Just talking about last year's fatal elephant attack was enough to spell trouble for the chief executive of the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium.
Dr. Barbara Baker on Dec. 5 received an official reprimand and a six-month suspension of her membership in the American Zoo and Aquarium Association. The organization says Baker violated its code of ethics and deliberately misled her peers in a talk she gave Jan. 17 at a zoo directors retreat in San Antonio, Texas.
The 45-minute presentation titled "The Role of a Zoo Director in a Tragedy" was Baker's account of her response to the death of zoo employee Michael Gatti. Gatti, 46, of Butler, was crushed by a 20-year-old female elephant in November 2002.
Two audience members at the talk felt Baker withheld information by not discussing alternate theories on what caused the elephant to attack. Baker said she mentioned only the official result of an independent investigation, which concluded the elephant had become spooked.
She said she received only positive feedback on her talk until July 17, when she was notified that two individuals from different zoos had filed a complaint. Under association rules, she was given a chance to defend her position to a 13-member ethics board. The board concluded that Baker violated standard 3-A of the professional code of ethics, which states "a member shall not knowingly misinform other members regarding animal records or specimen disposition, professional information, and advice."
Baker says she intended the talk as a crisis management lesson, not an analysis of elephant behavior.
"I believe that some felt that because I did not articulate all of the theories, that perhaps that I was incomplete in my talk or that they should have been given the opportunity to hear all the theories and judge on their own," Baker said.
During the suspension, Baker will not receive any association publications, will not be offered discounts or be permitted to attend or vote at any meetings. The reprimand will not affect the operation of the Pittsburgh Zoo which has its own association membership.
There are no transcripts of Baker's talk, according to a zoo statement. Baker also said she knows of no pending legal action by Gatti's family.
"I do believe we got caught in the politics of the organization," she said. "I do believe we got caught in the controversy regarding elephants in captivity."
Jane Ballentine, spokeswoman for the American Zoo and Aquarium Association, had no details of the complaint, which the association keeps confidential. The number of reprimands issued are confidential as well. "If it's a reprimand, we'll never find out about it," she said.
Suspensions of membership, the more serious charge, are listed in Comminque, the association's monthly publication.
"We don't have many of them. I've been on the job 10 years, and I recall only one," Ballentine said.
The board is asked to investigate about a dozen complaints each year, she said. Many pertain to animals that individuals feel are being mistreated or neglected. Anyone can file a complaint with the association, she said.
"They're not looking to make a political statement," she said of the elected board members. "It's probably hard for them to come to a conclusion and to do this to one of their colleagues. I don't think that they would come to a conclusion without fully investigating and really getting to the bottom of it."
Zoo board Chair Linda Dickerson said the board has been briefed three times and has given Baker a unanimous vote of confidence.
"We are both surprised and disappointed," she said. "But the AZA is a large institution. It has over 3,000 members. This is a small cadre of individuals. Any large organization does have politics within it."
The Allegheny County Coroner's Office ruled the death of Gatti an accident. An investigation by the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration found no workplace violations. In a Dec. 17 letter to Baker, area director Robert Szymanski said OSHA found no reason to cite the zoo for not providing a safe workplace.
