A glimpse of South Louisiana

More than 30 inches of rain fell on areas in Louisiana over the past few weeks. For this area of the country, that's actually not unusual. What is unusual is that the 30 inches of rain fell in the span of 4 days on an already saturated ground. If you've seen the news, you know what the result is — widespread flooding. Most everyone I spoke to in the area said they've never seen this before. I got the chance to visit four courses in the area and hear the stories they had to tell.

Carter Plantation, Springfield, La. I met up with course superintendent Lessley Boyd, CGCS, on Sunday afternoon just before the crew was leaving for the day. In the building, sheetrock was already removed, indicating how high the water had risen. The water level was over 3 feet in the shop area which means that all of the equipment engines had been submerged, requiring draining the oil and cleaning out the intakes. Lessley already had several mowers running and the crew was mowing turf in areas that weren't underwater or too wet to mow. At the time of my visit, there were still large sections of the course that were underwater. The pump station blew a transformer, and all the irrigation controllers on the course had been submerged for several days. The clubhouse was spared, but the conference center and most of the homes in the development had flood damage.

Santa Maria GC, Baton Rouge. First thing Monday morning, I met superintendent Phil Watson at his maintenance facility. According to many of the people I talked with earlier in the week, this was one of the worst flooded facilities in the area. Fortunately, the shop didn't flood but pretty much the entire golf course was under water the prior week. That meant all of the irrigation controllers and pump house had been submerged for days. When we toured the course ,the turf actually looked like it was in good shape but many areas were still underwater and there was significant damage to the bunkers. Phil explained to me that a good portion of the city of Baton Rouge drains in his direction, his property is adjacent to Bayou Manchec and there simply wasn't anywhere for the rain waters to go so the bayou overtook the golf course. Most of the homes in this development seemed to be spared from the flooding damage.

Country Club of Louisiana, Baton Rouge. After leaving Santa Maria, I went right across Interstate 10 to CC of Louisiana where I met superintendent Ed Pippen at his maintenance facility. His facility was in similar shape to Santa Maria with the course being underwater for days but the maintenance facility only had a small amount of water on the floor so the equipment was spared. Ed gave me a tour of the course, and again, I was surprised at how well the turf looked in the areas that had drained for a few days. There were still several holes that were inaccessible with several feet of water covering all but the highest points on the holes. There were several portable pumps in place on the course in order to expedite the water removal. There was damage to some bunkers and a few areas where silt had formed a small sand bar, but fortunately for all the courses, the water was fairly clean, which meant there wouldn't be countless hours of picking up debris.

Greystone Country Club, Denham Springs, Louisiana. From the moment I got off of Interstate 12, I could see that this was one of the hardest hit areas. Virtually every home and business I passed had much of its water-soaked contents out at the edge of the street. It was a mess. The club was hit hard. There was a large air handling unit blowing air into the clubhouse. A large dumpster outside had some of the damaged contents in it. The were two FEMA disaster relief semitrailers in the parking lot as people scurried about trying to clean up the mess. I was met by General Manager Blaine Lindsly in front of the clubhouse. He explained that superintendent Woody Brown was off property getting parts to fix the sprayer. Blaine told me about the situation at the club and offered to show me the golf course. Our tour revealed much the same as the other courses except Greystone had much more debris on the course from home construction in the development. Entire bundles of 2x4 lumber had floated away from the home sites and now rested against trees along the rough. When we went to the maintenance facility we found that Woody had returned and he was with an insurance adjuster looking at all the equipment. At Greystone, the shop, pump house, irrigation controllers and clubhouse all had significant damage. The grass "tide line" was about 4 feet high on the walls of the shop.

This is only a brief description of the damage done to four courses in the Baton Rouge area. Many golf course staff members lost either their home, their car or both. The agronomic damage from this storm will pass quickly and the courses will be back to normal. The residents of the Baton Rouge area will take much longer to get back to normal. Support the relief efforts for the area because there are thousands of people who aren't left with much and many of the residents don't have flood insurance since it wasn't required in many of the neighborhoods.

