Today's guest is Heather Reading, the Conservation Division leader at Land Advisors Organization. With over 20 years of experience in land and water conservation, Heather is skilled in developing tailored strategies that benefit landowners while solving resource challenges, protecting drinking water supplies, and improving recreational opportunities. In this episode learn about Heather and her career journey from studying biology to working as the Land & Water Protection Director for The Nature Conservancy in Arizona to her current role as Conservation Division leader at the Land Advisors Organization. You also learn all about the Yavapai Ranch Project she’s diligently working on conserving.
Welcome to She’s Wild, the Podcast for Women in Land & Development. Today's guest is Heather Reading, the Conservation Division leader at Land Advisors Organization. With over 20 years of experience in land and water conservation, Heather is skilled in developing tailored strategies that benefit landowners while solving resource challenges, protecting drinking water supplies, and improving recreational opportunities.
Heather helped shape the 2018 Farm Bill by working at local, state, and national levels to improve conservation programs and increase funding; she then directed multi-millions in Farm Bill funding to Arizona. She assisted in efforts to successfully pass the Great American Outdoors Act and worked at state and national levels to increase funding to the Land and Water Conservation Fund. She utilizes these sources to secure multi-million dollar funding awards for current projects and she’s also developing new fund sources and creative financing strategies for conservation with corporate business partners.
In this episode learn about Heather and her career journey from studying biology to working as the Land & Water Protection Director for The Nature Conservancy in Arizona to her current role as Conservation Division leader at the Land Advisors Organization. You also learn all about the Yavapai Ranch Project she’s diligently working on conserving.
Connect with Nancy:
Instagram:https://instagram.com/nancysurak
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nancysurak/
Website: www.nancysurak.com
Connect with Heather:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heather-reading-aa055b27/
Learn more about the Yavapai Ranch: http://www.yavapairanch.com/
Heather's book recommendation: The Secret Knowledge of Water: Discovering the Essence of the American Desert by Craig Childs via Amazon: https://a.co/d/aDnZHY6
Heather’s YouTube Yoga Recommendation: Boho Beautiful https://www.youtube.com/c/bohobeautiful
She’s Wild Sound Production by: Luke Surak, Surak Productions: surakproductions@gmail.com
Nancy Surak00:00
Hello, welcome back to She's Wild the podcast for women in land and development. Today's guest is Heather Reading the head of a conservation division at land advisors organization. With over 20 years of experience in land and water conservation. Heather focuses on conservation transactions and advisory services protecting drinking water supplies, improving recreational opportunities, and contributing to healthy communities. Before joining the land advisors organization, she worked for The Nature Conservancy in Arizona, where she negotiated complex real estate transactions, developed market based solutions facilitated public private partnerships, all shaping public policy. Heather is involved in various organizations and serves on numerous boards, including the Arizona women in water and agribusiness Council, Arizona forward State Water strategies Committee, and the Maricopa trail and Parks Foundation Board. And the Advisory Committee for White Tank Mountains Conservancy. And if those were not all enough to fill her calendar, she and her husband are also the proud owners of aspen sports and outdoor gear store in Flagstaff. Hi there. I'm excited to have you here today on the show. And I can't wait to get into exactly what you do. And what brought you to specialize in this type of land work. Welcome to she's wild.
Heather Reading01:42
Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here with you, Nancy.
Nancy Surak01:44
So what I like to do when I have some somebody on the show, as I like to just say, Hey, tell me a little bit more about your background and how you came to do what you do today. But in your case, because you didn't study real estate or sales or economics, which most of my guests have you studied biology and undergrad, take me through how you got from there to where you are now.
