What’s best for Billy?

Re “C’mon, L.A., free Billy the elephant,” Opinion, Jan. 5

Daphne Sheldrick’s Op-Ed article about Billy the elephant was right: Elephants have human-like emotions and bonds. That’s why Billy deserves a real family of other Asian elephants in a completed Pachyderm Forest at the Los Angeles Zoo, with 3.6 acres of waterfalls, pools, mud wallows and varied terrain.

As the zoo’s elephant keepers, we have 71 years of experience helping elephants enjoy quality lives. Day after day, we exercise Billy, play fetch with him or scrub his tusks and feed him.

Sheldrick is also wrong that Asian elephants can only thrive in sanctuaries. Elephants in high-quality zoos live as long as elephants in refuges. For the 30,000 Asian elephants that remain, “the wild” is a vanished Eden. State-of-the-art zoos can save this species from extinction.

It’s time to finish the Pachyderm Forest that 79% of Angelenos voted for so that Billy can have the best possible life.

Jeff Briscoe,

Vicky Guarnett,

Scott Haist

and Don Aguirre

Los Angeles

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Billy the elephant’s space is equivalent to us living in a closet. Surely the $42-million spent to construct the zoo’s Pachyderm Forest could be put to better use. Keeping one lonely and sad elephant is not a sight to behold or promote.

How many more elephants must die in zoos before we realize they do not belong in captivity?

Judy R. Martin

Los Angeles

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There are so many reasons why Billy should no longer be kept in solitary confinement at the zoo. His life has been spent in the service of humans, and it’s long overdue for him to be able to enjoy life at last. Fifteen elephants have died at the zoo since 1975, and the new exhibit will not be adequate to accommodate his needs.

What infuriates me even more is the outrageous expenditure when the city is in such a severe economic slump and facing the firing of teachers, exorbitant parking fees, closing parks, libraries and other public facilities.

Arlene Cohen

Los Angeles