Talk on the Wild Side
with Brad Cornell

Transcription

Vikki Locke

I am Vikki Locke with C2 Communications, and this is Talk on the Wild Side. We talk about careers in conservation and it’s brought to you by the Florida Wildlife Federation; and we welcome to the show, Brad Cornell. Hey Brad!

Brad Cornell

How’re you doing, Vikki?

Vikki Locke

Good. And yourself?

Brad Cornell

I’m fine, thanks. Glad to be here.

Vikki Locke

Great! Brad is the Southwest Florida Policy Associate for Audubon Florida and Audubon of the western Everglades. The Everglades, I see it on the news all the time, why are the Florida Everglades so important?

Brad Cornell

The Everglades are one of those iconic places in the world that aren’t like anything else. They used to be twice as big as they are now and even in their reduced size are just immense and awe-inspiring. They don’t have mountains, they don’t have volcanoes, but they have amazing wildlife, iconic waiting birds, with all kinds of colors pink and blue and white that people have been fascinated with for generations. It’s a wetland system that is just mind-boggling so water is life and I think that’s what sort of makes them a place that everybody really gravitates to.

Vikki Locke

I think you’re right and I think it’s safe to say that conservation in the wetlands are music to Brad’s ears because brad, for those of you who don’t know, is a musician. He spent 25 years in the music biz. He is a classical trombonist, even played with the Naples Philharmonic, so tell everyone how you switched directions career-wise.

Brad Cornell

I’m not saying that this is something everybody should do is change careers but you know, life is short and has lots of turns that you can’t predict. I always enjoyed playing trombone from when I was a little kid and was good enough at it that I went to music school, to a conservatory and got a master’s degree and got jobs in Texas, and Chicago, and here in Florida and had a great time for 25 years and then I had another passion that I got an opportunity to pursue after volunteering for an Audubon chapter for eight years and I realized, oh my gosh, that is something else that I really love and I  want to pursue. I did a lot of reading and got a lot of experience and have been doing that for almost 20 years now as well.

Vikki Locke

Actually, conservation was with kind on the back burner because you, didn’t you publish your own newspaper when you were in middle school?

Brad Cornell

That’s right. A friend of mine and I wrote articles for a little ecology rag we shared with our friends at school because we felt strongly. I grew up in a steel-making valley in Western Pennsylvania and it was full of all kinds of pollution, and also some beautiful words and streams, so we felt pretty passionate about that issue so we shared it.

Vikki Locke

Now you took constitutional law so that helps you in your job today, obviously.

Brad Cornell

Yeah, I think it’s important that people who are interested in a career in conservation whether you want to do research or you want to do policy or fundraising, whatever it is, you need to do your homework. You’ve got to read studies, you’ve got to talk to the experts. This is an area, like many, that relies on good information and good science to base good policy on, and if we don’t have good science then, what are we really talking about?

Vikki Locke

What are we really talking about, right? Everyone should be passionate about it especially if you live in Southwest Florida.

Brad Cornell

Absolutely. It’s the draws a lot of people and it’s a beautiful place, but the more people, the more threat to the resources so we got to figure out, and this is a worldwide challenge for humans as a species, we’ve got to figure out how to compatibly exist in our human communities without undermining and destroying the natural environments that we ultimately depend on, and all the other creatures that we share this earth with, so it’s an ethical and a survival motivation.

Vikki Locke

So would you say that you are basically a lobbyist for not only the land and obviously the water but for the people of Southwest Florida?

Brad Cornell

Oh, absolutely! Nature for people is the only way we’re going to make any progress. It people aren’t convinced and don’t love this place, they’re not going to protect it, they’re not going to work to to do what’s necessary to pay the expense to sacrifice what’s necessary to make sure we don’t lose this natural beauty.

Vikki Locke

What do you do on a day-to-day basis workwise?

Brad Cornell

I spend a lot of time reading permits, reading papers on how wetland protection works, on the threats to endangered species like Panthers and wood storks. I talk on the phone a lot I’m sitting in front of my computer, like I am right now, more than I would like to be, so if you are a field kind of person, maybe you want to go into research. Policy people spend a lot of time talking to other people because that’s really where our target is. We’ve got to convince commissions, and city councils, and state legislators, and even congresspeople to do what’s right for the environment and that takes on knowing the topic and then educating those policymakers.

Vikki Locke

So you must be constantly educating yourself.

Brad Cornell

It’s a lifetime pursuit, which you know, if you love the subject, it should be a process of love of fulfilling that thirst for understanding of how these things work. It’s complex, whether you’re talking about the way the human body works or the way a whole ecosystem works or a watershed. These are complex things and we’re fooling ourselves if we think we understand everything so we’ll never be done trying to figure this out but in the meantime let’s not throw away any of the pieces. If I can quote Aldo Leopold: “The first rule of intelligent tinkering is to save all the parts,” right, that’s a paraphrase, but that’s kind of what this ecological mission is.

Vikki Locke

Let’s wrap up with just giving us what gives you the greatest satisfaction about your career?

Brad Cornell

Well, I would say seeing the light bulb go off in colleagues, in policymakers that I’m talking with, seeing good policies come to fruition that maybe I thought of or maybe I didn’t think of, maybe somebody else thought of, and suddenly I recognize, oh my gosh, these people had a great idea! That’s a wonderful reward. And if I can add just one other thing before we close and that is how important recognizing this path in my own career, how important it is to spend time volunteering for an organization. It’s a great opportunity to get experience, to figure out what it is you’re interested in. You may find that you hate sitting behind a computer and need to be outside or vice versa, that you don’t like bugs, and you don’t like snakes so you’ll take the computer in the boardroom. It’s important to learn that about yourself what it was about nature you love and how you’re going to pursue that. Volunteering for an Audubon chapter, or a Sierra Club chapter, or another organization, that’s all really important. That gives you experience and shows commitment.

Vikki Locke

Thank you so much for taking time out of your busy busy day to be with us.

Brad Cornell

It’s a pleasure Vikki, I enjoyed talking with you.

Vikki Locke

And thanks to the Florida Wildlife Federation for sponsoring Talk on the Wild Side and keeping the wild in Florida since 1936. You can learn more at floridawildlifefederation.org.