Billy Bomar relaxed on a folding chair in the shade of a covered patio at Prairie Falls Golf Club in Post Falls on a recent sun-splashed afternoon.

Behind him, his newly-purchased, 16-year-old, par-70 golf course glistened in the sunshine, the sounds of golfers beating balls on the driving range, the spacious pond guarding the nearby ninth hole, the freshly-mown grass suggesting the start of something new.

"If you just look around, I just kind of fell in love with it. It's a great opportunity for me and my family to come down here," said Bomar, 51, who moved from Alaska and took over as majority owner at Prairie Falls on May 1.

Bomar's task - take a golf course that was up-and-coming a little more than a decade ago, but has come upon some hard times of late, and bring back the excitement - and the golfers.

"I want to bring a new energy to it," he said. "That's one thing, getting the Prairie Falls name out in the golf community again, and letting people know that it's the new Prairie Falls, and hopefully come back out here and see what we're doing. And enjoy the golf course."

BOMAR's WIFE, Kimberly, is a flight attendant for Alaska Airlines. They wanted to give their son, Chase, an opportunity to play high school golf (there is junior golf in Alaska, but not high school golf). Living near a major airport would be helpful with her job, and "she put in a stipulation that I needed a job if we left," Bomar said.

He spotted the golf course for sale on a PGA job finder website last fall. He was on his way home from an event in Arizona, and when he was in Seattle, he called the real estate agent who had just gotten the listing - Mike DeLong, former Director of Golf at The Coeur d'Alene Resort Golf Course.

"He was like your long-lost PGA brother," Bomar recalled. "I flew over here in November, and it just kept better and better as we drove around. The potential here was tremendous, I thought. The course was real playable, not too long, but it could stretch out from the back tees a little more. The greens have a lot of character, and they're in good shape."

A deal was worked out for Bomar to take over the course from the previous owners - Bomar has a minority partner, Jerry Neeser, a former Coeur d'Alene resident who is now in the construction business in Alaska.

Billy and Kimberly found a home in Greenacres - a compromise between the Spokane airport and Prairie Falls. Chase, 15, will be a sophomore at Central Valley High this fall.

"I think a lot of it was the potential growth, and getting the business back," Bomar said of his motivation to take over. "I know they'd had some hard times the past few years. ... not sure there was going to be a golf course or not."

In recent years, Prairie Falls was losing money - and members. Lifetime passes sold when the course first opened in 1998 as a nine-hole layout (a second nine opened in 2001) brought in money initially, but not later.

"They had lifetime members that all of a sudden weren't ... a lot of political things that are hard to win either way," Bomar said.

Now, lifetime members can purchase season passes "at a little bit of a discount," he said. "But my philosophy is, the more people I ve got out here, the more money they're going to spend. If you re doing your job right, they're going to come out and eat, they re going to come out and spend money in your pro shop, they're going to take lessons ... "

In addition to bringing back the energy at Prairie Falls, Bomar said he hopes to bring back the golfers by "growing the game" - getting more juniors and families to play. He said at his course in Alaska, he had a junior program with nearly 800 kids. He was also part of The First Tee of Alaska, and he d like to bring that youth program to Prairie Falls.

BOMAR RAVES about his employees. Marcus Curry, who was part of the ownership team before, has remained on as the course superintendent. His head pro, Bryce Bingham, worked at Prairie Falls under the previous regime, and took over as interim pro after Darrell Hull left to take over at The Links Golf Club, also in Post Falls.

As for more immediate changes, Bomar said the bunkers haven't been worked on for some three years, and more sand has been ordered. And some of the tee boxes aren't as level as they should be, he discovered.

He likes the greens, though "this is the first course I've had in a long time where people complained they're too fast," he said. "Faster than people are used to, because they don't keep them as fast in Spokane, or at some of the other public courses."

