This is the first installment of a continuing series on the renovation of a Superfund site in Monticello, Utah. Periodic reports by Hal Phillips, a former editor with Golf Course News, will examine what role golf may play in how a community of 2,200 residents utilizes land it will inherit from the federal government.

By Hal Phillips

This mud is different. It doesn't follow the familiar pattern of simply filling the nooks and crannies of a boot sole, only to squish out in all directions when hard rubber meets terra not-so firma. No, the mire here is more perverse; it gloms onto the underside of one's foot, forming an oval-shaped patty substantially wider and longer than the shoe itself.

Perhaps this mud acts differently because a 25-year rainstorm has just blown through southeastern Utah, transforming the normally arid clay soil into a sea of brownish-red goo. While visitors move gingerly, their eyes cast down to survey the treacherous track, an experienced mudder like Paul Mushovic forges along with breezy confidence, looking straight ahead, his dirt-caked boots having taken on the quality of snow shoes.

"You can see it there — a wonderful hole running along the pond," an animated Mushovic points out. "If we put a green right there, then we can run a par 3 across the far corner of the retention pond, or maybe across the creek channel, which follows that line of vegetation there. And if we decide to put the new clubhouse on top of the hill across the way, you can see we'd have a great par 4 finishing hole. Can you see it?"

Anyone can see it. Bending gently uphill to the right. It's as plain to see as the 10,000-foot Blue Mountains, which, if one looks west, form an enormous snow-capped backdrop for every house, tree, streetlight and ball washer in Monticello, a community of 2,200 residents that has nine holes of golf.

But Mushovic is hell-bent on providing the city with at least nine more. And he intends to lay them out on this 110-acre quagmire hard by Montezuma Creek that, truth be told, is one of the last properties one might expect to be used for recreation.

Of course, the Department of Energy isn't in the course-building business. Neither is the Environmental Protection Agency, whose traditional role in golf development has been that of regulatory bogeyman. Many a project has been snuffed out by the Agency's protective, some say overprotective, administration of environmental policy. Yet both the DOE and the EPA are solidly behind this project. Call it bureaucratic guilt. Or further evidence of the game's broad popularity. Or another sign of golf's growing environmental reputation. Mushovic and his federal colleagues have recognized an opportunity to responsibly close the book on 50 years of government intrusion while expanding the city's golf offerings to 18 holes. This willing federal marriage of radioactive clean-up and golf development is what makes the Monticello project so extraordinary.

Though he may sound like one, Paul Mushovic is not a golf developer — not in the ordinary sense. He's a senior scientist with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which, along with the State of Utah, is overseeing the Department of Energy's remediation of the Montezuma Creek watershed.

Starting in 1941, the government-funded Vanadium Corporation of America operated a mill along the creek. The facility processed vanadium, a radioactive element used to strengthen steel. Three years later, the Monticello mill started generating a uranium-vanadium sludge used in the production of "yellow cake" earmarked for the Manhattan Project. Purchased by the Atomic Energy Commission in 1948, the facility continued to churn out weapons-grade vanadium and uranium.

When the mill was dismantled in 1960, it left behind tons of radioactive soil — "tailings" that were subsequently utilized around Monticello to mix mortar, to form beds for utility lines, even to pave driveways. With authorization under the Atomic Energy Act, the Department of Energy assumed stewardship of the mill site in 1980. Under the EPA's watchful eye, the DOE has since rid more than 400 private properties of these "hot" tailings under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, better known as Superfund.

In 1995, the two agencies set about purging the 110-acre site. The city broached the idea of building, where the processing plant once stood, nine more holes for Blue Mountain Meadows Golf Course, a nine-hole facility. The location, a few hundred yards from the existing nine and just across Highway 191, couldn't be more ideal. Being a practical man, and a certifiable golf nut, Mushovic didn't need much convincing. "I've been pushing the golf angle here as long as I've been on this project, since the early 1990s," he says. "It just makes too much sense."

"Without the assistance and interest of DOE and EPA, building the new nine wouldn't be possible," said Mayor K. Dale Black. "But make no mistake: There's still some resentment. My father-in-law worked at the site. People feel the mill may be responsible for the abnormally high incidence of cancer we have. Even after the mill closed, our kids played in those tailing piles and swam in the leaching ponds. Folks were pretty unsuspecting, and I guess the government wasn't a particularly responsible steward. But I believe the government wants to see this [course] happen as much as we do."

The Department of Energy is scheduled to complete its clean-up effort during the summer of 1999, says Wayne Evelo, the DOE's chemical engineer in charge of the project. By then, more than 2 million cubic yards of contaminated soil will have been excavated, hauled away and buried in a repository a mile from the site. The DOE has set aside approximately 120,000 cubic yards of "clean" soil to reapportion about 110 acres; it has further agreed to use this fill to "shape" basic golf course features, provided the city can supply design plans. [Golf Journal and the USGA will not offer any guidance or preferential assistance to any aspect of the project. Our only role will be to chronicle the activities in Monticello.]

