Lusty pachyderms trip zoo construction

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - With no one wanting to get in the way of an elephant's sex drive, the Rio Grande Zoo hastily set out to build better barns

but forgot to drop by another city department for construction permits.

"I guess I stepped in a pile of elephant poop," Ray Darnell, director of the city of Albuquerque Cultural Services Department, said.

Two of the zoo's bull elephants are growing up. One has already impregnated crowd favorite Rosie.

"They're becoming dangerous to the keepers, and we have to also protect them," Darnell said.

So the zoo designed and began building barns to house the bulls. It's a $1.7 million project expanding the exhibit from half an acre to five acres.

But KRQE News 13 learned the city, in its haste to keep chaste, built the foundation and walls without securing city zoning permits intended to assure safe and proper construction.

The city essentially violated its own rules and now has red-tagged its own structure until the permits are secured.

City Planning Director Richard Dineen said a structural engineer must now certify the work was done properly before further work can continue.

"It could collapse structurally, there could be a mechanical failure, there could be an electrical fire," Dineen said.

"There could be a number of things that happen with a building that isn't properly done.

"That's why we look at the drawings."

Albuquerque Chief Administrative Officer Ed Adams said he's holding Darnell accountable.

"This is not the kind of activity that we can engage in," Ed Adams, the city's chief administrative officer, said. "We

have to lead by example, get out there, take care of those permits the way they should be done."

Darnell said the building is safe and that the engineer's inspection will set the project back couple weeks.

"We're not going to do this again," he added.

It doesn't look like Darnell will face any tangible penalty and the city won't fine itself. Normally the planning department works to resolve these issues in the private sector without fines.

The city hopes to have the new barns completed by next summer