Safety, Awareness, and the Future of Our Kids

SPEAKER 01 : 0:00

Welcome to The Good News with Angie Austin. Now, with The Good News, here’s Angie.

SPEAKER 02 : 0:08

Hello there, friend. Angie Austin and Jim Stovall with the good news. Hey, Jim. Hey, it is great to be with you. Always great to have you on the show. I always like to ask you, anything exciting going on? Any trips? Any cool events in your life?

SPEAKER 03 : 0:23

Well, everything’s exciting. Of course, the new book’s out. You and I have talked about Coach for Life, and I’m doing a lot of publicity surrounding that. And then school is back in at the university, so I am excited. visiting with a number of young people from around the world, and I’ll be teaching a couple of classes. So that’s always fun, and all is well here.

SPEAKER 02 : 0:48

You know, it’s such an interesting time. We talk about the kids coming back to school, and my kids are doing really well. And I like to think they went to a really good public high school, the two of them that are in college now. And, you know, a lot of sports and, you know, friendships, et cetera. Well, this isn’t good news, but I guess it’s just kind of a, you know, a wake up call to grandparents, parents, just kind of keep an eye on your kids. You know, my daughter was sad like the first day or two, but then she’s been doing great. She has a really good support network there and they go to church every day. They have chapel and, you know, they go together as a team on the weekends. But she said they came back from their first day. game and there’s six suite mates so it’s three bedrooms and then like a living area with a kitchen living dining area so it’s a pretty good size dorm because you get that extra big room so anyway it’s two two girls to a room but six girls together with one bathroom is a challenge right you know i mean six girls one bathroom so they take turns with their showers and my daughter said something to me like i sound like someone’s crying or something So she hangs up, and then later on, about 1 o’clock in the morning, she starts texting me, but then she’s calling her brother, and she’s calling her sister. So she reaches her brother, who’s off at college, too. And apparently what happened is when she’d come home from dinner, she heard something, and one of her suitemates was having a seizure. And then she called the dorm mom because in these smaller Christian schools, a lot of times they have a live-in dorm mom. It’s actually a whole family that lives there. So she called her, and she said, call 911. So my daughter called 911, and then she called the coach and said, hey, there’s something wrong with my suite mate, my teammate. And come to find out, Jim, this is not – this is very sad. She tried to commit suicide. She overdosed on pills. And my daughter was kind of shaken up. And she’s a lifeguard. So she’s had to call 911 a couple of times before. But, you know, obviously really upset that her teammate was, you know, hospitalized. And then she’s gone. I mean, like she is gone, gone. Like you have to leave school. And so she found, you know, that distressing, but she’s really happy she’s going to get help. And then I just think, you know, that age is so it was a homeschooled kid. And, you know, because some of the kids come to your Christian school where you help a lot and teach. And some of them come from a homeschooling environment and then change cities. And all of a sudden, not only have they left home, but they’re in an environment where they’re around all these new kids. And it’s a lot. It’s a big culture shock. And then just the invincibility of these kids. Something sad happened in our community. My daughter’s a classmate and another boy that just graduated with her. So the girl’s a senior now, and the boy just graduated with my daughter. So he graduated in 2025. I think I’m going to burst into tears when I tell you this. They left school the other day, and we messaged my daughter the day after this happened and said, you know – Your friend so-and-so was in an accident. They left the high school gym on a motorcycle, and I cannot tell you how much I don’t like motorcycles. We’ve had deaths in the family on motorcycles. Grandpa almost died in a motorcycle. Both of the kids were killed instantly right down the street from our house, right down the street from the school. Literally, they had just left school. My understanding is that they were going at a pretty good clip. And, yeah, so boom. And just one, you know, one day in the course of one day, my daughter kind of got a little bit of a jolt, you know, with this. And because the girl was her classmate and friend. So anyway, I just said these young kids, we just have to keep an eye on them. And, you know, a lot of people kind of make fun of me for tracking my kids. And like Riley has a breathalyzer. I’m like, hey, if any of your friends are drinking, here’s a breathalyzer. Why would you give them that? Yeah, because I don’t want him drinking and driving. And let’s be honest, he’s going to be in groups of people that are drinking and they can’t drink and drive. And what an easy way for $15 to avert that. And then the tracking, like, you know, I know where they are every second. When my son’s friend got in an accident about a month ago, he rear-ended someone. This tracking device immediately went off and called 911 for my son and said, we’ve seen you’ve been in an accident. He said, well, I have it, but my friend has. And they’d already called 911. There’s so many things now that we can use to I feel like it’s accountability, Jim. I feel like I’m tracking them, but I also know their exact location. And I might be like, hey, I see you left so-and-so’s house. Why are you over at blah, blah, blah? Oh, we went by to pick up my sweater. Okay, that’s fine. But I feel like because they know we’re always watching, that they can tell their friends, like my parents, they really keep an eye on me.

