Local non-profit Leadership Long Beach is encouraging residents to explore their city and uplift local communities through a scavenger hunt on Saturday, June 24.
The annual fundraiser and citywide scavenger hunt deemed “Discover Long Beach” is modeled after the show “The Amazing Race.” For the first time, the scavenger hunt will now be open to the entire community.
Leadership Long Beach (LLB) is a community leadership organization founded in 1989, that focuses on community engagement through various social programs and leadership courses. The organization has over 1,500 alumni of adults as well as middle school and high school students.
During this “Amazing Race,” new students team up and race each other across the city in yellow cabs, scurrying to complete various tasks and search for landmarks.
LLB’s Vice President of Development Erin Wilson says this beloved team-bonding tradition serves the dual purpose of being a fun way for LLB classmates to get to know each other and help them learn more about their city.
For the inaugural scavenger hunt fundraiser in 2021, the name of the event was changed from “Amazing Race” to “Discover Long Beach” to avoid any potential conflicts with the CBS show of the same name. However, Wilson said she believes the new name fits the intended purpose of the event much better.
“Aside from people getting together and doing something fun that’s totally family-friendly and affordable, you get to see and learn about parts of Long Beach that a lot of people maybe didn’t know existed,” Wilson said.
Organizing the event is a team of roughly five people on LLB’s executive committee, plus the alumni committee that is tasked with running the “command center” the day of.
Through businesses that sponsor the event, LLB hopes to drive challenges toward a myriad of local restaurants as well as a variety of parks and community centers. Sponsors can choose from one of four sponsorship levels, spanning from $500 to $5,000.
Wilson said the fundraiser had around 25 local business sponsors along with 100 challenges for scavenger hunters in 2021.
This year, LLB has secured even more sponsorships, which has allowed them to make the event more affordable and accessible for residents. The 2023 edition of Discover Long Beach is also a lot shorter than the previous iteration; another strategy to entice more folks to participate.
Once the hunt starts at 9 a.m., each scavenger hunt team will have until noon to utilize the GooseChase app to complete a plethora of challenges ranging from taking a silly picture in front of a local landmark to picking up a bag of trash at a local beach.
Many of the challenges are volunteer-based activities that promote supporting the city and its residents.
Challenges will be scattered all over Long Beach, allowing teams to strategize what tasks will yield the most points. Participants can stay close to home if they prefer, while more points may be given for harder-to-get-to and hidden spots around the city.
All points will be tracked on the app so teams can view where they rank on the leaderboard throughout the hunt.
“The goal is to learn something new about our community and to have a fun Saturday,” Wilson said.
Scavenger hunt teams can register for $45, with only one team member needing to register for the whole team, which is recommended to be at least 2-4 people.
Discover Long Beach will take place Saturday, June 24 from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. For further details about Discover Long Beach, visit the Leadership Long Beach website.
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