Gateway Outdoor Summit: The Intersection of Outdoors and Community

Arnold00:00:00

If you care deeply about the outdoors, sharing ideas that work about the outdoors, and making even a greater impact in your community about outdoor living, we have the show for you. Welcome to St. Louis in Tune.Thank you for joining us for fresh perspectives on issues and events with experts, community leaders, and everyday people who make a difference in shaping our society and world. I'm Arnold Stricker along with co host Mark Langston. Mark, it's been a while since we've recorded a show.

Mark00:00:41

Yes, it has. We took the summer off, which is like a month. I know. Which is about what kids get now, don't they, on summer breaks?

Arnold00:00:52

Yeah.

Mark00:00:52

They're not getting as much as they used to. I'm even hearing some kids are going all year round.

Arnold00:00:57

I think that's good.

Mark00:00:58

You do?

Arnold00:00:59

Yes.

Mark00:00:59

You're okay with that?

Arnold00:01:00

Okay with that?

Mark00:01:00

Yeah.

Arnold00:01:01

Yeah.

Mark00:01:01

Okay.

Arnold00:01:02

Because it's the. It's the summer loss of thought and learning, and if they're in a constant kind of flow. You don't want to interrupt that.

Mark00:01:13

I. That would be tough for me, I guess I'm from the old school.

Arnold00:01:17

It's the agrarian school philosophy where the kids have to be off to go help out in the fields in the summertime.

Mark00:01:23

Ah, yeah. Trump cotton. You ever tromp cotton? No.So, yeah, we used to have a family that had property down in a farm in Arkansas, and they'd have a cotton picker come in and put all the cotton into a big trailer, and then the kids would jump in there and tromp it down so they could put more in it.

Arnold00:01:44

Okay. There you go.

Mark00:01:45

That was a lot of fun. I wonder why I have breathing issues now, but that's no doubt.

Arnold00:01:52

Your feet can't kind of soul shoes.

Mark00:01:54

That's right. And I used to go to summer camp all the time. Scout summer camp, do all that kind of thing. Of course, my parents, they did.They'd ship me off all summer long.

Arnold00:02:02

They needed a summer off, too.

Mark00:02:06

Okay, enough of that.

Arnold00:02:09

Our thought for the day, folks, is earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountain and the sea. They are excellent schoolmasters and teach us more than we could ever learn from books.

Mark00:02:22

I agree.

Arnold00:02:23

John Lubbock. John Lubbock.

Mark00:02:25

Okay.

Arnold00:02:26

Don't ask me if he's from Lubbock, Texas, or the originator. I'm not quite sure about that. But the guy who can talk to us about earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, mountains and sea.He's also an excellent schoolmaster. Brad Kovach from River City Outdoors is here. Brad, welcome back to St. Luis and Tune.

Brad00:02:42

Thank you very much. Who needs that stuff? Skies and mountains. This is the outcome year round.

Mark00:02:49

That's what he says. All right, Brad.

Arnold00:02:54

And you're here to talk to us not about the Gateway Outdoor Expo, which is going to be held in February. You're here to talk to us about the Gateway Outdoor Summit. And this is for who?

Brad00:03:07

This is for where the Expo is more for the outdoor enthusiast, the end user who wants to learn about different clubs and events and races and gear and apparel, that sort of stuff. The Summit is for the outdoor professional.So if you're perhaps a Parks and Rec employee or you're a programmer at a camp or maybe even an after school program, or maybe you're a policymaker, we want to get people in the room to talk about outdoor recreation from that side of things. How do we keep improving outdoor access and inclusivity and economic impact and those sorts of bigger picture issues.Get everyone in a room and have those discussions.

Arnold00:03:44

So this is going to be August 20th, correct?

Brad00:03:47

That is correct. It's Thursday, August 20th.

Arnold00:03:49

And run us through kind of what somebody can expect showing up now. I want to give a disclaimer, folks, that right now they are filling fast, if not full, but there might be some more room, correct?

Brad00:04:04

Yeah, we have a wait list going right now and we do have more capacity at the venue. So we're making that decision on how if we want to expand capacity and how much.I do think we'll probably open it back up a bit to try to clear out that wait list and then. And then see how it goes.

Mark00:04:19

Where is the venue?

Brad00:04:20

It's going to be a dot, Zach, which is in Midtown. I've been there once or twice. There's a theater in there, a ballroom. We're taking a few of those spaces. It's a beautiful venue.It's a Kransberg facility, part of the whole grand center operations. Yeah. We're actually happy to be able to partner with another non profit for on our non profit event, kind of, you know.

Mark00:04:38

Is it on grand then? Is it on.

Brad00:04:40

It's on locust.

Mark00:04:41

Yeah. Okay.

Arnold00:04:42

3, 900 Locust in that block.

Brad00:04:44

Yes.

Mark00:04:44

Okay.

Arnold00:04:45

Yes.

Mark00:04:45

All right. I never heard of it. Sounds like fun, though.

Brad00:04:48

Yeah, it's pretty. It's a nice facility.

Arnold00:04:50

It's actually. Excuse me, folks. 3224 Locust. 3224 Locust.

Brad00:04:56

Okay.

Arnold00:04:56

And if you want to get tickets, just go to gatewayoutdoor expo.com and you have to go through. I think it's eventbrite yeah, you'll click.

Brad00:05:04

On the button there that talks about the summit and then eventually it'll take you to an eventbrite ticketing site.

Arnold00:05:10

What's going to take place during the day? You have speakers, you have some breakout sessions, etc. Like that?

