Ruralite Cafe: Published 09/06/01

By Lisa Majors-Duff - News Editor

Budget crunch is hurting the state zoo

I was waiting around to speak with Rod Hackney, the zoo's public relations manager, when I noticed a newspaper clipping, complete with several yellow highlighted paragraphs, posted on the Visitor Services window. The headline said something about how the state budget crunch was hurting the zoo. Operating hours would have to be cut back and jobs would be lost, the story said.

That's when it hit me. The N.C. Zoological Park, like so many other potential state gems, is getting shafted by the government. Remember the stories a couple of years ago about how our state parks don't measure up to others in the Southeast. From my visit this weekend, the same can be said for the state zoo. And it's all too apparent from one end of the park to the other, even if the eye seeking the beauty happens to be attached to my slightly-more-critical optical nerve.

As the Ruralite Cafe's resident amusement/theme park expert, I admit to being overly sensitive to a facility's appearance, its amenities, even its employees' attitudes. Right away I spotted the previous day's trash lying on the sidewalks; I even saw a used Kleenex taking up space on a park bench. The tables in the various refreshment areas are old and often not tended to. I even found myself hesitating to touch the railings in most of the exhibit viewing areas. Believe me, this says a lot coming from someone who firmly believes in the "5- to 30-second rule." (For those of you without children, the "5- to 30-second rule" applies to dry food hitting the kitchen floor and remaining suitable for consumption for up to 30 seconds.)

I was ready to add North Carolina's zoo to my "Must Not See" list, when I discovered that the park's problems are not the fault of some uncaring corporation, but our own state government. Instead of condemning the zoo, I'll instead insist that it be given the consideration it deserves, keeping in mind that the victims of this financial neglect are the animals behind the dirty glass, the rusted fences and the broken wires.

It's true that our legislators in Raleigh have important decisions to make when it comes to balancing the state's budget, and that many human beings have already been the victims of cutbacks. But most of these people presumably have skills they can use to find work in the private sector. What are the polar bears, the sea lions, the alligators, elephants, gorillas, baboons, rhinoceros, giraffes, roadrunners, elk, bison, gila monsters and peregrine falcon to do when times get tough? Run away and join the circus? Maybe they should post their resumes on the Internet or apply for transfers to the San Diego Zoo.

According to the Courier-Tribune in Asheboro, the zoo has 35 job vacancies, which amounts to 15 percent of the permanent staff positions. These vacancies do not include six positions eliminated by the state in June, staff writer Kathi Keys said in her Aug. 30 story on how the state budget is affecting the zoo's staff and its future projects.

"Morale is not high," zoo Director David Jones said about employees having to double up on their workload.

No kidding. When I found zoo employees going about their daily routines, it was obvious that something was wrong. I even heard one employee ask another, "Are we having fun yet?" to which the second replied a flat "no."

But what struck me even more was the lack of zoo staffers in the park. I missed them most at the chimpanzee exhibit when a little girl started shrieking, her face turning as crimson as her pig-tailed red hair. She was lost and terrified, and no one official-looking was around to help her. Thankfully, her mother was just around the corner.

Because of staffing problems, said Jones, the aviary and African Pavilion, which reportedly is in need of $15 million in renovations, are being closed early on weekdays to help shorten the staff work day.

The Asheboro zoo was the nation's first state-supported zoo and remains one of only two state zoos; the other is located in Minnesota. Its greatest attributes are its African and North American exhibit regions, which span more than 500 acres, giving the elephants and rhinos in Africa plenty of room to roam.

One of the zoo's primary missions is to make visitors aware of the connections between humans and the world's animals, plants and natural resources. And those running the zoo should be allowed to continue doing just this before zoos and the like are the only places left on earth to find red wolves, grizzly bears, pumas, lowland gorillas, mandrills, falcons and crocodiles.

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