SPEAKER 03 : 5:10

Yeah, I think parents need to understand it’s better to be a little intrusive than… have one of these horrific situations. We had a suicide on campus last year, and I told our people, we need to talk about this. It’s not like if we don’t say something, nobody’s thinking about it, so we may as well deal with the elephant in the room. And I told them, I said, guys, problems come and go you know relationships at your age come and go class problems you know bad tests all this stuff comes and goes and i promise you you won’t remember it so you know problems are temporary dying is forever i mean that is a uh and there’s just nothing worth that either you know and i i you know i told him i said i remember When I was in high school, I broke up with a girl and I thought I was going to die and everything. And, you know, and my grandfather said, someday you won’t even remember her name. And I was telling the kids that. And one kid asked me, what’s her name? And I said, son, I honestly don’t remember. You know, and I said when I was on this campus, I did great on some tests and not so good on others. And it really doesn’t matter. No one’s ever asked me how I did on my humanities test. So, guys, you know, you need to. And then you need to keep an eye on your roommates, your suitemates, and other people. And it’s worth it. It’s worth it. So, no, I think it’s good. And when I think of my parents that have now both graduated to heaven together there, but there was one thing I ever wanted when I was a kid that I was not able to get, and that was a motorcycle. Oh, yeah. At the time, I hated it, and I thanked them many times. You know, because, yeah, just too many people just, I mean, you make one mistake and you’re gone. And, you know, and kids that age are going to have, unfortunately, accidents. And they don’t have experience driving and all this. And it amazes me that we let kids on motorcycles drive. Here in my state, they let them out there when they’re 14, and you can’t even drive a car until you’re 16. And it’s just, wow, you know, 14-year-olds are not known for great judgment.

SPEAKER 02 : 7:38

Yeah, you know, oh, by the way, that device, I totally remember that app. It tells me how many hard starts, fast starts where they’re accelerating too fast, and then hard stops where they’re really slamming on the brakes. And there used to be so many. And I can also see their phone usage, how many times they pick up their phone when they’re driving. And I went in last week and I looked because my daughter’s driving with someone else. She doesn’t have a car at college. I was pleasantly surprised that I was getting zeros on all the readings for my son and my two daughters. Like they’re not doing it anymore. And they were doing it like crazy. And we even gave them a limit. If you have more than 10 hard breaks and 10 hard starts in a week, we’re taking the car away for a week. We are monitoring this, so you better keep an eye on that. I was shocked last week when I really saw there weren’t any, even for me and my husband. It just makes you more aware of your driving. I’m using up all of your time. We are talking today about your column, Time and Money Investors, always a great topic for us. What are you teaching us in Winner’s Wisdom this week?