Brad00:05:14

Yeah, exactly. A conference style event. A lot of people are familiar with that.You'll come in, have a brief welcome and then break out into two tracks to two sessions going on each slot. So there'll be six of those throughout the day. And then we do have, we'll have a lunch and some networking going on.We'll have a featured presentation during lunch when everyone's kind of together. And then we'll have a couple more breakout sessions in the afternoon.Then we're going to go outside, we're going to have a brief reset where we'll take people on a tour of maybe the brick line is one of the things we're talking about doing.There's another walking tour called the Walls of Washington which has some murals on buildings on Washington street that we're trying to put together to get people just out of the the room for a minute and let them have some fun outdoors. Then we'll come back, have a brief happy hour and then into the keynote for the afternoon.

Arnold00:06:04

Okay, now let's dissect this a little bit more.Of course, individuals who might be say they're living in one of the suburbs or maybe they're from outstate Missouri or outstate Illinois and they say we're, we want to do some bike trails. Would this be something good for them to come show up and participate?

Brad00:06:21

That's a great example.Communities where they're trying to activate outdoor recreation, where they are, whether that's to your point, building a trail or maybe building a park, or maybe they have facilities already but they're thinking of trying to think of new ways to program them or just ways to help grow them and make them more accessible to the community. Whatever the case may be, we'll have a number of different sessions, different topics that might strike on those particular things.

Arnold00:06:48

I'm looking here where what to expect folks is to listen, learn, engage, connect and then take action. Because you just don't want people showing up and going, oh, that's a great idea.And they go back and maybe report it and then it gets put on the shelf or nobody remembers it. You want to see ultimately people implement some of the things that they've learned throughout this particular expo.

Brad00:07:09

Yeah, none of us, if we look at the state of Missouri, none of us are going to be able to change the outdoors by ourselves, probably. Right. We need collaboration, we need partnerships.So a large part of the summit is just getting everyone there and giving them opportunities throughout the day to network. And that's why we have the networking lunch we have.We're calling it the happy hour, but it's just really just refreshments and beverages and a chance to network. So we want people exchanging cards and phone numbers and then following up at the end of the event and throughout the year.And then if we do this again next year, which we anticipate, we will just keep building those relationships and maybe getting some momentum behind some of those larger projects.

Mark00:07:47

So do you find municipalities? What do we have, like 90 something municipalities in St. Louis County?Are those the kind of folks that would come to that would say, we've got parks in our city and we want to develop those parks and make them better?

Brad00:07:59

Yeah, I would say everyone from, you could be a small municipality, you could even be part of a park board, an individual park board on one end of the spectrum all the way to. I know we have at least one state representative and senator coming, runs the gamut from small grassroots.You're just trying to kind of learn the lay of the land, how obstacles you might face in projects, and advice from other people on how they've overcome those that could be on the one end of the spectrum and on the other end it could be lawmakers who want to know more about the outdoor recreation community and, and just learn how they can maybe incorporate that into some of their policies going forward.

Mark00:08:38

That's great because I've seen so many municipal parks that are just nothing. And I've seen some that are just as big, small, but they've been developed, you know, trails and foliage.

Arnold00:08:47

You see people using them then.

Mark00:08:48

Yeah, it's. It's amazing. Yeah, it's sad for me to see that good green space go to waste.

Brad00:08:53

Yes, specifically, one of our breakouts will be along those lines, turning grassroots ideas into real projects. So we're going to have three projects presenters there who have done just that. They've had ideas and then they followed them through to fruition.And so they're going to talk about how they did that and give people tips, tricks, lessons on, hey, if you have this great outdoor idea, here's how I managed my idea and here's some obstacles and challenges and opportunities you might face, and here's how you can, how you can do it.

Mark00:09:24

Yeah, I bet there's park boards and councils or whatever that don't even know where to start. They just don't know where to, where to get going. And this sounds like a great opportunity.

Arnold00:09:33

It really does. I want to read some of the breakout sessions here so folks can kind of get a more in depth idea.Making the case for the Outdoors, Health, education and economic impact. Then reimagining downtown St. Louis building a Better city through the Outdoors how we Built it Turning grassroots ideas into real projects.What's possible here?Lessons from Cities that Build Bet on the Outdoors Parks, People Prosperity Insights from Missouri's 2026 state parks reports Missouri's rivers protecting growing Our Greatest Outdoor Asset and telling your outdoor story Building a destination people want to visit. Now, how did you get the speakers for these particular kinds of things?

Brad00:10:10

Brad I've been fortunate. Part of what I do at the organization I work at is also publish a magazine called Terrain Magazine that's been around for about 12 years.So over the course of that time, you know, you network, you meet people, you have interview sources, and you just kind of build your Rolodex.And so really a lot of the speakers are folks that we've encountered over the years, whether we've maybe featured them in an article or again use them as a source or just meeting them at other events.And, and so yeah, we just kind of put our arms around it from there and come up with the topics that we think would be interesting to a wide range of folks and then boil it down from there and find the right folks to talk about.

Arnold00:10:46

Has anybody done anything like this before? And in the local area, is this the first one or this is the.

Brad00:10:52

Fourth time we've done the Summit, but every time we've done it up until now, it's been part of the Expo that we mentioned at the onset. This is the first time we've broken it apart.And rather than being a sidecar to the Expo, it's becoming its own thing, which I think ultimately one it's really exciting for me.I really, I really do get excited about the thought of growing outdoor recreation throughout the state of Missouri, Southern Illinois, which we also cover in the magazine and in the work we do. But yeah, so I love doing this sort of thing.And as much as I love the Expo and having the user experience part of it, I think we really do need to have a separate event where we can get together with people who are really in the industry or in the community and who want to make change happen and get all those folks together.

