Lemoore area golfers return to city's course after March 24 closure rescinded

City officials recently opened the course following its March 24 closure due to the coronavirus.

Up until its closure in March, the Lemoore Golf Course had always been open for business. While there wasn’t an official mandate to close golf courses, most local jurisdictions in California opted to close their courses to the public.

For several weeks it was difficult to find an open golf course in California.

‘We’ve been open since Wednesday. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday have been extremely busy, probably our best three consecutive days of the year,” said Tom Ringer, the golf course’s manager.

“There has been lots of activity. The course is in very good shape,” said Ringer, a longtime PGA professional who arrived in Lemoore six years ago to run the 18-hole course. “We took care of it while it was closed. People are very happy to have a recreational outlet. I spoke to a couple of people who haven’t played golf in years, but they came out here to play.”

There are some changes. The city visited the Kings County Board of Supervisors with a set of proposed guidelines and Wednesday the course opened. Other courses have started opening, albeit with restrictions.

For starters, if a player wants to ride in a cart, he will have to do it alone, unless he is related to his partner. Golfers are asked not to touch flagsticks. Instead, the cup level was raised to prevent the ball from falling in the hole.

The clubhouse is closed to the public. Golfers check-in is at the front door. Players can still get something to eat thanks to the kitchen’s outdoor window. Golfers also aren’t allowed to congregate around the clubhouse before and after their rounds. “We’re definitely enforcing social distancing,” said Ringer.

Golfers can also use the driving range. Golf balls are washed after each use, and range baskets are dipped in disinfectant. The golf cars are also washed between rounds. There haven’t been any price increases, but the course’s hours have changed slightly. The revised hours are 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Lemoore’s course has been operating since 1992 as an 18-hole course when council members at the time opted to expand the original 9-hole course to its current 18 holes.

When the coronavirus pandemic began, California’s residents were asked to remain at home, leaving only for food, exercise, or medical treatment. All businesses deemed non-essential were to close their physical locations. However, golf courses were not explicitly listed as a non-essential or essential business.

However, most counties and cities made choices to close their golf courses. Within the last week, many of California’s public golf courses began opening, almost all of them with certain restrictions, similar to Lemoore’s.