An award-winning Canadian filmmaker is expected to address the Los Angeles City Council on Friday on the cruelty of elephant captivity at the invitation of Councilman Bob Blumenfield.
Fern Levitt is expected to discuss her new documentary “Lucy: The Stolen Lives of Elephants,” which she bills as the first documentary to reveal the cruelty elephants experience in zoos and the misinformation zoos tell the public in order to justify their captivity.
The documentary examines the transfer of Asian elephants Billy and Tina from the Los Angeles Zoo, despite calls from some residents, celebrities and animal advocates to send them to a sanctuary. Blumenfield also backed such a request.
“This film is more than exposé — it’s a call for change,” Levitt said in a statement. “Elephants are intelligent, social beings, yet too many spend their lives behind bars. We owe them a future in the wild where they belong for their sake and the sake of our fragile planet.”
According to Levitt, the documentary also explores the Nonhuman Rights Project’s legal fight to recognize elephants as legal persons; the capture of wild elephants from Swaziland for U.S. zoos; and innovative solutions such as Buenos Aires’ decision to transform its zoo into a so-called “Eco Park,” as well as the yet-to-be approved Jane Goodall Act which would ban elephant captivity in Canada.
The documentary will be screened at 7 p.m. Sunday at the Sepulveda Screening Room in Westwood.
In May, the Los Angeles Zoo quietly transferred Billy and Tina — the last two Asian elephants in its care — to their new home in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The Tulsa Zoo’s Elephant Experience and Preserve was already home to five Asian elephants, and its preserve covers 17 acres, including a 36,650-square-foot elephant barn and a 10-plus-acre wooded elephant preserve.
Los Angeles Zoo officials insisted the move was the best choice for the pair of elephants.
“The decision to move the elephants to the Tulsa Zoo was made with the health and well-being of the individual elephants as the top priority and at the recommendation of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums and its Elephant Species Survival Plan which advises on the management of the entire population of elephants in AZA-accredited institutions as a single herd,” according to a statement from the L.A. Zoo that was issued May 21.
“The Tulsa Zoo was the top recommendation of the SSP based on space, herd dynamics and expertise of the staff. This option also ensured that Billy and Tina would be able to remain together,” the statement continued.
The transfer prompted protests and a lawsuit in which a judge declined to issue a temporary restraining order to block the relocation of the elephants to Tulsa.
Tulsa Zoo officials stated in the summer the two elephants were doing well, and bonding with the other elephants.
Critics contended that the size of the enclosure was far too small to accommodate two more elephants, and urged for the elephants to be relocated to an elephant preserve.
Source: NBC Los Angeles
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