Heather Reading02:12
Okay, so it was a really round about career path. And I like to say that I Forrest Gump my way into land conservation and real estate. I started out with a love of science and really thought that what I wanted to do was, um AIDS and cancer research when I first started out. And as it turns out, I have horrible sterile technique and lab and can grow anything in a petri dish that you're not supposed to. And so I quickly realized that that was maybe not the right career path for me. And I realized that I really love being outdoors. And I love nature. And I liked field research. And so I took that through a career in biology. And I had a research project that I did that started out as an undergrad, and was working on Hantavirus research, which is a deadly virus to humans, that is carried through mice. And in 1996 or so, we had a big outbreak here in the southwest. And I was fortunate to be part of this team that got to study the outbreak of the virus. And I realized that, you know, maybe the direction I wanted to be was in field research. So I got into that took my research project to NAU Northern Arizona University, finished out my biology degree, started that project as an undergrad and carried it on to my master's work in the school of forestry. And I looked at the forest health treatments that were going on here to fend for us and reduce wildfire risk. And I had this really fun piece of research that was related to the small mammal community and how they responded to those forest treatments. And then the disease piece up at the epidemiology research that was funded by the Centers for Disease Control, and got my graduate degree in forestry with a wildlife management emphasis. And then thought about going to work for the Center for Disease Control doing outbreak research. As it turned out, that seemed like to my husband and I that while that might have been fun getting to travel to foreign countries, a lot of it dealt with very deadly viruses like Ebola, and perhaps that wasn't how I wanted to spend my time and he thought that was a fairly dangerous activity that he wasn't fully supportive of. So I got the first job out of grad school that I could working for the Forest Service as a wildlife biologist, and spent several years in wildlife biology with Federal agencies before service US Fish and Wildlife Service. And then realize that as an agency biologist, you spent a lot of time indoors, not a lot of time outside. And I really wanted to at the time, I was living in Southern California, working for the Fish and Wildlife Service, and had the opportunity to come back home here to Arizona, to work for The Nature Conservancy. And the job description was Field Representative, which is fairly ambiguous. And it's like you could do any number of things. And by the time I got an interview, I still had no clue what the job was about. But as it turns out, it was doing conservation real estate. The Nature Conservancy called that land and water protection, but it's really negotiating real estate deals, typically, on behalf of agency partners, apt to set aside land for state parks and wildlife areas, the National Forest System, some wildlife refuges, those types of things. And it was a very steep learning curve. For me. I had a great background in natural resources, but I had no idea about real estate. And, you know, I was being asked to go out and meet with these landowners who had property that had been a priority for conservation for decades, and negotiate a deal. And these were multimillion dollar deals, and I had no clue what I was doing. But what I loved was talking with the landowners here in Arizona, oftentimes it was farm and ranch families that had been on the land for generations, and had just this really rich family history, and a wonderful love of the land. And I found that I could help them to meet their goals for their family, for their ranching, or farming operation, or to leave a legacy for the local community, and be part of that. And so I really loved it. But again, very steep learning curve. And the real estate side of things was very challenging for me. I had this moment of frustration, once with my boss, and I said, you know, why did you hire a wildlife biologist to do real estate? I'm really frustrated that, you know, I am not getting up to speed at the rate I think I should be. And I feel oftentimes, like, I have no idea what I'm doing. And he said to me, Well, you know, a biology degree, of course, your degree, those things are take many years, whereas real estate is a process, and you'll learn it, you'll figure it out. And we had a really great support staff of real estate attorneys and paralegals, and you know, it was just a process of learning by doing. But what I loved is that the negotiation, I really love putting deals together. And that for me, I knew after just a short year or two, that's what I wanted to do, forever. And I was with the Nature Conservancy for about 15 years, the last five of those years, I was program director for land and water conservation in Arizona, for the Arizona chapter. And I managed the conservancies entire portfolio of real estate assets, from acquisitions to conservation easements, which is purchasing development rights. And also I created a disposition program for properties that were acquired as conservation but no longer really fit the conservation context. So it was a really wonderful experience. And then I had the opportunity about two years ago to join land advisors, and launch a conservation division, which really pushed me outside of my comfort zone to leave a large organization that had a lot of support for doing these things and try making it happen with a land brokerage. But I think that this was such a great opportunity, and really aspirational of our CEO, Greg Vogel, and land advisors to try something new like that.
Nancy Surak09:28
Absolutely. I think, you know, it's exciting for me to have you on the show, because not a lot of folks in my space deal with conservation. And it is such a part of just the land business. It comes up. I see conservation easements all the time. I've not done a conservation land deal, but I have done a Trust for Public Lands, Parks deal. So I'm familiar with a deal. That's right. It is I mean, it's the park it's for the public use. It is Something that I is in my community, I get to pass it, it's beautiful. And I lived that transaction super, I'm real. I'm just as proud of that deal as I am any development deal I've ever done, because I can see the contribution it's making to the overall community, for making the community better, you know, and you'd love it. Because it's like, right on the water. It's just a beautiful little park for the whole community. But I love the fact that you said, you know, I did all this work, and you loved the negotiation. So you come over to the brokerage side? I'd love to know, my curiosity is such that, Oh, do you find it more challenging to be on the brokerage side? Or is it really kind of the same?
