MattR

@troop165sepulveda, welcome to the forum!

It's a GIS. That would have explained a lot to me. I think the scouts could enjoy it. I went and found a hike I did yesterday. Now I know how long the hike is. I might have figure out the elevations next.

I've used Google earth to set up compass courses. Getting a USGS overlay would really help for hiking trails.

And how do we know it's an article? Please delineate other's content. It doesn't have to be real rigorous with citations and all, but at least use some quotes. It helps readers.

Yep. Hope it helps. It's been a lousy year. One thing I learned as a new SM is that there are lots more people complaining than helping. As a retired SM I learned that nobody really cared about my opinion so much as whether I helped. As for your old SM swearing at the new SM, that's just an angry old guy that can't find a way to help. Don't let him bother you. Oh, and give yourself a raise of, say, 45%? Does that sound fair? 😀

Since the Ch 11.3 thread is wondering around CO's and their responsibilities I thought I'd try and drag that sub thread over here. The discussion was CO's are not responsible. That's clear to me. The question, however, is what to do going forward. Just changing the wording on the agreement doesn't make anyone responsible. Who takes on the responsibility that the CO no longer will evade? It won't be the DE. It won't be a background check.

Maybe they're right. A jersey would make a lot more sense to me. Let the scouts decide.

@MGinLA, I agree with most of what you said but I did things slightly differently. I still ran the elections. First, I had a couple if scouts that did find their place in the OA and they never would have known about it if I hadn't run the elections. I agree with you that the scouts know more about the scouts than the adults and our elections were much more about character than popularity as the popular scouts took longer to get elected than the quiet, helpful scouts. That said, I can also see certain personalities, if there were enough scouts like that, that would turn it into a popularity con

I'd sign up to be one if I saw a way to make it work. It's an impossible position as described. As implemented it's a group of people that answer simple questions about council policy. My troop's commissioner goes to most of our committee meetings but is solely there to answer questions about policy. If there's a bigger purpose they're not interested. Comparing that reality to the discussions here about commissioners being an important way to help units develop - I see a gap.

Wrong thread? This is about fees and not charters.

I never used a timer. The scouts had fun just watching the rockets crash into the end and fall apart.

I was both an sm and district camping chair. As an sm the district events could help the scouts fill in the calendar but when they had an abundance of ideas, camporees got replaced. As camping chair I understood that. I also tried to make camporees fun and challenging so the scouts wanted to be there. As for the other events mentioned I didn't organize any of those. We didn't have the bandwidth.

Hopefully the chimney wasn't lit. I use a burner for a minute to start charcoal in a chimney. Much better than wads of newspaper. No flaming bits of paper floating around.

This is kind of amusing. I see angry people turn any group toxic, but their wealth and race don't really have much to do with it. If there's one common thread to toxicity in my district it's the council exec. But I think it's less toxicity and more good old fashioned burnout. Our council and district volunteers get along with each other.

This all assumes you have more volunteers than open positions. "We haven't had that spirit here since 1969."