Madison’s Georgia Safari Conservation Park (GSCP) celebrated its first anniversary in business on Monday, June 2.
In honor of the milestone, the park hosted a brief ceremony featuring refreshments and a ribbon-cutting ceremony, which the Madison-Morgan Chamber of Commerce attended.
Before the ribbon cutting, the event featured several speakers who acknowledged the importance of the occasion and the effort involved in making the park possible.
“It has been a long and stressful journey, and it’s only been done through a group of people here,” GSCP President Mike Conrads said. “It’s because of you that we’re able to focus on our mission, and that mission is to develop in people a greater understanding, appreciation, and connection to the natural world, inspiring lifelong stewards for the conservation of animals and their habitats.”
During his speech, Conrads discussed how the park has positively impacted the community throughout the past year, including 15,185 guests and a 32-percent increase in the animal population.
“Forty-seven school tours have been held, three homeschool days, and [roughly 1,700] kids have been here at the park learning and becoming those future conservationists,” Conrads said. “So, thank you all for all those efforts.”
Conrads also credited Bill Killmer, a partner of the Georgia Safari Conservation Park, with establishing the park.
Killmer pitched the idea of creating the park in 2013 and began assembling a team the following year.
“It’s a team approach, and nobody does anything alone,” Killmer said. “You can have a vision all day long, jump up and down, and if people don’t believe in it or buy into it, you go nowhere.”
According to Killmer, the team’s primary goal was creating the park “to share and give back to people.”
He believes the mission to protect wildlife is essential for improving student education.
“We want to help save animals and connect people to animals because people don’t try to protect something they don’t know,” Killmer said. “That’s the key to this conversation; it’s education and bringing people and animals together in a really great way.”
Brandie Anderson, a fellow GSCP partner, joined the team in 2014, leaving behind a career in healthcare. She spoke at the celebration of her decision to join the project, which would allow her to pursue her love for animals and conservation.
“In 2014, I came on board, took a chance, gave up a pretty great career in the healthcare field I was heading towards to take a chance on this part of the park,” Anderson said. “What can I say? This is a dream come true.”
Anderson credited the team and fellow staffers for making the entire project happen.
“We wouldn’t be here without many people in this room,” Anderson said. “But here we are, and all I can say to people is when you have a dream and you believe in that dream with everything in your being that you do not take no for an answer, and you push through, and you find a way.”