Heather Reading10:47
Well, it's similar in many ways, Land Advisors has an incredible support staff. But not a lot of folks have worked directly in conservation. And so we speak a little bit different language. One thing that's challenging is I'm trying to take essentially a nonprofit model and shove it into a for profit box and be creative. And think outside the box while also knowing my sideboards and, you know, operating within the law and legal limits, and ethically and above the board. And I think one thing that's great at Land Advisors is, our organization is very ethical. And so there's never a point in time where I feel like I'm not operating absolutely, with integrity beyond reproach. It's just the rules are different. And I have to know what the the rules and the bounds are. So that's very different. For one piece of that, as I worked in policy quite a bit at The Nature Conservancy, and they love the policy work. And a lot of what we do is cultivating our congressional delegation, to advocate for our projects and bring funding and that's perfectly legitimate. But once I step into the policy arena, I can't lobby or advocate for changing policies or changing law. And so that's something very different. And I have to be very aware of my new sideboards, and not overstep those, but I've been able to navigate that very well. And I still have a great friend, Melinda Chang with the Nature Conservancy, who is my real estate attorney there, who is always available for me to call her and ask for advice. If I have a question on a piece of policy or project that I'm working on.
Nancy Surak12:40
What a great resource. So speaking of of that, I know, you've done a couple of deals where you're working on some deals, is there anything you can tell me about anything you've already closed, or that you're comfortable enough, that's in the public domain that you can talk about that you guys are actively or working on, or have closed recently, just about, you know, while you've been here with land advisors.
Heather Reading13:04
So conservation deals take an incredible amount of time to get to closing a fast track deal where all the stars aligned, would be a two year closing. And that's almost unheard of, it's more common that our deals take at least four years to close, if not longer. And that's because most of them rely on federal funding or grant funding cycles of some sort. And a lot of what I work with, and what I worked with before the Nature Conservancy, and now here at Land Advisors is land and water conservation funding, and also farm bill funding. And those take quite a long time from applying for the grant money to get it all the way through the closing process. And so right now, I'm really proud that we've got several great Land and Water Conservation Fund deals that are in progress. So the one that actually brought me to Land Advisors is the Yavapai Ranch project. And we applied for grant funding. We we assisted the federal agency, Prescott National Forest, in applying for grant funding to resolve what is the largest remaining in holding in the southwestern region of the Forest Service. So the ranch itself has close to 100,000 acres, and nearly half of that is privately owned. It's a checkerboard of every other section. So one square mile is owned by the private landowner. And the other section is owned by the Prescott National Forest. So this is a land management nightmare for both the landowner and the National Forest. And they've been working for over 40 years to try to resolve that. So we are finally making some amazing progress. With this the land advisors deal, and we assisted Prescott national forest in applying for land and water conservation funding, which is it's not your tax dollars at work, it's actually revenue from offshore oil drilling that was established as a fund to mitigate future environmental disasters. This was back in 1964, when this was created by requiring payments into the fund from the oil companies. So that one day when we had a disaster, like the Deepwater Horizon, and numerous things have come afterwards, that couldn't possibly, you couldn't possibly mitigate for that disaster, what you could do is set aside important lands and waters on the continental US so onshore. And so this fund is created from that, that is meant to acquire those important lands and waters. It's a highly competitive, it's a national grant process, and you've got to compete for funds. And we, for the first phase of the project, we competed very well. And our project ranked in the top 10, nationally at number nine. And if you can get into the top 10, you're pretty much guaranteed funding. And that wasn't the President's proposed budget for fiscal year 23. Congress then had to fund that budget. And the budget was passed, just recently, in early March. And so we know that we have funding set aside at nine and a half million dollars with the funding to get the first phase of that project done. We're now on the second phase of the grant cycle. So we've applied for funding for a really big ask of 18 and a half million. We don't We won't know until the budget has passed. But we have but again, we were in the President's proposed budget for fiscal year 24. And we moved up in the ranking to number six. The Forest Service proposed that the project be cut down to a smaller size. So we're on the national priority list at number six, but they chose to put the rest of the project that had been satisfied or, you know, instead of leaving it on the chopping block, they added it to what's called the supplemental list, and Congress can restore that funding. So we're really hopeful that that will happen. And we'll get another big chunk done this year. And in addition, we have a conservation easement deal on the same ranch over three sections of the ranch that are outside of the administrative boundary of the National Forest, and may not be eligible for the Land and Water Conservation Fund. So they'll stay in private ownership. But I'm now partnering with the Nature Conservancy and my former team, which is really fun on a conservation easement deal that will be funded through the Farm Bill, or an agricultural conservation easement. And so we've got this really big project that's of national importance, the national priority, it's I'm a multi agency priority with both the national forest and the National Resources Conservation Service that administers the Farm Bill. And we are doing an amazing job. Our team, which includes another broker, Pete Johnson, and that's it Land Advisors. And I couldn't be more proud of the success because the first thing that I've done without the support of such a big national conservation organization, and in fact, it's it's kind of unheard of.
