Blaze66

Bob you do what you have to do! Thats the way it really works. Our pack has not in the 9 years I have been here had a committie that did anything and the CO has never done anything either other than gave us a place to meet. The pack was active for 7 years before I came into it and it worked the same way. I know that's not how it is suppose to work... I have been through all the training and I know what the orgainzation of a pack and troop should be, but the reality is that alot of packs and troops are running the same as we are. And its because of one thing and one thing only because we ( or a few parents who have taken responsibility) have stepped foward to do it for our kids! (or someone elses kids we have grown attached too or felt sorry for.) I know this is how more than half the packs in our district are running and some of them have been around since I was a youth. The CO we are at now did not choose scouting to promote in the community not in the sense that someone in the Church stood up and said hey, lets start scouts in our church. They became the CO because another pack in town folded and one of the people in that pack said well ill go to my church and see if they will let us meet over there and they said well yeah but is it going to cost us anything thing... they said no and they said well sure come on... we dont mind... and its just been that way ever since. They don't care one way or the other whether we are there or not. We can say all day long that well its not up too the volunteers as to whether the pack stays or not, but it is because without the volunteers you can't have a pack cause there is no one there to run it. And saying well if the volunteers leave and the CO decides not to have a program anymore, all your doing is transfering blame for the pack's demise, from the volunteers to the CO.

Eagle, our CR did that as I stated in another post. He wen't to the deacons and they basically said, we don't have the human resources in our church right now to help out, plus like I said they don't have parent's in the church that have kids of scout age, they are either older or younger and they don't want to get involved in anything their kids aren't into.

Basically now its not about keeping the pack going, its about whats the best thing to do for the scouts we have right now.

Shell, that's exactly what we did four years ago when our former Cub Master left. She had been there 13 years and was ready to go. I was at the time the Committie Chair and also running the Webelos Dens. We had 10 Webelos cross over and they took two leaders with them on top of our CM leaving. We had a meeting, told everyone it was important information about the Pine Wood Derby (which we did have something to tell them about it... and its the only thing they really got fired up about and would come too). They got in the room we sent the boys off to their dens to meet and i shut the door and locked it. Told them here is the deal... we have been to some of you individually and asked if you would help us out with leadership in the pack and you turned us down, now here is the deal... we have these positions to fill ( and we put a chart up on the board showing them along with what the responsibilities were) and said now if we cant fill all these positions then we are going to have to close the pack and all those boys that just walked out the room wont have a pack here anymore. Well everyone save of two in the room agreed to help with some of the positions. We even had about half of them fill out applications and pay their fees that night! Then the came in as assistants in the dens so we could let them watch how its done... then we let them run a few meetings... then slowly one by one they fell off.... came up with excuses... till we only had about two actively staying... which are the two we have doing wolves right now... husband and wife team. The rest aren't here anymore at all their son's either quit or they crossed over.

Our pack is small... we only have 15 registered boys. Four Tigers ( of them only one parent is capable of being a leader, but he runs his own business where he works at 6 days a week and he teaches bible study three nights a week in our church. So he wont committ. One of the other parents, works at night and she takes a break during the time of our meeting to come up there with him. She is just lucky she works right up the street from our meeting place and can do that. But she is usually late getting there and has to rush out the door as soon as the meeting is over. The other two tiger parents, just arent mentally capable of being a leader. I know that sounds bad but there isn't any real nice way to put it. Thats just a sample of one den in the pack. The rest are basically the same.

No it's not really up too the chartered organization. I know I know... in virtual scouting the chartered organization is in charge. But not here in the real world. Our chartered organization has not really been insturmental in our Pack for many many years. Other than giving us a place to meet they haven't really been much support to the Pack. And Committie? What Committie? We are lucky to just have leaders. The 9 years I have been associated with this pack there has never been a "committie". Now thats not to say we don't have people listed as committie members, and pay their recharter fee every year, but they don't take a real interest in the pack. We have tried the one on one approach to gaining new leaders and it hasnt worked either. Like I said we had people that were capable, but they don't want to get involved. We recruited four new den leaders two years ago and none of the four are still here. One was a supposed Eagle scout who joined with his step son and said he wanted to become a leader.... So we put him with the Wolves. He got ticked off cause we wouldnt let him do camping with just his den, so he left and took two families with him. We found out shortly after he left that he really wasnt an Eagle scout and that he had been in some trouble where he came from. (all this before they did the background checks). Two of the other leaders were husband and wife team. They came in all fired up ready to go to work, she wanted to be ACM and he was going to do Webelos. Well he was x military got here and found out you couldnt run a pack like the military and didnt want to follow all the rules so he made ups some excuse as to why he didnt have enough time to help out anymore and after 6 months quit. Then is wife, she stayed on through the year and then said her kids werent interested anymore and then she left. The other leader we recruited in that same group, he was all excited... former scout... had two sons one wolf and one tiger... wanted to be on committie and had even expressed interest in being the new CC when we rechartered last year, but after the first camping trip he went on and he found out that cub scouts only do car type camping... he left and took both his sons and they went to a Church Based youth camping group.

