A Taipei City councilor yesterday accused Taipei Zoo officials of misappropriating funds designated for “animal adoption,” urging the Taipei City Government to look into the zoo’s expenses.
The animal adoption fund was established in 2002 to accept donations from the public to provide better care for animals in the zoo. Donations to the fund reached NT$6.6 million (US$200,000) in 2007 and NT$3.9 million last year. Donations in the first four months of this year jumped to NT$12 million amid the panda fever.
Individuals, including children under 12 years old, have contributed more than NT$2 million to the fund since 2007.
INSPECTION TOURS
However, more than 40 percent of the funds were used by zoo officials and staffers for foreign inspection tours and research projects, New Party Taipei City Councilor Lee Ching-yuan (李慶元) told a press conference.
The research projects undertaken by zoo staffers, including deputy director Yang Chien-ren (楊健仁) and Taipei Zoo spokesman Jason Chin (金仕謙), cost up to NT$4.4 million, but the research papers presented were less than 10 pages.
“The fund, which doesn’t need approval from the city council, has clearly not been used for animal adoption, but to raise zoo staff members,” Lee said.
Lee cited as an example a research project by Yang on Formosan black bears that cost the zoo NT$850,000 and resulted in a two-page research paper.
Chin wrote two papers on the conservation of pangolin in 2007 and last year. The zoo budgeted NT$710,000 for the two papers, each of which was only five pages long.
Lee condemned the zoo for squandering the donations and asked Taipei City’s Department of Government Ethics to look into the fund’s expenditure.
‘LEGITIMATE’
Yang yesterday said the fund had been used for “legitimate purposes.”
The zoo sent staffers on inspection tours to other countries and encouraged them to present research projects to raise the zoo’s international competitiveness, he said.
Chin acknowledged that some of the research projects, including his two papers, were not perfect, but added that both the inspection tours and the research projects were related to animal protection and care.
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