Tami Brown

 

General Manager of the 
greater Cleveland Aquarium

 

by Kourtney Caesar, crew 2

 

 

Would you like it if you were appreciated and adored by people you met, and even by the people whom you worked with? Of course you would! Mrs. Tami Brown is just that, as the General Manager of the Greater Cleveland Aquarium, a Cleveland enthusiast, and a dedicated provider to Cleveland. Overall she’s a pretty amazing person. Tami is a woman who has her mind set to change Cleveland, and so far, has been doing a great job reaching the goals she has set.

 

Tami was not born in Cleveland, but she moved here 23.5 years ago, and fell in love with the “arts and culture of Cleveland”.  She dedicates her time to helping making Cleveland a better place for everyone who lives there. She started at the organization Positively Cleveland, and worked her way up to becoming what she is now, the general manager for our Aquarium. She was excited when the city reopened the Aquarium, after it closed in 1985. After the reopening was a success, we now know that Tami’s visions of make Cleveland more welcoming and beautifying it, are really starting to unfold. So many people are so happy to have someone so enthusiastic about helping Cleveland and restoring it to the strong and thriving city that it was before. Cleveland’s Renaissance will make people realize that the popular quote “hard work pays off” is one of the most truthful phrases you will probably ever know. Nobody is stopping Tami Brown, she is going to keep persevering, until she can’t anymore, and in the end we will all see the result, of her hard work.

 

When asked why she moved to Cleveland Tami told us it was because of “the strong arts and culture that we have here.” She also said that she loved and preferred big cities, and with Cleveland’s 397,000 population, we have a substantial city here. Much to Cleveland’s chagrin, like being placed number 6 on America’s list of most dangerous cities, Tami still wants to be a part of the group that is helping Cleveland thrive. She plans on helping educate Clevelanders to show us how precious and unique our wildlife is, and how we can use our land for things that won’t pollute the air or flaw the soil. She also told us how she really wants to help our endangered species. She is really focusing on what she could do so this beautiful city does not go to waste. We all take advantage of the fact that we have good soil and a giant freshwater lake right in Cleveland. She is doing what she can to make Cleveland a beautiful, healthy, clean, safe environment.

 

Tami Brown told us that she had been living in 23.5 years, so that’s about half of her life. Her husband who fixes houses for a living, grew up in New Hampshire, but met her in Boston, Massachusetts. She also has a 14 year old daughter in the 8th grade. She was born and raised in Canton, Ohio, with her three sisters and one brother, who is a cancer researcher. She told us about when she was young and decided what career would be, she told us it went like this: “When I was little I wanted more than anything to be a ballerina, but I was terrible. Then I wanted to be an artist, I wasn’t good at that either, but finally I settled on business, and that I was good at.” She told us about how when she was little, she was shy and quiet, but she went out of her comfort zone, and is now a very social butterfly!

 

“I loved high school,” Is what Tami told us when we asked her about her high school years. She went to Canton McKinley for all of her 4 years of high school. In college Mrs. Brown went to Miami University and studied speech communication, and worked with the media for 4 years. She also took a minor in French (merveilluex!). Tami started working at Positively Cleveland before working at GCA. When we talked about her first few months at Positively Cleveland she said “I loved it there, I was always helping people.” She told us about how excited she was when the GCA opened up again after almost 30 years. In the past two years alone, they have had an amazing over 650,000 people visit the museum, and counting. She says her staff knows that the #1 rule is to do anything to make the customers happy, and she does what she can to make sure that the staff has what they need to  do their job. From experience, I can honestly say, I believe that the staff really takes the time to follow that rule. It’s an amazing experience to have; the staff themselves just makes everything ten times better.

 

Tami says that when she retires she wants to travel the world and see more than just the U.S.  After explaining about that, she told us the answer to one of our most important questions: What is your passion in life? She said this “I am passionate about making sure that the young people in Cleveland can succeed in making Cleveland a better place.” She loves her job and how everyone really cares about the world, but soon it will be up to the young people to continue her work.  Before we ended the interview, she gave us some advice. She said “If you know what you want to do or accomplish in life, step out of your comfort zone and do what you love, and I promise you will reach your goals.”