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Help Send Lucky to a Sanctuary! San Antonio Zoo elephant is held in cruel isolation

Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Posted in Environment Wildlife | Tagged Environment, Wildlife

Lucky desperately needs your help. She’s a 48-year-old female Asian elephant who has been living alone at the San Antonio Zoo in Texas since the death of her companion, Alport, almost one year ago. Female elephants are intensely social, making her solitary confinement especially cruel.

In addition to Lucky’s inhumane isolation, she likely suffers from foot problems, as evidenced by the zoo’s frequent foot treatments, and has a large abscess on her back leg. Foot problems are no surprise, as the San Antonio Zoo elephant display is extremely small and outdated, giving Lucky only about one-half acre of barren space.

Foot problems and arthritis, caused by inadequate zoo conditions, are the number one reason for euthanizing elephants in captivity. Another elephant at the San Antonio Zoo, Ginny, was euthanized in 2004 after suffering for years from painful, infected feet and arthritis.

As if all this weren’t bad enough, the San Antonio Zoo is adding a unique twist to Lucky’s story. The zoo is constructing a new attraction that will feature African animals, including elephants. As Lucky is an Asian elephant she will have no place in this new display. Yet rather than retire Lucky to a sanctuary, the zoo has come up with a nonsensical plan to bring in another Asian elephant and then ship out both Asian elephants when the African section is complete!

After 46 years on display in a tiny, unnatural exhibit at the San Antonio Zoo, Lucky deserves to be sent to a spacious natural-habitat sanctuary where she can spend her final years roaming freely in the company of other Asian elephants. Once at the sanctuary and living on soft, natural surfaces, many elephants see improvement in foot problems.

A coalition of San Antonio activists needs your help to urge city leaders to do everything in their power to help Lucky, including sponsoring a resolution to send her to a sanctuary.

Please make a call or send a letter today!

Please write a polite letter to Mayor Phil Hardberger and the following city council members and let them know that:

It is cruel to keep Lucky in solitary confinement.

• Lucky shows signs of foot disease caused by decades of life in a tiny, inadequate exhibit; she must removed immediately from  that damaging environment.
• The City of San Antonio should do the right thing and show it cares about Lucky’s welfare by sponsoring a resolution to send her to a sanctuary.
• Lucky’s sorry condition is a black eye for the City of San Antonio and the San Antonio Zoo.
   

CONTACT: (Here’s an e-mail string of all the contacts listed below. If you’re sending them each the same e-mail, cut and paste this string into your “cc” field: phardberger@sanantonio.gov,district1@sanantonio.gov, district2@sanantonio.gov, maria.fares@sanantonio.gov, district4@sanantonio.gov,

district5@sanantonio.gov, district6@sanantonio.gov, Debra.Hill@sanantonio.gov, district8@sanantonio.gov, Iris.DeLaGarza@sanantonio.gov

district10@sanantonio.gov )

Mayor Phil Hardberger

P.O. Box 839966

San Antonio, TX 78283

Phone: 207-7060/7107

Fax: 210-207-4168

Email: phardberger@sanantonio.gov

COUNCIL MEMBERS:

District 1 - Mary Alice P. Cisneros

Phone: (210) 207-7279

Email: district1@sanantonio.gov or use the message form at http://www.sanantonio.gov/Council/D1/Contact/form.asp

District 2 - Sheila D. McNeil

Phone: (210) 207-7278

Email: district2@sanantonio.gov

District 3 - Jennifer V. Ramos

Phone: (210) 207-7064

Email: maria.fares@sanantonio.gov

District 4 - Philip A. Cortez

Phone: (210) 207-7281

Email: district4@sanantonio.gov

District 5 - Lourdes Galvan

Phone: (210) 207-7043

Email: district5@sanantonio.gov

District 6 - Delicia Herrera

Phone: (210) 207-7065

Email: district6@sanantonio.gov

District 7 - Justin Rodriguez

Phone: (210) 207-7044

Email: Debra.Hill@sanantonio.gov

District 8 - Diane G. Cibrian

Phone: (210) 207-7086

Email: district8@sanantonio.gov

District 9  - Louis E. Rowe

Phone: (210) 207-7325

Email: Iris.DeLaGarza@sanantonio.gov

District 10  - John G. Clamp

Phone: (210) 207-7276

Email: district10@sanantonio.gov

OTHER ACTION YOU CAN TAKE

The San Antonio News-Express recently ran an op ed about Lucky. You can view it at http://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/Comment_Luckys_name_has_been_a_misnomer.html. Please write a letter to the editor of the San Antonio News-Express at letters@express-news.net. Include your daytime phone number and address for verification purposes only. No word count is stated, but letters to the editor are generally limited to 150-200 words.

For more information on Lucky’s plight, please visit www.VoiceforAnimals.org (where you can also sign an on-line petition) and www.helpelephants.com.