Louisville golf-course complaints reach advisory board amid city review of Coal Creek finances

Public complaints about recent changes at Coal Creek Golf Course have reached Louisville’s Recreation Advisory Board as city staff separately review how to make the municipal course more financially self-sustaining.

The board’s June 22 agenda packet includes several written comments alleging changes to youth camps, instruction and league play. The June 22 agenda also lists both a golf-fund presentation and a separate informational item on Coal Creek Golf Course, showing the city was taking up course operations.

One letter in the packet, from resident Erin Finn, says her family reconsidered enrolling their son in afternoon golf camp sessions after schedule changes and after Coach Brandon Shupick, known as “Coach B,” was no longer part of the camp staff. Finn also wrote that Shupick had to raise lesson prices by $25 because Coal Creek was charging him to bring students onto the course, and she urged City Council to investigate both those changes and what she described as employee departures under new management, according to her letter to the board.

Other comments in the same packet describe broader customer-service and policy concerns. One writer said golfers are now limited to two tee-time reservations per person, that league winnings can no longer be applied to green fees, and that Imperial pass holders were initially charged to play on Memorial Day before that decision was reversed after complaints, according to that submitted comment. Another commenter said the senior program had shifted from a shotgun start to a sequential start and argued that communication and responsiveness had declined, according to a separate email in the packet.

What the city has documented more clearly is a broader operational shift at the municipal course. In a June 22 staff presentation, staff said Coal Creek operates as an enterprise fund and that the city wants the course to become self-sufficient by covering both operating and capital costs. The same presentation says staff had been directed to reexamine unlimited golf packages, consider resident preferences and look at fee increases because the golf fund is projected to run a deficit beginning in 2027.

That presentation projects a roughly $227,000 deficit in 2027 and a cumulative shortfall of about $943,000 from 2027 through 2032, before additional possible capital costs. Staff also told the board that efforts to increase market-rate rounds were already changing the customer mix, with 73% of May 2026 rounds booked at market rates, up from 58% in May 2025, and average revenue per round rising to $53 from $42.

Those financial and pricing discussions are ongoing rather than settled. Staff said they planned to return to the advisory board in July for more feedback and again in August with final recommendations on 2027 pricing and pass options, according to the June 22 presentation.