In the time that followed, Adam gradually began to give up those controlling attributes of his personality that had driven so many aspects of his life, both personal and professional. He gave in to something new and secret. He confessed to her that it was like a dream state – euphoria induced solely by her presence in his life.
Misti smiled and cried, believing in her own way that God had fulfilled the promise of her prayers, spoken so many years ago as a child. They were old souls, lost in time and by Grace reunited in this life to fulfill some destiny cut short by an earlier fate. Theirs would be a long and joyous life together, of this she no longer had any doubt.
Their disquiet had been short lived, and they quickly settled into a more normal and happier existence. Together, permanently in Barrows Bay.
Chapter 17
Jimmy Phillips and Alan Martin had been friends all their lives, growing up in a nice middle-class neighborhood on the outskirts of Trenton, New Jersey. They were good kids, decent students and had never been in trouble with the law. As they entered high school they began to turn their attention to careers and, with the pushing and prodding of their parents, began to look at colleges around the country. Neither was sure what they wanted to do, only that they would begin their adventure together. That was the plan anyway.
As they reached their senior year, Jimmy and Alan both realized that college would not be in the stars for either of them. Neither had any interest in the classroom and lately their time and attention had been taken up with new activities. They had been hitting the outdoors hard: hiking, camping, fishing and hunting all around the east coast; wherever their old camper van could take them on a weekend, or further away during longer vacations. Having read about the west but never having visited, they had become fascinated with the State of Colorado, with all its rugged outdoor beauty, forest woodlands and bountiful lakes, rivers and streams. It was a hunters’ paradise and they couldn’t wait to graduate and migrate west. Both had decided that becoming guides to the backcountry, to remote lakes and virgin woodlands, was the life they really wanted. They would start young, live the life and translate their wilderness experiences into real jobs. They were convinced they could make a go of it and left for Denver less than a week after graduation.
The plan had some flaws and they soon learned that they did not have the money to start their dream business. They hiked and camped every chance they got but soon realized that their real drawback was that they weren’t from Colorado and did not know the territory like a native. They were glorified tourists from New Jersey. Real guides did not take them seriously and after two years of hard work and nearly exhausted savings, they had nothing to show for it. They had to find real jobs and go to work, which meant they were not out where they wanted and needed to be.
They soon decided that one way to begin making valuable contacts was to join as many organizations as possible dedicated to the preservation of wilderness. In this way they could learn about the wilds of Colorado while gaining valuable outdoor experience. It could also be a source of business for them if their newly minted friends came to respect their outdoor skills. They discovered that many organizations needed people to do work in the wild; but these organizations sought older guides with more experience and a resume, not two yahoos from Trenton. Besides, the pay was often crap and would barely cover expenses.
One organization they joined, largely because dues were ten dollars a year, was the Wilderness and Wildlife Preservation Society, usually just called the Society, based in Denver, but financed by wealthy families out of New York City. They were excited about the upcoming monthly meeting, held in the small town of Juniper City. The excitement built not only because one of the old school members of the Board of Directors was flying out from New York City but because the meeting was an effort to meet a man claiming to have extensive funding sources available to support the work of the Society, including field work. There would be jobs for eager young men with moxie and a love of the outdoors. The opportunity couldn’t be more welcome or the timing better. They hated their jobs at the chain camping stores where they worked and could not wait to get out in the wilderness again.
They drove to the little town on the edge of a national park, surrounded by one hundred thousand acres of lush virgin forest, some parts of which had never been fully explored. Adjacent to the Park was an old ranch and logging operation comprising an additional twenty-five acres. It was now in private hands, but the Society had long coveted the acreage; it had been allowed to go fallow and many of the scars from its days as a commercial enterprise were healing. They wished to buy the land and keep it pristine.
The mystery man was from the Institute for Biological Diversity, another New York based think tank with plenty of cash and was in town to meet with the local members of the Board of the Society. He was tasked with determining whether the Society should be given a grant to judiciously acquire new tracts of land which could then be used for long term biological and environmental research. Research was the main interest of the Institute, so naturally they would want to meet those who ran the Society to be assured that they were dealing with the ‘right kind of people’. Aims and goals had to be consistent as the funds of the Institute were deep but not unlimited. The Institute had no experience managing wilderness in Colorado, so it made sense to them to partner with existing organizations with a track record in land management. There may be joint ownership and control, but this would hardly conflict with the basic goals of either organization.
It was a win-win at its finest.
The boys arrived well ahead of the time set for the meeting, so they could mingle with the other members, and hob nob with the members of the Board. They had met the local talent at other events, but not the largely out-of-state, back east permanent Board members who only infrequently got west of the Mississippi to see first-hand the fruits of their labor. This was an exciting time for them and they knew, just knew that their big break would come out of this meeting, right here and right now. They had a lot to offer a prospective employer, though depth of experience and a deep resume were not among them. They would bluff if they had to; they would size up the Stiff from New York City and BS their way into a job. After all, they used to live right across the Hudson; they were practically family.
