Editorial Staying the course

On Friday, June 16, the Irish Golf Association, the 500 members of which come mainly from the Bronx, Queens, lower Westchester, as well as Connecticut and New Jersey, can take a bow.

For some time now, Irish golfers in the New York area have been finding it increasingly difficult to find a place to play, at times that suit them, and at reasonable prices. But rather than merely complain, a number of golfers decided to do something about it. The result is a new first-class links-style course on a 200-acre site at Union Vale, complete with state-of-the-art irrigation system. An 18,000-square-foot two-story clubhouse on the course is currently under construction and will be officially opened next spring.

That this project is so near to completion has taken some in the Irish community by surprise. Even some members of the IGA who were not regular visitors to Union Vale were taken a aback when they read in an Irish Echo feature article last April of the progress that had been made on the course.

The idea for the course goes back to the mid-1990s. In the fall of 1997, some IGA members discovered a farm for sale at Union Vale and eventually purchased it for $3,000 an acre. From there, IGA members quietly worked on their project with little fanfare, other than to seek some publicity when members were being sought. Of course, that there were those who were willing to pay $10,000 to become IGA members played no small part in ensuring that the $3.6 million project is now reaching fruition. But the IGA itself also embarked on the project in a common sense and businesslike approach, meeting and courting local officials early, laying out details of its finances for anyone who wished to know, as well as assigning preparation of the entire permit application to one professional group.

The Irish have often been accused of fighting among themselves. Indeed, the writer Brendan Behan said that the first thing on the agenda of any new Irish organization is a split.

On the rolling hills around Union Vale, however, Behan has been proved wrong. There, the IGA has shown what the Irish can still achieve when they work together — and when given the opportunity to do so.