You never really know what direction a congressional visit might go.  Sometimes you feel like you're one of a dozen appointments for the day and you wonder whether your message will have impact in the district or in DC.  Other times, you feel like you're truly making an impression with a lawmaker or a member of their staff and the meeting will bear fruit for the golf industry. On a recent visit to the Capital City Club at Brookhaven in Atlanta, I'm happy to say the latter was the case!

Kyle Marshall is the director of golf course management at the Capital City Club and had been working to set up a visit with Representative Barry Loudermilk's office for some time. He was successful at setting up a meeting at the course and I was happy to join in when asked. We were to meet with Claire Bartlett who is the Field Director in Rep. Loudermilk's Atlanta district office. We contacted Michael Lee at the GCSAA office to discuss the issues we wanted to cover during the visit a few days in advance and gathered some leave behind information.

I arrived early to the club — because you can never trust the Atlanta traffic — and met Kyle at the clubhouse where he had a private room set up for the meeting. Claire was right on time and we sat down and shared business cards and explained what our roles were within our organizations. We also explained the Grassroots Ambassador program and mentioned that we focus on legislation such as WOTUS and other environmental issues. We quickly found out that Claire was very well prepared to talk about WOTUS and our conversation on the topic lasted for several minutes. Claire asked several questions about how the ruling might affect the club and Kyle was quick to reply on how difficult it could be to interpret the rule as it would apply to the two courses he manages. Claire took plenty of notes on our conversation and asked what other issues we have. This was a perfect transition to talk about labor.

Kyle explained that he uses H-2B workers at both of his golf courses and the April to September period in the program is perfect timing for the busy season at the club.  Kyle went on to talk about how the lottery system used this past year made it difficult to get the workers he needed and also stressed the importance of having returning workers at the course. He emphasized that when workers have experience at the course, there is less training involved in course procedures and finding their way around the property.  Again, Claire took plenty of notes and asked several questions about the program and how it is used by the Capital City Club and she was very familiar with the program, its procedures and its metrics.  She also mentioned that Congressman Loudermilk felt that the program needed to be fixed and that the numbers of workers was too low, especially when unemployment in the US is at or below 4 percent.

We moved on to the next topic which was water quality and Best Management Practices. This seemed like an important subject to talk about since Claire mentioned early in our meeting that the congressman was not a golfer but he does like to hunt and fish. Kyle discussed how much of the neighborhood surrounding the Brookhaven course actually drains onto the club. That water is collected in the irrigation lake where it is allowed to settle out the suspended solids and is used as irrigation water when needed.  The bermuda grass turf on the course is very efficient at pulling many of the nutrients and metals out of the water as it makes its way back into the aquifer. We also mentioned that the Georgia Chapter was a leader in developing Best Management Practices during the drought period in the mid 2000's. We shared GCSAA's goal to have BMP's in place in all 50 states by 2020.

Our final topic was the economic impact that golf has on the Georgia economy. Kyle provided a copy of the last economic impact study that was completed several years ago. We explained that the chapter — along with allied associations — were currently engaged in completing a new economic impact study that should be complete early this winter. Claire asked if we would be sure to send along a copy of the new report when it is available. She was also impressed by the financial impact the game of golf has in the state especially when she was told that less than 10 percent of the US population plays the game on a regular basis. Claire took more notes on both the economic report and in her notebook where she was now on her forth page. 

At this point we were just over an hour into the meeting and it was time for Claire to head to her next appointment. She asked Kyle for some additional information on the items we discussed and was very interested in following up on many of the projects the golf industry is working on. This was a truly engaging meeting with plenty of ideas being shared by all three of us. Claire left with many new viewpoints on the golf industry and Kyle and I felt like we now had a friend in the Georgia District 11 office!

Thanks to Kyle and the staff at Capital City Club for setting up and hosting the meeting and to Claire Bartlett for taking the time in her busy schedule and showing true interest in the topics we covered.  This was a very good meeting!