Nancy Surak18:37
It sounds amazing. So I'm assuming I'm going to ask you've been on this property or parts of it, correct?
Heather Reading18:45
Oh, yes, part of my role is to give a lot of tours. We recently toured the Regional Forester, this is the top priority for the southwestern region, the Regional Forester and her team. mean she co Martin, she's wonderful, very supportive of the project. I've given all kinds of tours from conservation partners, to federal agency partners, and everyone in between that I can show the importance of this project, I've given a helicopter tour for our senators, staff and yes, it's one of my favorite places to be and that's a great part of my job is getting to go outside and spend time on the land.
Nancy Surak19:28
When you're doing these tours and you know, that you have, you know, the first funding like you're in the right spot, you're the second funding looks really promising. The third funding looks really promising. I mean, I've done long term, public private partnership deals that just take forever for all that funding to kind of snap together. But every time you get another good news or good email or like okay, we're through this hurdle, it's it becomes more real every time right Right. So when you stand out there, or you're on these tours or in the helicopter, and you're looking, can you leave? I mean, how do you even reconcile it in your head that you're putting together this massive conservation deal?
Heather Reading20:14
So yes, yeah, so these deals are massive. And I think the best part of it is assembling your team. In terms of putting it together, that it's going to be real part of our team here at lean advisors organization, we've contracted wonderful consultants called seeing stream conservation consultants. And the two women that are that makeup seeing stream are some of my favorite people to work with. They speak my conservation language. And they are so helpful. Brenda Schick is the principal and Kathy DeCoster. In helping me think through these deals, and political strategy, we have a whole political strategy behind this of who we need to engage, who we need to outreach to, and how to how to answer the hard questions that will come up about these projects. And then everyone has kind of their assignment as to go. It's so exciting when you see it actually coming together. And when we start building momentum around it, you get that first kind of success and an application and interest. And then you work that whole ranking, all the way up to the president's office in Congress of outreach to staffers and education about why this is important. The project I'm working on now is important to to securing state water supplies in the future, and how do we craft those messages and get that, bring that message home, get it across? It starts to really feel real, when you find out how well you've done in that grant ranking. But there's a whole lot that goes into it afterwards. That is kind of the sausage grinding of the deal. The due diligence process, once the agency receives the the actual funding on a two year cycle, you know, several years later, and we started actually working through the transaction, their due diligence process, as a federal agency is rigorous and arduous. And it's very challenging to get the landowner through that, because they have to have a lot of patience in that in that process. One of the things that I really enjoy about what I'm doing here at land advisors that I always saw as kind of a missing piece, when I was with the Nature Conservancy, is working on behalf of the landowners through that process. Because at the conservancy, you work for so long on these deals that you become like family, with the landowners, and I'm sure you know how that goes. And you've become very close and very candid, and you're very trusted. Which is wonderful. But when I worked for the conservancy, I was looking through the lens of the nonprofit, we had certain legal requirements that we had to meet as a nonprofit. And then the grant or requirements for our federal agency or state agency partners, we had to meet those requirements. So you're drafting documents through that lens, you're negotiating the deal through that lens. And oftentimes, we would come Full speed ahead, we're getting close to closing, and all of a sudden, everything would come off the tracks. And the deal would look like it was starting to fall apart. And it would be because we'd have this impasse with the landowners were, you know, they would say, I can't believe that you just asked me to agree to that. It won't work for my farming operation, it won't work for my family. That's not something we can do. And I'm just shocked that you would have. And I began to realize that it's because we weren't looking through their lens. No, I was looking through the nonprofit lens, I was not looking through the lens of the family, or their ag operation or whatever it happened to be that was important to them. And so at Land Advisors, I can play that advisory role. And because I know the other side of it, the conservation side, I can start to see things that might come up as an issue and deal with them up front and head them off. So hopefully we're not going to hit those stumbling blocks.
Nancy Surak24:30
Yes, you can anticpate where those problem areas are going to arise. Right and then educate that landowner like, Hey, this is likely gonna happen, because you've seen it before.
