Boy, was I surprised

>From when I first entered Scouting as a Cub Scout (mid 1960's) until today I
had never in my experience been in a Pack or Troop that "refunded" or
transferred funds from Scout accounts with the youth when they moved or left
the unit.

You go from CS to BS? The Pack absorbs the money back into the general fund.
You quit BS? The Troop absorbs the money back into the general fund. That was
money earned by the unit and they, out of the kindness of their hearts, gave
the youth a cut to reduce the cost of big ticket items like Summer Camp, High
Adventure, Jamboree. You wanted to travel free you earned more money for the
unit and got more credit for yourself.

But those funds are not "the Scout's". That money was earned by the unit for
the express purpose of reducing the cost of Scouting for the CO/PO. They were
kind enough to allow the youth a share based on their sales, etc., they were
not setting aside actual cash for the individual boy to take with them.
Usually it was done with the idea of motivating the youth to sell more.

By even broaching the idea you're looking at something that could become a
bookkeeping mess. The minute you transfer funds to the boy's troop, WHICH MAY
HAVE YOUTH ACCOuNTS OR MAY JUST THROW IT INTO THEIR GENERAL FUND, you're
creating a P.R. headache. The minute you pay out cash to a boy for something
besides the unit activities you're creating a source of income that would have
to be tracked and reported. For that matter, if a Pack gave the youth's money
to the Troop, they'd STILL have to report it.

There should not be any unit around who hands the cash either to the youth or
to another unit. It's the committee's to spend in the name of the CO/PO, not
the unit's to hand out. And it should have one of two things occur when a unit
closes (depending on your council and its own decisions) - either that money
becomes part of the funds of the CO/PO, who ideally will hold it in trust for
the next time a Scout unit forms at their location or it will be absorbed by
the council to be held in trust under that unit's number until the unit is
reformed. VERY FEW COUNCILS HAVE EVER DONE THE SECOND OPTION, but I've been a
member of one that did, so I felt it safest to warn others that such a thing
might exist.

I've seen units hold a boys credit after he turned 18 so he could go on the
next HA trip that summer. But I've never seen units handing money from one
treasurer to the next for the boy to continue his account wherever he moved.
And were I attached to such a unit I would be doing everything to stop such a
practice before something went wrong that caused a problem. What if the other
unit's Treasurer is stealing from the Scout Accounts and you transfer winds up
with nothing? Who will collect some of the blame and become part of the
article in the paper? "Mother says her boy's Cub Pack didn't check to be sure
his funds wouldn't be stolen by Treasurer"? Sounds good? Sounds like something
I don't want happening in my back yard.

Think this one through a little more. The money IS NOT the Scout's and should
not be travelling from unit to unit with him.

Tom Petrik

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