Michael Pascucci's Sebonack Golf Club Scores a "Whole" in One:
The Most Environmentally Conscious
Golf Club on Long Island

Story by Maureen Traxler
Cover Photo by Miranda Gatewood

If you ask Sebonack Golf Club owner/developer Michael Pascucci: "How's your golf game?" He might answer, "It stinks!" But make no mistake; he's one heck of a golf course developer, having created a course that he says is "super environmentally friendly." But, is it golfer friendly? "I wanted big fairways, good strategy and good greens," he adds. His course has "no rough," and the affable Pascucci quips, "People are happy when they play our course because they don't lose their golf balls. There are no scary shots and it's visually very pretty." In Golf Digest's annual national survey, Sebonack was named Best New Private Course of 2007.

    For its expansive contributions to protecting the environment, the Sebonack Golf Club was recently honored as the recipient of the well-regarded Metropolitan Golf Association's Second Annual Environment Award. Additionally, the Pascucci Family will be presented with the Hartman Philanthropic Leadership Award by the Thomas Hartman Foundation for Parkinson's Research at its Fifth Annual Cure for Sure Dinner on June 10.
   
    A Bucknell University grad, Pascucci received an MBA from New York University School of Business, and soon after, formed his own construction company. In 1974 he founded Oxford Resources Corporation, a mortgage finance company, and five years later, he created an Auto Lease Division, transforming the auto sales business.

    Pascucci says his tapping into the consumer auto leasing market put him "in the right place at the right time," and he spent ten years training dealers across the East Coast on leasing cars. Oxford became the largest publicly traded independent auto leasing company in the nation, and after a better-than-20-year-run, Oxford was acquired in 1997.

    Although Pascucci's dad who caddied throughout his life tried to get his son interested in the game, it wasn't until Pascucci was 35 that he started playing golf as a way to socialize with business clients. "At one point," he says, "I did business with 41 bankers around the country and bankers like to play golf." Golf eventually became somewhat of a family tradition; his wife Jocelyn, daughter Dawn, and sons Michael Jr., Christopher and Ralph who worked with him at Oxford also play.

    In a recent interview with Networking® magazine, Pascucci, who owns a home in Florida, mentioned that some years ago he had visited The Floridian golf course north of West Palm Beach, which was built by billionaire entrepreneur Wayne Huizenga and his wife Marti. The story goes that Huizenga had amassed some 2,000 acres and was mapping plans to develop an exclusive golf club with estate homes to cover his cost, when his wife surprised him by saying, "why don't we just keep the golf course for ourselves and invite friends." Officially, The Floridian has just two members, Wayne and Marti Huizenga, and each year they extend privileges to friends, relatives and business associates who anxiously await their special invitation.

    With this in mind, Pascucci remarks, "I said to my boys, it would be great to have our own golf course." In 2001, Pascucci purchased the 300-acre property called Bayberry Land on the Great Peconic Bay, formerly a summer camp and conference center for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 3-the perfect spot to build their family-owned Sebonack Golf Club. The pragmatic Pascucci had said: "If we're going to go through the difficult process of finding land on Long Island, it's gotta be waterfront property." Pascucci, however, put a twist on Huizenga's idea-he created a club that is, in the words of Neighborhood Network Executive Director Neal Lewis, "the most environmentally conscious golf club on Long Island."

A laborious but deliberate trail

    Before a shovel hit the ground, Pascucci says he attended over 350 meetings-town meetings, public hearings and meetings with community and environmental leaders and groups.

    "I probably went through four blizzards, leaving town meetings at midnight in 8 inches of snow, canceling countless meetings and trips," describes Pascucci. "They don't want to see the lawyer, they want to see skin in the game, they want to see blood." In other words, he explains, "How bad does this guy want this?" As a result, he concludes, "We got done fairly rapidly and made a lot of friends in the community."

    Pascucci notes that his Sebonack team, which includes project manager Mark Hissey from the Oxford management staff, reached out to the community and sought advice from Richard Amper, Executive Director of the Long Island Pine Barrens Society, Peconic Baykeeper Kevin McAllister and Robert DeLuca, President of the Group for the East End with its interests in preservation and environmentally friendly projects. The team had extensive meetings with representatives of The Nature Conservancy, Long Island Chapter. They hired Greenman Petersen Inc, an environmental engineering firm, and they worked with experts from Rutgers University, Cornell University and its Cooperative Extension, which now monitors the course greens weekly to check for any potential problems.

    Sebonack sought the expertise of the Ohio State Department of Plant Pathology under the direction of Professor and Chair Michael Boehm. Dr. Boehm put his Turfgrass Science and Plant Health Management students to the test when they held a working session at Sebonack and assisted in developing environmentally sound management plans for the golf course.

    They also brought into the fold Neal Lewis, who says Neighborhood Network, which has historically been involved in bringing lawsuits to prevent golf courses from being built, supported Sebonack's application before the Town of Southampton. "It's the only golf course we ever spoke out in favor of, in terms of public hearings," says Lewis, "and I feel good about that support for their golf course because it's a beautiful course and used a lot of innovative techniques."

    Pascucci agreed to a stringent plan to build the course organically, preserving and expanding native vegetation whenever possible. Sebonack also preserved the wildlife habitat, which remains home to osprey, red-tailed hawks and deer. Of the original 300-acre parcel, Pascucci donated back to Southampton part of the property that contains Cold Spring Pond, a 3-acre beach parcel and 1,000 feet of beachfront that didn't run along the golf course. He remarks that Sebonack preserved the land with "only 4 acres of hardscape."