Heather Reading24:41
Many times.
Nancy Surak24:44
Yeah, you know, I mean, on the on the more private side of development deals. You know, I had two contracts that came across my desk today and my seller I've worked with for a dozen years and she's like, make sure that it didn't miss anything in the contract and we can have that relationship because we've, we've done so many things together that I can anticipate I know exactly where in the contract she's going to trip up. You know, because it because you just have experience so that that's awesome that you can fulfill that role for the landowner, because ultimately, they're a partner in this as well, you know, and I think it's awesome, because so, so much of my show, and so much of what I do is development, but I think it's awesome. When we conserve some of our land in we make sure that it's available for, you know, the next generation. Yeah, for like water research, I think it's also I'm we have to have that you have to have that balance can't
Heather Reading25:39
You have to have that balance. You absolutely have to have that balance. And, you know, one of the things I enjoy about conservation is it's solving problems. You know, it's not just a nature problem, most of the time with it, it's the nature and people problem, that there are resource challenges that we can be creative and solve. Yeah, another one that I'm really proud of, it's I have three lands of land advisors, I have a consulting contract with a corporate partner Salt River Project, which is a large water and power supplier in Arizona. And I'm working with them on a conservation program to protect the upper 25 miles of the Verde River, which Salt River Project considers to be the most at risk part of their water supply. That provides water to over 5 million people in metropolitan Phoenix. And so I'm working on a big collaborate collaboration with other conservation organizations. The Nature Conservancy is a big partner in this, the Arizona Game and Fish Department, Natural Resources Conservation Service, I brought in smaller local land trusts and players on the land trust, to develop essentially a conservation easement program that will protect the aquifer that supplies spring flow, and all of the water that's necessary to support flows and the opportunity pipe miles river. So this is a big long term project, you know, 1520 years, but that's protecting a critically important state water supply. And I get to work with landowners in negotiating these conservation deals, I get to work with all of those partners in negotiating grant applications and what each partner will contribute in terms of funding. So right now, we're working on a grant application, that's essentially like a five party negotiation to just get the grant applications and get everybody to commend you know, millions and funding to make this work.
Nancy Surak27:46
That's so amazing. So I mean, I have to ask, when you were younger, before you even went to the University to study biology? I mean, could you have predicted that you would have ended up in this role?
Heather Reading27:59
Never, I never would have guessed.
Nancy Surak28:04
You didn't see. And, you know, you weren't playing in the streams and the rivers and saying like, Oh, I'm gonna save these properties later.
Heather Reading28:11
No, I, I think it's so i. So, you know, our CEO, Greg, at Land Advisors is big on visioning. And realize, you know, realizing your dreams what you want, right? putting pen to paper, even just in a simple way. I'm gonna stay with the river. So, it when you ask it that way, Nancy? Yes, I guess from being a young girl, I realized that I wanted to save the Verde river. I wanted to save the pronghorn antelope that I saw in the grasslands that were near my home. And I wanted to do those things. How I had no idea. I had absolutely no idea that I'd be doing that's two years later. But yes, I guess in that way, I did know that. You know, those were my dreams that the small things you say that you intend.
Nancy Surak29:03
That's so cool. It really is cool. So when you look back at all of that, your job previous at The Nature Conservancy now at land Advisors, what's the biggest lesson that you've learned through all of it in terms of how you conduct yourself? What's the biggest lesson that you've learned in your career?
Heather Reading29:25
I think persistence, perseverance. One thing I'm not good at is taking no for an answer. If you want something bad enough, if you dream it and you feel like it's important enough, then go get it. And I when I was supervising my team of four, I would tell them that all the time, that that No, doesn't mean no, don't take don't take no for an answer. No means not right now. Go back. Think about that. why that person turns you down? Think about the points that they made in that conversation that got them to a no. And work on how you can get them to a yes. And let's figure out how we can get them to a yes. Whether it's a partner, whether it's a landowner, sometimes it's a timing issue. I mean, often, we work on relationships with landowners for decades, and they're not ready to do something, but then they have a change in circumstance, you know, it's death in the family, sometimes, unfortunately, or, you know, someone has a critical illness, and then something has changed, and we can step in to help them. But if you're not persistent, then you'll never get there. So just keep keep the your eye on the prize and keep going for it.
Nancy Surak30:51
Now, if that's 100% true, I mean, I see it all the time. You know, I see it all the time. So that that's great that you shared that? What's been your biggest failure that you've had to overcome?
