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Home > Desert Oracle Radio > Local group Morongo Valley Projects create free “Discover Morongo Valley” info packet for visitors
Podcast: Desert Oracle Radio
Episode:

Local group Morongo Valley Projects create free “Discover Morongo Valley” info packet for visitors
Category: Society & Culture
Duration: 00:00:00
Publish Date: 2025-10-07 16:14:09
Description:

A group of Morongo Valley residents calling themselves Morongo Valley Projects are aiming to put their town further on the map as a regular stop for the Basin’s 4-million annual visitors, starting with their “Discover Morongo Valley” packet they’ve constructed for the Hwy 62 Art Tours.

Morongo Valley has both a blessing and curse: its unique placement as the first town to greet you in the Morongo Basin with so much to offer, yet most visitors literally speed right past it, creating a dangerous element on the already hazardous stretch of Hwy 62. In addition, Morongo’s various family-owned businesses struggle for patronage despite the millions of cars that drive through it on the way to Joshua Tree. 

But Foster Tucker, the spokesperson of the new community group Morongo Valley Projects, says he and his fellow residents have taken action to encourage visitors to slow down and stay a while; to take advantage of what Morongo Valley offers. 

“The people in Morongo Valley are tired of people going 100 miles an hour through our town, and you can do two things about it: you can spend years with Caltrans trying to get more stop lights and speed traps, or you can give people a reason to want to stop in Morongo. So before we waste time on lobbying, we came up with the first ever comprehensive directory with not only the shops and what to eat, but where to have the experiences in Morongo Valley,” says Tucker. 

Morongo Valley Projects is currently being grassroots funded by its half-dozen members who hope they can eventually turn it into an NGO (or non-governmental organization, a non-profit that operates independent of government control pursuing social, humanitarian, environmental, or political goals) with the baseline aim to simply “help everybody.” Tucker hopes the end goal can be a return to a Morongo Valley Chamber of Commerce like the town had years ago.

“The businesses in Morongo are all family run. No chains. But they are barely getting by. And when I tell them 4 million people go up and down this road every year and that if they got 1/2 of 1% what would that mean for their business? If we don’t do something ourselves as people who love this area and wanna see it preserved, no one is gonna help us.”

Morongo Valley Projects “Discover Morongo Valley” packet contains a “Who and Where We Are” statement, which ensures the town “endeavors to remain rural and to grow the local economy with independently owned businesses.” The packet is robust with advertisements of these businesses, as well as a list of experiences unique to Morongo like the Big Morongo Canyon Preserve, Laster Ranch Animal Rescue, and landmarks like the Morongo Indian Village Historical Marker. To bolster awareness of Morongo’s need for highway safety, there’s also an educational newsletter from the CHP.

You can pick up the free “Discover Morongo Valley” packet at any Morongo Valley business, as well as various stops in town at the Hwy 62 Art Tours.

The post Local group Morongo Valley Projects create free “Discover Morongo Valley” info packet for visitors appeared first on Z107.7 FM Joshua Tree.
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