The long-languishing Thompson Zoo has lo and behold been rediscovered and animal welfare there has unexpectedly appeared suddenly as more than a blip on the local radar.
What's going on? Well, it seems opponents of the University College of the North (UCN) student housing plan for the new Thompson campus are concerned it will disturb the peace and quiet the zoo animals need. Really?
The UCN student housing plan, which has been a matter of public record for at least a year and has been covered without any public reaction in the media until now, called for a new childcare facility and 200 new housing starts in a mix of 100 mainly three and four-bedroom townhouse style multi-family units and another 100 dormitory units when it was unveiled in 2008.
How absolutely rich that the UCN student housing opponents should emerge now and rally to the cause of the zoo animals. An exasperated Mayor Tim Johnston observed at a meeting Oct. 21,"For 15 years people in this community have talked about the need for UCN, and now to have people stand up and say 'We really want it, it'd be great, but we don't want it close to the zoo, and we don't want the housing,' what do you want?" he asked. "Housing, childcare and the campus have always been part of UCN.
"The City of Thompson has entered into discussions with the zoo, with Spirit Way regarding what are potential options for the development of the zoo. None of those options, including the report we received back from an individual we retained to list those options, indicated the movement of the zoo was necessary to any other properties," Johnston noted. "I've committed to working with the zoo, but I do not believe it's reasonable to allow those issues to stop UCN. It's not fair to Northern Manitoba."
For her part, zoo director Erin Wilcox has made no objection the UCN student housing project. Wilcox has been the executive director at the Thompson Zoo for six years and has an environmental science degree from the University of Manitoba.
While we can agree with UCN student housing opponents (who will disingenuously tell you they're not really opposed to student housing somewhere for - can we say it out loud? - perhaps a substantial number of aboriginal single mothers) that the zoo animals' welfare is an important issue, we'd have to be blind not to observe the general neglect of interest by many in the zoo in recent years until now.
This is classic case of Not In My Back Yard (NIMBY). UCN student housing? Sure, fine. How about over in Eastwood, maybe on Princeton Drive, near where the current dorms are? Or maybe on some of that city-owned land behind 10 Yale?
It's "déjà vu all over again," to borrow a line from baseball legend Yogi Berra, with shades of last winter's Rotary Park debate when council was forced to backtrack under pressure from Deerwood residents on a plan to allow the Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corporation to develop at least 10 low-income multi-family four and five-bedroom townhouses and row homes in Thompson in what would have been in its first project here since 1990.
If ever there was a Dickensian poor stepchild among local external organizations, with the their arms-length relationships to the City of Thompson, it is the approximately $200,000-a-year, largely city funded, Thompson Zoo. The zoo also gets some additional funding through the province for their environmental programs, which are presented within local schools from time to time.
While the Thompson Zoological Society was incorporated as a not-for-profit entity in 1978, the history of the zoo dates back to 1969 and Hawley Duncan's observation that local youngsters never got a chance to see farmanimals.
From that observation of Duncan and vision of others, including Red Sangster, Don Johnson Sr., George Piett, Mayor Tom Farrell, Roy Bibeau, Forbes Stewart and Sharon Koshul, sprang the Thompson Zoo, developed through the usual combination of government grants, donations and much volunteer support.
A fort-type pole fence enclosure, requiring 3,800 logs to construct and meant to remind visitors of the early fur trading forts that played such an important role in the development of Northern Manitoba, was built around the perimeter.
The Thompson Zoo originally started with just three deer - a pair of Japanese deer and a whitetail buck - donated by the Flin Flon Zoo. Duncan acquired some ponies for children to ride and a few hens for them to feed. Stewart, one of a seven-member zoo board, presided over by Duncan, is said to have had a special interest in birds and it was largely through his efforts that the zoo's early duck and geese flocks were built up. A lynx, captured by city employees, found a home at the zoo and other animals were purchased from other zoos. By 1971, the Thompson Zoo was the proud owner of 13 animals.
For the first two decades of its existence, the Thompson Zoo generated local interest. The animals' pens tell the tale in the 1980s. A visitor may still notice such signs as "built and funded in 1987 by the Thompson Rotary Club" and "built and funded 1987 by Manitoba Hydro Employees Society."
In a June 9, 2008 report to council, deputy mayor Oswald Sawh, the city's representative on the zoo board, wrote, "In our opinion, the situation at the zoo is continuing to deteriorate. We saw evidence of the grounds not being maintained and some animals not being suitably cared for."
Of particular concern is the small wolf pen where Neige, an Arctic wolf, and Mohickan, a timber wolf, are being held.
Spirit Way Inc. recently contracted Doug Ross, the formerdirector of the Assiniboine Park Zoo in Winnipeg, to help design a wolf park.
Johnston said last week while some people think a new wolf park would be within the zoo's existing footprint, he's told Volker Beckmann, the driving force behind Spirit Way, that he doesn't think that necessarily has to be the case and that folks should think outside the box when it comes to location.
Ross has also prepared a separate report on the future of the Thompson Zoo for the City of Thompson, which should be released publicly shortly.
