While the Woodland Park Zoo’s new, popular penguin population pleases, the zoo’s 800-pound gorilla, so to speak, may be its three elephants. Protest groups have been organizing to have Watoto, Bamboo and Chai removed and taken to an elephant sanctuary in Tennessee to give them more space and sanity, according to protestors.

As the Ballard News-Tribune reported April 27, a press conference was held that morning with actor/comedian Lily Tomlin and included Alyene Fortnang, co-founder of Friends of Woodland Park Zoo Elephants, who want the three zoo elephants liberated from captivity.

Now, an ambitious 15 year old from Greenwood, Maia Sebek, is taking the bull by the horns, or, in this case, the elephant by the trunk, and has created The Elephant Project. Coached by her mother, Mary, and helped by her younger sister, Katie, she, like Tomlin and Fortnang, is putting pressure on the zoo to free the elephants.

They are collecting signatures and appearing at the Ballard Farmers Market and other public venues to get their message out.

In a Feb. 17 letter Deborah Jensen, president and chief executive officer of Woodland Park Zoological Society, Maia Sebek wrote, “Everything I have read seems to show that elephants don’t do well in zoos because zoos can’t meet their basic needs for family, space, and things to do…I read that the (Woodland Park Zoo’s) mission is to educate and inspire people about animal conservation, but I don’t see how keeping elephants in unnatural and inadequate conditions can teach respect for them.”

In Jensen’s reply in a letter dated March 19 she said, “We need elephants in zoos, in real life and in real time, to champion conservation for their wild counterparts…We believe we are meeting the mental and physical needs of our elephants. They eat well, play, socialize, vocalize and interact with their heard mates and keepers…”

“They survive the best they can (at the zoo) but there is no way that without space and without the family these elephants can survive effectively,” said Mary Sebek.

E-mail The Elephant Project at the.elephantproject@yahoo.com.