How Colorado’s Golf Heroes are Tackling Staffing Shortages, Inflation and Record Traffic to Keep Courses Lush Despite Challenges

First, they had to grow grass despite a drought. Then, they worked through a pandemic. Now, they’re facing staffing shortages and inflation, with record numbers of feet trampling their work every day.

“It’s absolutely amazing to me the condition golf courses are in,” says Colorado Golf Association Executive Director Ed Mate. “I think about how hard it is to maintain my lawn, which is three inches of rough, with nobody walking on it or taking big, gouging divots out of it, no carts driving across it. And I can’t keep it green or even healthy. And these guys and gals are able to keep acres and acres of maintained turf pristine, despite people attacking it all the time.”

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The state’s golf heroes these days aren’t the players breaking par but the superintendents and maintenance workers who are on the job long before the golfers tee off. Golf courses all around the state were in impeccable condition last summer and well into the fall, until the late-December snowstorm that shut everyone down through January and promises an equally lush 2023.

Denver Golf Director of Agronomy Pam Smith says the pandemic’s early days gave the crews a lesson in what could be.

“We were shut down for six weeks and had the maintenance staff reporting, so we had the luxury of doing a lot of deferred maintenance, aerification and fertility,” Smith says. “And the lack of traffic had the courses in probably the best shape they’ve ever been in.”

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After that, says Smith, three seasons of increasingly nonstop, dawn-to-dark traffic raised new challenges: “How do we work while people are playing golf? How do we get our jobs done?”

Mitch Savage, superintendent at CGA-owned and operated CommonGround, credits his board with coming to the rescue with new machinery. “From there,” he says, “it was really about getting creative. A small example might be mowing a new walkway through a little native area where you’re not as worried about people beating down a nicely maintained turf area. We look for ways to help people and carts maneuver their way through the golf course without sacrificing the golf course.”

CommonGround incorporates maintenance blocks twice a month, clearing the tee sheet for three or four hours first thing in the morning so that crews can accomplish things without golfers in the way. Denver’s municipal courses, expected to bring in revenue while also providing their communities with recreational opportunities, don’t have that luxury.  

“So we have the philosophy that we want to get out ahead of golfers, get our greens mowed, cups cut,” Smith says. “Each golf course is different in how they do it, but we throw a lot of labor at those early morning jobs to get out and ahead of golfers.”

Which is not so easy with Denver golfers teeing off on both the front and back nines at sunrise.

“We’re starting maybe a half-hour or hour in the dark,” Smith says. “And that is extremely challenging and sometimes even dangerous for our staff to be operating mowing equipment in the dark. If you have a hydraulic leak, you sometimes don’t know it and it can lead to turf damage … It takes a special person to work maintenance these days for those reasons.”

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With staffing shortages continuing for businesses around the state, even golf course jobs — which may come with perks like free golf, flexible days and great scenery – are vacant. “You could say 50 percent of our on-call positions go unfilled at any given time at any golf course,” says Smith.

She’s working on restructuring job categories to attract more applicants. Savage has maintained his workforce with a “just say yes” approach to inquiries. “If somebody expresses an interest but says, ‘Well, I really only want to work a few days a week,’ I don’t even bat an eye. I just say, yeah, come on in and fill out an application and we’ll figure things out.”

As these superstars of Colorado golf continue to figure out how to keep courses covered in lush, mowed grass, there’s one thing we golfers can do to show some love: When they’re in the way of the next shot, give them a friendly wave instead of the stinkeye.

“We’re trying to be like Navy Seals out there,” says Savage. “We just want to get in and get our job done and get out, without being seen.”

Susan Fornoff has covered golf for the San Francisco Chronicle, regional golf associations and her own GottaGoGolf.com. She is a member of the Overland Park Golf Course and Links at Highlands Ranch women’s clubs. This is her seventh Executive Golf Guide for ColoradoBiz.