VANCOUVER — Officials with the Vancouver Aquarium say they have applied for a judicial review aimed at overturning a park board bylaw banning whales, dolphins and porpoises from its facility in Stanley Park.
The aquarium says it is asking the B.C. Supreme Court to rule the cetacean ban is invalid and set it aside.
It says in a news release that it will argue the bylaw is vaguely worded and the board does not have the authority to impose it.
The application also alleges the bylaw causes numerous adverse impacts to the aquarium's mandate of conservation, including the loss of a long-term home for rescued cetaceans that cannot be released.
Park board commissioners voted 6 to 1 in favour of approving the bylaw last month.
At the time, board chairman Michael Wiebe said scientists have found cetaceans are best treated in a natural habitat and research data captured from aquariums is no longer necessary.