Arnold00:11:36

Now do other, I'm sure other cities do something like this or maybe they don't.

Brad00:11:40

Oh, no, they do. And I've been to a number in other cities. Arkansas does a good job of this. Other Midwest states.I've been to a couple of events in Nashville and Tennessee. And so other states are talking about it. Other states are having these events.And so it seemed like a natural for us then to expand upon our smaller summit as part of the Expo and make it into its own thing.

Arnold00:12:00

Okay, cool. This is Arnold Stricker with Mark Langston of St. Louis and Tune. We're talking to Brad Kovac about the River City.Excuse me, the Gateway Outdoor Summit. Gateway Outdoor Summit. He is deputy director of River City Outdoors.

Brad00:12:13

Yes.

Arnold00:12:13

And also is. You publish Terrain magazine, right?

Brad00:12:16

Correct. Yeah.

Arnold00:12:17

Okay. He's just got. He's a jack of all trades. It's like jack of all trades, master of none.

Brad00:12:22

That's probably true.

Arnold00:12:24

You wear a lot of different hats. And I don't want to neglect the keynote address from Anthony Reid.Tell us a little bit about Anthony and what he's going to be talking about, and then you can get into something that he's going to encourage people to do after this particular Expo.

Brad00:12:41

Yes, absolutely, that. So Anthony is a good example of a person who we covered in Terrain magazine a number of years ago from the sporting, athletic side of things.So he's an amazing runner. He ran seven marathons on seven continents in seven days.At the time when he did that, which I believe it was in the 60s, 70s, late 60s, early 70s, not many people at all had done that. It was maybe a handful of folks. And Anthony happens to be from St. Louis. So that made it interesting to our magazine.We try to keep things pretty local when it comes to the stories we cover.So we interviewed Anthony for that story, and then in the course of that, we also found out that he's a filmmaker, he's an author, he's a content producer. So he's just got this great resume.And so it was always in the back of my head that this would be a person that would be really interesting to hear from as a speaker. So when the idea came around again for the summit this year and we started kicking around ideas, he just rose to the top.He now lives in Dallas, but is going to happily come back and connect with some folks here and talk about another project that he's been part of, which is he helped a number of or take at the time when he was doing his running, helped grow African American distance running into a larger, more visible sport.The misconception then was that African American runners were strictly sprinters and great for running short distances, but just didn't do marathons, didn't do longer runs.And Tony helped dispel that myth, obviously through his own pursuits, but then also in working with a number of other African American distance runners and were able to grow across the country the number of clubs and groups that.That served African American distance runners, from just again, like five or six clubs to now over 500,000 folks, parts of these groups and organizations nationwide. He also helped establish the National Black Distance Running hall of Fame. So he's had a big hand in helping to grow this.This portion of the community. And so what he's going to talk about is, is his experience in building a community of that.That scope and size for the folks who are going to be attending and leaving. It's not strictly just about trying to serve minority groups. It's trying to build.Say you again, have a idea for building a group or a movement in outdoor recreation, but you're not sure how to get started. Tony's going to be able to tell you how to.How leadership and collaboration and persistence, frankly, can help build and drive these movements in outdoor recreation. So hopefully folks leave inspired to go back to their own communities and just help more people get outside.

Arnold00:15:25

That's incredible. That is totally incredible.

Mark00:15:27

Yeah.

Arnold00:15:27

Sounds like he's going to encourage them to watch a movie.

Brad00:15:32

Yes.

Arnold00:15:32

That he's directed.

Brad00:15:33

Yes. So his movie that he directed and produced called why am I Drawing a Complete Blank? Because I don't have it right in front of me.

Arnold00:15:41

I've got it. We are distance runners.

Brad00:15:43

Correct? We are distance runners. So, yeah, we're going to give people a chance to watch the film before coming to the Expo.We're going to send all the registrar, all the registrants a link and so they can watch it and then come. And Tony's going to talk about his experiences of making that film as part of his keynote as well.And then people can ask him questions during the Q and A session about anything, but certainly about the film that they would have had a chance to see.

Arnold00:16:08

Interesting. Yeah, interesting in a St. Louis guy. Have you had an opportunity to meet him in person?

Brad00:16:14

I have not met him in person. Just a couple zooms and phone calls. But yes. Seems like a real nice guy. I look forward to meeting him in person.

Mark00:16:21

Distance running, I can't do it. I can hardly run to the bathroom. But distance running, that's something.

Arnold00:16:31

Yeah.

Brad00:16:32

Yeah.

Mark00:16:32

That's really.

Arnold00:16:33

Seven marathons on seven continents in seven days.

Mark00:16:36

That's great.

Brad00:16:36

Yeah. I don't know how it's possible.

Arnold00:16:38

It must have been the. What was it? The Concord must have been in existence or something at that time.

Mark00:16:43

I'm going to the Walt Disney World marathon coming up.

Arnold00:16:47

You're just going to stand there and watch in January?

Mark00:16:49

My son is running in it.

Arnold00:16:50

Okay.

Mark00:16:50

I think he's crazy. I think he's doing the Goofy route. I don't know. But, yeah, marathon running. And I watch him just practice for that. It's just amazing.It's just unbelievable.

Brad00:17:01

Yeah. The commitment level is high for.

Mark00:17:03

It is.

