Marty Lyons’ passion for the Saint Louis Zoo started when he was a young boy growing up in St. Louis.
 
His parents took him there often as a child, and as he got older he was enrolled in summer education classes at the zoo.
 
“I remember distinctly going to those classes where the zoo staff would bring out snakes that you would get to touch, or skins from various kinds of animals and the keepers would tell you about the different animals,” Lyons says. “I had very red hair as a child, so my very favorite animal was the orangutan. I always enjoyed when we would go to the monkey house to see the red-haired orangutan.”
 
As senior vice president and chief financial officer at Ameren, he gets his fix by taking his family to the zoo and by volunteering his financial expertise as a board member. He has been a member of several subcommittees since 2003 and for three years had served as treasurer of the Zoo Friends Board.
 
“I get the opportunity to have an impact on an institution that is very meaningful to me that I have enjoyed going to and have enjoyed taking my kids to,” Lyons says. “I try to find a way to use my expertise, which is making sure the financial reporting is accurate and easily understood, and the money that the zoo has is being used efficiently and effectively to improve the zoo.”
 
Currently, he and other board members are overseeing a $120 million capital improvement and zoo endowment campaign.
 
“Our goal is to make sure that all the projects that we identified when we put the strategic plan together actually get built,” Lyons says. “We make sure we don’t commit to a project and spend money before cash has been raised to fund that project.
 
“We’ve come up with a number of exhibits that need to be refreshed or redone to improve the environment that the animals live in, but also make them better from an entertainment and a visitor experience,” Lyons adds.

The capital campaign is important because, Lyons says, the board prides itself on keeping the admission to the zoo free of charge.
 
“All of us on the board have grown up in the St. Louis community and feel the zoo is a civic treasure,” Lyons says. “It’s always a goal to make sure that we’re not doing something that undermines the ability to keep the zoo free and accessible to every man, woman and child in the region.”
 
November 2011