SPEAKER 03 : 8:37

Well, as kids come back to the university at the Stovall Center for Entrepreneurship, we have kids from 150 nations on campus, and they all want to start businesses and be creative forces and do all this stuff. And invariably, people want to know, okay, I got an idea, where do I get the money? And, you know, and I have 10 million books in print and I get calls from everybody, my phone number, my email addresses and all of them. So, you know, that’s one of the questions people where where do I find investors? The answer to the question is you probably don’t. And, you know, they think of venture capital. Well, a venture capitalist is going to love my idea. Venture capitalists don’t invest in ideas. They invest in businesses that need to be brought to the market. And now there is such a thing as an angel investor. But, you know, I always tell people, if you’re going to find an angel investor, it’s probably someone that was on your Christmas card list last year. Other than that, it’s not going to work. But I am a huge fan of what I call sweat equity. You know, go out and put it together and make it work. Or the new crowdsource funding, you know, Kickstarter and those sorts of things. And, you know, I was involved with a film project, a documentary on the work of Napoleon Hill. And they ran short on money and they needed $750,000. finish this film off. They real quick put up a Kickstarter thing. Hey, you can get, for this much, you can get a movie poster, you can get signed by the cast, you can have your own premiere, you can do all this stuff we put in there. And, you know, bang, three quarters of a million dollars almost instantly. And, you know, it’s a great way to pre-promote the film. And you didn’t give up any equity. You still own 100% of the thing. So, you know, there are so many great ways to go. But just because you have a great idea doesn’t mean anybody’s going to do anything. You know, and I am very, very grateful for in all of my companies, I’ve never had an outside investor in a traditional sense. So, I own 100% of all of it. And there are times, I have to tell you, during the lean times, if you have an investor and you’re cutting up this pie, we probably wouldn’t have made it. So if you’re looking for equity, it’s probably sweat equity. Go out and do it yourself. And look to the crowdsource funding. Look at the amazing things that are happening out there. And you can get the money you need without… you know, selling your future to a venture capitalist or the vulture capitalist, as it were.

SPEAKER 02 : 11:15

You know, I love watching that Shark Tank show, seeing how people have come up with money and they’re trying to get, you know, additional investing. And there’s a few times where they actually turn the sharks down and kind of do their own thing and I’ve been reading about one recently that had become successful. I can’t remember if it was like a bed that cools you or a mattress or something, but whatever it was, I was like, wow, I was just blown away that he kind of, you know, was able to pull himself up. What do you call bootstrapping in your article where he was able to, you know, funded himself, but he didn’t want them involved. And I know they have a lot of connections and they help in other ways besides financially, but, But it blows me away when people are like, you know what? I think I’m worth more than that. I’m just going to go for it when they actually can, you know, make it.

SPEAKER 03 : 11:58

Absolutely. And for whatever you would be giving away a big chunk of your company for today, it would be ridiculously expensive in the future. And I just helped a gentleman. He started a company several years ago, and he didn’t have any money. So he gave up 25% of the equity in his company for a guy to do the incorporation and set up the books. This cost $3,000, $4,000, $5,000 with an accounting firm. Now he’s got a company worth $5 million.

SPEAKER 01 : 12:22

And I said…

SPEAKER 03 : 12:27

You have $1.25 million in equity over here to an accountant. And thankfully, we were able to get in touch with the accounting association. And taking equity from a client like that is a conflict of interest. So thankfully, we were able to help him out on that. But don’t sell your future for a few pennies today.

SPEAKER 02 : 12:49

Oh, that’s interesting that you’ve got to kind of watch out with people with ulterior motives that may come in with what seems like a really sweet deal and in the long run benefits them a lot more than it benefits you in the long run. And then, Jim, you always end your columns with today’s the day. Why do you always say today’s the day?

SPEAKER 03 : 13:08

Well, it doesn’t matter what we think about or want to do or meant to do or hope to do. or plan to do. What matters is what we did. And so, you know, I always want to remind my readers that, you know, if there’s anything in this that’s worthwhile, today’s the day. Go do it today, or get it on your calendar. But, you know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions and everybody meant to do something but it really comes down to what did you do you know and so i always want to remind people that if you have a thought a dream an idea or just some i is something that’s going to improve your life do it now well i have to um say that in honor of you i i got a little plaque that says today only happens once make it amazing which goes with you know what you teach me so thank you jim stovall thank you