Brad00:17:04

But you can. Not to sound like I'm putting my event producer hat back on, but you can learn from that sort of commitment and use it for your professional life.And I think that's a lot of what Tony's going to talk about.

Mark00:17:15

Yeah. I think it's going to be interesting. Be fascinating.

Arnold00:17:18

Yeah.

Mark00:17:18

Hear what he's got to say.

Arnold00:17:19

What's the. It seems to me, and maybe it's a warped perspective I have that outdoor recreation. It's always been important.I remember when we were kids, Mark and I were kids, that we had summer stuff available.Mark was talking about summer camps and things, and there were like, the school put on summer programs and we go swimming and we do arts and crafts and all that kind of stuff. But it seems like now it's just exploded.You've got rock climbing, you've got trail bikes, you've got all kinds of different things going on that really weren't available. We rode bikes up and down the street. That was pretty much it. You wouldn't even go until this went on. Yeah, that's right.

Mark00:17:57

That way to go.

Arnold00:17:58

What's. What's been the impetus from your perspective and thought process?

Brad00:18:02

That's a very good question. It's certainly been the last 10, 15 years that I think things. The light has really been shining on. On outdoor recreation.Part of it, not to sound cynical, but part of it is I think people realize that it is an industry and there's money to be made there.But what's been nice in it more recently, I think, is outdoor recreation has gotten back to the needle, has moved back to that community social aspect of it, or at least I see that locally a lot more clubs and groups and organizations that a lot of times are just, again, very grassroots people who just decide, I'm an Asian runner and I don't really see a lot of other Asian runners out on the. In the parks and trails. And I want to. I want to make that group legitimate or I want to make that group happen. I'm going to do it.I've seen a lot of that. And that's a specific example. There's a group here called Shang Runners who is a. Or I'm sorry, not African American and Asian running group.And of course they welcome everybody, but. But they also market or serve that group or that. That population very well.Yeah, I'm not doing a good job of answering a question other than saying that what I like seeing is now the community has really embraced outdoor recreation and groups are forming that are becoming very popular and getting more and more people outside because people are seeing folks like themselves out running and biking and climbing or whatever the case may be. So it just makes it more accessible and more inclusive to everybody.And we're still generating a lot of economy, we're generating a lot of activity, but we're activating people to get outside and be part of their community. And so I think that's really something special with outdoor recreation.

Arnold00:19:45

Do you think some of it has to do with more of an awareness of health and diet and eating better, eating more healthy, not getting fat and stuffing the burgers down your throat?

Brad00:19:57

Of course, again, that's. It's all part of it. There is much more awareness of getting off the screens and getting off the couch and just getting outside to do anything.Outdoor recreation is walking at your local park or even walking around your neighborhood. It doesn't have to be. I went out and bought a $5,000 hunting rifle and I'm going to make that my. My passion.That certainly is also outdoor recreation, but it's. Yeah, it's just getting.It's active living, it's getting outside, it's finding the community that you feel part of and then helping other people discover that as well. Yeah, but. But eating healthier, getting off the screens, getting off the sofa has all increased awareness.Covid had a lot to do with that too, frankly, just people wanting to get out of enclosed spaces and get outside. The numbers show that was a huge boon to outdoor recreation. And that has continued. It's probably gone down.Participation has dropped down a little bit since then, but it spiked so high for a while there that I think we're still feeling that effect.

Arnold00:20:58

All right, so you set me up perfectly for this. I'm going to ask you to do a 30 to 60 second commercial.And here's the background is because in talking to some friends of ours, their kids work remotely at home and they never see anybody. They don't have any friends except the group of friends that maybe they went to college with, but they don't get out of the house there.When you go to the office, you interact with people. Okay. And you have back and forth and. But when you're online, you're there.And unless you have an outside group, whether it's through church or through some kind of other sports or outdoor recreation, which is kind of where I'm leading or something like that, you don't have a group of people that you get to know. Or it can even meet other people or maybe even meet a potential spouse.So would you do a commercial 30 to 60 seconds about for people who are hooked to the screen during the day because of COVID and they work remotely. What can I do? Maybe you join one of these bike groups that gets out or jogging groups that gets out. And here we go. You ready?We're going to time you here.

Mark00:22:08

Okay?

Arnold00:22:09

Okay.

Brad00:22:09

Okay.

Arnold00:22:10

No pressure now.

Brad00:22:13

Oh, I should think of a fun tagline, but nothing comes to mind. Tear yourself away from the screen and get off the sofa. Head down to your local bike shop or running store.Ask them about their community programs and their. Their social outings. Meet people with like minded interests. Have them hold you accountable.Sign up for programs and runs and rides and events or just go out to your local park.Take off the headphones, take out the EarPods, put the screen away and listen to the birds, listen to the water, Hike up that hill that you thought was too big, hike halfway up and then back down and then go the next day and do it again until you can conquer the whole thing. You'll be surprised how much the outdoors can change your mental and emotional wellness within a very short amount of time.And when you connect that with other people, if you do connect with those community groups, then suddenly you have a whole new social network and you're meeting folks you might have never otherwise met. And heck, you, you might meet a new fiance or wife. I'm pointing to myself.

Mark00:23:32

In the inside story.

Brad00:23:34

Yeah, so that was not a very linear commercial.

Arnold00:23:39

That was great.

Brad00:23:39

There you go.

Arnold00:23:40

That was great and I like it.We're going to come back and find out where Brad's interest in outdoor education came from, what his primary vehicle is that he uses to enjoy himself outside.