As part of the remediation effort, Evelo explains, the DOE must leave the site with erosion control features — flat surfaces with minimal slopes ideal for golf. "But we can't do any of the fine sculpting or creative backfill work associated with course construction," he says. "We can't build tees or greens; that wouldn't be a reasonable use of taxpayer dollars." Adds Mushovic: "We can't construct the course. But to the extent we can shape it, we'll shape it. We can get things down in the right place and make the course as reasonable as possible to build."

Superfund regulations also oblige the DOE to restore at least 12 acres of wetlands and revegetate the parcel. Evelo says the DOE can't plant bentgrass; that would be too close to golf development. However, the department has agreed to provide Monticello with those funds for revegetation, allowing the city to buy turfgrass seed. Once the basic shaping is finished, the DOE intends to hand the land over to Monticello, which will then set about building the course itself.

This is when reality will set in.

"This is not a wealthy community," explains Monticello city manager C. Trent Schafer. "Once DOE shapes the course, it seems like $500,000 to $600,000 will be necessary to build greens, install an irrigation system and connect the nines with a tunnel [under Highway 191]. We don't have that kind of money. We'll have to beat the bushes, look under every rock for grant money and corporate investment. And we'll certainly rely on volunteers to get the work done because the course won't be able to repay loans for a long time."

Monticellans aren't shy about rolling up their sleeves. The municipal swimming pool, the original nine holes and the recreation facility at nearby Loyd's Lake were built with volunteer labor following grass-root, fund-raising efforts. "That's how we've done just about everything here," notes the mayor.

Yet Black also recognizes this nine will be Monticello's most ambitious project. Although course architect Ron Cutlip toured the site and subsequently donated a set of preliminary sketches, the city has decided it cannot afford the luxury of a full-fledged designer. The city will rely on Cutlip's conceptual drawings, Mushovic's amateur ardor and the practical wherewithal of Chriss Leavitt, the course superintendent at Eagle Vail Golf Club in Avon, Colo. Leavitt is the brother of Monticello city councilman Craig Leavitt; he's also the son of Grant Leavitt, who served as pro at Blue Mountain Meadows for 35 years.

"I sort of grew up on that course, so I feel like I owe the town something," says Leavitt, who admits that he, like many superintendents, is eager to apply his agronomic skills in the design arena. "I probably know enough about architecture to get myself into trouble, but I also think I know what 'not' to do. I'll say this: It's exciting to be involved in a project where building a course and recovering the land are so important. We're going to have to do this on a shoestring, but that's part of what makes it so interesting."

Built in the 1950s, Blue Mountain Meadows is long on charm and short on window dressing. There are but two sand bunkers (which saves on rakes) and golfers won't see any yardage notations on irrigation heads. Yet the course is picturesque, well kept and, in spots, inventive. The par-5 fifth sports a wonderful tee, perched on a hillside 60 feet above the fairway. From this rarefied vantage point it's not uncommon to see several herd of deer meandering across the course.

Blue Mountain Meadows may be modest, but it's popular nevertheless. The municipal layout handles 10,000 rounds a year, and a common sight are the retirees who drive up from Arizona and park their RVs across from the clubhouse. As Monticello is located on the road between Moab National Park and Lake Powell, the course accommodates a significant number of holiday-makers who drop in for a quick nine.

"We have several groups that come here just to play that course," says Charles O'Berry, proprietor of Monticello's Grist Mill Bed & Breakfast. "We have one group that comes in every year from Montrose [in Colorado, some 100 miles to the East]. So I'm confident that 18 holes would bring in quite a bit more business. These golfers come in for three, four nights and they spend money all over town; the groups that come in now are free spenders."

"We may quadruple our play with 18," adds Mayor Black. "The climate here is ideal during the summer. We're up about 7,000 feet. When it's 105 degrees in Moab, it's 85 degrees up here."

Monticellans are especially eager to bolster their tourist trade because they recognize the local economy will sag when the federal agencies finish their work. For 16 years the federal government has employed 150 to 200 workers on the mill site and surrounding properties. "DOE has pumped a lot of money into this economy," says Evelo. "But that's going to start drying up very quickly." Mayor Black expects the housing market to soften; Schafer is certain the city's sales tax revenues will suffer.

Like O'Berry, Mayor Black would love to see Monticello offset its losses by becoming a tourist stop. Says O'Berry: "You can't swing a dead cat around here without hitting a national monument or Indian ruin." The Morman Church recently built a temple here, the only one serving the Four Corners region, bringing a modest influx of newlywed visitors. In theory, a new nine would add to the equation; indeed, there isn't another 18-hole course within 50 miles. There's even been talk of renovating the existing nine.

But Black refuses to be carried away. "It would really be nice to build a big, beautiful, monument golf course here, but financially that's not possible. Throughout this process we've tried to keep our feet planted firmly on the ground and tackle the basics. We need to build nine new holes and we need to sort out a tunnel to connect the nines. And we can't do any of that until we find ourselves some money."

"Let's face it," says Mushovic, "there's no way this community can come up with what it costs to build a course. If they can come up with $300,000 to $400,000, they'd be lucky. However, with that sort of funding, and all of us working together, I still think we can make a go of this thing."