By Matt Ward —
City of Fredericksburg officials estimate around $100,000 will be saved at Lady Bird Johnson Municipal Golf Course by the closure of the Redbird Grille.
Though the decision will not become official until the approval of the city’s 2015-2016 budget next month, the Fredericksburg City Council informally agreed to close the grill following budget discussions Thursday evening.
The course’s restaurant will close as of Oct. 1, scaling back food operations to a “grab and go” system of cold sandwiches and drinks.
“I just keep thinking that we can make this golf course something that this community supports,” Mayor Linda Langerhans said, “that more people will go golf, more people will be willing to accept a small deficit.”
Council members entertained the idea of leasing the grill to a third party after being approached by several local business owners, but opted not to pursue that route.
“We can continue down that road and have a fancy diner out there and have an expensive pro and an assistant pro and spend all this money on that golf course and have a deficit every year,” Langerhans said, “or we can attempt to do something that reduces that deficit and make it a more user-friendly course that would gain some support in this community.”
Grille financials
Revenues at the golf course have fallen well short of expenditures for several years, leaving the city with an unbalanced budget that councils have financed by transferring money from the general fund.
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