Letters regarding greens fees at the new North Hempstead golf links tend to obscure the prime problems faced at many public golf courses. Too many players.

I find it incomprehensible that a system of fees is not set up that would at once lower the number of players, reward the taxpaying players of North Hempstead and restrict the number of non-resident and non-taxpaying players.

The comparatively slight difference between the respective greens fees of residents and non-residents I have seen published is unfair to the taxpaying residents.

If residents were to be charged an annual fee of, say $35, this would take care of the tee time requirement. Charge non-residents $800 to $1000 per annum per annual membership plus a greens fee of say $30 for playing nine holes and $50 for 18. Residents; greens fees could be $15 for nine holes and $20 for 18 holes. For seniors both resident and non-resident a $5 reduction should be allowed for the 18 hole fees.

This fee structure would cut down on the volume of players but still achieve a satisfactory revenue base.

If the course is as good as May Newburger hopes it to be (one of the top 100 public golf courses in the country) and, after having walked it I believe her right, there should be all the desired income required.

The City of Glen Cove course, of which I have been a non-resident member for some years, has the exact fee system I have outlined. The non-resident members pay more of the operating costs than the resident members, whose tax dollars built the facility. This is as it should be.

While it is true that the Town of Oyster Bay course and that of the Town of Hempstead do not have this fee system, they both have a much larger tax base and were built at an earlier time. The cost per taxpayer was much lower.

Let us not allow the fee-setting Town Board steamroller us into an unfair and easily avoided situation.

Robert H. Furlong