Anything a group of us could do to support the initiative?For anyone in the Philly/South Jersey area, I've posted from time to time on Cobbs Creek Olde, a municipal course within city limits that was designed by Hugh Wilson (architect of Merion), which hosted majors way back in the hey day.
The course has a tortured history, which includes the US military occupying it and altering it significantly to install missile silos.
A few years ago, a private group raised a significant find to restore the course to its original design, hiring Gil Hanse to do the plans, and cleared all environmental issues to make it work. The design would turn the other 18 holes into a 9 hole course and utilize some of it to lengthen the course to PGA tournament standards. I think the whole idea is to revitalize the course similar to Bethpage and make it one of the better public courses to play.
While everything had been ready to go, the hold up has been with the City. They only want to grant a 25 year lease while the private group wants a 99 year lease. This lease is for control/maintenance pretty much.
At any rate, we just had elections here and apparently the newly elected mayor means there's a good chance of this happening. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!