After years of fighting the financial realities that threatened to overtake it, Glen Annie Golf Course will close July 6, according to a statement issued by the course Monday.

The announcement comes just one week after the Goleta City Council voted not to allow studies that would have examined the viability of residential development on the course’s property.

Last July, representatives of the 159-acre course applied for an amendment to Goleta’s General Plan, asking the city’s permission for the agriculture-zoned property to include a combination of recreational and residential development.

The property is in an unincorporated area, so annexation by the city would have been required, as would the General Plan amendment to change portions of the land designated for open space to residential.

ValleyCrest Companies, owner of the golf course at 405 Glen Annie Road, proposed turning the course into an 18-hole executive course, with 185 units of multi- and single-family residential units and townhomes. But last Tuesday, the council shut down any possibility of exploring that option.

The course has been burdened by financial difficulties since it opened more than a decade ago, and has lost nearly $15 million since its launch.

According to course officials, the closure will affect 75 employees, and any events scheduled for after the July closing.

Rich Nahas, general manager at the course for the past 10 years, was at the City Council meeting last week, and said the vote “came as a surprise to all of us.”

“There’s a lot of emotion that went into it,” Nahas said of the decision to close. “We expected to deal with a potential outcome like this several years from now, after the study was complete.”

Owners of the course were losing up to $1 million a year, Nahas said, and the company had been researching other options for the property for some time. Course officials conducted more than 200 meetings with the public to gather input about the project over the course of four years, Nahas said.

“We thought it was a very well thought-out plan,” he said of the residential development idea, adding that officials had gone through several mockups, gathering feedback from the community, and they had based their ideas on suggestions such as the desire of residents to keep the Frog Bar & Grill open.

“It was carefully crafted through a tremendous amount of community input,” he said.

“We could not see why reasonable minds would not attempt to study this,” he said Monday.

Weddings, tournaments and several fundraising events had been scheduled for the summer and beyond, and those clients have been contacted, he said. The company will be working to refund deposits.

Nahas said it’s difficult to say exactly what sent the course over the edge, because there are many factors that contributed to its demise; however, unexpected expenses and lower-than-projected revenue were an issue throughout the life of the course, he said.

It’s unclear what will become of the property, and Nahas said many matters need attention between now and the closure date.

Dave Pintard, who golfs at the course about three times a month, said he was extremely disappointed when he heard the news about the pending closure.

Pintard golfs on the course’s men’s club team and the match play team, as well as with charity tournaments that Glen Annie often hosted. The course was accommodating to nonprofit organizations, Pintard said, adding that he probably won’t play as often because of the higher costs of comparable courses nearby.

He said he was aware of the course’s financial troubles and that the owners were exploring residential developments as an integrated part of the course, but said he never thought they’d be remotely successful.

Pintard said he felt things at the course were on the upswing, until officials announced the closure. “I thought the whole operation was starting to take stride,” he said.

“There was a really good camaraderie and they had an excellent staff,” Pintard said. “They really ran a great operation.”

— Noozhawk staff writer Lara Cooper can be reached at lcooper@noozhawk.com.