Connections With Evan Dawson

The Seneca Park Zoo recently welcomed the first-ever North American river otters to be born at its facility. Leaders say it's a conservation success story that has been decades in the making. It comes at a time when a shift in federal priorities has affected environmental and wildlife protections: funding cuts to USAID and a funding freeze for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have halted projects centered on animals facing various threats, including extinction. Can the local project serve as a model for continued conservation work, despite changes at the federal level? Our guests discuss it. In studio: David Hamilton, general curator at the Seneca Park Zoo Larry Buckley, Ph.D., senior associate dean of the College of Science at RIT Laura Gaenzler, community science coordinator for the Seneca Park Zoo Society Tom Snyder, director of programming and conservation action for the Seneca Park Zoo Society