Questions are swirling among golfers in the D.C. area about what will happen to the District’s three public golf courses, after news Wednesday of President Donald Trump’s administration terminating the National Links Trust’s lease to manage the courses.
Now the National Park Service will manage East Potomac Golf Links, Rock Creek Park Golf and Langston Golf Course.
National Links Trust is a nonprofit with a stated goal of making golf more accessible to the public.
“We were formed because we want to make sure that there are affordable golf options for our community,” Executive Director Damian Cosby told WTOP. “Especially in the municipal space, it’s our duty to make sure our facilities are affordable and accessible. Golf in general has become very, very expensive.”
That mission includes management of the courses and community programming at the courses, including Free Lesson Friday, a series of free golf clinics at East Potomac and Langston to golfers of all ages. The organization also runs a workforce development program, providing intern and caddie positions at Langston.
Rock Creek is closed for a renovation that was just about to begin, but has now been halted. While East Potomac and Langston remain open, all the programming offered at those courses is now in limbo, Cosby said.
WTOP spoke to a student golfer who credited National Links Trust for what she called incredible opportunities.
“I was the first female golfer on the East Coast to play at Pebble Beach through the Tiger Woods Junior Invitational,” Aaliyah Shabazz said. “I wouldn’t have been presented with that if I never came here to Langston and if National Links Trust wasn’t here to support me.”
The 17-year-old Dunbar High School student is one of the caddies at Langston, and completed a summer internship through the program.
“Where we learn workforce development skills that we can use on and off the golf course,” Shabazz said.
One of the mangers at Langston Golf Course, Melchior George, came outside to greet Shabazz and her mother.
“Young ladies like Aaliyah have been like young roses that we’ve watched blossom here at Langston,” George said. “There’s a rich history of that and hopefully we’ll find a way to continue to do that.”
According to George, there are between 20 and 30 student athletes who are involved with the program every year at Langston, and he said the goal is to teach them the career opportunities within golf.
“Managing brands, growing and being creative to be able to do what it is that they have their eyes and their hearts set on,” George said.
Langston Golf Course is near and dear to George’s heart.
“I’ve been here all my life, since I was 5 years old, sitting on the porch there since I was 5 years old,” George said.
Not only did George’s father attend school across the street from Langston, but his grandfather lived two miles away.
“We are deeply entrenched in this community, and how it’s impacted people of underserved communities, African American, Hispanic, and we want to continue to find ways to reach out to our young people,” George said.
Langston Golf Course dates back to 1939 and was the second racially desegregated golf course in D.C.
The course was named after John Mercer Langston, the founding dean of law at Howard University and the first African American elected to Congress in Virginia.
“Being a steward of a municipal golf facility, it’s our duty to be an on-ramp for golfers that don’t have means, or are new to the game, or are on a fixed income. We are the places where they can go to play, to feel welcomed and to be able to afford to play,” Cosby, executive director of the National Links Trust, said.
WTOP’s Nick Iannelli and Thomas Robertson contributed to this report.
