More than simply an outing.
Founded in 2022 on the belief that the wild can do what walls cannot — and everyone deserves a second chance.
Built by a
startup veteran.
Run by guides who showed up.
Outside the City was founded in 2022 by Scott Swift — a startup veteran whose career began at World Vision Relief and who has built businesses in both for-profit and nonprofit sectors. As the father of a son with autism and epilepsy, Scott learned early that the right environment doesn't just shape behavior. It changes lives.
He had also found his own outdoor compass: years of California beach mornings, Southwest hiking and backpacking, and the kind of trips that send you home different than you left. He started Outside the City to offer that same compass to young adults who had been pulled into gangs, addiction, and the systems that follow.
We operate as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit under Teen Health, Inc. (EIN 87-4628884). We serve participants across Orange, San Diego, and Los Angeles Counties. We charge them nothing. Ever.
Adventure. Belonging.
Purpose. Opportunity.
To connect formerly gang-involved, unhoused, and underserved youth — and the adults rebuilding beside them — to nature, belonging, purpose, and opportunity through life-changing outdoor experiences.
Kinship
We create spaces where people feel seen, valued, and supported. Healing starts with being held, not fixed.
Growth Through Experience
We deliver real-world learning and resilience through challenge, adventure, and the outdoors.
Rewriting the Narrative
We challenge limiting narratives — breaking cycles of stigma and trauma to turn setbacks into leadership.
We work alongside Homeboy Industries, the Kinship Project, and probation and re-entry organizations across Southern California to reach the young people who need us most.
- Homeboy Industries
- Kinship Project
- Probation programs
- Re-entry organizations
Steward
the land.
Getting young people outside is the first agenda. Protecting the places that heal them is the second — because the youth who come to love a place become the ones who defend it.
Our actions
- 01Trail stewardship and habitat restoration on the land we use
- 02Leave No Trace certification for our youth program leaders
- 03Partnerships with the U.S. Forest Service, BLM, and land trusts
- 04A long-term commitment to protecting open space
Why access matters:
Access is a right, not a privilege
The health benefits of time in nature — calmer minds, stronger bodies, sharper focus — belong to everyone. ZIP code, background, and past shouldn't decide who gets them.
Connection creates the will to protect
We fight for the places we know and love. Outside the City builds that connection — one outing, one young person at a time.
Stewardship is learned, then passed on
Leave No Trace. Respect the ecosystem. Carry out what you carry in. Not rules — a tradition passed from person to person.
Public land is shared wealth
Few people can own a mountain. Everyone can hike one. Public land is one of the last great equalizers in American life.
Stronger together
Hikers, skiers, bikers, climbers, paddlers — our differences are real, but the threats to public land are bigger than any of them.
Advocates are made, not born
From 2001 to 2017, the U.S. lost an acre of natural habitat every 30 seconds. We're in the business of reversing that — one place at a time.
The team behind
every trip.
A founder with operating experience, a creative lead who's spent three decades behind a camera and on a bike, a controller who walked the trail in Afghanistan, and an advisor helping us scale. Plus dozens of volunteers across SoCal who keep showing up.
Meet The Team