City to add 3% credit‑card surcharge at golf clubhouse; Parks board to send resolution to council

Parks and golf staff told the committee they plan to add a 3% surcharge on credit‑card transactions at the clubhouse to reduce growing merchant fees and recover processing costs.

Dean (Parks Board member) and Kyle (golf staff) said the city processed about $404,337 in credit‑card transactions in 2024 and has paid rising processing fees. Under the proposed program the city would assess a 3% surcharge on credit cards only; debit cards and cash would not be surcharged. Kyle said the city's processor (Heartland) would provide a credit of 2.7% on the statement and would retain 10% of that credit (about 0.27 percentage points) as a program fee; the remaining amount would offset the city's merchant costs.

Staff said the TSheets point‑of‑sale software will automatically detect credit versus debit cards at the terminal and apply the surcharge where appropriate, so employees will not need to decide whether to charge a fee at the register. The parks board said the city would post sign notices at the front door and at points of sale as required by law and agreed to move Parks Board resolution 20xx‑5x (credit card fee policy) to the city council agenda for final action.

Board members said the surcharge would primarily affect large ticket purchases such as season passes; Kyle gave an example that a $1,160 purchase would carry a $34.80 surcharge at 3%. Staff and board members discussed customer acceptance and noted similar surcharges are common in other retail settings.

Ending: The parks board agreed to advance the credit‑card surcharge resolution to council (to be scheduled on the next council agenda) and staff will prepare signage and implementation steps; no immediate change to point‑of‑sale operations will occur until council acts.