Aquarium

To the mayor, business leaders, press and scores of excited Camden residents in attendance, it sounded like New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean was pledging state financing for a multimillion-dollar aquarium in Camden. Kean's Camden visit last April 24 announcing the tourist attraction provided the most cheerful news the economically depressed city had heard in years. Almost a year later, there is doubt what Kean - then beginning a re- election campaign - actually said in Camden. His press aide says Kean pledged state "support," "coordination," "study" and "help in planning the financing" for the $15 million to $20 million project.

For two years, it has been the subject of scarcely concealed skepticism. How could Camden, to many people a model of urban malaise, pull off such a coup? How could local boosters - yes, Camden boosters - convince anyone that a million tourists a year would flock to an aquarium on the long-dilapidated waterfront? Few people today doubt that it's really going to happen or that it will raise hopes for a grand waterfront revitalization scheme that includes a hotel and conference center, trendy shopping promenades, new housing, a corporate headquarters for the Campbell Soup Co., recreational boating and, possibly, restored ferry service to Philadelphia.

Fish are ideal pets for people whose jobs take them away from home for relatively long periods of time or whose leases prohibit dogs and cats. Although a fish won't be the buddy that a dog or cat can become, having fish can be enjoyable, and researchers have found that watching the fish relieves tension and can lower blood pressure, just as owning a canine or feline can. Fish can be left alone for up to a week if proper precautions are observed....

A group of about 50 Camden residents gathered last night to object to the formation of a 35-block special improvement district encompassing the new state aquarium on the waterfront. The meeting came after officials introduced a 17-member board, including eight Camden residents, to supervise the new district. Opponents declared that they would march on the aquarium on its opening day, Feb. 29, to oppose "lack of community input" into jobs, procurement and public services at the new state facility.

Bill Donaldson's dream passed its first reality test yesterday. Six hundred schoolchildren saw what the late Philadelphia Zoo president's dream has produced - the new state aquarium on Camden's Delaware River waterfront - and declared that, as one put it, "It's neat. " In fact, Katie Sorenson, 10, of the Burlington County Special Services School, said, "It's nicer, neater than Sea World . . . there we couldn't pet nothing. " The Thomas H. Kean New Jersey State Aquarium will open daily beginning Feb. 29, but Katie and 600 other schoolchildren, representing every county in New Jersey, were given a sneak preview tour by Gov. Florio yesterday.

To avoid a "costly" referendum on the issue, Camden City Council is expected to move tomorrow to dismiss plans to create a controversial special improvement district that would upgrade the Camden aquarium area. "It is not something we need to do right now," Council President James Mathes said yesterday at a Council caucus meeting. "It would cost $70,000 to $80,000. " Council yesterday reviewed, without objections, the ordinance that would repeal creation of a planned 35-block area of the waterfront that would have been managed by a nonprofit private management agency.

Lured by fliers promising jobs and business opportunities at Camden's new aquarium, 250 area residents packed a city gym last night. "We need jobs. Any jobs," said Jorge Villanueva, one of 200 workers laid off last week by Jack Lambersky Poultry in South Camden. But the residents last night learned little about available jobs. Instead, the standing-room-only crowd was treated to a half-hour speech by Freeholder Director Michael A. DiPiero, who urged residents to take to the streets against unnamed "plantation masters" who he said controlled city waterfront redevelopment, to protest the aquarium's failure to hire city workers.

The state is moving closer to a decision on how to pay for a $42 million aquarium that is the key to a massive Camden waterfront improvement plan, but the plan raises doubts about whether construction can begin by July, as scheduled. Gov. Kean is leaning toward including the aquarium in another proposal that would enable the state Sports and Exposition Authority to borrow money to build a major-league baseball stadium in North Jersey, Kean spokesman Carl Golden said yesterday. If the governor decides to go ahead with the proposal, it would have to be presented to the legislature and, if approved, would then be put before voters in a November referendum.

Two key antagonists in a legislative impasse over state money for Camden's aquarium snarled at one another yesterday during an emotionally charged hearing - and funding for the project remained on hold. Literally sputtering with rage, Democratic state Sen. Walter Rand of Camden, normally a mild and fatherly figure, lashed out at North Jersey Republicans who have been blocking $32 million for the project and accused General Assembly Speaker Chuck Hardwick (R., Union) of "continuing to hold the city of Camden hostage for some private political reason.

Second of four parts Thanks to $25 million in recovery money, America's poorest city now has hippos. The landmark 2002 Municipal Rehabilitation and Economic Recovery Act that put Camden under state control set aside $175 million for dozens of city projects. And none was larger, or more emblematic, than the $25 million expansion of the 10-year-old, state-owned aquarium. The money bought the city a privatized aquarium with hippos, sharks, and a West African aviary. But it did not affect Camden's median income, the lowest of any medium-sized American city.

