Zoological Association of America (ZAA) President, Jim Fouts is announcing that Bearizona Wildlife Park has earned accreditation. The announcement was made at the 2011 annual business meeting held in Dallas Texas last weekend.The accreditation process requires a zoological facility to have a professional ZAA member on staff, demonstrate professional standards for husbandry and animal care practices and safety of humans, both staff and visitors, and wildlife conservation. An expert panel of ZAA board members inspected Bearizona Wildlife Park in September and presented their findings to the entire board at the annual meeting.
The Accreditation is important because it shows Bearizona’s standards on maintaining excellent park facilities, great care for the animals, continued conservation efforts and educational programs.
The ZAA’s mission is to promote responsible ownership, management, conservation, and propagation of animals in both the private and public domains through professional standards in husbandry, animal care, safety and ethics. Bearizona Wildlife Park Chief Operating Officer, Vanessa Stoffel explained, “Obtaining ZAA accreditation was a strategic goal since Bearizona’s concept phase. We constructed our exhibits and facilities to ZAA standards with this goal in mind. We are proud to be associated with ZAA and its accredited members, and look forward to actively participating in the organization for wildlife conservation.”
For more information contact Bearizona Wildlife Park 928-635-2289 or visit the web www.bearizona.com.