    Hissey, who managed contacts with the Town of Southampton, points out that Sebonack has an integrated turf health management system that uses aggressive "scouting" to locate disease and "nip it in the bud." He adds that Sebonack has "wells and lysimeters (a preventative tool to protect groundwater) located on the property that get tested every month, so our water quality isn't up for debate. It's scrutinized constantly and damage to the environment is simply nonexistent." Sebonack installed custom-built green liners to capture any rainwater run-off into a dedicated irrigation pond and has its own compost site.

A designer course

    Construction of the 18-hole course began in 2004 with two of the top designers in the field. Pascucci brought aboard his Florida friend and neighbor, golf legend Jack Nicklaus, and through the efforts of Hissey, they snagged course designer Tom Doak.

    "We put the Tom Doak minimalist strategy and look with the Jack Nicklaus strategy, because he's a clever golfer and won all his majors. It was a perfect combination," notes Pascucci. "Doak wouldn't let us hire a contractor; we pulled every tree out and shook the dirt off. Doak wanted us to leave the dirt in place right there. We didn't move any of the ground; it's the way nature built it…that's what we got. And, we just carved the holes into the sand dunes. Everything was thought about through friendliness to the member."

    Pascucci, who likes to get his "Sebonack fix," says, "13 holes have water views or are on the water. The course has a natural look. It looks like it's been there for 100 years …it's been there a billion years!" And with his customary sense of humor, he says:

    "Usually golfers are all smiles on the first tee, but the smiles fade as they get beat up. But our course is user-friendly" when they walk off, they're laughing and smiling. On the last few holes you finish high up overlooking the water…it's a great finishing walk."Pascucci adds that he's fortunate that with his financial resources they were able to build the course without needing a real estate component to recoup funds. "300 acres,"he says, "It's a walk in the park, and there are no houses."

    Sebonack opened in August 2006, and Pascucci expects the clubhouse to be ready this coming Fourth of July. The club is filling out its membership. Sebonack is bordered on the north by National Golf Links of America and on the southeast by Shinnecock Hills Golf Club-two of the most important clubs in the American golf history.

A prestigious MGA award

    A club in its infancy, Sebonack is already being noticed for its outstanding contributions to the industry and the sport. In addition to its recognition as Best New Private Club, Sebonack was honored by the premier golf association in the region, the Metropolitan Golf Association. Accepting the second annual MGA Club Environmental Award for environmental stewardship on behalf of Sebonack, Hissey attended the MGA/USGA Green Chairmen Education Series and Club Luncheon at Wheatley Hills Golf Club in March.

    The panel of judges looked at a variety of factors, including water quality, education, outreach, Integrated Pest Management and wildlife preservation. "They sent us an application, saying, tell us what you do environmentally,"states Pascucci. "When they got it back, they said," and he adds with eyes wide open, "Oh my God!"

    "Sebonack's application was very impressive," explains Gene Westmoreland, MGA's Senior Director, Rules and Competitions and Assistant Executive Director. In recent years, he says, the use of pesticides and other agents potentially damaging to the environment "has taken a 180-degree turn," thanks in large part to the superintendents, and he notes that as a result, the MGA decided to initiate the Environmental Award.

    "One of the biggest factors facing the industry is environment issues," adds Matt Ceplo, superintendent of the Rockland Country Club and chairman of the MGA selection committee. "A lot of golf courses do environmentally good things, but it doesn't help if you don't tell anyone."

    The selection committee found Sebonack's education component "very important," says Ceplo. Not only did Sebonack work to communicate with local community groups and the Town regularly during the construction phase, but they also plan to educate members about how a course is properly maintained. He also points to Sebonack's funding of an Ohio State plant pathology class based on experiences at Sebonack and its working with the USGA.

    "Hopefully what Sebonack has done will be looked at by other courses that are in the process of being built," adds Ceplo.

An entrepreneurial and giving spirit

    About the same time he was building his auto leasing business, Pascucci recalls offering to help the Diocese of Rockville Centre with its television station (Telecare), where he met and befriended Monsignor Thomas "Father Tom" Hartman. Pascucci saw that the new station didn't have all the equipment it needed, like cameras and quality lighting, so Hartman says, "Pascucci started a golf tournament to raise funds," and he adds, his friend was willing to give matching dollars.

    Although Pascucci had no background in broadcasting, except for one undergraduate course in radio and television, as a local businessman who advertised on television, he realized that Long Island, as populated as it was, didn't have a television station. So, he looked into it, and discovered that there was an allocation for a station but it was never built.

    "Everything looks easy to me when I'm not in it," declares Pascucci. But through trial and error, he formed WLNY-TV55 in 1985 and currently serves as the commercial television station's chairman. And just as he experienced at Oxford Resources, he retorts, "The key to success is hiring people smarter than me. "He credits the work of dedicated staff for TV55's ability to capture many of the top rated shows, including Jeopardy, Oprah, Wheel of Fortune, Dr. Phil, Ellen, Rachael Ray, Judge Judy and Deborah Norville's Inside Edition.

    Pascucci has been a volunteer member of the Telecare Board of Trustees since 1979 and currently serves as chairman. Hartman says, "If there was an event or project in the planning stages, Mike would always volunteer for the hardest job, and he'd get it done, too."Of their friendship, Hartman adds that he has "gained strength from Mike and his family."

    Pascucci serves as chairman of Abilities, Inc. and is a past chairman and current trustee for the National Center for Disability Services. "I've been on the Abilities Board for 37 years," notes Pascucci. Additionally, he serves as a trustee on the Jack Nicklaus Children's Health Care Foundation.

    "If you try to do something for a good reason, you always get blessed from it," remarks Pascucci. He says his family's nonprofit and service interests are health, the disabled, and working with the Catholic Relief Services. The Pascucci Family will receive the Philanthropic Leadership Award from the Hartman Foundation at its Fifth Annual Cure for Sure Dinner, June 10, at the Crest Hollow Country Club.