Heather Reading31:06
Ah, so this is always a hard question. I think it changes from day to day. biggest failure? I don't know. i It's a hard question. Because I don't really see anything, per se as a failure. I think failure is an opportunity to take risks. And if it doesn't work out, then you tried, you tried your best, and you have to try, try something else and keep on going.
Nancy Surak31:38
That answer? I think that's fantastic.
Heather Reading31:42
I have one that's just annoying to me, that I and I don't see it as a failure, I just did a you know, we took a risk tried can make it happen, tried to put together a deal with the landowner that I think really would have helped them about a year ago. And that landowner was a friend of someone here in the family friend of someone in the brokerage that came in to have a conversation and we offered to list the property. And I this is an important property for in the context of the conservation program that I'm working on, for protecting the upper verde river, and I kind of had it in my head all put together how we could create this great deal that would benefit the landowner. And that land owner was insistent that they weren't going to list the property with anyone, any brokers anytime. And then just yesterday. I got the email from our broker, our our broker, saying, Oh, he listed it with someone else. And the value that he was asking at the time that he had an expectation of value that was unrealistic. And I don't think any of us ever sad, that's an unrealistic expectation, but I knew that it was the listing price is the price at which we could have done the deal a year ago. So that's frustrating to me, those sorts of things, you know, I see those as like, oh, what could we have done differently? To convince him to do to work with us to get that time? And I guess I feel that those were failures. When I I feel like I've not succeeded.
Nancy Surak33:27
Or when you were right there, right, you were at the table. And you're totally different, you know, practice. But I mean, I've been there, right? You know, I've I've been pitching to people like, Oh, this is the path of development. This is where the growth is going. You need to buy these four sites like this is what's going to happen. This is what you can do here, here and here. And I can visualize it. All right. And I just, I'm too many steps ahead of the market. I've had it happen to me my entire career. And I joke around and I tell people, you know, and what happens is, you get enough nose that you start to look for the yeses. And so you forget about that challenging project, or the one that you just you know, it's gonna work. But then your attention goes somewhere else. And I've had it happen to me so many times when I turn around and it's, it's built and I'm like, oh my god, I was I was there I was at the table. I was I was I was there was like four or five years ahead.
Heather Reading34:27
And it feels really bad, because you can vision it and you knew how to put all the pieces together perfectly. But yeah.
Nancy Surak34:33
And then sometimes, you know, when you when you have a landowner who won't participate, like you said, sometimes it's timing and if you're focused somewhere else, it just isn't meant to be but it is frustrating. So I get it. Those are like the worst but I will tell you from having them this for as long as I have. It comes around full circle to you'll get that call from that landowner who you've been courting, who will say it I'm ready to talk
Heather Reading35:00
Yeah
Nancy Surak35:00
So you have to focus on those two. So keep going, you know, just keep throwing stuff against the wall and then celebrate your wins, you know, celebrate the stuff that you're doing on the big project and just say, you know, I'm just meant to do that right now. Not this other thing.
Heather Reading35:14
Yeah. And I think that's great advice, because we often don't celebrate our wins. I mean, our deals are so big. Oftentimes, it takes so long to get there, there is so much sausage grinding that goes into it, that by the time you get to closing, you're exhausted. And well, it feels so good to have it close. And you're so happy for the leaders that you're working with, and your partners that you've got this deal done. You're so tired, that you're too tired to celebrate the win. And so I think that that's really important. We need to do more of that.
Nancy Surak35:50
100% agree. I can't agree more. I Yeah. Just thinking about all my deals, and how hard it is through just the long time, you know, they all the
Heather Reading36:07
Yeah
Nancy Surak36:07
All the variations you go through. So I totally get that. So at the end of every interviewer, I always love to ask three questions. So we're gonna go into that bar right now. If a young person were to reach out to you and say, hey, I want to get into conservation land or brokerage, or working with the conservatories or the Trust for Public Lands, what's a piece of advice that you would share with them to explore that side of the business?
Heather Reading36:39
I would say seek out an internship opportunity. And go for it. Find either if it's a certain organization that you want to work for, or a brokerage that you want to work for, then go ask for internship opportunities. There's nothing that's going to pave that career path for you better than getting into your field. And getting that on the ground experience. And you'll learn so much even by doing grunt work. And I think, really, it's important to prove your assault. And that will really help you to get those career jobs, when you've got your degree or when you've got your real estate license. You'll really get those opportunities and the doors will open. And it's also not necessarily what you know, but it's who you know, so make those relationships and contacts. And an internship can really help with that.
