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Zoo trip.

7om5hipp

Regular Member
Joined
Aug 12, 2013
Messages
144
Location
Centralia, MO
Howdy folks. I was wondering if anyone here has visited the St. Louis Zoo and carried. Do they check you as you come in or can you cc while there?
 

skidmark

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Jan 15, 2007
Messages
10,444
Location
Valhalla
Call the zoo and ask let us know what they say.

Never, ever ask ahead of time. It gives them time to think they ought to say "No". Go, and be polite and have at least your digital voice recorder going. Leave if they ask/tell you to.

Find out later if preemption is supposed to be in play and if so find the right people (not the zoo administration) to complain to if preemption was violated.

stay safe.
 

deepdiver

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Apr 2, 2007
Messages
5,820
Location
Southeast, Missouri, USA
Last time I was there was about 7 years ago. My recollection is that it was posted identical to the nearby Natural History Museum we visited the same day. They were posted in a manner probably best described as pro forma. Signage and lettering while upfront and obvious on the door failed to meet signage requirements by either size of sign or size of lettering. I'm thinking they may have been the places posted with the 3'x5" handwritten index card taped to the entry door.

I just don't remember exactly but I was CC and as I visited both with my wife I must have ignored the non-conforming signs.

Doing a quick interwebz search I found pictures purporting to be of a St. Louis Zoo gate from this year with a fresh looking NGZ sign. But no metal detectors.
 

deepdiver

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Apr 2, 2007
Messages
5,820
Location
Southeast, Missouri, USA
I was just at the STL Zoo about a week ago. There are signs posted prohibiting firearms and knives.
Gotta love the lib mentality - St. Louis zoo is a world class attraction that draws people nation wide. Many of those people are going to be carrying. St. Louis Zoo would rather you have your gun stolen from your car in Forest Park and out on the street than in your holster where it belongs. :banghead:
 

Renegadez

Regular Member
Joined
Aug 31, 2011
Messages
182
Location
Lees Summit
Never, ever ask ahead of time. It gives them time to think they ought to say "No". Go, and be polite and have at least your digital voice recorder going. Leave if they ask/tell you to.

Find out later if preemption is supposed to be in play and if so find the right people (not the zoo administration) to complain to if preemption was violated.

stay safe.

I guess I just see things differently IF they think they ought to say "No". Then let them say NO up front to my phone call. I definitely do not want to waste my time energy and money going to a place that does not want my firearm with me carrying it that's their loss ill take my money else or i would respect their rules and not carry either way on a family outing wife and grand kids i would not want it dicked up by a confrontation about me carrying my firearm because i was too stupid to know my business ahead of time. it would be different if i am out and about and run across an issue while OC'in but plan a trip somewhere like the Zoo I must do my due diligence just the way i do business. I dont like surprises if I can avoid them.
 
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Ezek

Regular Member
Joined
Jan 19, 2015
Messages
411
Location
missouri
I guess I just see things differently IF they think they ought to say "No". Then let them say NO up front to my phone call. I definitely do not want to waste my time energy and money going to a place that does not want my firearm with me carrying it that's their loss ill take my money else or i would respect their rules and not carry either way on a family outing wife and grand kids i would not want it dicked up by a confrontation about me carrying my firearm because i was too stupid to know my business ahead of time. it would be different if i am out and about and run across an issue while OC'in but plan a trip somewhere like the Zoo I must do my due diligence just the way i do business. I dont like surprises if I can avoid them.

I agree with this, why have a family moment ruined because some jack hole with a ZOMG GUNS mentality who runs the place wants to have a problem with a law abiding citizen? rather then put in metal detectors and kick out the riff raff carrying concealed and illegally.

like the KC zoo.. they had some shots fired last year with the county funding appreciation day or whatever it was called. this made them change their WHOLE setup by giving 2 free days to be randomly used. so as to keep the dangerous gun toting gang bangers from trying to settle disputes in their front entrance/parking lot.
 

BB62

Accomplished Advocate
Joined
Aug 17, 2006
Messages
4,069
Location
Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
It may be what you think is best for you, but don't you see that if they say "No" and post signs, because of your call, you have ruined it for everyone else that might CC there. Many people may be carrying in that zoo now without notice or concern. Is it that you just don't care about anything except your own situation? If the zoo administration has not take the time, forethought or effort required to consider the situation, it must not be important to them. If its not important to them just carry and let everyone else carry, without bringing it to their attention.
Unfortunately, the signs are already there.

In the past day or so a friend of mine was threatened with arrest if he didn't remove himself from the Zoo property. His "crime"? Wearing an **empty** holster.

I'll see if I can get him to post about it here, but no promises!
 

BB62

Accomplished Advocate
Joined
Aug 17, 2006
Messages
4,069
Location
Cincinnati, Ohio, USA

Renegadez

Regular Member
Joined
Aug 31, 2011
Messages
182
Location
Lees Summit
It may be what you think is best for you, but don't you see that if they say "No" and post signs, because of your call, you have ruined it for everyone else that might CC there. Many people may be carrying in that zoo now without notice or concern. Is it that you just don't care about anything except your own situation? If the zoo administration has not take the time, forethought or effort required to consider the situation, it must not be important to them. If its not important to them just carry and let everyone else carry, without bringing it to their attention.

If a place like the Zoo has not already figured out how they are handling firearms on their property then I guess when I called that would give them pause for thought that is fine with me. If I ruin OC in that place then they did not want you carrying there to begin with in which case I guess i never wanted to waste my money there. I do not openly carry my firearn to have to worry or sneek around and hope no one notices because they forgot about putting up a sign in fact even if a place does not have a sign and wants me to leave I go. I will deal with it through other channels such as what happened at habeneroes. To me OPEN Carry is about being above board. If the Zoo has a no firearms policy I I will help work to change it. But I am not going to ruin a family outing or leave my gun in a car. I do not go out of my way to ask about OC every where I go but the zoo would be a family outing for me. Yes in answer to your question yes I care and I try to stay low key but I want to know where i stand on somewhere like that before being blind sided.
 
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Jaysann22

Regular Member
Joined
Aug 2, 2010
Messages
109
Location
St Louis
I went to the St Louis Zoo approximately a year ago completely armed and completely ignored the signs. I don't care. The St Louis zoo is unfortunately simultaneously an affordable fun place for my family to enjoy and also very dangerously in and close to high crime areas with a vast amount of diversity of people. The zoo is just too high risk to go unarmed. And I'm not going to deprive my family of a fun day and disarm myself because a few libtards irrational illogical fear. I am not willing to put my family at risk. I am starting to fear that all this media frenzy over gun carry in the zoo is going to lead to bad things. Such as resulting in a state law being passed enforcing no guns in the zoo. Making it a misdemeanor being caught with a firearm in the zoo.
 

deepdiver

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Apr 2, 2007
Messages
5,820
Location
Southeast, Missouri, USA
The zoo 45 years ago and in exchange for being forever public and a political subdistirict of a political district, it got the authority to tax the public through sales tax and property tax to force everyone to pay for the zoo starting in 1972.

Now the zoo says that we, the public, have built them such a darn fine institution that it is now too popular, too powerful and too good for the likes of citizens who might want exercise their constitutionally protected right to carry firearms in compliance with preempted state law so the zoo now wants to be continue collecting sales and property taxes and be publicly funded but only open to people it wants to be open to and only under the terms it wants to be under, the general assembly, state law and the Missouri Constitution be darned.
 
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