The Vancouver Aquarium Marine Science Centre announced Monday that it had received $25 million in combined federal and provincial grants to help pay for substantial upgrades to the 54-year-old facility.
Aquarium president John Nightingale told Business in Vancouver that the $10 million from Victoria and $15 million from Ottawa will help fund eight projects ranging in cost from $1.5 million to $18 million apiece.
In total, those projects will cost $60 million. So, the government grants only cover about 42% of the expected costs.
He said, “We will provide some of that other funding ourselves and we will do some fundraising in the community through the philanthropic private side and corporate side.”
One planned upgrade is to boost the size of the aquarium’s whale pools.
Will this quell the movement to keep the aquarium from having whales in captivity?
“No, because I don’t think it’s a movement,” Nightingale said. “You’ve got basically a few people – five or 10 – who are very active with their feelings.
"What went on at the [Vancouver] Park Board I believe was paying off a political debt. Somebody got elected promising to do something so they had to introduce the motion. The public, as we learned in our consultation in 2008 and 2006, supports the aquarium keeping whales and dolphins by well over 80%.”
On July 15, Vancouver park commissioners denied a motion to add a non-binding plebiscite on the issue to next year’s municipal ballot. That means voters will not get a say on whether the aquarium should keep whales in captivity until at least 2015.
Commissioner Stuart MacKinnon initiated the park board vote in June after a one-year-old beluga whale, Nala, died at the aquarium.
Nightingale’s facility employs the full-time equivalent of 350 staff. He said that with larger facilities there would likely be more hiring.