SPEAKER 05 : 14:03

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SPEAKER 02 : 15:04

Hey there, friend. Angie Austin here with the good news. Well, the good news is there are things that we can do to be a better neighbor to animals. And, you know, I talk about animals all the time. I have five pets myself. We do a lot of animal segments. And there are so many things we can do to save animals’ lives that are super simple. And I learned, too, that I’ll never forget. I’ll just tell you one, and I’ll tell you the other later during the interview in a minute because it’s a big one. But one, I just was checking out at the grocery store, and I had a six-pack of soda, and the checker stopped. And at At first, I thought she was kind of rude, because she’s like, you know, you have to cut these. And I said, what? Pardon me? She said, when you take these six-pack rings off, you have to cut them into sections, because animals get trapped in them. And I’m telling you, at first, I thought she was kind of bossy. And then I thought, oh my gosh, you know how many animals I probably saved? I’ve never again in my life not cut a six-pack ring all the sections apart. And so today we’re going to learn from an expert, some simple tips and tricks for being a good neighbor to animals, saving animals’ lives. Jacob Shaw is joining us, and Jacob is the manager of Strategic Initiatives with PETA. Welcome.

SPEAKER 04 : 16:09

Thank you so much for having me on. That story you told about the six-pack ring, I mean, the perfect way to tee this up, because hopefully I’ll be able to share some other tips that people can also incorporate into their day-to-day lives, that just like that will be easy, but things that make a big difference for animals.

SPEAKER 02 : 16:25

OK, I know we’re going to talk about food, Jacob, and I just want to tell you one more. I was in the Everglades and I was on. I love tours. I love history and I like learning about things. And so anyway, they were talking to us about birds and just like the vultures even. And they said, do not throw. He said, do me a favor. never throw food again like out of your car or on the side of a highway because the bird or animal will come to that food and they will die so I’m going cross-country taking my kid to college and my husband’s in the car and somebody whips a banana peel out and then my husband and I said don’t do that and my husband said oh it’ll it’s biodegradable it’ll be gone in a day or two I said yeah, but not before it kills an animal that tries to run out and get it on the highway. And so he was like, ah, you know, what’s the big deal? What’s the big deal? Not 10 miles later, animal dead in the highway. I said, see, that’s what I’m talking about. They come out onto the highway to eat the food and they get killed.

SPEAKER 04 : 17:17

Yeah, you’re exactly right. And that’s actually, you know, one of the things I wanted to bring up today was this subject of open containers, because it’s the exact same problem, right? It’s Things we sort of absentmindedly do that end up attracting hungry animals and causing them harm in the process. So, like, when people are throwing their trash recyclables away, a lot of the time they don’t think about the fact, you know, I hadn’t thought about this until the last couple years, that hungry animals, whether we’re talking about a raccoon, a possum, or dogs or cats, they’ll try to lick the last remaining bits out of the inside of the can or other containers. And in the process, their heads can become stuck inside. Right. And once that happens, there’s no way for them to get food or water and they can starve to death or become severely dangerously dehydrated. But, you know, like you’re saying, you know, all you have to do is not show the food. out the car window. In this case, all we have to do is just take a few moments to crush cans and just put the lid back on top of a jar or a bottle before throwing it away.

SPEAKER 02 : 18:17

Ah, okay. Put the lid back on. And then another thing that I’ve found, it’s so simple, is to make sure that when we do do all of that, that you shut the lid on your recyclable or trash bin when you put all that stuff in there so that the raccoons or whatever, you can’t jump into your trash bin and rifle through all your stuff. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, think about it, Jacob. How many videos have we seen now that, you know, social media is so big of animals walking around with something on their head that they can’t get off? And it’s very difficult to catch the animal to get it off. And I think of my own dog. Oh, my gosh. Louie getting her head buried in a Ben and Jerry’s container that one of the kids either dropped or put in like a low trash can. And obviously that wasn’t an issue because it was easy to get it off my Pomeranians. said. But I mean, any animal is going to go for a Ben and Jerry’s. I mean, let’s be honest, it’s delicious. Oh, absolutely.

SPEAKER 04 : 19:09

Especially if it’s one of the dairy-free Ben and Jerry’s that they have everywhere. And also, I can’t believe your dog’s name is Louie because my dog is Louie as well. And most of the time people think Louie is a boy, but she is not. She is her wonderful, amazing spouse.

SPEAKER 02 : 19:27

Oh, my gosh, Louie is my female white Pomeranian. Her name is Lulu, but I just somehow got it down to Louie. That’s funny that you’re Louie’s girl, too.

