Comprehensive designs and cost estimates for updating the clubhouse at Hobbit’s Glen were presented to the Columbia Association Board last week. Both the renovation and new clubhouse options are estimated to cost around $6 million.

The renovation option would cost $5,702,702 and the new clubhouse would be $5,854,085, according to Kelly Cooper, spokesperson for the CA. The CA Board is expected to pick one of the options at its next meeting on April 26, according to Cooper.

H. Chambers Company, the firm charged with updating the clubhouse, presented the two options, along with a third that included the new clubhouse, a new turnhouse and course updates on April 12.

CA Board Member Tom Coale wrote in his blog, HoCo Rising, that under both plans the clubhouse would be split into two segments, one for a restaurant and one dedicated to golfers. In addition, wrote Coale, both plans would include locker rooms for golfers and provide meeting/event space.

The clubhouse would be open to the whole community to rent for meeting/event space, according to Rob Goldman, chief operating officer of the CA.

Also, both designs would update the exterior look of the building and create more outdoor patio space. The other additions, available in the third option, include a new turnhouse ($250,000), new curb cut ($112,000) and golf course modifications ($230,000). The golf course modifications would include a lengthened driving range, practice teaching holes for a golf teaching academy, an enlarged putting green separated into two greens for ease of maintenance, an improved bag drop area and a relocated #1 blue tee.

In his blog, Coale wrote there were at least two board members unlikely to vote for any improvement to Hobbit’s Glen, but, “I want to assure all of you that these improvements are not being done at ‘the expense’ of any other amenity (i.e., pools).”

The Columbia Association budgeted $6 million for the project. The original clubhouse, built in 1967, has undergone several additions, but "is in need of several necessary renovations, as well as some desired enhancements," according to the CA's website on its renovation.