The Detroit Golf Club says it has a contingency plan if it can't resolve the bubbling labor dispute with members of its grounds and maintenance crew, but the club is staying mum on what that plan looks like as the city readies to host its first PGA Tour event in history.

“As with any event of this size and importance to the community," Detroit Golf Club president Andy Glassberg said in a statement Tuesday, "we have contingency plans built in for many different scenarios."

In a follow-up email from the Free Press, requesting specific details about the plan, a spokesperson declined to elaborate.

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The Rocket Mortgage Classic is set to tee off Thursday at Detroit Golf Club, and in the shadows of the event, the union representing the club's seven-member grounds and maintenance crew says it's willing to strike if the club doesn't grant its request for a 3% pay raise, better health care benefits and job security language under a new contract.

The workers have been advised not to talk about the negotiations.

The Detroit Golf Club workers include five groundskeepers and two mechanics. In addition, there are 40 temporary groundskeepers, who are not part of the union and could be called upon to keep the course at PGA Tour standards if the union strikes.

Officials from the PGA Tour said Tuesday afternoon they have a turf management expert who visits each site before a tournament, but the PGA is not responsible for providing groundskeepers. That responsibility, officials say, belongs to Detroit Golf Club this week.

"Without our guys," said Kevin Moore, president of Teamsters Local 299, the local union representing the group, "their stuff don't work."

The groundskeepers mow the property's greens, tees boxes, fairways and rough. They repair and maintain sand traps, fertilize, work with irrigation, plant flower beds and help with general clean-up and maintenance.

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The mechanics fix the specialized equipment that is used daily to keep the property's two Donald Ross-designed courses in tip-top shape, including lawn mowers, edging equipment, plugging equipment for fairways such as aerators, and rollers and mowers to manicure the greens.

Moore said the group is willing to take action starting Wednesday. On the table: "Demonstrations, strikes, whatever is at our disposal."

Teamsters employees want a 45 cents-per-hour pay increase. Glassberg said in a statement Monday the club offered a contract with benefits and salaries 4% higher per year than the most recent contract and a 17% increase over the duration. The union deemed the offer insufficient, citing a 15% to 20% wage reduction in 2015 and a nearly $600 a month increase in out-of-pocket medical expenses for family medical.

"I hope it doesn't get there," Moore said Tuesday, of a potential strike. "That's a question that's kind of elusive. My job isn't to jeopardize their job, my job is to get them awareness for a fair contract. They're just being asked to be treated fairly."

Contact Greg Levinsky: glevinsky@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @GregLevinsky.