Communicate in the community

Sugar Creek Golf Course superintendent KevinGoss earned the 2025 Communication and Outreach Award from the GCSAA’s Environmental Leaders in Golf Awards — and rightfully so. Discussing and advocating for environmental stewardship is something he’s been doing for a while.

“I was surprised at first,” Goss says. “I didn’t expect to win. I thought maybe I’d be a runner-up, but then I kind of thought back, and I was like, ‘Well, I have been talking many people’s ears off for a couple decades about this.’”

Located in Villa Park, Illinois, about 20 miles west of downtown Chicago, Sugar Creek is a public facility home to a 9-hole, par-32 layout. The course is run by Elmhurst Park District and the Village of Villa Park. When the course recently renovated out-of-play areas and the creek shorelines, a key part of Goss’ job was keeping the community informed of those changes. 

“Most people realize why we did it. We put up a lot of posters, and I gave a lot of presentations,” Goss says. Because of Goss’ communication, the course hasn’t received much pushback from golfers on the changes. 

Goss has been working with the park district for more than a decade to plan and fix the course’s stream shoreline and irrigation pond. The pond had been filled with silt, and the stream banks, lined with metal, were fully rusted through. The project was funded by the golf course, village, park district, DuPage County and the Illinois EPA, requiring extensive engineering and permitting. 

One deep pool was created for irrigation, and the rest of the areas were converted to wetlands. Three acres of the compact course were naturalized. “It’s a very small golf course,” he says. “It’s 45 acres total, so we didn’t really have very much area to naturalize except for the stream banks.” 

Buffers along the shore are now 30 to 40 feet, preventing inputs from entering water streams. “Some golfers like the extra challenge,” Goss says. “I’m sure some don’t, but it was best for the project and necessary to receive the grant funding.”

Goss believes that being environmentally smart is not just the right move for the golf course, but for the entire community. 

The property holds a large pollinator garden that has successfully attracted monarchs, hummingbirds and other butterfly species. “We serve a lot of functions for the surrounding community that we should promote,” Goss adds, “and we do our best to be a link in the ecosystem.”

Goss promotes the club through multiple avenues:

• He serves on the Elmhurst Park District Environmental Committee
• He teaches as an adjunct professor in the horticulture department at the College of DuPage in nearby Glen Ellyn.
• And he provides informative posters and social media in the community, explaining the course’s environmental work

Through his role on the park district’s environmental committee, Goss has helped write IPM manuals, invasive species plans and policy manuals.

 “The superintendent’s job — I see it as much bigger than just maintaining the fine turf surfaces,” Goss says. “We have to look at the whole property and then the area surrounding the property.” 

Working in the community where he grew up provides a motivational boost for conservation and outreach. Goss started working at Sugar Creek when he was 16 years old, and started playing there even earlier.

“A lot of it is having a personal connection to the area,” he says. “But I feel like even if I didn’t have a personal connection to the area, and hadn’t grown up in the community, I would still have the same priorities.

“Being a public golf course, we want to do what’s best for the entire community.”