And they were welcoming, honest to God. We walked into the icebreaker and it was like a breath of fresh air. Everybody was so nice. And I had five of my team with me. Everybody was so nice, and welcoming, and coming up and talking to you. And the board… Read More
And we all went back to the hotel together and we’re like, whoa, what was that?… Read More
And so we knew that we needed to be accredited. So we went through the process of becoming ZAA accredited, because we needed that for that funding. And that actually was reason we got in interested in ZAA, ZAA is the Zoological Association of America, and it’s only about 15… Read More
We’ve got to get this ball rolling. And there was some kind of deadline, I don’t remember what it was even now, but there was some kind of deadline that we needed to meet. And so I sent them a letter via email saying that we were leaving, we had… Read More
But we needed to be accredited. So we went to ZAA, we went to our very first conference, it was in Las Vegas. It was a blast. Had so much fun. It was like the, ironically, Mark, it was like the AZA conferences of old, it was so much fun. Read More
Interestingly enough, I knew absolutely nothing about ZAA. So in the months that we were looking at, we did a very thorough analysis when we were looking at leaving AZA of what it would mean. Read More
What’s it gonna mean, what do we have to do, where does it impact?… Read More
And one of the things we had picked up on was that we needed to be accredited to, we were getting some money from the state, not a lot, but a little bit. Some money in a line item that I had helped develop with Pete Hodgkins, the director of… Read More
So we run over to the mailbox, we get the check, we are all, we’re dancing around with it in the office. We’re like, look at this, this is $2.2 million, and everybody wants to touch it, ’cause they never touched $2.2 million. We did the happy dance, the money… Read More
It can’t be sold, it can’t be developed. If for whatever reason Pittsburgh wanted to get rid of it, for whatever reason, I don’t know what that would be, it would have to go back to RK Mellon. So that was the start of our international conservation center. And it… Read More
How did you become associated with the Zoological Association of America and develop that relationship?… Read More
I’m like, what?… Read More
You’re kidding me?… Read More
But we got ’em down to $2.2 million, and RK Mellon funded it completely. The whole amount. Sent me a check, it came in the mail, just the regular mail. We get the mail. My secretary, my assistant comes to me and she says, there’s a check from RK Mellon. Read More
I mean, what do you mean there’s a check from RK Mellon?… Read More
She said, there’s a check from RK Mellon for $2.2 million in your box. Read More
So now how much do we pay for it?… Read More
So I really like negotiation. I think that’s fun. I think it’s fun to go back and forth, either arguing a point or discussing something. People who know me know I like to do that. And so negotiation was fun. So they originally wanted $3.2 million, and by the time… Read More
And so they have a whole branch to do that. So I’m like, whoa, okay. But RK Mellon is one of the foundations that was upset in 1975. So I haven’t cracked that nut yet. So I don’t have a relationship with them that’s real good yet. I’ve gotten little… Read More
We called their land preservation branch and we said, we’ve got this idea, we wanna build this breeding farm. We wanna conserve this land. We don’t wanna change the land, we just won’t put animals on it. Keep making hay, keep doing all the things that are going on out… Read More