Our chartered organization just doesnt have anything to pump into the Pack. And I don't say a whole lot real bad about them cause its my church! but its made up of alot of older people. Of the younger ones in the church, their boys are either too old for cub scouts or too young. We only have two boys that attend the church that are members of the pack. There just isn't alot of base in the church to pull from and there isn't alot of support other than giving us a place to meet. Infact we have had to move our meetings nights once already to accomodate them last year and this year we thought we were going to have to move again because they started a new program and wanted to be able to set up for it during the time we were meeting.

No it's not up too our chartered orgainzation as to whether or not the pack remains viable. Its up to us few volunteer leaders to decide. Because if we leave the pack will die. Period We already know because we have talked to the CR and he talked to the church deacons and they don't have anyone to put into it and if we go they are going to let it go. So forget all the policy and procedures and all that BSA how its suppose to be. Im telling you how it really is. The only reason the Pack is still here now is because of that little bit of love and support it has gotten from the five active leaders it has right now. But we can't be den leaders for ever. All but two of us have stayed way past what we aggreed too when we got into Cub Scouts and the only reason we have stayed this long is because we didn't want to see the pack fold and we couldnt recruit new leaders to take our place. (not that we havent tried). But its getting old. We are getting older... Our own children have moved on and we have tried to move with them but are stuck between what we want to do and what we feel obligated to do.

Ok the future is now. As some of you may know from other posts I have made, I have always been real active as an adult in Cub Scouts, (long after my son had left the pack and moved to the troop) because my pack folded when I was a youth and I felt left behind. Also because our Pack and Troop are both chartered by the same organization and I feel that without a strong Pack you can't feed boys into the Troop and keep it strong.

Well we have come to a delima.

Our pack has been on the decline for the last three years due to many outside interests by the boys in the community. (ie.. sports, church based youth programs, school activities) Also our small town lost its only industry three years ago when the company sold off the textile plant. We have two neighboring towns who's packs seem to be thriving. Infact one of the towns just had a second pack spring up last year. We put on an excellent program in our pack. We have lots of zingers we throw in to keep the boys interested and we try to camp at least three times a year with the pack as a whole. Webelos do an extra two camping trips a year for 5 trips total. The boys we have leave the pack don't leave because they don't like it or loose interest (except for the few I have mentioned in other posts), they leave mainly because it interfers with their sports practices or games.

Well we have come to a crossroads. Our Cubmaster (my wife) has lost interest in the pack. Our son has been out for 4 years now and with a daughter in highschool now she wants to move on to other community groups to help out with. Our Bear leader (who has been doing bears for almost 8 years) her son moved to the troop 3 years ago and she is ready to get out also. Our Wolf leader is a husband wife combination team also. They have an older son who went through all 5 years of Cub Scouts but dropped out after a year of Boy Scouts. Their younger son is a Wolf this year but is wheel chair bound with MS, so he has to have one parent with him where ever he goes. Once he has finished with Cub Scouts in three more years, both of those leaders will be gone. Only reason they stay is because of him. That leaves only me. Right now I do both Webelos Dens and have done so for the last 5 years. But I too am getting burned out. Mostly because we are not getting any new leaders coming in to the pack. The parents we have either just don't care a thing about being leaders and taking on the responsibilities or (and I hate to say this but I know every Pack has them) they are just not mentally capable of being leaders. The few parents we do have that would make great leaders, are so strung out with work and other groups they do, they just won't take on the added responsibilities of leadership with scouts.

So the delima is what should we do? We hate to see the Pack fold for alot of reasons but we haven't been able to come up with any good solutions.

Here are a few ideas we have been discussing...

Slow phase out... under this plan we would not hold any round ups. After this year there would be no more Tigers in the den. After next year no more Wolves... then Bears and so on and so on till the last Scout remaining leaves which if the ones we have now stay would be in 4 years.

Move... Under this plan we would help the boys we have now move into other packs in the near by towns. This wouldn't be a real big problem because most of the ones we have in the pack now have come to us from those towns. I think only about half of the boys in our pack actually live in the town where we are chartered. Under this plan we would fold after this year.

The other plan we discussed was just to get all the parents together in a meeting, tell them at the end of the next recharter we were leaving and see what happens.

We can't find any good answers. I guess there aren't any when your talking about folding a Pack.

So lets go from here and see what advise yall can give us.