The man sitting alone in the back of the room had to be the Stiff, Alan said to his best friend. Dressed in an expensive suit and business attire, he looked like a New York lawyer who had no interest in wilderness. They sidled up to him immediately, introducing themselves as wilderness experts, born and raised in New Jersey but who had vast experience in the Colorado outback. The Stiff took down their names and number and promised to contact them should an opportunity arise. After all, they said to the Stiff, they were practically cousins, right?
The meeting got started when the last Board member finally arrived, a half an hour late. He was an interesting looking older gent, tall and grey, dressed in khakis and penny loafers, wearing a light plaid wool shirt. He sat at the raised dais where the other Board members were seated on either side of a podium. The meeting agenda was written and there was some old business to take up before they could begin to discuss the reason everyone was there: an offer of funding from an organization with deep pockets and more money than brains.
The local Board members were comprised of an environmentalist, several conservationists and a couple of ranchers with deep historical and environmental roots in Colorado. The permanent Board members were generally not from Colorado and represented “old money” interests and other Foundations trying to do good for the nation and its people.
As the meeting turned to new business, the Board welcomed their guest from the Institute and invited him to speak. The Stiff rose from his seat and began to walk toward the podium.
Chapter 18
The Stiff rose from his folding chair in the back of the small but packed meeting hall, originally built by the Grange, the farmers’ fraternal organization, in the early 1900’s
. The Grange Hall had been the center of rural farming and political debates in Juniper City and there was a time when any politician wanting to get elected to statewide office in Colorado knew the exact location of every Grange Hall in the state. By the mid 90’s, the Grange Hall in Jupiter City was a dilapidated old building that had not seen active service in many years.
In 1995, partly at the request of some of the Members then serving on the Board of the Wilderness and Wildlife Preservation Society asked if there were funds in the cookie jar to purchase and renovate the historical building rather than lose another piece of history to make way for another B&B; tourism redevelopment. While the Society would not spring for necessary funds, one of the newly elected Board Members, Winston Abernathy, decided it would be an investment his old money family trust would be delighted to make. Winston was an old school liberal of the old money variety and had been employed for many years in the family business. It turned out the family business was presently doing quite well in the hands of the new business school trained younger generation of family members.
Winston was married with four kids who would never see a dime of the family trust funds if they didn’t earn their way to it. He had an Ivy League college degree which was followed up by an MBA from Harvard Business School. He then followed in his father’s footsteps by pursuing a brief career on Wall Street. After that was a much longer career in managing a portion of the family’s trust assets and investments, a stint at the John and Edith Abernathy Foundation, then back to managing the family’s various trusts and business interests. In truth, Winston’s main job was making sure his family continued to grow its extensive wealth and holdings and avoid squandering great grandad’s fortune. He was exceedingly financially conservative for a political Progressive; a term he could not abide. “I’m a liberal, writ large and proud of it. I would not want any right-wing conservatives out there to confuse me with any of the young ‘poli-wonks’ on TV today. I’m an old school lefty, a devout Protestant and I vote.”
“Poli-wonk” was his term for the new cadre of young left leaning liberal thinkers dominating the airwaves these days. Like the word polliwog the term was meant to suggest, Winston felt that mainstream liberal political theology should not be left to the immature of the species. Simply put, political thinking was a grownup sport, and, to his way of thinking, significantly more credible when carefully and clearly enunciated by men or women of a certain age and stature. To Winston, who had seen too many ‘principled political losses’ in his lifetime, it was far more important to actually get the correct politicians elected and exercise power. It annoyed him that some liberals would prefer to lose on principle and go back to ineffectual name calling, endless internal debates and some occasional rabble rousing.
However, as a former anti-war protester in the sixties, Winston did enjoy the occasional rousing of the rabble, even if it was now only at family events. Winston met his wife of forty years at one of those protests, though Heather, his one and only flower girl, had come from old Long Island money too.
Winston could be tough as nails and thoroughly unpleasant when he had to be. He could be a hand full at any time if pushed hard enough and in the wrong direction. While it was he who had taken the lead on this new matter before the Board, there was still a process that had to be followed before securing any approval for affiliation. He would introduce the Stiff to the locals on the Board, then gauge their interest in what he had to say about the Institute and its generous offer to acquire wilderness land. The offer was interesting, but Winston understood the concept of ‘due diligence’ and had done a thorough review himself. Well, mostly by himself.
The Stiff approached the podium but was waived off by Winston who asked him to avoid the electronics, speak up in a loud voice and talk plainly to the assembled membership in attendance.