I will check back with these four courses in a month or so to see how things are progressing from a personal standpoint as well as a business standpoint.

Some of the homes in the Greystone development with piles of flooring, wall material, appliances and furniture waiting to be picked up by FEMA.

Construction debris littered the course at Greystone Country Club in Denham Springs, La. One of the hardest hit areas.

Flood water still covering part of the front nine at Santa Maria Golf Course in Baton Rouge.

Building a bridge — getting started with GOMA

Getting started three years ago in my current position with GCSAA meant dealing with a great deal of change. Gone were the days of looking after my 185 acres and worrying about things like weather, mole crickets and staff disputes. Now, my frame of reference is far more broad. I work with seven different states in my region, as well as staying on top of national issues that face the golf industry. I could see that the potential was there to get involved in things far bigger than I had previously experienced. Little did I know that listening to Chava McKeel speak about something called the Gulf of Mexico Hypoxia Taskforce would add a completely different aspect to my focus and forever change the way I look at environmental issues and the role that state and federal government play in those issues.

Being the curious person that I am, I did some research about the Gulf of Mexico Hypoxia Taskforce. As usual, I started with a Google search and wound up on the EPA's Hypoxia 101 website. The page gave a good explanation of what hypoxia is, but I was shocked when I saw the list of possible contributors to the nutrients that were responsible for the "dead zone" in the Gulf. Nestled right between agriculture and home lawn fertilization was golf courses. That observation started a mission for me that is still going strong today — working with state and federal water regulators to find out what, if any, impact the golf industry had on the dead zone in the Gulf. I wrote several emails and made many phone calls to the EPA trying to learn more about the Hypoxic zone only to get answering machines and no email replies. A few weeks went by when I got a call from a number that I didn't recognize. It was an EPA staff member who was working on the Hypoxia Taskforce and she was in the neighboring state. I tried my best not to be defensive for my profession while on the phone call and after several minutes of discussion the EPA staffer suggested I get in touch with the people at the Gulf of Mexico Alliance (GOMA) where I might be able to find some answers to my many questions.

After gathering some information about GOMA on the internet, I reached out to the executive director and arranged a visit to her office, which was only a 45-minute drive from my house. Laura Bowie was welcoming and willing to listen to my constant stream of questions and I think she was a bit surprised by my enthusiasm for the environment and my willingness to get involved. Near the end of an hour-plus conversation, she suggested that I should get involved with one of the GOMA teams and attend the upcoming All Hands meeting in Biloxi. I was placed on the Water

Resources team and started to read all the team information in preparation for the big meeting.

My first All Hands meeting was a bit overwhelming. Surrounded by 300 state, federal and NGO workers, I was feeling very alone. But, once the three-day meeting got underway, I realized that everyone was there for the same reason, improving the health and well-being of the Gulf of Mexico and the residents of the five states that surround it. I got to meet many brilliant people who work on a myriad of human and marine issues that exist in the Gulf and it opened my eyes to the complexity of the problems, both ecological and social. I was pleasantly surprised to find that many of the other team members were interested in why someone from the golf industry was in attendance. It wasn't long and I started to feel like I did belong with this group and I got the chance to build relationships with people from all corners of government.

My second All Hands meeting just concluded several weeks ago and it was great to see so many of the people from the previous year, many of whom are now my friends. Also, as a result of building this network of professionals, I have been asked to work on several projects in my hometown and within the state. I am now able to put golf course properties together with local watershed managers to the benefit of both. Maybe the most important part of getting involved with GOMA is the fact that many staff members of the EPA, NOAA, USGS, NFWF and state water managers know that the golf industry is a great partner to have when working on water and environmental issues. This whole process is still relatively new to me and I have plenty to learn going forward but I would encourage GCSAA members to get involved with your local watershed groups because you will gain much more than you give and the relationships you will build will open many doors going forward.

Get involved, you'll be glad you did!