Mahalo for supporting Honolulu Star-Advertiser. Enjoy this free story!

The state is taking steps to reclaim control of the land it owns under the Olomana golf course in Waimanalo and recover unpaid rent from a company that closed the course two weeks ago. Read more

The state is taking steps to reclaim control of the land it owns under the Olomana golf course in Waimanalo and recover unpaid rent from a company that closed the course two weeks ago.

The Department of Land and Natural Resources is requesting board approval to terminate a lease and permit with Olomana Golf Links Inc. and recoup $115,275 of delinquent rent by cashing in bank deposits serving as a performance bond.

Board members are scheduled to consider the request at a Friday meeting.

It’s unclear whether Olomana Golf intends to make any effort to hold onto its lease, which runs through 2032, and reopen the golf course, which has been in business since the 1960s.

A representative of the company could not be reached Tuesday or last week.

Olomana Golf has had a difficult time with the property since new owners acquired the business in 2016 with plans to improve the 18-hole course, which features budget prices and has been popular with President Barack Obama and local golf star Michelle Wie.

Edward Kageyama, a local golf industry veteran who was also a Hawaii and Asia-Pacific regional manager for Virginia-based management firm Billy Casper Golf, bought Olomana Golf with partners two years ago and intended to re-brand the course under the Billy Casper name.

That branding deal didn’t work out, but Kageyama in late 2016 said his goal was to make Olomana prettier with upgrades to tee boxes, fairways and greens. He hired the former chef of Palomino and Ola, Fred DeAngelo, to improve the restaurant. And he envisioned developing a training center for college players and young pros to complement the state’s largest junior golf program, the Casey Nakama Golf Development Center, which had operated at Olomana since 1996.

Instead, Olomana Golf was challenged with just keeping the course playable because of repeated flooding.

Kageyama said last year that flooding from the adjacent Waimanalo Stream on Marine Corps property at Bellows Air Force Station had forced partial or complete course closures for about 90 days between July 2016 and April 2017.

Kageyama said at the time that Olomana Golf had lost around $400,000 in revenue and was seeking damages from the Marine Corps.

“We have suffered great economic hardship,” he said in a July interview.

Olomana Golf told DLNR last year that it couldn’t pay the rent because of its losses. The company’s minimum rent is $140,000 a year, with $35,000 due every quarter. The company also rents a plant nursery site for $18,500 a year. Rent can be higher if certain percentages of revenue top the minimum rent.

In June DLNR said the company was about $138,000 in arrears. Olomana Golf sought a repayment plan but then paid the overdue rent by the end of July before DLNR’s board was scheduled to take up the request.

By January, however, Olomana Golf had not paid $70,700 in rent, according to DLNR. Olomana Golf managed to pay $35,000 last month, but DLNR said in a report that the delinquency is now at $115,275.

Olomana Golf, which had about 35 employees, also had trouble paying vendors. A golf cart supplier took back about 90 carts in March. Then all operations ceased April 13, and a chain was strung across the entryway to the parking lot.

DLNR’s report said Olomana Golf has a performance bond in the form of two certificate of deposits totaling $289,060 that could be retained up to what the state is owed under the lease.

The agency also said in the report that it will convey to the board any requests it receives to use the property on an interim or long-term basis.