“We’re all friends here, Mr. Jameson, so just talk to us as you would to your family and make your case. We’re all interested in what you have to say. Please proceed.”
The Stiff spoke from the back of the hall, while members and guests turned to listen to what he had to say.
“Thank you, Mr. Abernathy, and thanks to every one of you here in attendance tonight. My name is Darren Jameson and I am the New York counsel for the Institute for Biological Diversity, which most of you may know is a non-profit private foundation nominally headquartered in New York City. The Institute conducts research around the world through partner organizations, such as yourselves, into the cutting-edge issues affecting biodiversity on a global scale. We have research and project relationships with over thirty non-profits, twenty-five universities and fourteen governments worldwide.
“Our formula for the business end of the stick is to provide funding to partner organizations, such as the Society, in return for access to the raw data developed in specified new projects and for access to similar research from other prior and future projects in which we do not participate.” The Stiff stopped and paused for effect, looking around for confused faces that were his stock in trade.
Winston, who had been listening carefully, spoke up, “Darren, I don’t quite understand what you are proposing to us. We don’t conduct any research that would be particularly helpful to your organization. We’re a wilderness and conservation group. We buy large tracts of land, slap on deed restrictions to protect the future of the land as wilderness and conduct occasional nature hikes for Eastern liberals like me. Where’s the fit?”
“Good question, Winston. What we are willing to do is to fund the acquisition of wilderness in exchange for permission to conduct research and testing on your holdings.”
“You mean on the land we acquire?”
“No, on all your holdings. It’s a package deal. In exchange for capital funding now, we will have access to all your holdings to conduct research.”
“Our holdings are pretty dispersed as you know, but easily 80% or so are located here in North America, and by North America, I mean the US and Canada. We have some wilderness in Mexico, near Campeche but it isn’t a large holding. Seems to me that you could get whatever information you may require from public sources or by access to wilderness areas we do not control. Again, not seeing the fit exactly.”
“Well, the fit comes not only from the holdings you have but from the holdings you may acquire over time. We are interested in a long-term relationship to understand biodiversity at home and abroad for many, many reasons. But mostly we want to understand the nature of biodiversity in our own back yard. Particularly in areas free from development before that changes too.”
Heads were nodding in seeming agreement around the room, as well as on the dais.
Most of the chatter between Darren and Winston seemed reasonable to most of the attendees and if the occasional term or two flew over everyone’s head, that could be ascribed to the presence of two high power New York types trying to get to the bottom of what each wants. Not unlike dating.
“Darren, you should be aware that even if we wanted to proceed, right this minute, we could not. We have numerous other arrangements with partner organizations with restrictions on use that could easily interfere with whatever research you wish to conduct.”
“We’re aware of that, Winston. We can only do what we can only do. If other organizations are unwilling to cooperate, we move on.”
Winston looked up at Phil. “So, no lawsuits as a poor loser then? No attempts to piggyback on an agreement between us and go after our weaker partners, nothing like that right?”
Darren was ready to provide a great many unresponsive answers to a great many nominally relevant questions. He was also prepared to deflect almost all totally relevant questions either through dissembling, outright prevarication or the judicious use of the ‘non-answer question’.
“Not sure what you mean, Winston? We have had a long-term relationship with a great many organizations over the past twenty years or so. The IBD has never sued any organization for any reason in all that time.”
&
nbsp; Darren had the look of satisfaction of a man who had just lied but the lie had yet to be uncovered.
“Yes, that appears to be true, Darren. But it’s also true that while IBD has been in existence for twenty years, it has only become active in the past three years. Isn’t that correct?”
“Can’t be certain about that, Winston. Not sure what that has to do with our generous offer of capital investment in the Society?”
“Quite a bit actually. We did some research into you and your organization prior to this meeting. In fact, I have just been emailed the final report on you and IBD just minutes before the meeting tonight commenced. It’s the main reason I was so late. I apologize for not getting this done sooner but my initial research was flawed. Our meeting likely would not have been necessary had I been more careful initially.”
“I don’t understand,” said Darren.
“I’ll be brief then, Darren. Your organization, IBD, is the successor to another organization the American Wilderness Initiative or AWI, as well as seventeen other similar organizations owned or controlled by various commercial interests both here in the US and around the world. Particularly in Brazil, Africa and Asia. From what I understand, IBD has become sort of the umbrella organization for all these non-profits, private foundations and research groups. Is this accurate, Darren?”
“What is accurate and what I can comment on is that we have been successful in bringing diverse research groups together into one large and well-functioning non-profit organization to achieve more fundamental research than any similarly sized organization in the world, bar none. So, if that’s what you are getting at, then yes: guilty as charged.”
Discovery Page 42
