Featured in L.A. Times—Wilson Sherman, Ph.D. student, on how urban policies shape wildlife behavior in Los Angeles

Featured in this week’s Los Angeles Times Climate and Environment coverage, UCLA Ph.D. student Wilson Sherman shares insights on how inconsistent policies, surveillance infrastructure and fragmented governance affect where wildlife appears — and how it behaves — across Los Angeles.

“Sierra Madre has an ordinance requiring everyone to have bear-resistant trash cans,” Sherman noted. “Neighboring Arcadia doesn’t.” These kinds of local variations, he said, can influence where wild animals spend their time, creating a patchwork of risks and opportunities.

Sherman also described how surveillance systems are quietly shifting perceptions of who belongs in the city. “That might mean that people are suddenly aware that a coyote is using their yard,” he said, prompting some to modify their landscaping to discourage animals from returning.

Ideally, “the California Department of Fish and Wildlife would be the first agency to respond in a ‘wildlife situation,’” Sherman said. But people often default to calling the police, which in some cases can result in lethal outcomes.

Sherman is a Ph.D. student in UCLA’s Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, where he studies human–wildlife interactions, governance and urban ecology.

Read the full article in the Los Angeles Times

The story was written by IoES Ph.D. student Marcos R. Magaña, an intern at the Los Angeles Times through the CDLS Environmental Justice and Science Journalism Fellowship.