Bomar, who played at Arizona Western and at Oral Roberts, turned pro at 20 and played in a Hogan Tour event a couple years later, said he's won around 150 tournaments in his career. He's won four of the last five U.S. Open local qualifiers he's played in.

He hopes to one day qualify for a Champions Tour event. He's tried five times, once advancing from a Thursday pre-qualifier to the Tuesday qualifier. He plans to play in a U.S. Senior Open qualifier in Indianapolis (at the course next to the speedway where they run the Indy 500) in a couple of weeks.

He plans to start playing soon in the Monday Inland Empire PGA pro-ams, and also hopes to play in the Rosauers Open in Spokane in July. A side-saddle putter, in 1996 he finished seventh at the World Putting Championship in Florida, an event which included Payne Stewart.

Bomar's oldest daughter, Brittany, 26, turned professional after playing golf at the University of Hawaii. She recently finished playing the Australian Tour, and is coming home to play a few events on the Canadian Women's Tour before heading off to Europe for more tourneys. She's hoping to someday qualify for the LPGA Tour.

His other daughter, Taylor, 20, was one of the top soccer players in her age group in the country before a spate of knee injuries derailed that career. Still, she was good enough to also be the placekicker for her high school football team in Anchorage.

Bomar is commissioner of golf for Special Olympics Alaska, and will be accompanying the team to nationals in New Jersey later this month. He said he'd like to get involved in Special Olympics golf in this area.

IN RECENT years, there was talk of construction of housing on 19 lots near the tee on the par-5 fifth hole, to bring in some money for the course. Bomar said that isn't in his plans - that would shorten the hole to a par-4, and a par-69 golf course wouldn't be quite as appealing.

Rather, changes he's thinking of down the road include moving the driving range and building a permanent clubhouse/pro shop (the current one is a trailer). Both the range and clubhouse/pro shop could eventually wind up on 38 acres that are for sale, that sit to the right of the ninth tee, and behind the sixth and eighth greens.

The current driving range area is approved for 48 lots. But to the left of the range is the 10th hole, and even a slightly-pulled shot could wind up in the maintenance area. And a slice from a right-handed golfer could bean someone walking up the 18th fairway.

Either way, Bomar said, Prairie Falls will have a driving range somewhere.

"There's a lot of golfers where, if you don't have a driving range, they won't come out and play," he said. "To me, if I'm going to grow the game, you have to have a range, you have to have a short-game facility."

Another possible future move, he said, might be to replace the large bunker which guards the right and the front of the par-3 sixth green with a large water hazard with a water feature.

More immediate plans are to improve the snack bar and stock the pro shop - Hull owned the pro shop when he was at Prairie Falls, so he took the inventory with him to The Links. Bomar said Tim Morton, head pro at StoneRidge and one of the former Prairie Falls owners, has helped Bomar in restocking the pro shop.

BOMAR WAS born in San Antonio, and attended high school in Mesa, Ariz. He has taught at courses in Arizona and Alaska. Most recently, he was general manager/head pro at Tanglewood Lakes Golf Club and Dome in Anchorage, Alaska. Before that, he was general manager/partner at Settlers Bay Golf Course in Wasilla, Alaska, and director of instruction at Anchorage Golf Course. Years ago, he was a teaching professional for John Jacobs' Golf Schools & Academies.

He is no relation to the Bill Bomar who played baseball at Coeur d'Alene High in the 1980s, and was a 22nd round draft choice of the Texas Rangers in 1986 - though more than a few locals have tried to make that connection when they first met him.

Alluding to the pro shop being a trailer, one of his friends joked that if it doesn t work out at Prairie Falls, "you can put wheels on it and take it with you."

Bomar laughs when he tells that story, his optimism and passion for golf showing through a recent interview at the course. In his mind, the only way the pro shop moves is if a new one is built elsewhere on the property.

"I'm just blessed to be here," Bomar said. "It's a great opportunity, and I just enjoy coming to work each day. I think there's a good future."