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Do The Sloths Have A 401(k) Plan?

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Daniel Ruth

The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 13, 2008

Maybe the best way to appreciate why the elephant-you-know-what has royally hit the fan over at the Lowry Park Zoo, is to suppose for a moment that the attraction's president, Lex Salisbury, was instead a Hillsborough County commissioner.

Imagine the hue and cry if it was learned that a certain Commissioner Salisbury was using county workers and county resources to help him build a private, for-profit business.

This kind of thing often leads to unpleasantness at the ballot box.

In recent weeks, disclosures have begun to envelop Salisbury and a for-profit critter park he is developing in Polk County called Safari Wild.

Salisbury and his business partner, veterinarian Stephen Wehrmann, plan to offer visitors a sort of "Hatari!"-lite safari experience on the 258-acre site at $50 a pop.

And Salisbury has also suggested Safari Wild would be a great spot for the zoo animals to take a vacation break away from the stress of all those Lowry Park Zoo customers gawking at them all day long as they basically lie around.

401(k) Plan, Too?

Good grief, do these beasts return to their lairs after a hard day of staring off into space and say to their fellow sloths, "I gotta tell ya, Karl, I'm whipped. Sure could use a few days off from doing nothing."

No word yet if the zoo kookaburras, goats and toucans also have a 401(k) plan, too.
Lowry Park Zoo, which sits on public land, operates on an $18 million annual budget and receives $900,000 yearly from the city and the county. The facility is getting an additional $1.8 million this year from county taxpayers for capital improvements.

And while Salisbury spends time attending to his business, he also receives a $271,000 paycheck from the zoo.

Not Good

So various public officials, especially folks like Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio and Councilman Charlie Miranda, who sit on the Lowry Park board, were a bit miffed to discover that without their knowledge the zoo was helping Salisbury build barns and fences on the Safari Wild property.

The expense of using zoo resources to build the structures at Safari Wild was approved by Lowry Park Board Chairman Fassil Gabremariam, who as fate would have it also sits on the Safari Wild board. Well, you have to appreciate tidiness when you see it.

And it is exactly that sort of coziness that raised the hackles of the likes of Iorio, Miranda and former Mayor Bob Martinez, another Lowry Park board member, who weren't informed of the zoo/Safari Wild relationship.

Now the mayor is demanding Salisbury's business repay the zoo for the buildings and Miranda is on something of a safari himself looking for heads to roll.

Bob Merritt, who sits on the zoo's executive committee, insisted nothing has been found to suggest an impropriety occurred. Uh-uh.

Alas Merritt, Gabremariam and Salisbury don't seem to grasp there is a huge difference between lack of "impropriety" and avoiding the obvious conflict of interest by simply doing the right thing.

Safari Wild has its taxpayer-funded barns. But this wink-wink-nod-nod deal also has (for lack a better term) no shortage of a certain barnyard product aroma about it.

Keyword: Book of Ruth, to read and comment on Daniel Ruth's blog.

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