owed nothing, and the investors threatening to take out a unilateral $4-million loan in the members’ names, and “repay” themselves with that plus $500,000 in club reserves. Unfortunately for the membership, not enough members knew what was going on and unwittingly voted to amend the bylaws to allow the investors to do precisely that.