ATLANTA - The world's largest aquarium is expecting the pitter patter of giant fins. The Georgia Aquarium has a rare beluga whale pregnancy, the first mammal to conceive at the downtown Atlanta attraction since it opened in 2005. The whale, Maris, got pregnant without artificial insemination, which is rare for belugas in captivity. Maris, whose midsection is bulging, is being monitored round-the-clock as she gets closer to the end of her 14-month pregnancy. She is expected to give birth by June to a calf that could be up to 50 pounds.

Saturday-Sunday Tribute to Wilt A photo and video exhibition of basketball legend Wilt Chamberlain is planned for Saturday and Sunday, featuring a commemorative $10 program book on the 50th anniversary of his 100-point game. The limited edition book, published by the Philadelphia Tribune, will be available during the Black History and Cultural Showcase at the Pennsylvania Convention Center, 12th and Arch Streets, from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday. On March 2, 1962, Chamberlain, a former Overbrook High star, and NBA star, scored 100 points in leading the NBA's Philadelphia Warriors to a 169-147 victory over the New York Knicks in Hershey, Pa. Saturday-Sunday Showcase for Easter weekend The Black History and Culture Showcase at the Convention Center this weekend also offers free events 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday.

CAMDEN - Bigger isn't always better, especially when it comes to attractions for Adventure Aquarium's smallest visitors. "KidZone," which opens Saturday, is the aquarium's most child-accessible exhibit space yet. The underwater windows are closer to the ground, the rooms encourage interaction, and the sea creatures are relatively small. But they all have their quirks. Any child who remembers the film Finding Nemo will recognize the display's orange-and-white clown fish, or the outgoing cleaner shrimp - which, given the opportunity, will climb on your hand and inspect your cuticles.

Newt Gingrich has spent the past 17 years in a box. It's an aquarium, actually, and a modest one. It measures about 500 cubic inches, which makes it a pretty small place to spend 17 years. Newt Gingrich is a fire belly newt. In 1994, shortly after we moved from Bucks County to rural upstate New York, our boys, then 8 and 10, urged us to buy "him" (though Newt may actually be a "her"). They wanted a pet, and we weren't ready for the Labrador retriever that eventually became a big part of our lives.

Met-Pro Corp. of Harleysville, said it received a $1.3 million order to supply 80 pumps for a large-scale aquarium attraction outside the United States. It did not name the location or buyer. Met-Pro's saltwater pumps are used in large aquarium installations around the world. The company employs about 350 and makes product recovery, pollution control, fluid handling and filtration systems.    - Reid Kanaley

Eat breakfast with Scuba Santa and watch him dive into the holiday spirit as the Adventure Aquarium presents its seasonal celebration daily through Jan. 1. Watch Santa jump into the aquarium's 760,000-gallon Ocean Realm exhibit and swim with sharks, stingrays, sea turtles, and other fish. Once Santa hits the dry side, guests can join him and his helper inside the Winter Wonderland Theater for the "I Believe in Scuba Santa" show, and take photos with him weekends through Dec. 24. On Saturday and Sunday from 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., for an additional fee, kids can have a buffet-style breakfast with Santa along with mascot characters including Gill the Shark and the newest character, Bumble the Abominable Snow Monster.

Met-Pro Corp. , Harleysville, said today it received a $625,000 order to supply 47 water pumps for an unidentified aquarium outside the United States. The order is to be shipped during the company's November-January quarter. Met-Pro supplies the pumps, which are not affected by sea water, to marine-related institutions in the U.S., Europe, Asia, the Middle East and the Caribbean.    -Paul Schweizer

BALTIMORE - Shhhhh. With two baby dolphins in the house, not only is Baltimore's National Aquarium asking visitors to keep it down, but the infants have forced the attraction to reconfigure one of its most popular shows just as tourist season launches. With little ones to consider - to say nothing of their sensitive mothers - the usually boisterous dolphin show, known for splashing and shrieking, has turned into a quiet zone, with hushed music, fewer visitors allowed in at a time, and a video documenting dolphin births substituting for most of the noisy acrobatics.

THE SHARK was like a master surgeon, sinking its mouthful of scalpels into Robert Large's flesh so quickly and with such precision last year that he felt almost no pain whatsoever. Large, a longtime volunteer diver at Camden's Adventure Aquarium, had just descended a ladder into the Shark Realm exhibit on Dec. 6, 2009, when he felt an "intense squeezing pressure" on his right leg. He thought it was a sea turtle. "I thought to myself, 'What the heck is that?' " the married father of two said earlier this week.

An exhibit that opened Friday at the Adventure Aquarium in Camden enables children to touch those strange and slimy fish called stingrays. Though they can terrify beachgoers on the Jersey shore, these shark cousins at the aquarium are quite docile, because the stingers embedded in their spines have been clipped. "The spine becomes very dull, like a pencil eraser," said Mark Kind, the aquarium's animal husbandry director. The exhibit, which cost $800,000 and took 14 months to build, is part of an ongoing effort to draw visitors by getting them to interact with marine life.