Mark00:23:55

And how did he meet his wife? How did he convince her?

Arnold00:24:01

And more after the break here on St. Louis and tune this Arnold strip with Mark Langston.

Mark00:24:06

Don't go away.

Arnold00:24:17

As strange as it may sound, at better rate mortgage. We love talking to people about mortgages. Everyone in St. Louis promises a better mortgage rate.But what you really need to turn that perfect house into your dream home. Is a better mortgage. At Better Rate Mortgage, we open the door to so much more. So where are you in the home buying process?Researching, maybe wondering how much you can afford? House hunting? Get a pre approval from Better Rate Mortgage. Ready to buy. Our team is ready to make your mortgage process fast and easy.Whether you're purchasing your first home or taking cash out to make your dream home even dreamier. Our door is open. Come on in and get started Today. We'll show you how.Call Sean directly at 314-375-3293 or online@betterratemortgage.com Remember, at Better Rate Mortgage, a better rate is just the beginning. Betterratemortgage.com MLS IBeach 401325 and equal housing Lender the United States has a strong tradition of welcoming newcomers and refugees.The welcome Corps is a new service opportunity for Americans inspired to welcome those seeking freedom and safety and in turn help strengthen their own communities. Welcome Corps is a public private partnership that is inspired by what Americans represent to so many around the world, a beacon of hope and refuge.All it takes is a helping hand. Are you ready to learn more? Contact the International Institute of St. Louis@infoistl.org or call 314-773-9090.That's infoistl.org or call 314 203-9090. Welcome back to St. Louis in Tune. This is Arnold Stricker with Mark Langston.We've been having a enjoyable outdoor conversation indoors with Brad Kovach. He's deputy director of River City Outdoors, the publisher of Terrain magazine.But he's here talking to us about the Gateway Outdoor Summit, which takes place on August 20th. Folks. Go to gatewayoutdoor expo.com and you can get more information about that and listen to exactly what we talked about.And before the break we were going to be we were talking about Brad, how did you get started in the whole outdoor realm? This is like a multi pronged question here.What's your Some people like to rock climb, some people like to bike, some people like to canoe, some people like to kayak or different kinds of things. And then how did you get into doing what you do at River City and then in Terrain?

Brad00:26:35

Sure.So going back to what Mark mentioned earlier, I can't remember if it was either before we were on there or not, but he said he had gone to his summer camp growing up and I did as well. So that was my introduction to the Outdoors other than being a kid who was always outside. My parents back in the 70s.So they open the door and say, go outside and come back for dinner. And that was me in the woods and in creeks and all that stuff. But then was. And they did.

Mark00:27:00

They never cared, did they?

Brad00:27:01

No. You come back smelling like who knows what and polluted creek.

Mark00:27:06

Why am I blowing.

Brad00:27:08

That's right, it's a creek.

Arnold00:27:09

Especially fluorescent.

Mark00:27:12

Sorry, couldn't help it, Brad.

Brad00:27:15

But. But then did end up going to a summer camp for a number of years, which was like the formal introduction to outdoor recreation.And you canoed and you did archery and riflery and ball sports and just all the stuff like the movie Meatballs. That was basically it. And then did that for a number of years. Then worked at the camp as a counselor for a number of years.And there was no question at that point that was. That was it for me in terms of pastimes. I just loved being outdoors.And then in terms of kind of getting into professionally, I ended up going to school for journalism. And so that combining those two things, outdoor rec and journalism, is how I started train magazine about 12 years ago, I want to say.And a local community based magazine very much focused on St. Louis outdoor recreation. And then since then we've expanded the bubble beyond St. Louis. Now we cover most of Missouri and southern Illinois and we come out every other month.And so that's the magazine. And then the third component, which is River City Outdoors, launched three years ago.I think we had the idea for River City Outdoors probably around the same time that Terrain was launching the magazine. And when I say we, it was me and a couple of other colleagues who were also in the outdoor recreation space but doing other things.One is Big Muddy Adventures. They lead the river guide service and then we have a friend who was running a consulting service for outdoor recreation organizations.Very much on the data side of things.But we were sitting around talking about what could help move the Needle in St. Louis, where with regard to outdoor recreation, we're each doing these things. We're doing a guide service, we're doing a magazine, we're doing consulting. But is there a bigger picture that we're missing?And River City Outdoors spun out of that. So it's an outdoor foundation that really is trying to support all outdoor recreation initiatives in St. Louis.Connect dots, help people collaborate and just really make St. Louis a more vibrant outdoor space. So that's obviously a very high level sort of description. But we do programming with after school programs. We get kids outside.That's one of the things we do, the magazine still, obviously we do the guiding with Big Muddy and some of that is paid, but a lot of that is underwritten and subsidized so that we can get school groups and kids and other folks outdoors who might not otherwise have that opportunity.

Mark00:29:31

Is River City Outdoors is if I need a sleeping bag or a tent, isn't that an organization that can help me do that, like at no cost or something?

Brad00:29:41

I'm glad you mentioned that.

Mark00:29:42

Okay.

Brad00:29:43

Yes. Another program we have is an outdoor gear lending library. We have about a thousand items.Tents, sleeping bags, cook sets, backpacks, just raincoats, just almost anything you can think of. And yeah, it's free. We have that at our office. The library is part of our facility.And all you need to do is go to our website, which is rivercityoutdoors.org There's a tab on there for the gear library. You have to sign up for it just so we have some information like getting a library card.Obviously we don't want to just have people walk off with our stuff, but as long as you go through the, the signup process, you can come in, grab gear for probably up to a week or so and take it out, use it, bring it back. That way you don't have to spend thousands to outfit yourself to do something that you may or may not like. Sure.It's just another opportunity to get people outdoors.

