by Fred Seely
Editorial Director
The First Tee of Jacksonville is trying to give itself a present for its fifth birthday and a former National Football League star is helping the kids’ golf program.
The innercity youth program, one of almost 200 nationwide, aspires to add a learning center building to its nine-hole course and large range just off I-95 and Golfair Blvd.
“We have plans for a large building that would give us the ability to really implement the life skills program,” said board chairman John Donahoo Jr. of the Bank of America. “We know that we’ll need to raise between $250,000 and a half-million, and we’re gearing up to do that.”
The “gearing up” includes new staff and a board that has a citywide reach. It also includes former football star LeRoy Butler, a Jacksonville native who grew up in a local housing project and who emerged to stardom with Florida State and the Green Bay Packers.
The First Tee opened five years ago after a major effort by the Deerwood Rotary Club as a whole and specifically George Doyle of the Suddath Cos., one of its members.
They raised money, including $750,000 from the City Council, and got the land next to the A. Philip Randolph Center, the nine-hole course designed by Mark McCumber, a large range, a doublewide as the headquarters and staff.
“It’s time to do something bigger,” said Donahoo, who took over as board chairman last year. “The Rotary Club did a great job. Now, we need to extend our reach around the city, to bring in people from all areas.”
The Rotarians are still deeply involved and Donahoo and a pal, attorney Carl “Hap” Stewart, are building a new board to take The First Tee into the next decade or so.
They’re also getting more corporate involvement from companies such as Wachovia, Hartley Press and The Players Championship. PGA Tour player Len Mattiace has raised money through his charity event. A major fundraiser with the St. Johns First Tee is being planned. The national First Tee office, which is based at the World Golf Village, has added funding as well as has the WGV.
The City’s support is continuing — the district’s City Council member, Gwen Yates, is solidly behind it as is another influential Council member, the Westside’s Michael Corrigan, whose son and father-in-law are regulars in the program.
The staff has been boosted with the addition of Pepper Peete as general manager. She brings management expertise and a solid golfing background: her husband is former Players Championship winner Calvin Peete.
The program now has about 400 students. The course remains in good condition with the help of advice from Timuquana superintendent Chris Neff.
It’s also a public facility and there’s a reasonably steady stream of people playing for perhaps the lowest rates in the city. The course sits on part of the old Brentwood course, which was designed in 1922 as Jacksonville Municipal by the famed Donald Ross, and McCumber gave it a Ross flavor.
Security has always been a problem in that area — Brentwood closed in 1977 after numerous robberies of golfers by thugs from adjoining housing projects — and there was a well-publicized robbery on the course two years ago.
“We’ve worked hard on that,” said Donahoo. “We know it’s a concern. The sheriff’s department has been great. We have fencing in place. A security system is in place to scan the area.”
Donahoo dreams of a comprehensive program to serve the kids, and hopes the building will attract others who have similar interests.
“We’ve already talked to the Otis Smith Foundation and LeRoy’s foundation,” he said. “There are others like those, too, such as the MalaVai Washington Foundation, which would make a good fit.
“If we had a roof for everyone to get under, we could work together for a great program.”
One model may be the East Lake Community Foundation in Atlanta, which took over the Ross-designed East Lake course, worked to clean out the slums which surrounded it and today has a public nine-hole course, a massive kids’ program and affordable housing around the venerable course, which is ultra-private and the home of the Tour Championship.
“We don’t have the advantage of having an East Lake,” said Donahoo, “but we have a good location and I think we have the ability to raise the money we need.
“It’s an investment. We need those kids to be good citizens.”