{"id":414092,"date":"2025-11-30T02:00:16","date_gmt":"2025-11-30T02:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/414092\/"},"modified":"2025-11-30T02:00:16","modified_gmt":"2025-11-30T02:00:16","slug":"brown-grass-caused-the-pga-tour-to-pull-out-of-a-historic-maui-golf-course-leaving-a-50-million-hole-for-the-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/414092\/","title":{"rendered":"Brown grass caused the PGA Tour to pull out of a historic Maui golf course, leaving a $50 million hole for the island"},"content":{"rendered":"

High up on the slopes of the west Maui mountains, the Plantation Course at Kapalua Resort provides golfers with expansive ocean views. The course is so renowned that\u00a0The Sentry<\/a>, a $20 million signature event for the PGA Tour, had been held there nearly every year for more than a quarter-century.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to see it to believe it,\u201d said Ann Miller, a former longtime Honolulu newspaper golf writer. \u201cYou\u2019re looking at other islands, you\u2019re looking at whales. \u2026 Every view is beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n

Its world-class status also depends on keeping the course green.<\/p>\n

But with water woes in west Maui \u2014 facing drought and still reeling from a\u00a0deadly 2023 wildfire<\/a>\u00a0that ravaged the\u00a0historic town of Lahaina<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 keeping the course green enough for The Sentry became difficult.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, as the Plantation\u2019s fairways and greens grew brown, the PGA Tour canceled the season opener, a blow that cost what officials estimate to be $50 million economic impact on the area.<\/p>\n

A two-month closure and some rain helped get the course in suitable condition to reopen 17 holes earlier this month to everyday golfers who pay upwards of $469 to play a round. The 18th hole is set to reopen Monday, but the debate is far from over about the source of the water used to keep the course green and what its future looks like amid climate change.<\/p>\n

Questions about Hawaii\u2019s golf future<\/p>\n

There\u2019s concern that other high-profile tournaments will also bow out, taking with them economic benefits, such as money for charities, Miller said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt could literally change the face of it,\u201d she said, \u201cand it could change the popularity, obviously, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

The company that owns the courses, along with Kapalua homeowners and Hua Momona Farms, filed a lawsuit in August alleging Maui Land & Pineapple, which operates the century-old system of ditches that provides irrigation water to Kapalua and its residents, has not kept up repairs, affecting the amount of water getting down from the mountain.<\/p>\n

MLP has countersued and the two sides have exchanged accusations since then.<\/p>\n

As the water-delivery dispute plays out in court, Earthjustice, a nonprofit environmental legal group, is calling attention to a separate issue involving the use of drinking water for golf course irrigation, particularly irksome to residents contending with water restrictions amid drought, including Native Hawaiians who consider water a\u00a0sacred resource<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cPotable ground drinking water needs to be used for potable use,\u201d Lauren Palakiko, a west Maui taro farmer, told the Hawaii Commission on Water Resource Management at a recent meeting. \u201cI can\u2019t stress enough that it should never be pumped, injuring our aquifer for the sake of golf grass or vacant mansion swimming pools.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018This is water that we can drink\u2019<\/p>\n

Kapalua\u2019s Plantation and Bay courses, owned by TY Management Corp., have historically been irrigated with surface water delivered under an agreement with Maui Land & Pineapple, but since at least the summer have been using millions of gallons of potable groundwater, according to Earthjustice attorneys who point to correspondence from commission Chairperson Dawn Chang to MLP and Hawaii Water Service they say confirms it.<\/p>\n

Chang said her letter didn\u2019t authorize anything, but merely acknowledged an \u201coral representation\u201d that using groundwater is an an \u201cexisting use\u201d at times when there\u2019s not enough surface water. She is asking for supporting documentation from MLP and Hawaii Water Service to confirm that interpretation.<\/p>\n

In emails to The Associated Press, MLP said it did not believe groundwater could be used for golf course irrigation and Hawaii Water Service said it didn\u2019t communicate to the commission that using groundwater to irrigate the courses was an existing use.<\/p>\n

MLP\u2019s two wells that service the course provide potable water.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is water that we can drink. It\u2019s an even more precious resource within the sacred resource of wai,\u201d Dru Hara, an Earthjustice attorney said, using the Hawaiian word for water.<\/p>\n

Recycled water solutions<\/p>\n

TY, owned by Japanese billionaire and apparel brand Uniqlo\u2019s founder Tadashi Yanai, doesn\u2019t have control over what kind of water is in the reservoir they draw upon for irrigation, TY General Manager Kenji Yui said in a statement. They\u2019re also researching ways to bring recycled water to Kapalua for irrigation.<\/p>\n

Kamanamaikalani Beamer, a former commissioner, said he\u2019s troubled by Earthjustice\u2019s allegations that proper procedures weren\u2019t followed.<\/p>\n

The wrangling over water for golf shows that courses in Hawaii need to change their relationship with water, Beamer said: \u201cI think there needs to be a time very soon that all golf courses are utilizing at a minimum recycled water.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"High up on the slopes of the west Maui mountains, the Plantation Course at Kapalua Resort provides golfers…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":414093,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[285,1430,26621,268,1456,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-414092","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-climate-change","9":"tag-golf","10":"tag-hawaii","11":"tag-investment","12":"tag-pga-tour","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115636182957438339","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=414092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414092\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/414093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}