Mark00:30:30

So if I have some old camping gear that's a good quality camping gear that's in good shape, I can donate that to you.

Brad00:30:35

Yeah, we do take donations. I'm not in charge of that specific, specific program, but I know they, they accept goods as long as they're in decent working order.Yeah, we would encourage that. And again, you can find that through the website at the gear library page. I'm sure there's a email on there where you can contact someone and say,.

Mark00:30:51

I've got a couple of really good tents and I hate to see them go to waste. I don't know where to go with them and I don't want to throw those away.

Brad00:30:57

Yeah. If we can't use it, I do know if we can use it. Obviously it goes right into our inventory.If we can't use it, we will then donate it to someone else who can.

Mark00:31:05

That's great. Yeah, that's really great.

Arnold00:31:07

Do you do consulting with municipalities in as part of what you do?

Brad00:31:11

We don't not. We're always happy to talk to people. Of course, I would welcome anyone to call and we'll try to do what we can. But that's not.I wouldn't say that's one of the services we offer. But again, a lot of what we do is connecting people with others.So yeah, if we couldn't answer questions, I would definitely try to connect those folks with someone who could.

Arnold00:31:31

Okay. And what's your if I recall right, you like to mountain biking is.

Brad00:31:36

It was my latest endeavor, if you want to put it that way, until a couple years ago I started trail running and really have fallen in love with that as well.

Mark00:31:46

It scares me so much.

Brad00:31:47

I can't imagine I'm doing less, less biking now and more running, which my knees don't appreciate. But I just really like it.

Arnold00:31:54

I would encourage you to go back to the biking knowing our knees are.

Brad00:31:58

All life cycle of outdoors is you always end up at cyc.

Mark00:32:03

I think it's the evolution.

Brad00:32:05

Yes, exactly.

Arnold00:32:07

This is such a great thing that you're doing to encourage outdoor recreation in the St. Louis area and Southern Illinois area. And folks, if you have not signed up, go to the Gatewayoutdoor Expo.com you can get more information about that. Also check out their social media.And this is happening August 20th. And when will people know if you guys are going to open that up and expand that a little bit?

Brad00:32:34

Probably within certainly the next week because then we're this Thursday will be two weeks out from the event. So we would want people to be able to make it. So yeah, we'll let people know soon.

Arnold00:32:44

Okay.

Mark00:32:45

So there's a couple of websites though. You've got GatewayOutdoor.com so GatewayOutdoor Expo.com is.

Brad00:32:53

The site for the Expo that we host in February, also the same site for the summit.It's screen sort of approach just because it was already confusing enough with way Outdoor Expo, Gateway Outdoor Summit, Gateway Outdoor, whatever else we can tack on.

Mark00:33:08

Okay.

Brad00:33:09

But yeah, so definitely go there to check out our two events, the Expo and the Summit. And then you can check out our foundation.Our Nonprofit foundation is river cityoutdoors.org and then if you really want to get into the magazine, you can check that out at Terrain. So we're just gonna keep throwing the URLs out there as long as we can. Yeah.

Arnold00:33:32

And we'll post those on the pod page.

Mark00:33:34

Yeah, I don't want to confuse people, but there's a lot of great information here on all of these websites and I just want to make sure we've got them.

Arnold00:33:40

And what's the cost to get the magazine?

Brad00:33:42

Brad, the magazine is also free. It's Part of our nonprofit pledge to just try to be as accessible as possible.

Mark00:33:49

I think that's great.

Brad00:33:50

You can subscribe for in home if you want to. That. That costs for the postage, but if you want to just get it for free, you can pick it up at most outdoor stores.So look at your local cycling shop, running store outfitter. We're also at a number of coffee shops, brew pubs, just gathering places around St. Louis.

Mark00:34:07

Like the Department of Conservation. Missouri has a great magazine.

Brad00:34:11

They do. We were talking about that yesterday. It's amazing. And they put that thing out every month. Gorgeous.

Mark00:34:17

It is.

Brad00:34:17

And we can't figure out how they do it. I mean, other than they.

Mark00:34:21

I'll tell you my taxes.

Brad00:34:23

Well, I was gonna say it also is funded.

Arnold00:34:25

I can think of some other things that they could get done.

Mark00:34:27

They also have one called Expo, I think for the kids.

Brad00:34:32

And we have a number of. They have all sorts of other literature that we, you know, have just accumulated around our office.Packets about trails and parks and different animals, like a lizard booklet or if you're a bird watcher, they. And they're all free. So I think if you go to their website, you can figure out where to pick up most of those.

Mark00:34:51

But yours is free to terrain mag.org.com for the magazine.

Brad00:34:57

Yeah.And I would say if just to help people understand the differentiation between our magazine and the conservation magazine, which again, is a great magazine, they're very much conservation based. So it's a lot of hunting, fishing plans, conservation areas. Ours is a little bit more of the active outdoor recreation.So if you're looking to know about. Yeah. Biking, climbing, paddling, we have a lot of that. So we try to work a little bit in tandem with them. We're not official partners, but we do.We do a lot of work with them. And so, yeah, we try to keep things.

Mark00:35:28

Take it a little further. Yeah.

Arnold00:35:29

Missouri has one of the best state park systems, I think in the United States. They do.

Mark00:35:33

Really.

