Los Angeles Mulls Turning Over Zoo Management to Nonprofit
July 5, 2012 | Read Time: 1 minute
Los Angeles is the latest and largest U.S. city to consider privatizing its zoo as a budget-cutting measure, according to Bloomberg.
The city is negotiating with the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Association, a nonprofit that handles concessions and organizes volunteers for the facility, about taking over all the operations at the zoo, which employes 209 people and houses 1,100 animals. The city would retain ownership of the animals, their enclosures, and the zoo property.
Dallas, Milwaukee, and Tulsa, Okla., are among the cities that have transferred zoo management to private groups in recent years to reduce budget deficits.
The zoo is set to receive $18.3-million in taxpayer funds in the fiscal year that began Sunday. “The dollars we’re paying to feed an elephant are competing with the dollars we’re paying a police officer,” said Miguel Santana, the city administrator of Los Angeles.
