ALAMEDA — A legal battle that drove relationships at Alameda’s municipal greens into the rough may soon run its course.
In a March 21 letter, then-City Manager Eric Levitt and Amy Wooldridge, Alameda’s director of recreation and parks, accused GGA and Umesh Patel of violating their lease—active through at least 2053—by pausing construction of the North Course, and demanded the company provide a final schedule of the build-out.ALAMEDA, CALIFORNIA – OCTOBER 3: Corica Park Golf Course owners Umesh Patel and his wife Avani Patel walk along the golf course at Corica Park Golf Course in Alameda, Calif., on Monday, Oct.
For now, that resolution appears to have left Alameda officials in the weeds with their own lawsuit, since it piggybacked off of claims within Logan’s complaints. Attorneys representing the city used that evidence to request a temporary restraining order allowing them to audit GGA’s books and the ability to terminate Corica Park’s lease agreement if construction to complete North Course renovations did not resume.
Alameda amended its complain earlier this month, and a case management conference is scheduled for Friday. Last year, the Patels said they felt like the city was retaliating against them for ruffling longtime golfers’ feathers, especially after the couple shrank the number of the clubs’ reserved tee times to accommodate more people from across the Bay Area. Those feelings prompted them to file a cross-complaint in September, accusing the city of directing a “campaign of harassment, false or baseless accusations, and character assassination” towards GGA and the Patels.