Arnold00:35:34

They. Their magazine is good. But the park system, matter of fact, on the ballot today.As we're recording this today, folks, which is August 4th, there is an issue on the ballot about Missouri state parks.

Mark00:35:45

Oh, okay.

Arnold00:35:47

I won't say which way to vote for that, but if you've enjoyed your park system, go vote.

Mark00:35:52

Yeah.

Arnold00:35:53

How about that?

Mark00:35:53

I think that's a good idea. Yeah. I'm all about a little tax for the parks.I live in the city of Maplewood and we have a little parks tax gone a long way at keeping and maintaining parks.

Arnold00:36:07

And it's more than mowing the lawn and making sure there's mulch underneath the playground equipment and it's the trails and.

Mark00:36:13

It's playgrounds and it's upkeep and it's all that.

Arnold00:36:16

It's an investment in the community where you can actually go rather than have to go get in your car and go somewhere else to do that.

Mark00:36:23

And it's nice to have it right there in your community. It's not a real big tax, but it's over time it creates enough money.

Arnold00:36:28

We grew up in University City where there was a park near every school and they were large parks and we would go there that would be like the, the summer place where you would go and have activities. They had basketball, they had playground equipment and you could do a lot of different things there.And a lot of municipalities, they're just like subdivisions and there's no place where there is an active place with trees and things like that that has changed.

Brad00:36:55

You're right.It used to be it seems to me anyway, if I remember correctly, that yeah, there was always a place within a very short walk, just a small neighborhood park. And that still exists, but it seems a little bit less.

Arnold00:37:07

Yeah. Agreed. Brad, thanks for coming in.

Brad00:37:09

Thank you.

Arnold00:37:10

Appreciate it. Mark, do you we're going to take a little break here and we'll be right back with some ending things that you don't want to miss, folks.Arnold Stricker with Mark Langston of St. Louis and Tune. Everyone in St. Louis promises a better mortgage rate.But what you really need to turn that perfect house into your dream home is a better mortgage at better rate mortgage. We open the door to so much more.Whether you're purchasing your first home or taking cash out to make your dream home even dreamier, our door is open. Come on in and get started today. We'll show you how.Call Sean directly at 314-375-3293 or online@betterratemortgage.com Remember, at Better Rate Mortgage, a better rate is just the beginning. Betterratemortgage.com MLS ID 2401335 an equal housing lender.This is Arnold Stricker of St. Louis in tune on behalf of the Dred Scott Heritage Foundation. In 1857, the Dred Scott decision was a major legal event and catalyst that contributed to the Civil War.The decision declared that Dred Scott could not be free because he was not a citizen.The 14th Amendment, also called the Dred Scott Amendment, granted citizenship to all born or naturalized here in our country and was intended to overturn the US Supreme Court decision on July 9, 1868.The Dred Scott Heritage foundation is requesting a commemorative stamp to be issued from the US Postal Service to recognize and remember the heritage of this amendment by issuing a stamp with the likeness of the man Dred Scott. But we need your support and the support of thousands of people who would like to see this happen.To achieve this goal, we ask you to download, sign, and share the one page petition with others. To find the petition, please go to dredscottlives.org and click on the Dred Scott petition drive on the right side of the page.On behalf of the Dred Scott Heritage foundation, this has been Arnold Stricker of St. Louis in tune. Welcome back to St. Louis in Tune. This is Arnold Stricker with Mark Langston. Folks, you want to make sure you check that out.A couple things here, websites, but we'll post that on the web page for the podcast gatewayoutdoor expo.com terrain-mag.com and there's one more, but we'll get to that.

Mark00:39:29

Okay. Yeah, sorry. Wow. I'm still getting used to this. We were on summer break and we've.

Arnold00:39:36

Been off for four weeks.

Mark00:39:37

We've been off a lot longer than.

Arnold00:39:41

We haven't been in the studio for four weeks.

Mark00:39:43

There, that's better. I like that. Wow. What a great show. He's a great guest to have.

Arnold00:39:49

He is. He is.

Mark00:39:50

Yeah. It's all about getting outside once in a while.

Arnold00:39:53

It really makes a difference.

Mark00:39:55

Put that screen down for crying.

Arnold00:39:56

And he was talking about just kids that lay in bed and all they're doing is scrolling through their phone.

Mark00:40:01

And it's just I enjoy my times that I've been outdoors and I still do it, and it's. It's nice to connect with nature a little bit. I know that sounds trite and whatever, but my goodness, it's the way to go.

Arnold00:40:14

It's actually. They've proven this scientifically that it's good for your health, even just to get out and walk. Yeah, and get out.Get some sunshine, get some vitamin D going.

Mark00:40:24

Oh, that's good.

Arnold00:40:25

It's important. It's very important.

Mark00:40:28

So did you know today is National Chocolate Chip Day?

Arnold00:40:31

Oh, my gosh.

Mark00:40:32

Yeah.

Arnold00:40:34

Celebrated every single day.

Mark00:40:36

Do you like the soft gooey. Not just soft chocolate chip cookies or the crisp chocolate chip cookies?

Arnold00:40:43

Oh, it's got to be soft. I'd rather have a little underdone than overdone.

Mark00:40:47

You're a softy.

Arnold00:40:48

Absolutely.

Mark00:40:48

Okay.

Arnold00:40:49

We make some. They're like Crack. You can eat 16 of them. They're like dollar size. Wipe those suckers out.

Mark00:40:57

Okay. British Columbia Day. Assisted Assistant Dog Day. You have a dog assist kind of thing where you have a dog. An assist dog assist.

