WHY THE 4:00 pm GOLF CART CLOSING
 

Perhaps this topic was addressed before, but does anyone know the reason for 4:00 PM golf course closings. I fail to see how a later closing would adversely affect our exposure to COVID-19. During this time of limited activity, this ruling seems somewhat arbitrary. Since we are all still paying our amenity fees and trail fees and golf has been accepted as an approved activity, why close early. The cost to The Villages has already been paid. This limited time is not only a problem with people wanting to play after 4 PM , but ripples through the entire system to deny us promised amenities.
I am generally supportive of The Villages (a great place) but this rule seems faulty. Perhaps The Villages is limited to what the state will allow.

They've lost a bunch of employees who felt it safer to not work during the pandemic. Since the human resources department is in the Villages offices, which are currently closed, they can't conduct interviews to replace these people. In addition, once the pandemic is over, those people will want their jobs back - and rightly so. No one should feel obligated to risk their lives in order to accommodate the entertainment needs of a bunch of self-sufficient able-bodied retired people. The Villages has allowed them to take a leave of absence. That means they get their jobs back when the pandemic is over.

That ALSO means that even if they were to hire people to cover the shifts - those people would need a couple weeks training - for a minimum-wage temp job. But they can't hire them, because they can't train them, because the pandemic has closed all of the departments responsible for hiring and training people.

Since they're short-staffed, something has to give. So they reduced the hours. The golf courses ARE open after 4. But the last tee time is 4PM (or 3:58, depending on the course).

Tee-times are available for 8 hours or more, every day. If you can't manage to find a tee-time at any nearby executive or championship course, then maybe you need to work on your phone-calling skills. The courses up in the northern section of the Villages are not heavily populated lately.

Thanks for your reply. I can accept the logic and trust it came from a learned source. However, your comment regarding the phone calling skills appears a bit critical to one who does scheduling by computer. I am finding that comment to be a totally wrong since very little is available north or south for Wednesday for example, which has been the case lately.

I would have liked them to open later and stay open later. Some people do work and look forward to daylight savings time so they can play after work. It doesn't affect me, but it does affect others.

Totally under stand...My concern is previously we were permitted to walk on after last tee time till dark. Why not now ? I don't quite comprehend that change
Been a number of nice evenings would have loved to play a round with the Ms

Did not see one answer in your supplied list. The question was why the 4PM closure. In response to the new post got an answer whether true or false. That was that some course employees opted not to risk exposure to COVID-9, thus not enough help available to keep open longer.

"Tee time hours are being modified to reflect the current available staffing levels of Executive Golf Operations. Hours will be from 7am through 4pm"

Village Community Development Districts

Read this carefully - IT’S A PERSONNEL ISSUE.

Do people really not know about all the closures that have happened in the last few weeks? Golf remains open with reduced hours, everything else has no hours.

Again I will ask.....what is so hard to understand? It's in the link above
I don't know but I'm pretty sure that would pertain to champ golf also


"Tee time hours are being modified to reflect the current available staffing levels of Executive Golf Operations. Hours will be from 7am through 4pm."

And I believe there is a number to call with further questions.

Steve

Yes, I know this has been discussed previously. Yes, I have read the limited staff explanation. Are not ALL the rec centers closed? What are those folks doing? Could those that choose to take the place of those golf course employees that choose not to work? On a related note; I have noticed that the golf course ambassadors are available to patrol the exec courses at 7:30 ish to ensure there are no walkers on the paths. The two that asked me to leave were actually pretty nice about it. Just following orders.

If we just followed orders and stayed off after 4:00, they wouldn't need to be there, nice or not.

The quote about the tee time is true, but it doesn't answer the question that the poster asked. He wasn't asking about tee times. I get what he's saying but I don't have an answer for him.

Here's his concern:

Previously, people could tee off AFTER the last scheduled tee time, in the evenings, and play until dark if they wanted to.

Now, they must adhere to the schedule, and may not tee off after the last scheduled tee time.

It used to be, if the last available tee time was 6:29 - and the starter left at 6:40...

you could go to the first hole at 7:10 and tee off and play a round if you wanted to.

I don't know if that was an actual permission granted, or if they simply looked the other way and didn't try to enforce any rules about it, or if it was against the rules and people just disregarded the rules and since there wasn't anyone there after hours to enforce it, nothing was ever done to do so.

But that is what I'm getting from this person's post: that he used to be able to play AFTER everyone with a scheduled tee-time was finished, and now he isn't allowed, and he wants to know why.

Unless the rules have changed you can PLAY after 4 p.m. WITHOUT a tee time
 

Yes, it did change.