City Park's long-promised championship golf course complex took a major step to becoming reality Tuesday. The City Park Board of Commissioners unanimously approved a measure that has it partnering with the Bayou District Foundation to run the new complex and help pay for it.

There are a few more hurdles to cross with FEMA and the state as well as a management agreement to draw up with the Bayou District Foundation. But those aren’t considered major issues and construction on the new golf course could start as early as February. At that start date, completion would likely be in the fall of 2014. A later construction start could mean the course would open in the summer of 2015.

“Obviously, I think we’re both anxious to get started sooner rather than later,’’ Bayou District Foundation CEO Gerard Barousse Jr. said. “I think we ought to be in a position to do that (start construction) in the first quarter (of 2013). Hopefully, earlier in the first quarter rather than later. The idea is to be in a position to open in the fall of 2014. You need the growing season of 2014, April through September to get the course grown in.’’

The new facility is expected to cost $24.5 million. City Park and the Bayou District Foundation -- a nonprofit group that joined in the redevelopment of the St. Bernard public-housing complex -- will pay the cost of construction.

City Park will use $15.5 million for the project, $5.9 million which will come from FEMA reimbursements from Hurricane Katrina and $9.65 million from the state capital outlay program.

The Bayou District will contribute $8.9 million in private money to build it.

The two sides have been working on an agreement for the last two years. City Park let out a request for proposal to manage the facility in December 2009 and the Bayou District Foundation was awarded the bid in March 2010. Since then, they’ve haggled over details of the partnership such as how long the Foundation would manage the facility and how much revenue it would get.

The contract will run for 35 years. City Park will receive 75 percent of the first $1.15 million in revenues each year with the Bayou District getting 25 percent. After that number is reached, City Park will get 55 percent of revenues and the Bayou District 45 percent per year.

City Park CEO Bob Becker told the board that the park projects to get as much as $3 million in revenue from the new golf course, the North course and driving range about five years after completion of the new facility.

The design of the course is complete. New Jersey-based Rees Jones Inc., a golf-design company, and Torre Design Consortium worked along with the PGA Tour course design team in the project.

Construction bids cannot be let out until the final details are worked out with FEMA and the state, Becker told the board. He said he expects that to take about a month or two.

In the spring of 2011, the park board scaled back its original plan for the new facility, eliminating a nine-hole course and reducing from 310 acres to 250 acres the space needed for the new 18-hole layout.

Barousse Jr. said the new course could play as long as 7,500 yards. It will be built on the former East and West courses, which were severely damaged by Katrina’s floodwaters.

“It’s a flat property so creating the contours and really working within the existing skeleton of the great plantation oaks we have is a big driver of design,’’ Barousse Jr. said. “It probably could be stretched to 7,500 yards. At the same time, it is a very narrow framework with which you’re working with. There were some great alleys on the East and West courses and a lot of those will be recognized and reincorporated into the new design.’’

Katrina shuttered all four City Park courses in 2005. City Park opened the North Course in September 2009.

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