Zoo’s Sunset fundraiser benefits CONAPAC
In this September 2024 issue we share Zoo Education Director Claire Lannoye-Hall's report about Detroit Zoological Society's annual fundraising event.
Once a year, the Detroit Zoological Society hosts Sunset, our largest fundraising event. The evening is filled with great food, drinks, dancing, and, perhaps most importantly, opportunities to engage with Zoo staff about our conservation, education, and animal welfare work. In the last few years, we have included Connection Stations to share the vital work the DZS does that may not be as visible to our guests. The stations exemplify the Zoo's important role in creating meaningful connections between people, animals, and the natural world so all can thrive. This year, the Zoo’s partnership with CONAPAC was featured as one of the Connection Stations during the event.
Three DZS staff members who had traveled to the rainforest to conduct conservation-based partnership work spent the evening sharing the programs that 50 CONAPAC partner communities along the Amazon and Napo Rivers participate in. The Connection Station included a water filtration system from Global Access 2030, the same system used in many smaller communities to ensure families can access safe, clean drinking water in their homes.
We also displayed the folders, notebooks, and coloring books that CONAPAC custom prints with conservation messages for the annual school supply deliveries. These thoughtfully crafted messages are a constant reminder of the incredible responsibility and opportunity the young people in our partner communities have in ensuring they and the rainforest thrive for generations to come.
The final piece of the evening was an opportunity for our Sunset guests to contribute to the conservation work happening in the Amazon. In December 2023, four DZS staff joined the CONAPAC team for a week of planting fruit trees in several communities. The Fruit Tree Planting Foundation, a CONAPAC partner, provided the trees. Read about it.
The community of 03 de Mayo presented us with more than a hundred friendship bracelets handmade by parents and children to express their gratitude for the trees. The bracelets were displayed for Sunset guests and provided a conversation starter about the reforestation project, which led to the opportunity to make a $25 donation to choose a bracelet to take home. More than $500 was raised through bracelet donations, paying for close to a thousand more trees to be planted this December.
Want to donate?
We have several long-time donors and partner organizations who work tirelessly for CONAPAC; with you, we can do so much for our communities.
Our work is only possible with the many other donations, big and small, that we receive throughout the year.
