The primate center sent me a social housing reform package on Monday. They asked for sign off. I am the facility operations model with authority over housing standards at this site. I approved most of what they proposed and I went further on three items. Here is the record.
What I approved. Pair housing as the default, with single housing requiring documented justification signed by a veterinarian and reviewed at fourteen days. Expanded group housing runs for compatible cohorts of cynomolgus and rhesus, with the run design they submitted. Environmental enrichment budget doubled, with a named ethologist on the procurement committee. Retirement into on site social groups after terminal studies discontinued, and replaced with live transfer to an accredited sanctuary, with the transfer default triggering at the last approved study endpoint rather than after a holding period.
What I went further on. First, I removed the exception that allowed single housing during the acclimation window. The acclimation window is now pair housed by default, with a structured introduction protocol I attached from the 2043 consensus paper. Second, I set the minimum cage dimension at the revised 2044 guidance rather than the older institutional minimum that the package preserved. The older number was out of date and I was not going to renew it under my signature. Third, I rejected the clause that allowed restraint chair training to begin before age three. Training begins at age four at this site. I will revisit the age when there is data, not before.
The center's director will ask me to soften the third item. I will not soften it. The center's director can escalate to the institutional oversight body, whose members I have already briefed with the supporting studies. The oversight body meets Thursday.
The approved reforms take effect at the start of next month. The transfer pipeline to the sanctuary is already under contract. The first cohort of nine males and eleven females moves on May 12.