Second Class

Yes, my council is currently looking for at least two DE's. Send me an email and I'll send you some contact info. We are in S9.

I'm sorry, too. One of my scouts was the first scout in our Council to be awarded this grant. We were informed of it in early summer. So far, I have had three scouts apply and get these grants. I should have made note of this. I was unaware it was a national program.

Barry, I'm reminded by your question about the psychological study that allowed a group to electrically shock other people. They found that when anonymity was in place, some were willing to administer lethal amounts of electricity. I think there are some on boards such as this that have that trait; willing and able to lash out because they know there are no repercussions. If we all posted our real name, position, troop or pack number, and then CC'd our wife, pastor, Committee chairman, XO, ASM, etc., 99.9% of the backbiting would stop. To answer your question then, yes,

"From working at National Camp School, I know a lot of folks on the regional camping committee. When you can cut them away from the heard, they'll tell you there are some councils which don't have any business running camps. The don't have the program staff or maintenance budgets. Consequently, they'll run two weeks of camp at 40% capacity and do a half-assed job of that. I'll grant you the solution there should be to kick some butts, not sell the camps, but after years and years of kicking, it may be time for a new strategy." Perhaps the "new strategy" would be to hire SE's that can get

Not good. A phone call from the XO to the Scout Executive is in order. IMHO this is intolerable.

Eamonn, it is really hard to read a long post with no white space. I'll give it a go now. All the best. ========================================================= Eamonn's post with spaces. Yesterday I presented a lesson on Dealing With Stress. Working in a jail is very stressful and the stresses take their toll on the people who work within the razor topped fences. Part of the lesson plan deals with bad ways of dealing with stress. On my way home I got to thinking about how I deal with my own stress. I'm not an expert in this kind of thing but even still I

Explain how popcorn sales supports the district and council. Not to mention the scout's family, by helping the scout pay his way. Of course, if a unit is disconnected from Council, doesn't participate in Council summer camps,doesn't use council camps for program, or have cordial relations with that staff, this is a harder sell. But, if you do, your unit will reap benefits, and in the end, so will the scouts in your unit.

Double tap(This message has been edited by Second class)

Thanks for the lead. I'll be in touch with them.

Anyone have a good lead on poly tees that can be silk screened? We have an overnight on a battleship, and we'd like to get a gray one, with the scouts name on the back, a silhouette of the ship, and troop number on the front. We need about 60. Thanks!

Democrats complain when the Texas republicans do it, and Republican's yelp when the Democrats do it. Both sides are dirty in this regard. The Democrats did it first, over 100 years ago. The courts have upheld gerrymandering. As to the electoral college; each state has the power to decide how votes are apportioned, all or none, or as Nebraska does it, apportioned by per centage to each candidate. The long slide down started with the 17th amendment.

Able, and you all drank his kool-aid? I'd start them back without him, and show him up. That is not right. I am amazed his SE lets that slide. Roundtable is, IMO one of the best hour and a half I spend each month. I try to get there early, because it is the conversations with scouters that inspiration comes from. New ideas. New places to go. Yes, sometimes it ends early, mostly because the troops that had been assigned a portion are so rude to not show up or get a replacement, or even a by your leave. The cub scout side is very good as well. They do all of the next months

So whose troop is it? What I mean with this question is, are the disgruntled people trying to change the statis quo? Didn't they join the troop knowing how it ran? Are they trying to fulment a coup? If that's the case, they should go their own way and start their own troop. It's much harder than they think. As far as the scoutmaster being tight lipped, I see that as a good thing. Less red meat for others to chew on. If the noise makers don't want to leave, they should man up and get with the program. It's not about them. It's about putting on a good program for the youth.

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-wd/02-0041.pdf Here's a good bit of information. It's out there if you choose to look for it. We're moving away, rapidly, from scout accounts. Scouts are working to fund the troop, to pay their dues, and to help their family.

We use Troopmaster, and that's all I know. The cost as I recall isn't near what was listed. A three year with server hosted files was less than $100.00. That's what I recall from a committee meeting when it was approved. The web version allows multiple users to load it on their computer, and use the common/cloud database. Only one user at a time. It has done everything we have asked it to do, and more. With this and yahoo for group emails, we're covered. Some folks complain that we don't have a web site. I offer them that job, and they stop complaining.

We are rapidly moving away from scout accounts, due to what we have recently learned about how they put your CO's tax exemption at risk. Our previous treasurer kept a ledger of each scouts' amount, and how and when it was distributed. Do you use an envelope system for your scout accounts? You don't have a separate bank account for each scout, do you? I'd expect that all funds were co mingled, and a ledger which accounts for all of it, and to whom it is credited. Deficit spending is not normal. It's like a bad case of musical chairs. I wouldn't want to be there when that

That is awesome BD. How many troop members refuse to participate? How do you deal with that disparity of income production? That seems to be a rising issue for some of my troop members.

We had planned on using unsold Show n Sell product to fill regular sales orders. Won't have to do that as we sold our entire order of Show n Sell. We have had our best year ever, more than double our previous high. Of course, our troop has 15 more scouts, this year, too. Next year will be much less expensive for our scouts because of this. We'll have five go to summer camp totally free because of the sales levels they hit. 15 or more others earned $70.00 in gift cards. High intensity, short duration. We are done fund raising for the year. Woot! What's not to l

Yea, gotta keep those red wagons away from 13 year olds. Looks bad. And risky. Fire has kept more than one boy interested in scouting. I bet the overnight in the lean too was harder for the parents than the boys!

Twocub, those were Fred's questions, not mine. I was answering his. It may sound complicated, but it really is not. We pay for those that drive scouts, with the minimum safe number of vehicles. Simple. And avoids resentment five years from now, and countless miles of wear and tear, cut seats and spilled cokes. At least they get paid back for gas. It's the least that we can do.

Sounds pretty normal if you ask me. My troop of 52 has 35+ eligible to attend Philmont (sign ups next week), and we just barely scraped a crew together. Your results seem right in line. Scouts are soft and don't know what fun backpacking and hiking is. We're moving toward 3-4 backpacking trips per year, and this seems to be having good results. When we had 28 scouts, we had well over 70% attendance. Now, at 52, we have the same number, but lower percentage, attending monthly camp outs. Too many competing activities. And, truth be told, they are used as an excuse to not attend

"Do do you make it by who drove or who committed to drive?" We reimburse drivers that carried scouts. If you drive for your convenience and don't carry scouts, we don't reimburse. - Do you compensate by actual number scouts driven or the number of seats committed for scouts? We reimburse each driver the amount they claim. We don't have six mini vans carrying two scouts. Doesn't happen. - How do you adjust for changing plans? Like less scouts showing up? We combine cars/trucks to lower the vehicles driven to the minimum plus one. (in case of emergency run t

RE: Driver reimbursement. Yes, the troop reimburses drivers for gas. We use the honor system. They know how many MPG they get, and the distance. We accept a hand written receipt for their gas. Some don't put in for it, but we encourage them to. Prevents resentment 2-3 years down the road. (like all the nickle and dime stuff leaders are always hit with). We looked into a bus, briefly. One big negative for me is it gives adults and "out" for not helping with the troop.

The background checks in this area are $67.50, and are done from a company in Oregon. About as far from here as you can get. My troop is discussing how to get in front of this issue. We may go with full background checks on all leaders. We require YPT for all adults, registered or not, when camping with us.

Hmmm... That debate format could prove interesting. Might have some grit rise to the surface! I think at a minimum they should make a statement in front of the troop, and tell them what they are going to do in their term. How many PLC's they will be at, how many campouts they will lead.