Dragas responds to accusations of having unfair advantage in quest to buy VB National

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — Helen Dragas, CEO of Dragas Companies, said she does not feel her company had an “unfair advantage” in pursing a deal to buy Virginia Beach National Golf Club.

Rather, Dragas said her team took the initiative to put forward the “the “best competitive proposal we could.”

Next month, Virginia Beach City Council could vote to sell the 270-acre 18-hole course to Dragas, who along with Texas-based Century Golf, would redesign and refurbish the course. Dragas would then build nearly 660 housing units on the southern end of the property, and build a new childcare center.

Dragas’ proposal, titled “Princess Anne Landing,” was one of nine total groups who responded to the city’s request for proposals regarding of the future of the course.

Still, many on both social media and in public comments have accused the longtime housing developer of having the upper hand, given that she had the city sign a non-disclosure agreement in 2024, more than a year before the city’s intentions of possibly selling the course became public.

As part of an interview Tuesday with 10 On Your Side, Dragas was asked about those accusations and other questions. Responses are edited for style and brevity purposes.

REPORTER: You’ve heard some of the criticisms … sitting through the public hearings. … How do you take it when people say that you got an unfair advantage?

DRAGAS: I say that we invested thousands of hours of hard work and due diligence watching public hearings, media council meetings, digging into those engineering studies that I referenced before that showed the deficiencies, … understanding the comprehensive plan, the Historic Overlay District, the ITA situation, all that. There’s a lot of complexity there and we invested a lot of time and energy to develop the best competitive proposal we could. We never knew we would see it, and we still don’t know if we’ll see a single cent of that investment back. And that’s competition and that’s initiative, and we live in a country that’s always rewarded initiative. And we took it. And while others might have been spending their time on other projects or other endeavors, this is what we were doing. So we didn’t receive any nonpublic information. We just did our homework and I think we tried to solve a lot of problems in one proposal: housing, homeownership, childcare, golf course, you know, redesign and refresh and reinvestment and a future tax stream for the course. So we think we come up with something that provides benefit, not just at offers, but to a lot of other constituents in the city as well. We’re really proud of it.

REPORTER: You were telling me that … long before even the auditors report, you had your eye on that that parcel and thought it would be good for houses. Correct?

DRAGAS: Well, we always knew that there was that section that … could handle some housing, yes. And others did as well. There were other rentals. There was another unsolicited proposal or two. And then I think about half of the respondents to the proposal included housing.

Under the terms that have been negotiated between City Council and economic development staff for months in closed session, Dragas would purchase the roughly 270 acre course for $17.9 million from the city. The city will, in turn, give the $17.9 million back to Dragas, along with $1.8 million from the Virginia Beach Development Authority, to go towards an estimated $38 million golf course redevelopment.

On top of the nearly $20 million the city would give the development team for the golf course work, the city could contribute up to nearly $8 million in public infrastructure along Tournament Drive and Princess Anne Road, to include turn lanes, streetscape improvements, utility relocations, and a sewer extension.

REPORTER: Why does it need to be a public-private partnership?

DRAGAS: So right now the city has millions of dollars in deferred renovation — $7.7 million in identified stormwater deficiencies and remaining clubhouse and facilities repair. That doesn’t cover anything about renovating a 30-year-old course. And … everything needs a renovation, refurbishment at some point in its life, physical life. And so, this course needs that. There’s also public infrastructure that serves the entire area right there. So there’s some Virginia Beach Development Authority parcels that sit there and the first tee … as you probably know, is that land is going to be dedicated to the First Tee. There’s sanitary sanitary sewer infrastructure that serves all those parcels that was originally connected to be temporary, and that was almost 30 years ago. So the city has, I think, some deferred public infrastructure costs as well. What our proposal does is take the city off the hook for future maintenance liabilities. They’re actually going to come out of pocket less than they would if they just did the stormwater and the clubhouse repairs that were made, and in exchange, the city will have a $3.4 million a year tax revenue stream, a completely refreshed and refreshed renovated golf course, a badly needed child care facility and then, of course, the homes, homeownership opportunities for over 600 families.