Wharf Bids Farewell To Bay.org Leader John Frawley

Wharf Bids Farewell To Bay.org Leader John FrawleyJohn Frawley. (Photos: Courtesy of Aquarium of the Bay)
Geri Koeppel
Published on February 09, 2016

Fisherman’s Wharf and other waterfront stakeholders have bid farewell to an integral member of the community: John Frawley, the founding president and CEO of Bay.org. He left to take a position as president of the Minnesota Zoo; his last day was Friday, Feb. 5th.

Frawley founded Bay.org, a coalition of five Bay Area institutions dedicated to promoting environmental awareness and protecting the Bay Area’s wildlife and waterways. It includes Aquarium of the Bay, Sea Lion Center, Bay Institute, EcoCenter at Heron’s Head Park and Bay Model Alliance.


Aquarium of the Bay.

We caught up with Frawley on his last day to talk about how the organization has grown and what’s next for it after his departure.

Frawley started by giving us a bit of history, telling us that Aquarium of the Bay opened in April of 1996 as a commercial enterprise called Underwater World. “It got off to a really poor initial start,” he said. “It didn’t do well; it didn’t achieve its original goals financially.” And, it lacked the elements of a good aquarium—namely, lots of animals and a strong mission. Within a year, it filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Quickly, Frawley began working on lifting the standards, focusing on conservation and getting accreditation through the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, which was fulfilled in 2001. The Aquarium “brought in the right kind of staff you’d find in a nature-based facility,” he said. For the past 15 years, the Aquarium has seen growth and now gets about 400,000 visitors annually, and it's home to about 20,000 animals that live in the Bay and nearby waters.

In addition to gaining accreditation, Frawley told us, “One of my other goals was to find a long-term legacy for this project and take it nonprofit.” The Aquarium entered a merger with the Bay Institute in 2009. “That was a huge milestone for all of us who worked here,” he said. Through a generous grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, he added, the Aquarium created a strategic plan.


John Frawley.

The merger aided both organizations. The Bay Institute had existed for 30 years, protecting water quality in the Bay, and was strong in field conservation, policy and advocacy, but didn’t have a big brand awareness or educational outreach. The Aquarium was a very strong educational facility that had financial strength, but lacked a strong mission. They decided to merge under the Bay.org umbrella. “They both complement each other really nicely,” Frawley said. “We were trying to create a model for the next 30 years that had a lot of efficiencies to it.”

Bay.org was established formally in 2014 and has also merged with other partners, including an EcoCenter at Heron’s Head Park at Hunter’s Point, and formed the Bay Model Alliance to provide education in the North Bay. It's also created a classroom that’s open 365 days a year to teach visitors about the sea lions at Fisherman’s Wharf. “Six million people [per year] were visiting the sea lions,” Frawley noted, “but very little interpretation was happening.”

Looking to the future, Frawley said Bay.org is launching Goplacessf.org, which aims to facilitate more field trips in the nine-county Bay Area. “Transportation’s always been one of the things on my radar that I wanted to fix,” he told us. This will connect fleets of buses with teachers that need them for class field trips, along with donations from people and corporations. “A lot of times, they sit dormant,” Frawley said of various buses, whether school buses, tour buses or private buses that serve tech companies.

Frawley is also proud of the legacy he leaves that has named Bay.org and Aquarium of the Bay among the top 10 nationally for the percentage of its budget devoted to field conservation, out of a total of 230. “I never would have thought of leaving,” he told us. “I’ve been recruited before.” But, he said, “It was too much of a family pull for me,” because his parents, two daughters and two grandchildren live in Minnesota. “And it’s a great job,” he added. “The Minnesota Zoo is another great conservation-based zoo.”

Bay.org will conduct a national search this spring for a new CEO. “The team here is super strong," Frawley said, "and I’m sure they’re going to find a great leader who will complement everything I’ve done here and take Bay.org to the next level."