WESTCOAST NEWS
Car dealer wants zoo to return donation for Tina
Elephant is gone and so is about $18,000 that was to help build new enclosure

Nicholas Read
Vancouver Sun

April 30, 2004

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A Langley car dealer is demanding that the Greater Vancouver Zoo return up to $18,000 it donated in 2001 to build a new enclosure for Tina, the then-ailing Asian elephant.

In 2000, the zoo's management said it would spend $1 million to build a new enclosure for Tina, who, at the urging of animal-welfare groups, was sent to an elephant sanctuary in Tennessee last year.

The enclosure was never built, but Dan Springman, owner of Springman Saturn in Langley raised the amount toward its construction and now he wants the money back so he can send it to Tina's new home.

"Why shouldn't we get it back?" Springman said this week. "It was designated for her [Tina]. How it was spent was irrelevant. It wasn't used for what it was intended."

Springman said he has hired a lawyer to pursue the matter, but so far has only received "a run-around" from the zoo.

Zoo general manager John Lee said the zoo's current management wasn't in place when the money was donated, so he doesn't know what happened to it.

He said, however, if the zoo determines the money is owed to Springman, it would return it.

"If the zoo is responsible, we have to pay that amount," he said.

Springman's demands come the same week it was revealed the Canadian Association of Zoos and Aquariums (CAZA) had suspended the controversial zoo's accreditation because of concerns about its animal-care practices.

CAZA, the organization that sets animal-care standards for zoos across the country, has refused to allow the zoo to renew its licence until certain care problems are dealt with. CAZA president Bruce Dougan won't say what those problems are, but Lee said he believed the association's principal concern is the hippo enclosure, which is not fit to house hippos properly in winter weather.

Earlier this week, Lee promised the zoo would build a new hippo barn this year.

On the same day, the Surrey Teachers Association announced it was cancelling a teachers' field trip to the zoo on May 7 as a result of concerns it has about the zoo losing its accreditation.

Association president John Wadge said he would await advice from the B.C. Teachers Federation before allowing any further field trips to the zoo.
© The Vancouver Sun 2004