I heard…
That 69 percent of the membership at Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester, N.Y., voted to restore its East Course to the vintage 1925 Donald Ross design. With the club contracted with the PGA of America to host two major championships in the the next six years, Andrew Green will be handling the changes to holes that had previously been redesigned by Tom Fazio and Robert Trent Jones III. Green will have tour player input from Rochester native Jeff Sluman, the 1988 PGA champion. Ground breaking will take place just after the club hosts the Senior PGA Championship in 2019. “The history of the place is incredible and the documentation spectacular,” said Green, who is also handling a Ross restoration at Inverness. “We’ve got a nice set of documents to work off of.” The timetable for restoration is expected to have the course open for members by Memorial Day 2020, and completely grown in by 2023, when the club hosts its fourth PGA Championship, the last won by Jason Dufner in 2013. If there’s concern about Oak Hill’s readiness for the 2023 PGA, particularly if the PGA of America goes ahead with a proposal to move the dates of the major from August to May, it’s not over course conditions but whether the weather in upstate New York could create problems during the 100-day build out of the infrastructure required to host a major.