Interest in purchasing Ironwood Golf Course from the city of Gainesville is brewing.
At Thursday’s Gainesville City Commission meeting, District 1 City Commissioner Desmon Duncan-Walker, who represents the district Ironwood is in, said she has received a lot of interest.
“We know there are people who are very interested in that conversation,” Duncan-Walker said.
She said one of those people interested in the course is Meadowbrook Golf Club owner Chris Marcum. Meadowbrook has been closed since 2021 due to water damage. A Top Golf-style range was supposed to be built on the property by fall 2022, but much of the project has not been completed.
“He [Marcum] did call,” said Gainesville city manager Cynthia Curry at Thursday’s commission meeting, “and Andrew [Persons, an adviser to the city manager for sustainable and equitable development] and I are trying to set up a meeting with him.”
Marcum declined to comment on his interest in buying Ironwood.
Commissioners have discussed selling the course as the city anticipates cuts to its budget. The course has experienced hundreds of thousands of dollars in operational losses over the last three fiscal years and has become a burden to the city, officials said.
Presentations for those looking to buy or lease Ironwood from the city will be held during the June 15 city commission meeting. The city commission will also discuss how to process and facilitate offers for the course.
Mayor Harvey Ward said he does not want that day to turn into a bidding war.
“I would prefer for us to use that meeting that day to put a process together for what we see,” Ward said. And “to get advice from the [city] manager for what our diverging paths are and what processes would look like so that we don’t just get people randomly coming up and start a bidding war on it.”
Curry declined to comment further until after the June 15 presentations. The meeting will begin at 10 a.m. in the first-floor auditorium at City Hall, 200 East University Ave.