SPEAKER 04 : 19:36

Mine is Luna, but we’ve been calling her Louie forever. And, you know, actually, on that note, one of the things that we always tell people to do, that’s another sort of tip that is really easy to forget, is if you have companion animals, you know, whether that’s a dog or a cat, a lot of the time it’s actually their food when it’s left out overnight that can attract animals, like other animals, like mice, rats, or insects. So when I feed Lou, I always make sure, you know, when I’m going to sleep, the food is going back inside of the container. So I leave it out overnight. Louie is going to be sound asleep. The only animals who are going to eat that food are, you know, mice or ants or others who would be attracted by it. And, you know, that really sort of just leads to What we always try to emphasize, which is the only real long-term effective methods of making sure that animals stay outside, are removing any attractants like food or garbage, and then making sure that entry points in the exterior walls or on the floorboards of our homes are sealed off. Because otherwise, we’re basically just giving them an open invitation and blaming them when they take us up on it.

SPEAKER 02 : 20:45

OK, so you’re saying when you said food, I immediately thought of something else location wise. But you’re saying inside, like my mom would always say, don’t leave crumbs on the floor. Don’t make a mess with your food in the pantry. Then the mice will get in here and get it, et cetera. And we have cats and they must scare all them off. But we did have prior to them have issues. So pick up the dog food and the cat food. I didn’t think about that one. And then I was thinking when you said this, Jacob, my girlfriend who lives in L.A., It has cat food that she leaves out for the feral cats and her own cats. And apparently bears like that because she woke up to three bears in the pool, two baby bears. She like went viral for this, two babies. And then but the adult bear got into the house and. And, you know, they didn’t have to call anyone or anything. They’re like animal nuts. So they were fine with it. The bears actually keep coming back and swimming in the pool, but they no longer leave that food by the exterior door anymore. If she feeds feral cats and she takes, you know, the food back inside and she’s always trapping them to get them spayed and neutered and all that. But yeah, no more bears in the house. So I like your example of inside, because to be honest with you, I didn’t think about picking up the cat food at night and putting it away. So there’s another one. All right. And then once they do get inside, you said there’s a, There’s an issue with the traps if they do get inside the, you know, mice and rats? Yeah.

SPEAKER 04 : 22:05

So, you know, killing these animals, whether we’re talking about a mouse, a rat, insects, whoever we’re talking about, it really doesn’t do anything to prevent other animals from moving in. However, you know, the first visitors came, other ones will soon follow. So killing them just creates this endless, senseless cycle of violence, which we obviously want to avoid. And, you know, you mentioned these traps. The trap that we’re most concerned about at PETA are these glue traps. You know, they’re small boards that are coated with sticky adhesive. So these glue traps are responsible for more animal suffering than really any other wildlife control product that’s available today. And it’s because the traps are designed to catch animals, not kill them. Which, you know, may sound better, but it’s actually much worse because it means that after an animal walks across the surface of the trap, you know, if we’re talking about a mouse, a rat, even puppies or kittens, what happens is they get stuck to the glue and then they’re left alone. to die that’s slow excruciating deaths from starvation, dehydration, blood loss, exposure. I mean, oftentimes their mouth and their nostrils get glued shut, and they will suffocate to death. And then other times people just throw the trap in the garbage while the animal stuck to the trap is still alive, so they’re slowly crushed to death. I mean, it is the most… painful terrifying way to die imaginable but the good news is we are seeing countries around the world ban these traps and we’re making really amazing progress here in the U.S. as well we’ve seen cities like West Hollywood and Ojai introduce their own glue trap bans you know I

SPEAKER 02 : 23:39

I didn’t even know what they were. Like when I first saw this, you know, when I was reading, you know, about you before we started the interview, I thought it was a sticky glue trap for you to trap the mouse and then like put it in a field or something to like catch and release like you do when you’re fishing. I didn’t realize it was to like glue them and then let them slowly die. That’s horrible. What about the pest control companies? Yeah. It’s horrible. What about the pest control companies? My girlfriend called somebody for the squirrels or something like that. So he comes down with a trap, right? And he’s got squirrels in it. And I said to her, I swear to you, that dude brought those in with him and he just stuck them in that cage because I do not believe you had squirrels up there. It was like within like three minutes, he comes walking. And my friend had checked the traps. Right. They were empty. That’s why, Jacob, I’m so suspicious. Like, I swear to you, he just went up there with a few squirrels in his bag and put them in the trap because it had been empty that morning, like shortly before he came. But anyway, if they are really coming to catch real animals that they don’t bring to you in their own bag and put in the trap, what’s the problem with these companies that you hire?