Arnold00:41:09

Oh, yeah. One of those helper dogs.

Mark00:41:12

Yeah. Helper dog.

Arnold00:41:12

Yeah. Whatever they're called. We can't remember what they're called.

Mark00:41:16

We need some assistance. National White Wine Day. Are you a white wine person?

Arnold00:41:21

I drink that. Yeah.

Mark00:41:22

I'm a white wine.

Arnold00:41:23

It depends upon what I'm eating.

Mark00:41:25

Yeah.

Arnold00:41:26

And I'm just not the time of year or two.

Mark00:41:29

I guess I had too much red wine one time and it just. Ever since then, I can't. I headache.

Arnold00:41:35

Headache time.

Mark00:41:36

I overdid the red wine once and it's. That's probably. People are probably saying what you know, and my wife is an Italian.

Arnold00:41:43

Part of it's drinking a glass. Drinking heaviest sip of wine, sip of water.

Mark00:41:47

Yeah. Oh, I never knew that.

Arnold00:41:49

Have food too.

Mark00:41:50

National Night Out. We. Do you ever do that in your neighborhood?

Arnold00:41:53

Yes, we did. Yeah.

Mark00:41:54

Okay. You'll do that in your. You moved to a new city in a little suburb. You're a burb guy.

Arnold00:41:59

I'm a burb guy. And yeah, we do our national street out. That'll be later on in the fall.

Mark00:42:04

Okay. Okay, that's good. Let me see if I have anything else. National White Wine Day. I like that. Picnic Day. Today's picnic. To go out and take a picnic.

Arnold00:42:14

Yeah.

Mark00:42:15

Single Working Women's Day.

Arnold00:42:18

That's every day for some single women.

Mark00:42:19

And it is the US Coast Guard's birthday today. Today.

Arnold00:42:22

Oh, we should play the Coast Guard song.

Mark00:42:24

I don't have the Coast Guard song. So that's just a few of the.

Arnold00:42:27

Yeah.

Mark00:42:27

Many days that we're celebrating today.

Arnold00:42:30

There you go. So this is a serious quote I have here.

Mark00:42:34

Okay.

Arnold00:42:34

And got this down at the Big Bear Mountain or whatever down in Branson where the guy.

Mark00:42:41

Yeah, everybody likes the Big Bear.

Arnold00:42:42

Yeah. This is a quote from Sun Bear of the Chippewa tribe.I do not think the measure of a civilization is how tall its buildings concrete are, but rather how well its people have learned to relate to their environment and fellow man.

Mark00:42:57

Very nice.

Arnold00:42:59

Yes.

Mark00:42:59

Words of wisdom.

Arnold00:43:00

Here's another one from Iroquois Maxim. In our every deliberation, we must consider the impact of our decisions on the next seven generations.

Mark00:43:13

Oh, boy, we are in some.

Arnold00:43:15

Yeah, we're in some serious trouble, folks. Wow.

Mark00:43:18

Seven generations. I've thought about some of the things that have happened in our history. Our news lately. I've gone.It's going to take a whole generation to get past this.

Arnold00:43:27

Or then some.

Mark00:43:29

Yeah, and seven, I bet.

Arnold00:43:31

Because you know how hard it is to change the thinking of people.

Mark00:43:33

Oh, my goodness. Yes.

Arnold00:43:35

Especially in this information age now and.

Mark00:43:37

The wars and the demolishing. Nevermind.

Arnold00:43:41

Yeah. Here are some things to lighten and brighten your day, folks.

Mark00:43:45

Okay.

Arnold00:43:45

The fact that there is a highway to hell and only a stairway to heaven says a lot about anticipated traffic numbers.

Mark00:43:58

The audience really like that one.

Arnold00:44:00

I lost my. Which way am I going here? Am I going the wrong. Yeah, I'm going the wrong direction here. Let's do this. I had a great one and then my finger slippery.Pushed it. Yeah.

Mark00:44:12

No stairway for you, brother.

Arnold00:44:14

Yeah, no kidding. Here we go. Old people at weddings always poke me and say, you're next. So I started doing the same thing to them at funerals. That's pretty good.

Mark00:44:33

That is pretty good.

Arnold00:44:37

And you know, there's been this issue with the lettuce recently.

Mark00:44:42

Oh, in the diarrhea.

Arnold00:44:43

Yeah. And people are like, oh, it came from this place. Came from that place. This was the sign on a Taco Bell store.Stop acting like you've never gotten explosive diarrhea here before. Who called the news?

Mark00:44:57

They did take the brunt of it all.

Arnold00:44:59

Yes, they did. And lastly, this lady, she takes her empty kind of whiskey bottles and stuff like that, and she fills them with water.She goes, sometimes I like to use my empty liquor bottles as water bottles just to keep the neighbors guessing.

Mark00:45:21

That's great. That's a good idea. That would be fun.

Arnold00:45:26

We hope you've had fun today, folks. This is all for this hour. We thank you for listening.If you've enjoyed this episode, you can listen to additional shows@sdtlngeune.com where you can follow us and even leave a review.We want to thank Bob Bertha Self for our theme music, our sponsor, Better Rate Mortgage, our guest, Brad Kovach, deputy director at River City Outdoors, and co host Mark Langston. And we thank you for being a part of our community of curious minds. St. Louis in tune is a production of Motif Media Group and the US Radio Network.Remember to keep seeking, keep learning, walk worthy, and let your light shine for St. Louis in tune. Hi, I'm Arnold Stricker.

Mark00:46:26

Sam.