DEPARTMENT OF INTERIOR REVOKES NLT’S LEASE TO OPERATE AND REFURBISH DC MUNICIPAL GOLF COURSES – A LOCAL STORY WITH NATIONAL IMPLICATIONS

DEPARTMENT OF INTERIOR REVOKES NLT’S LEASE TO OPERATE AND REFURBISH DC MUNICIPAL GOLF COURSES – A Local Story with National Implications

On December 30 the United States Interior Department revoked the National Links Trust’s long-term lease to manage and improve the national capital’s three (3) publicly owned golf courses under the jurisdiction of the National Park Service – a lease that NLT was awarded five (5) years ago in a competitive process per a proposal that pledged to operate the three golf courses at very affordable rates and improve them over time by reinvesting all net proceeds into those improvements.

In a January 1 story Golf Magazine (golf.com) summarized NLT’s performance to date as follows:

“To date, the NLT says it has more than doubled rounds played and course revenue at D.C.’s municipal courses since assuming control of the lease from the Parks Department. It has also invested more than $8.5 million in “capital improvement projects” to the courses while maintaining rock-bottom pricing for peak tee time rates.

As part of the National Links Trust’s original agreement with the Parks Department, the NLT also secured pro bono design work from some of the country’s top golf course designers, including Gil Hanse, Tom Doak and Beau Welling, to handle renovations of each of D.C.’s public courses. Work had just begun on the largest of those projects to date — a wholesale renovation of Rock Creek — when the Trump administration stepped in.

More than golf access or tax revenue, though, the NLT’s most prolific work has involved its commitment to maintaining the D.C. muni scene’s affordability and accessibility. Tee times at each of D.C.’s three muni courses have remained well below market rates in five years since the NLT took over, amounting to less than $50 per 18 holes in most instances, while course maintenance decisions have aimed to ensure upkeep costs are low. In doing so, the NLT appeared to prove it could have its cake and eat it too: steadily improving the quality of D.C.’s public golf without driving up the cost on taxpayers.”

The reason given for the revocation: A claim of $8.8 million in unpaid rent – a claim that NLT vigorously and very publicly disputes. From NLT’s solitary public statement to date:

“We are fundamentally in disagreement with the administration’s characterization of NLT as being in default under the lease. We have always had a productive and cooperative working relationship with the National Park Service and have worked hand in hand on all aspects of our golf course operations and development projects.”

As summarized in that same Golf.com story:

“According to the details of the National Links Trust’s publicly available lease, rent payments from the NLT can be offset by capital improvements to the courses. And, according to the National Links Trust’s statement on the administration’s decision, the National Park Service approved rent offsets for an amount equal to the Department of the Interior’s calculation.”

California’s golf community has openly lauded the Park Service/NLT arrangement to the degree to which it offers a path for municipal golf systems to improve their product while keeping that product maximally affordable and accessible. NLT was an active participant and supporter of the “Community Golf Summit” that California’s allied associations sponsored in the Long Beach area last summer. NLT was the lead agency for a similar “Summit” in Massachusetts in late 2024.

Bottom line: Golf communities and golf alliances throughout the nation have held up the NLT model as something to emulate, and that is why we felt it important to share this story, as it is a story that is national to the degree to which what is unfolding in D.C. has repercussions for community (municipal) golf everywhere.

To be clear, today’s reporting and the reporting we do as this story unfolds will avoid the three “P’s” we always avoid when reporting on those places where golf and public policy intersect– politics, partisanship, and personalities. We will also avoid taking sides in what is in the final analysis a dispute between a lessor and a lessee.

However, we’ll let the poignant words of Jay Karen, CEO of the National Golf Course Owners Association (qtd. in Washington Post, Dec. 31, 2025) on the critical role played by publicly owned golf courses in the golf ecosphere stand as our own:

“The DNA of municipal courses is a bit different than those owned and operated privately and much different than country clubs,” said Jay Karen, chief executive of the National Golf Course Owners Association. “Munis are all about supporting the widest possible access to the game, while also preserving critical green spaces, for perpetuity. … There is a greater sense of history and pride in a community around their public parks that happen to be golf courses.” [Washington Post; December 31, 2025]

More certainly to come. There are a lot of lines to read between here. We’ll continue to provide the “lines” and leave the “reading between” to you.

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There will be a Volume II January 2026 newsletter to update you on the progress and details of the “Blocking Illegitimate Reservations and Protecting Equitable Access to California’s Publicly Owned Golf Courses Act” and anything else of importance that crops up in the first couple of weeks of the 2026 legislative session. In addition, we’ll update you on what we can in good conscience tease as some very good news about some of the public golf courses we have been writing about that are (or were) under some threat of closure, and we’ll share the details of the agreement that CAG and the SCGA reached in November, the gist of which is making what has long been de facto practice something more definitively de jure by executing a contract between CAG and SCGA that spells out how SCGA shall “manage” the Alliance for the benefit of the stakeholders that comprise and fund it and in the process provide the stable base necessary to grow it to the size most anticipate will be necessary to continue meeting public policy challenges that promise to only grow in California.