PLEASE, I URGE YOU TO WRITE A LETTER TO THE EDITOR OF THE VANCOUVER SUN. - THE EDITORIAL BOARD WROTE THE FOLLOWING AND IT SPEAKS TO US.
Vancouver Sun Letters <sunletters@png.canwest.com>
Thanks,
Annelise
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Vancouver Sun EDITORIAL
Aquarium's on a whale of a winning streak, but shouldn't push further
Published: Friday, June 29, 2007
They must be celebrating this week at the Vancouver Aquarium. On Monday, the Vancouver park board approved the latest of a series of measures to untie the aquarium's hands when it comes to acquiring and keeping whales and dolphins in captivity.
Taken together these measures, backed by the park board's Non-Partisan Association majority, largely undo restrictions imposed on the aquarium from 1995 to 2005.
- In May of last year, the park board rescinded a resolution passed by a previous NPA board in 1995, which required that any future aquarium expansion be put to a referendum.
- At the same time, directors reversed a resolution passed in 2005 when the Committee of Progressive Electors controlled the board, requiring that a referendum be held in 2008 on whether the aquarium should keep whales and dolphins at all in the future.
That was followed last fall by the board approving an $80-million expansion plan, including larger pools for beluga whales, dolphins and sea lions, as well as other amenities.
- This week, the board adopted new wording for a 1996 bylaw that will allow the aquarium to keep sick or injured whales and dolphins after they are rehabilitated, instead of being required to return them to the wild.
These measures may at first glance appear to be a repudiation of the animal rights activists who have been seeking to end the aquarium's ability to keep marine mammals on display, and of greener park boards of the past.
But history can be rolled back only so far, and the activists can take comfort that much of what they have gained over the decades will not be lost. Fishermen will not be given carte blanche again to shoot "blackfish" -- orcas -- that compete with them for fish. The aquarium will not hire contractors again to capture healthy wild orcas, or any other whales or dolphins. Whale and dolphin "shows" at the aquarium will continue to feature natural behaviours, not the demeaning tricks in vogue at some marine parks. And the park board has retained the main thrust of the 1996 bylaw that allows only injured cetaceans or animals that have been born in captivity to be kept in city parks; that is a reasonable limitation at present.
There can be no absolute standard on such issues. Over the last half century, societal values have shifted tremendously on whether and under what conditions cetaceans can be kept in captivity, and Vancouver has been in the vanguard of those shifts. Credit goes to both the aquarium and its very real role in educating the public about marine mammals, as well as to the activists who act as its watchdogs.
Compared to the magnitude of past changes, what the current park board is doing amounts only to fine-tuning. In any case, the activists must remember that the board was democratically elected in 2005. If change is required, it should be accomplished by electing a different set of directors, and that opportunity is little more than a year away.
Meanwhile, the aquarium need not push the envelope any further for now. This is a time to consolidate gains and manage the expansion, and to reflect on which way societal values are likely to shift in the coming years.
© The Vancouver Sun 2007
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VANCOUVER COURIER June 22, 2007
Slavery alive and well at aquarium says No Whales in Captivity group
By Sandra Thomas-Staff writer
An "aquatic Auschwitz."
That's the description of the Vancouver Aquarium by the new spokesperson for Coalition for No Whales in Captivity.
"It's a death camp for whales and dolphins," said Rob Light, who took over the role of coalition spokesperson from Annelise Sorg. "And now they're going to expand it."
Light said that in addition to the aquarium's expansion, which was approved last November, the parks board and aquarium president John Nightingale want to rewrite the bylaw governing the import of cetaceans-whales, dolphins and porpoises.
Park control bylaw No. 9, passed in September 1996, was intended to ban all future import of cetaceans, but a last-minute amendment permitted the acquisition of animals and mammals born or already living in captivity before the 1996 deadline. The bylaw also allows for the acquisition of an animal from an endangered species as long as the acquisition is approved by the parks board. The animal must also have been captured or otherwise taken from its natural wild habitat to rehabilitate it or prevent its death due to stranding. The goal is to release it back to its natural habitat.
On Monday the parks board will vote on an amendment to the bylaw to allow the aquarium to retain stranded or injured whales and dolphins once they've been brought back to health. A staff report notes that during the consultation held last fall on the aquarium expansion, the public "had no concern with retaining stranded or wounded cetaceans after their rehabilitation."
Once completed, the $80 million, 1.5-acre aquarium expansion will include new larger pools for belugas and dolphins. The coalition speculates more animals will be imported.
"This is the reverse of banning slavery," said Light. "We need to get the bylaw down [to include fewer whales and dolphins] but they're going to take more slaves."
Japanese fishermen chase dolphins into nets to kill or capture them, and the coalition believes such captures cause injury and stress to the surviving animals. Light said changes to the bylaw means the aquarium could purchase a dolphin caught in fishing and retain it once it's healthy.
"They're legitimizing the slave trade," said Light, who first addressed the parks board in 1987 to protest keeping whales and dolphins in captivity.
Both parks board commissioner Ian Robertson and Nightingale say the change to the bylaw is nothing more than housekeeping.
"It does give the aquarium the option of keeping dolphins that have been rehabilitated that probably wouldn't survive in the wild," said Robertson. "Sometimes it's not in the best interest of the dolphin to release it."
Robertson said the change to the bylaw clarifies a decision made last November.
"When we went through the whole community consultation we asked 'How do you feel about keeping rehabilitated whales and dolphins if it's in their best interest?'" said Robertson. "Ninety per cent of our respondents said they don't have a problem with that. I imagine this group would have a problem with that, but they don't represent the majority."
Nightingale called the change a "clarification" driven by the parks board.
"This group is saying 'Why are you doing this?' But we're not doing anything," said Nightingale. "The park board asked the question as part of the consultation and now their lawyers have added it to the bylaw. It doesn't change the fact that some animals can be released and others can't. We've always known that, but I guess some others don't. This is really being done on the behest of the coalition, but they lack the common sense to see that."
published on 06/22/2007
Vancouver Courier <editor@vancourier.com>
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Activist bemoans the lost art of sarcasm
Georgia Straight Letters
Publish Date: June 28, 2007
Your news article "Whales could languish forever in rule change" [June 21-28] was very informative. Unfortunately, there was a misunderstanding about my quote in the following sentence: "This latest [bylaw] amendment will be approved and it just means more smoke and mirrors that the Vancouver Aquarium has public support for buying rescued dolphins and filling up its pools."
I remember telling the reporter who interviewed me that the word rescued must go in quotation marks because I used it sarcastically. A rescued dolphin is supposed to be set free, not sold to the Vancouver Aquarium. Therefore, there are no "rescued" dolphins performing in those puddles in Stanley Park, no matter what the latest aquarium marketing campaign claims.
> Annelise Sorg, President / Coalition For No Whales In Captivity