After 18 months without a clubhouse, lost to fire in January
2006, Bolado Golf Course received the go-ahead this week from the
state to begin construction.
Hollister – After 18 months without a clubhouse, lost to fire in January 2006, Bolado Golf Course received the go-ahead this week from the state to begin construction.
Mike Winn, president of the San Benito County Golf and Country Club board, said everyone associated with the course is excited to finally see action taken. Construction has been on hold for months while plans have been sent back and forth between the club and the state for approval – which came Monday – with changes to disabled access.
If construction stays on schedule, the building should be done Feb. 20, 2008. It would then be open to members in April 2008, Winn said.
Winn said the new clubhouse will have many of the old building’s features, but a newer look and feel. The board president hopes the new clubhouse turns around a trend in the course’s membership, which has declined from 275 to 200 since the fire, he said.
“It’s a lot like it was before,” Winn said of the new design. “Of course, we’re using the same foundation.”
That foundation will need some alterations, which the site’s general contractor, Tony Silva of AJS Construction Incorporated, will handle.
Silva was at the site Wednesday marking and surveying the old foundation to begin excavation.
“There’s a lot of old stuff here that we need to rip out,” Silva said.
There will be a char-broiler – which the old clubhouse didn’t have – in addition to the fryer, stove and griddle in the new kitchen, Winn said.
The new clubhouse will have a bar – furnished with stools – which serves beer and wine. The old clubhouse did not include such a bar, Winn said.
The course’s food offerings have been relegated to snacks and sodas in a trailer that doubles as a starter shack. There will be an alcove in the new building to allow the starter a view of the first tee.
James Ferland, clubhouse manager, said the members and employees of the San Benito County Golf and Country Club have been waiting for a new home.
“Mike’s been working really hard to get this going,” Ferland said. “Everyone’s been working so hard.”
Faulty electrical wiring caused the 2am blaze Jan. 21, 2006, that destroyed the original clubhouse, built in 1950. Local firefighters weren’t alerted to the blaze until almost an hour after it began, when a passerby called emergency officials, authorities said at the time.
