Our lawn isn't a good lie, church protests

By MATTHEW WAITE

© St. Petersburg Times, published March 21, 2000

PORT RICHEY -- For David Wilson, church administrator at River Ridge Presbyterian Church, the situation with their neighbor next door is embarrassing.

It seems that for more than three years some duffers from the All Star Golf driving range on Ridge Road haven't seen their prayers answered, and their persistent hook has sent dimpled golf balls into the church yard. With the House of the Lord under siege from wayward golf balls, Wilson said, they had to go to a House of Law and sue their neighbor.

[Times photo: Janel Schroeder] David Wilson of River Ridge Presbyterian Church stands over a barrel full of wayward golf balls that landed on the church's grounds in Port Richey.

"We're a church," Wilson said apologetically. "We don't sue people; we help people."

The church more than a week ago filed an injunction against All Star Golf Inc. in Pasco Circuit Court to get the range owner to put 50-foot-tall nets between the business and the church.

A man at All Star Golf Monday afternoon who identified himself as the owner but wouldn't give his name said that nets would be installed by June 1. Flying golf balls have claimed a parishioner's windshield and a tail light over the past three years, according to the lawsuit. The leisure missiles have also put nearly a dozen dents into the metal roof of the gym, Wilson said. The matching blue metal doors that faces the driving range have golf-ball-size dents in them.

The majority of balls golfers were hitting Monday went into the practice fairway, landing harmlessly near mock holes. But the west end tee boxes do face the gym. To hit the church, a golfer would have to possess a bad hook or manage to hit one straight from the west end boxes -- at least 250 yards on the fly and over the cross facing the driving range and a dozen mature pine trees towering above the two-story gym.

To hear Wilson explain it, the property damage is a nuisance but no big deal. But the threat to the 85 middle school children who play outside from time to time is a serious worry.

"Our concern is we will be injured using our property," he said.

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