Nancy Surak37:37
Fantastic, okay. Is there a book or a podcast or something to you or an article, something you've read recently that you think is particularly inspiring to folks that you'd like to tell us that we should go check out?
Heather Reading37:53
Okay, so because I love just as much as I love land, I love water. And I love I love water law. And I love doing deals that have a water protection component. I'm always looking for things that are about water. So there I could name podcasts that are very boring about water. But really, my favorite books that I find inspirational. And I know you're taking a river rafting trip down the Grand Canyon soon on the Colorado River. This is a great read while you're on your river trip. It's called The Secret Knowledge of water by Craig Childs. And it is a fun book. It's a light read. And it's beautifully written. And it's about how he is contracted by the USGS to find water pockets in the desert. And then it takes you on a journey of his adventures, seeking water, essentially, kind of throughout his lifetime and all these desert explorations and it's really fun. What a great book, I can't wait. I might have to read that before I even go. You might want to it's really great. But then the other thing I love other than your podcasts, which I find to be incredibly inspirational, and whenever I'm having kind of a bad day and I'm feeling a little down, I put your podcast on and it's very that's awesome. I it's it's you find such inspiring women and such great stories that I really love it, particularly as the commercial side of working in real estate is new to me. I love to hear their stories, but I also because I think you know, we have a fairly high stress level in what we do. I need to find a way to destress quickly. And I love um, it's a YouTube channel. It's called Boho Beautiful Yoga.
Nancy Surak39:55
Ooh
Heather Reading39:55
It's very short yoga sessions that are theirs. This beautiful woman Giuliana who does yoga in very wonderful, beautiful nature settings like on beaches, tropical beaches and travels the world with her husband. And he does all the filming. And it's really great. And just I can do a quick yoga session of 1515 minutes to 30 minutes destress. And if they're fun,
Nancy Surak40:21
I'm gonna check that out, too. That sounds that sounds awesome, as well.
Heather Reading40:26
That's one of the things that I found during the pandemic, and I'm addicted
Nancy Surak40:30
And I love the idea that it's shorter to you know that your time commitment, Cuz usually by the time I'm like, oh, I need to do this. I don't want to I don't want it to take them half an hour or an hour. I want to be like, Okay, can I do something for the next 10 minutes, and it's going to refresh me, and I'm good to go.
Heather Reading40:46
And she's got 10 - 12 minute sessions. And you will, you'll feel great when you're done.
Nancy Surak40:52
That's cool. That's an awesome tip. I'm going to make sure that those links are in the show notes so that folks that are listening can be like, I'm going to check that out, too. I'll go and find her. And finally, that well, before we get to the final question, I didn't we didn't really talk about this too much on the podcast, but we talked about it prior to jumping on is the fact that you and your husband bought your own outdoor store. I don't know the right term.
Heather Reading41:20
Yeah, Outdoor Gear Store.
Nancy Surak41:22
So So tell me a little bit about that. Because I mean, you have this great career and you're working in the conservation. And now you're on the brokerage side. Now you're doing these like massive, nationally renowned deals. And in the middle of all of that, you're like, I'm gonna buy a retail store.
Heather Reading41:38
So my husband always my husband is wonderful, Rich, my husband Rich Reading. And he has sacrificed a lot for me to follow my career around. And when I was in grad school, he worked as a painting contractor, started a painting company with a friend, I was going to school up here at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. And Aspen Sports was our favorite outdoor gear store. Rich never wanted to be a painter. It's just kind of the fallback job. And he was able to do that wherever my career took me from Flagstaff to Southern Utah to see and Diego and back to Arizona. And we had a successful painting business. In Prescott, Arizona, for 15 years while I worked the Nature Conservancy, but painting was killing his body in his soul. It's really hard, physical labor. And he could just never step away from the job the way he had wanted to. So we were looking for something for him to do to get out of painting that would be more fulfilling, like my career was for me and conservation. And we went to a destination wedding in November of 2019. Friends got married until him and we sat down at the first table we sat down at with this other couple who looked familiar. And you know, we, the friends were from Flagstaff that were getting married. And so we were doing the I know, I know you but I don't know from where thing. And the man said, Well, I'm Jerry, I own Aspen Sports. And we said really? That's our favorite outdoor gear store. But we thought Dave Barnett, the manager on the store, he's been there forever. Jerry said, Oh, no, Dave runs the store. But I I've been the store owner for over 30 years, Dave, Dave runs the store. But Dave is getting ready to retire. And so my husband jokingly said, Well, if you ever want to sell it, let us know. And the conversation started from there. And then a year later, in November of 2020, during the height of the pandemic, we closed on the store and moved to Flagstaff and basically just kind of put the painting company on pause and my husband has been running the store. And it's really fun and fulfilling for him. And he loves giving advice to everyone who comes in that's on vacation, and he can send them on great hikes and get them outfitted for their river rafting trip and all the fun things that are way more fulfilling than it was painting. And it's definitely been a dream come true. But the way the timing worked out, we did not plan it. But we ended up basically buying a business. Both changing careers, essentially. I went to Land Advisors at the very same time and started there and moving to a new town city and buying a house and selling a house within like, I don't know 45 days. So all these big life changing things, but the last couple of years have been a little bit of a whirlwind. But it's been really great.
