Citizens Call on Zoo Commission to Send Ruby the Elephant to Sanctuary

Fate of elephant may be decided at zoo commission meeting on Tuesday

WHEN: Tuesday, January 16th, 10:00 a.m.

WHERE: Los Angeles Zoo, Grand Room

WHAT: The Los Angeles Zoo Commission will discuss the 45-year-old African elephant Ruby, whose proposed second relocation is at the center of a heated debate.

WHO: Members of In Defense of Animals (IDA), Los Angeles Alliance for Elephants and concerned citizens will address the Commission and urge them to send Ruby to an elephant sanctuary, where she would live on more than 70 acres of natural habitat, rather than in the small artificial environs of another zoo. A colorful banner, which has been signed by thousands of zoo customers who support moving Ruby to a sanctuary, will be unfurled.

WHY: In May 2003, Ruby was separated from Gita, her companion of 16 years, and sent to the Knoxville Zoo, generating a storm of controversy and a citizen lawsuit. After attempts to integrate Ruby with the Zoo’s other African elephants failed and she had been kept alone for more than a year, then-Mayor James Hahn ordered Ruby back to L.A. Zoo in 2004. Since her return, Ruby has been held in a tiny off-exhibit pen where the public is not allowed to see her. Since Gita’s death in June 2006, Ruby lived alone, which is extremely inhumane for this highly social species.

As L.A. Zoo’s planned elephant exhibit expansion will accommodate only Asian elephants, Ruby has no place in the Zoo’s future plans. Yet despite the failure of the last relocation attempt, the Zoo has stated its preference to ship Ruby off to yet another zoo.

Advocates are calling on Mayor Villaraigosa to intervene if necessary and send Ruby to a sanctuary, where she can spend the remainder of her life with other African elephants in a spacious, natural-habitat refuge that will give her more than 500 times the space of her current zoo enclosure.

For more information see www.helpelephants.com.