Jerry Miller, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, retained the Nicklauses as consultants to determine whether it would be feasible to build a second golf course on Greenbury Point near Annapolis, Md. Twenty-five environmental organizations came out against the golf course idea in a letter to the Navy secretary last year.
A group of environmentalists and local residents working to preserve Greenbury Point on the Chesapeake Bay near Annapolis, Md. thought talks of a second course the U.S. Naval Academy were silenced, The Washington Post reported. But an entry in the June edition of Shipmate, the Academy’s alumni magazine, has renewed concerns.
The entry says a wealthy naval academy alum-turned-real estate developer signed a contract with Jack Nicklaus and his son to design a second golf course on Greenbury Point, the peninsula across from the academy, as its Director of Athletics proposed last year, The Post reported.
Jerry Miller, a graduate of the academy’s Class of 1977 who later found success in real estate, met the Nicklauses in Florida and sealed the deal over a two-hour lunch in the golfer’s Bear’s Club, the alumni magazine reported. “And, yes, they signed a design contract,” the item says.
That wasn’t quite true, The Post reported. But it was enough to rev up opponents fighting to keep the 280-acre Greenbury Point Conservation Areas as a refuge for hikers, birders and others.
Several said the news of a design contract — which could run to millions of dollars for an 18-hole, championship course designed by a golf pro of Nicklaus’s stature — suggested that the plan to redevelop the peninsula has been moving along behind closed doors, The Post reported.
“What it means to me is that this thing is much, much further along than any of us knew,” said Gerald W. Winegrad, a former state Maryland state senator and Navy veteran fighting to preserve the area. “We’re all in shock.”
The battle for Greenbury Point began after Chet Gladchuk, the academy’s Athletic Director and President of the Naval Academy Golf Association, wrote to the secretary of the Navy early last year proposing that the private organization develop a second golf course on the peninsula, The Post reported. He said a new 18-hole course would accommodate the academy’s athletic programs, including intramural and varsity, as well as active military personnel and veterans of all branches, their civilian employees and academy graduates.
Gladchuk, in his letter and interviews, envisioned adding a second golf course as part of a broader overhaul of the area that would include nature trails, a boat launch, birdwatching blinds and other features, The Post reported.
The alumni magazine’s report this month moved Joel Dunn, President of the Chesapeake Conservancy, to suggest that President Biden set aside the area as a national monument by invoking the Antiquities Act, as he did a few months ago with Castner Range in El Paso. “Greenbury Point Conservation Area’s vital historic, recreational and scientific importance is threatened by these influential developers,” Dunn wrote in an e-mail.
But Miller said in an interview Monday that the alumni magazine misinterpreted what happened, The Post reported. Miller, acknowledging that he has agreed to foot the bill for planning and feasibility studies on overhauling the peninsula, said he retained the Nicklauses as consultants to determine whether it would be feasible to build a second golf course on the peninsula.
“We want to know — I want to know — if it’s possible to include a golf course,” said Miller, founder and Chief Executive of the Miller Group in Virginia Beach. “And so we thought that it might be helpful to have a golf course designer as part of the feasibility study. And that’s all we’re doing. There’s no contract to design a golf course.”
A spokesman for Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.-based Nicklaus Design — which has created hundreds of golf courses around the world and is part of the business empire Nicklaus founded and walked away from in an acrimonious split — referred calls to a firm recently created by Nicklaus, The Post reported.
Scott Tolley, a spokesman for that firm, 1JN Design, confirmed that Nicklaus, 83, has agreed to review the feasibility of putting a second golf course on Greenbury Point, The Post reported.
“Mr. Nicklaus’ extensive experience in such design projects makes him eminently qualified to evaluate the geographical and environmental conditions necessary to determine if the land is suitable for golf and, if so, the kind of course that would, in that location, best serve the Academy,” Tolley said in an e-mail. He also said if a study demonstrates the feasibility of putting a golf course there, Nicklaus would be interested in designing it.
Twenty-five environmental organizations came out against the golf course idea in a letter to the Navy secretary last year, The Post reported. “Save Greenbury Point,” a Facebook page created in May 2022, has grown to more than 3,000 members, and nearly 7,000 have signed a change.org petition opposing a second golf course. Anne Arundel County officials have asked the Navy to consider allowing the county to manage the land and making it into a park instead.
News that well-heeled backers have been working with the Nicklauses further inflamed the opposition, The Post reported.
“I’m just frazzled to no end after seeing that news,” Sue Steinbrook, who has helped organize opposition to a new golf course, said after learning about the contract last week.
Miller said the consulting contract with the Nicklauses is short term and only to find out what might be possible on the land, The Post reported.
“Nobody has permission to build a golf course,” Miller said. “Greenbury Point is a beautiful piece of property, and we’re just interested in what could be done.”
Ed Zeigler, a spokesman for Naval District Washington, which oversees the Annapolis command, said Navy officials became aware of the contract as reported by the alumni magazine but that it had no bearing on the current status of the peninsula, The Post reported. The local command has been evaluating the status of the peninsula since competing, unsolicited proposals came forward last year.
“The only thing it means is that people are free to do their planning,” he said. “I have no control over that. Our current position is that we’re not entertaining any proposals to build a golf course.”
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