Nancy Surak45:03
I am so excited to have learned that and I can't believe I've known you for a couple of years. And they didn't know about the Aspen Sports. But as I prepare for my own river raft tour, there's some things on my list and I'm like, do really I need this?
Heather Reading45:16
Oh, we can tell you if you need it or not.
Nancy Surak45:18
Right? I'm gonna have to be like, Alright, I know you're in Arizona, and I'm in Florida. But here's what I have. Here's what they're telling me. He's on the list like you hook me up long distance.
Heather Reading45:29
Absolutely. And we can tell you what, it's not on your list that you're gonna need to.
Nancy Surak45:34
Yeah, cuz I'm trying to figure all that out, too. But yeah, that's a whole another podcast on to itself have prepared to live your life out of a backpack for a week, because that is not me. But oh,
Heather Reading45:49
Yeah, you start to realize all the things that you don't need.
Nancy Surak45:53
I know. I know what that I mean, that is really so inspirational that, how it all sort of just happened for Rich and for you too right, I mean, it's a family business, but to know that you were on this journey, or you guys were equally on this journey of, it wasn't working for him to be a painter anymore. And just to have that, I mean, that is, I don't know, you know, that's God's work, in my opinion, like, it's just meant to be amazing
Heather Reading46:26
It's meant to be. And yeah, it's, it's been really fun. Um, Jerry, who Jerry is just amazing. He held our hands for the whole first year, and I try to keep myself fairly removed from the business, I do a little bit of the back end, bookkeeping and things. And we have a great bookkeeper, Jill, who came with the business, she's wonderful. She's been there for like, 30 years. And so I work with her a little bit. But mostly, it's my husband, and we've got this great crew, we had a seamless transition, we kept everybody with the store. And, you know, most of them are college kids. So they move on. But it's been really fun, and really rewarding. And just the way it all came together. The Universe puts you where you're supposed to be. Yep.
Nancy Surak47:11
100%. And with that, if my very, very final question is, where can people keep up with you and your activities and follow you? Are you active on social media? I think you're active on LinkedIn. But is there anywhere else that you'd like to mention, besides LinkedIn that you're like, hey, if you want to learn more about this, or that, here's the best place to do that.
Heather Reading47:33
Well, I am active on LinkedIn, I'm trying to be more active on LinkedIn. And we've got some fun and exciting things to post doing about the projects that we're working on. I don't really have a blog or anything that exciting to share. But hopefully, we'll be able to share some more things as we build our conservation site on the Land Advisors webpage as well.
Nancy Surak47:56
Awesome. Well make sure that you post some pictures of this great, amazing project, I will I'm going to kind of evolve. And when you take these tours, like make sure you get all that out there so that we can all celebrate you.
Heather Reading48:09
I'll start doing that. And then if you'd like to visit us on at Aspen Sports at Aspensportsflagstaff.com.
Nancy Surak48:17
Awesome. Well, I am so glad that you join me here and that you shared your story and your journey and everything that you're working on. I'm wishing you all the best on all these next few phases of funding and all the new projects that you're working on. Really appreciate your time here today. Take care.
Heather Reading48:33
Thank you. It's been a pleasure.
Nancy Surak48:35
Thank you for joining us for another episode of She's Wild the podcast for women in land and development. If you enjoyed today's show, please go out and rate us so that we can be found by other women in our industry. And if you know women who are working in land and development, please share this podcast with them. And if you know a total rock star woman, badass chick who is killing it in land and development anywhere in North America. I want to know who she is. Please reach out to me so that I can fe