The day before PLGA and SCGA announced their consolidation Mirjam Swanson of the Riverside Press Enterprise asked me whether the decision to merge had been a difficult one. My answer, which she published in her story on the subject: “Emotionally, very difficult; intellectually, very easy.”
Those six words echoed the spirit of language that William Bratton used when he announced he was leaving his post as Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department: “While there is a never a good time to leave a job you love and persons you respect and enjoy working with, there is a right time.”
SCGA’s incorporation of PLGA is considerably more significant and impacting than the departure of one department head; the LAPD carried on quite nicely after Bratton’s departure. But the dynamic is the same. No matter how wise or intelligent the decision to merge on the basis contained within a painstakingly crafted memorandum of understanding (MOU), it was never going to be easy to abandon 80 years of identity and tradition.
But it was the right time.
The fundamental reasons animating PLGA’s separation from the larger regional golf association had begun dissipating 15 years ago. A visions and values gulf once wide had dissolved almost entirely, not with PLGA moving in the direction of SCGA, but rather the other way around, with SCGA abandoning old habits in favor of the more democratic, broad based, public spirited values always favored by PLGA – grassroots outreach, equality of club type, public advocacy, broad-based representation, “recreational” tournament programming, and focus on service to the average golfer.
When SCGA Executive Director Kevin Heaney approached PLGA 10 months ago with the notion of exploring the possibility of merging operations, the test we set for ourselves was whether we could close the remaining values/governance gap sufficiently to draw the following conclusion: That a unitary golf association would be a better vehicle for serving the interests of the members of both associations’ golf clubs and the game of golf than the two associations operating independently.
Once the two association’s governing boards sat down and worked through the elements of closing that small gap and signed an MOU memorializing them in a formal agreement, that test was more than met. That’s why this decision was intellectually easy and why it was the right time in the 80-year history of our Association to move forward – so “easy” and so “right” that the PLGA Board of Directors unanimously endorsed it.
After the consolidation is complete on January 1, 2011, the unified Southern California Golf Association will contain all of the strengths and services of the pre-unified SCGA plus the following:
- A Board of Directors comprised of 40% public members, including 3 members of the current PLGA Board of Directors;
- A set of guidelines for the Nominating Committee to ensure continued if not expanded “credible” public representation on the governing Board;
- A Foundation Board containing former PLGA Foundation presence;
- A Staff containing all of PLGA’s current Staff members;
- A new department dedicated exclusively to the public/legislative/governmental advocacy so central to PLGA’s mission;
- A new Committee to oversee this new public/legislative/governmental department;
- A Southern California Public Links Amateur Championship and a Senior Public Links Amateur Championship expanded and upgraded to include the entirety of the region;
- A transition group to assist with the incorporation of these major public championships, including the Southwest Team Matches;
- A continuation of support for the municipal championships long supported by PLGA, such as the LA City Match Play Championship;
- An expansion of the already rapidly expanding “recreational” component of the tournament program to include those “recreational” PLGA components for which there is demonstrable demand; and
- An ad hoc group to explore palpable ways to preserve the history, traditions, accomplishments, and contributions of the Public Links Golf Association.
As strong as the above package is, its real strength is less in its details than the recognition that the persons standing behind them are just as dedicated to making them work as we are. Once the two Boards and Executive Staffs actually sat down with each other and took each others’ measures, they discovered that they were driven by the same imperative that drives all amateur golf associations when they are at their best: To first ask the question whether what they are doing is good for the game; and then to recognize that there are no follow-up questions.
It’s the right package, the right persons and the right time.