SPEAKER 04 : 24:44

I mean, the most important thing with these companies is just making sure that everybody is on the same page with the facts, right? And those facts are that lethal solutions just simply don’t work because if one mouse can get inside our home, others will keep coming as long as there’s food, water, and shelter available to them. So whether you’re doing this yourself or you’re hiring a company to assist you, the goal and the focus should be on prevention and exclusion because we know that those are the only effective long-term solutions. And if you’re looking to hire a company, the most important thing is to find a humane wildlife removal company, with humane being the key word, that will safely relocate these animals. You know, there are tons of humane wildlife removal companies around the country. So obviously, you know, if you just Google it or, you know, find one near you, that’s the best place to start. And I suggest calling them, you know, before hiring them and making sure that They do not use any traps, poisons, or other lethal methods because we know those don’t work, and all they do is just inflict terrible suffering on him.

SPEAKER 02 : 25:46

No, unless the guy just brings him, you know, his pet squirrel. That’s the goofiest story. The trap is empty, and then he arrives, and it’s full. Like, okay, okay, his pet squirrel. His pet squirrel, his own personal squirrel. All right. So what about, you know, making, I know we’re all out of time, about making our homes, you know, less inviting for animals to want to get inside. Any other tips for that to keep wildlife out?

SPEAKER 04 : 26:10

Well, since we already mentioned, you know, food for companion animals, I think the other big thing is really just Doing the thing that everyone’s parents tell them when they’re a kid, right, which is to be clean, tidy, and organized. You know, you don’t want to have crumbs and food scraps on your kitchen floors or counters. You want to make sure that your garbage is kept inside of a bag, inside a container. You know, don’t let the dirty dishes pile up. So do all these things that will improve your own quality of life. Having a more clean, attractive living space, which will, by virtue, become less attractive to all the other animals who would move in because the things that attract them are usually things that we shouldn’t really have around ourselves, the things being trash and food waste.

SPEAKER 02 : 26:53

Well, I’ve learned about some of the work that you’ve done. And in Ojai, I know about breathing of French bulldogs and the breathing impairments. If people don’t know about that, by the way, Google that because there’s some breathing practices with animals that I know you’ve worked on that harm the animal over generations where they’re barely able to go outside on a hot day because they can pass out because their breathing airways are so blocked, etc. So Thank you for all the work you do for animals. Good luck with Louie. And where can we go to get more information on how to live in harmony with wildlife?

SPEAKER 04 : 27:27

Well, the best place to go is PETA.org, right? We have tons of great information on, you know, wildlife protection tips and other ways that all of us can help animals in their daily lives. And, you know, I will just say that, you know, with this issue of intentionally breeding dogs to have these extreme features that cause impairments, you know, That was something that we were able to see a huge amount of progress at the local level because we had people who care deeply about animals, you know, reach out to their city council members and ask for this to happen. So, you know, wherever you live. there are always ways that your city can help animals. So, you know, you don’t just have to wait for federal policy to come down the pipeline. You can always reach out to your city council member, ask them to ban glue traps, ask them to ban this practice of torture breeding. There’s no end to things we can do. But thank you so much, Angie, and I hope you and Louie have an amazing day.

SPEAKER 02 : 28:20

And thank you. I’ve learned something new every time I talk to one of your PETA friends. And I didn’t know about the breeding until recently, and I’ve been in news for 30 years, and I didn’t even know about the glue traps until today. So thanks for educating us.

SPEAKER 04 : 28:34

Oh, of course. Thank you so much for the opportunity.

SPEAKER 01 : 28:37

Thank you for listening to The Good News with Angie Austin on AM670 KLTT.