Brown grass cost a famed golf course a big tournament and highlighted Hawaii water

 problems

JENNIFER SINCO KELLEHER
Sat, November 29, 2025

AP

FILE - Justin Thomas hits from the seventh tee during the first round of the Tournament of Champions golf tournament at Kapalua Plantation Course on Kapalua, Hawaii, Jan. 7, 2016. (AP Photo/Matt York, File)(ASSOCIATED PRESS)

FILE - Jon Rahm, of Spain, hits from the 13th fairway during the final round of the Tournament of Champions golf event, Jan. 9, 2022, at Kapalua Plantation Course in Kapalua, Hawaii. (AP Photo/Matt York, File)(ASSOCIATED PRESS)

FILE - A Kapalua Ridge Villas sign is viewed on Oct. 3, 2023, in Lahaina, Hawaii. (AP Photo/Mengshin Lin, File)(ASSOCIATED PRESS)

HONOLULU (AP) — High up on the slopes of the west Maui mountains, the Plantation Course at Kapalua Resort provides golfers with expansive ocean views. The course is so renowned that The Sentry, a $20 million signature event for the PGA Tour, had been held there nearly every year for more than a quarter-century.

“You have to see it to believe it," said Ann Miller, a former longtime Honolulu newspaper golf writer. “You're looking at other islands, you're looking at whales. ... Every view is beautiful.”

Its world-class status also depends on keeping the course green.

But with water woes in west Maui — facing drought and still reeling from a deadly 2023 wildfire that ravaged the historic town of Lahaina — keeping the course green enough for The Sentry became difficult.

Ultimately, as the Plantation's fairways and greens grew brown, the PGA Tour canceled the season opener, a blow that cost what officials estimate to be $50 million economic impact on the area.

A two-month closure and some rain helped get the course in suitable condition to reopen 17 holes earlier this month to everyday golfers who pay upwards of $469 to play a round. The 18th hole is set to reopen Monday, but the debate is far from over about the source of the water used to keep the course green and what its future looks like amid climate change.

Questions about Hawaii's golf future

There’s concern that other high-profile tournaments will also bow out, taking with them economic benefits, such as money for charities, Miller said.

“It could literally change the face of it,” she said, “and it could change the popularity, obviously, too.”

The company that owns the courses, along with Kapalua homeowners and Hua Momona Farms, filed a lawsuit in August alleging Maui Land & Pineapple, which operates the century-old system of ditches that provides irrigation water to Kapalua and its residents, has not kept up repairs, affecting the amount of water getting down from the mountain.

MLP has countersued and the two sides have exchanged accusations since then.

As the water-delivery dispute plays out in court, Earthjustice, a nonprofit environmental legal group, is calling attention to a separate issue involving the use of drinking water for golf course irrigation, particularly irksome to residents contending with water restrictions amid drought, including Native Hawaiians who consider water a sacred resource.

“Potable ground drinking water needs to be used for potable use,” Lauren Palakiko, a west Maui taro farmer, told the Hawaii Commission on Water Resource Management at a recent meeting. “I can’t stress enough that it should never be pumped, injuring our aquifer for the sake of golf grass or vacant mansion swimming pools.”

‘This is water that we can drink’

Kapalua's Plantation and Bay courses, owned by TY Management Corp., have historically been irrigated with surface water delivered under an agreement with Maui Land & Pineapple, but since at least the summer have been using millions of gallons of potable groundwater, according to Earthjustice attorneys who point to correspondence from commission Chairperson Dawn Chang to MLP and Hawaii Water Service they say confirms it.

Chang said her letter didn't authorize anything, but merely acknowledged an “oral representation" that using groundwater is an an “existing use” at times when there’s not enough surface water. She is asking for supporting documentation from MLP and Hawaii Water Service to confirm that interpretation.

In emails to The Associated Press, MLP said it did not believe groundwater could be used for golf course irrigation and Hawaii Water Service said it didn’t communicate to the commission that using groundwater to irrigate the courses was an existing use.

MLP's two wells that service the course provide potable water.

“This is water that we can drink. It’s an even more precious resource within the sacred resource of wai,” Dru Hara, an Earthjustice attorney said, using the Hawaiian word for water.

Recycled water solutions

TY, owned by Japanese billionaire and apparel brand Uniqlo’s founder Tadashi Yanai, doesn't have control over what kind of water is in the reservoir they draw upon for irrigation, TY General Manager Kenji Yui said in a statement. They're also researching ways to bring recycled water to Kapalua for irrigation.

Kamanamaikalani Beamer, a former commissioner, said he's troubled by Earthjustice's allegations that proper procedures weren't followed.

The wrangling over water for golf shows that courses in Hawaii need to change their relationship with water, Beamer said: “I think there needs to be a time very soon that all golf courses are utilizing at a minimum recycled water.”

Donald Trump’s golf bill for the American taxpayer is on eye-popping pace

HuffPost said that current total sits at $70.8 million.

Brian Linder

Sun, November 30, 2025 

Donald Trump loves to golf and that does not come cheap for the American people.

In fact, according to a recent analysis by HuffPost, the president has spent nearly $71 million of taxpayer money hitting the links this year. And, per the report, that puts him on pace to shell out a whopping $300 million on golf during his second term in office.

To put that in perspective, Trump spent an estimated $151.5 million golfing during his first term, so he is on pace to double that figure.

“I really wish I could tell you that it would make anyone in America change their mind about him, but the corruption is so backed in, so endemic, and so ludicrous that it feels like the collective reaction will be a shrug,” Republican consultant Rick Wilson said per HuffPost. “It’s one more example of Trump defining the presidency down. Way, way down.”

According to HuffPost, Trump golfed at his Palm Beach County course, just four miles from Mar-a-Lago, last week. The outlet reported that each golfing trip costs $3.4 million in travel and security expenses. Trump has made 16 trips to Mar-a-Lago, where he typically goes before golfing at courses in West Palm Beach and Jupiter, and nine to his course in Bedminster, New Jersey. The outlet said each of those trips cost about $1.1 million. HuffPost said Trump’s trip to Aberdeen, Scotland for the opening of a new course cost nearly $10 million.

HuffPost said that current total sits at $70.8 million.

The outlet’s estimate comes in at a far lower total than the website DidTrumpGolfToday.com which tracks the president’s golf trips and estimates that he has spent $107,800,000.

HuffPost came to its estimate by using figures from a 2019 Government Accountability Office report that examined Trump’s first four trips to Mar-a-Lago during his first administration. You can see the report, here. It calculated that each of those trips cost $3,383,250, and that was based on 2017 dollars meaning that the actual cost today is likely higher than the estimate.

The costs involved with him golfing in Florida include flying in on Air Force One. Also, per the site, the military flies the vehicles for his motorcade in on C-17s each time he makes the trip. Also, because Mar-a-Lago, where Trump stays while he plays at his courses, is on the water, police boats with machine guns and a Coast Guard vessel have to be called in to patrol. The site said additional costs included law enforcement and bomb sniffing dogs.