Sea lions none of board's business-aquarium boss

By Sandra Thomas-Staff writer

Unless it involves a dolphin or a whale, the Vancouver Aquarium and Marine Science Centre is not obliged to inform the parks board of any new acquisitions of live animals and has no plans to do so, says aquarium president John Nightingale.

Nightingale was responding to criticism from the parks board and animal activists this week regarding the capture of six, 10-week-old steller sea lion pups about a month ago off the north coast of Vancouver Island. Yesterday one of the pups, Zayas, died of suspected pneumonia.

The parks board only learned of the acquisition through the media, said vice-chairwoman Anita Romaniuk. "We have an agreement to let them handle the day-to-day operations of the aquarium," she said. "But I'm not so sure 'day-to-day' includes capturing research animals."

The female sea lion pups are the fourth group collected by the aquarium in the past decade, bringing the total currently on site to 14. Last March, despite protests from local environmentalists, the former parks board gave the aquarium permission to expand the sea lion research pool, located on the north end of the aquarium, to include new in-ground pools and larger decks.

That expansion was approved in principle in 1993 as part of a long-term lease with the aquarium. That same year, the aquarium began working with a consortium of universities, including UBC, to study steller sea lion diet and growth patterns in an effort to find out why sea lion numbers are dwindling to the point that they're now endangered.

Romaniuk said the parks board hopes to discuss the issue of notification with Nightingale this fall, likely at the same time they meet to talk about the importation of dolphins. Last month, board chair Heather Deal asked the aquarium for a temporary moratorium on the acquisition of new dolphins until the city's legal department can re-examine the bylaw governing cetacean acquisition. "They didn't tell us when they got Spinnaker [a male dolphin] last year, but eventually the media found out," Romaniuk said. "These issues are going to create a media circus anyway; it's a lot easier on us if we at least we know what's going on before hand."

But Nightingale said the parks board wasn't informed about the new sea lions pups because it's not required by the lease conditions and commissioners didn't ask.

"Anita had a briefing here at the aquarium along with the rest of the park board members and they were all shown the sea lion research centre," he said. "They didn't ask then when they had the opportunity to, so we didn't feel it was necessary to inform them now. I'd like to know where this is going. Are we going to have to inform them when we change our toilet paper?"

Annelise Sorg, director of the Coalition for No Whales in Captivity, said the aquarium has a responsibility to inform the parks board and public of any new live collections because it's a public, non-profit institution.

"It's a public aquarium, run with public funds on public land," she said. "However, the Vancouver Aquarium hates the public to have anything to do with it. The aquarium should have been built somewhere else where they could run it like a private business and not have any public accountability."

Meanwhile, the Vancouver Board of Trade is throwing its weight behind the aquarium. Last week, the board sent letters to its 4,300 members asking them to contact the parks board in support of the aquarium. Chief economist Dave Park said the Board of Trade considers the facility a "great asset" to tourism and education. "It's also a great economic resource for our city and the parks board is trying to pull the rug out from under them."