Brynwood Partners LLC has drastically scaled back its plans to build housing units that would turn Brynwood Golf & Country Club into a golf community.
The course”™s owners submitted a preliminary final environmental impact statement at the North Castle Town Board meeting Nov. 5. The statement details plans to build 80 housing units, including seven affordable housing units, 10 “golf cottages” and 63 condominiums. Attorney Mark Weingarten, who represents Brynwood Partners, said the proposed condos and golf cottages would be taxed like single-family homes. Previous iterations of the plan have included as many as 243 housing units on the golf course property.
“This has been a very long and complex process,” Weingarten told the Town Board. “We”™re looking to preserve the Brynwood Country Club by creating a first-class luxury neighborhood surrounding it.”
Weingarten said that if another location could be found for the seven affordable housing units, they would be built elsewhere and replaced with condos. Additionally, the owners of the country club proposed that the owners of the condos pay property taxes at a rate comparable to what would be paid by single-family homes.
Built in 1961, the Brynwood club was previously known as the Canyon Club. The course was owned by Mitsubishi and primarily used by the company”™s executives. Brynwood Partners LLC bought the course in December 2009 after it fell into financial distress due to dwindling membership.
Since buying the club, Brynwood Partners has reinvested millions of dollars into the course and hired Arizona-based golf club operator Troon Priv̩ to manage the clubӪs facilities. The 65,000-square-foot clubhouse was renovated and the club has started to financially rebound, Weingarten said at the meeting.
“They were successful and they”™ve built it up to 400 members, half of which are North Castle residents. We think they”™ve created an asset worth preserving for this community,” Weingarten said.
But, Weingarten said, private golf clubs can”™t survive on just golf, activities and dining anymore.
“Unfortunately, we believe that it”™s not enough to have long-term success,” Weingarten told the board. “The fact of the matter is that the golf course world has gotten worse. If we”™re going to be successful in having this club succeed in Armonk and be here for years to come, we need to create a better course with better facilities.”
The addition of housing units would create a community targeting empty nesters that would enable Brynwood Partners to reinvest the proceeds from the sale of the condos and golf cottages in the course.
As the project moves forward, the developers will place funds in escrow and the town will refer the preliminary final environmental impact statement out to its consultants. After the consultants report back to the board, public hearings will be opened regarding Brynwood Partners”™ request to amend the town”™s comprehensive plan, add special-use permit language to the town code and qualify the property for the special use.
Reached by email, Brynwood Partners LLC said, “We appreciate that the Town Board has decided to review our revised FEIS and we look forward to working with them.”
Brynwood isn”™t the only course in Westchester County seeking to build condominiums and use the sale of the housing units to support the golf course.
In January, Hampshire Country Club in Mamaroneck unveiled its plan to build 121 luxury condominiums in a 290,000-square-foot cluster that would have included a 200-space underground parking garage. The village shot down that proposal a month later due to community worries about increased traffic and environmental concern in an area prone to flooding. A second, scaled-down proposal by Hampshire was also denied by Mamaroneck”™s elected officials. In response, Hampshire sued the town, seeking $55 million in damages.
While Westchester County is the birthplace of golf in the United States and home to some of the country”™s most historic courses, a downturn in the game”™s popularity among younger adults and the expense of the sport in general has hit private clubs hard in recent years.
“We”™re losing money every month totaling into the millions of dollars. It”™s unsustainable,” Weingarten, speaking for Brynwood Partners, told the Town Board. “If we want to sustain (the golf club), we need the housing. We have no other alternative.”