I can't say much for our district or council but I can say that our Pack has seen a real decline in the last three years. Mostly in part because it's a small community and has some really strong sports programs. Sports pulls more kids away from scouting in our community than anything thing else. We have moved meeting nights and times around to try and accomodate and help increase our numbers but it just hasn't worked. We even tried some really creative ways of doing round up and put some real zingers into our program to jazz it up in hopes of drawing some more boys back in. But it's just not working. Two years ago we had a spring round up of Tiger Cubs only and drew in the largest single group ever, 26 new Tigers! by spring of the following year only about half of those were still with the pack and now two years later, there are only 5 left. All of the rest of them dropped because scouts interfered with their baseball, or basketball or soccer or on and on and on..... Slowly over the last couple of years our round up numbers have been dropping. Last year we only got 8 new Tigers to sign up and of those we only have 4 left here at the end of the season because the other 4 got so heavily involved in sports they dropped. It is so disparing for the Pack. And as you know when you don't get new boys in you don't get new leaders in. So the ones we have are really getting burned out. Which maybe a queston for a new thread to post in the near future!

I always see something else I should have commented on when I go back and read all the other posts the second time.

My daughter who is now 16 was in Girl Scouts. She made it through Juniors and had a really great time but after Juniors she got bored. Her Girl Scout Troop only went camping maybe two times a year once to a summer camp and the other was a work weekend where they would stay outside at their Scout Hut. The rest of the time they spent, in her words "cooking, sewing and making crafts" which was not what she wanted to do. I grew up camping so when my kids came along I didn't want them left out of the experiences I had as a youth so I started them camping really early. Six months for my daughter and like 12 or 18 months for my son. (only reason he didnt start as early as she did, is because he stayed sick alot his first year.) So anyway, when my daughter got out of Juniors she had enough of Girl Scouts. We didn't and still don't have a Venture Crew really close to where we live... closest one is like 30 minutes drive from the house and it met on the same night as the Troop/Pack meetings so we couldn't get her there. So to satisfy her appetite for camping I take her with me on some of the backpacking trips with the Troop just so she can get out, but it causes some problems with the boys in the troop cause she can go faster, farther and harder than most of them! Other than that she gets along great with them and we have had no serious problems except a few crushed egos..

When she was in Girl Scouts there were about 15 in her group until they got to Juniors. Now I think there is only one or two left from her group still in Girl Scouts. Most of them got out either for the same reasons my daughter did, or because they got interested in other activities.

I always wish that when she got out I had started a Venture Crew for all those girls in her group that dropped out of Girl Scouts, but at the time I couldn't do it. I was very active in the troop, was still doing Cub Scouts and between those and the other activities outside of scouting I was doing, I just didn't have the time. But im sure she isn't the only girl that has ever been unofficially in a Boy Scout Troop, and even though she doesn't attend meetings, she can't earn any rank or become an Eagle, she has been on the journey! And one day when she has children of her own, I hope that because I included her with Boy Scouts she will send them on the journey too!

Well I didn't actually quit Cub Scouts, Cub Scouts Quit me... or rather the leaders did. I lived in a really small community when I was of Cub Scout age and there was only one pack anywhere around me. The pack was started by a few leaders in one of my friend's churches. I went through Wolves and Bears and then the pack folded up because the leaders quit. Two years later I got into a Boy Scout Troop across town at another church. I made it to Second Class and then I dropped out. Basically because the troop wasn't doing anything. Meetings were a joke, either the boys just sat there and goofed off or the leaders preached for an hour and a half on something we did wrong the week before. Plus I grew up camping. After the first two real campouts we ever did and I realized that I was doing more rugged camping on my own with friends than the scouts were doing I got disintrested. There idea of outback camping was a giant cabin tent next to the car in a farmers field not a mile from the regular meeting site!

This whole experience though has changed my life because I got back into scouting as an adult when my son joined Tigers. My son has been out of Cub Scouts now for almost 4 years and me and my wife are both still doing Cub Scouting. Mainly the reaon I am still there is because I didn't want any boy to be left behind because they didn't have a leader like I was when I was in Cub Scouts. Although I have dilligently stuck with Cub Scouts now for 9 years, I am slowly about to get out. Mostly because I am burned out. Secondly because I have to choose too many times between doing something with the Troop my son is in and being a leader and doing something with the Pack. My short time in Boys Scouts as a youth has also effected my time as an adult leader in the Troop. I push more for backcountry adventures with the troop rather than car camping experiences. Most of the boys in the troop when they first got in, hated backpacking but now because we have pushed it so much and taken them to so many places they couldn't go car camping, they now love it. My son is now 13 and a Life Scout. I hope that through my participation and pushing him to strive for the best he can be, that he will one day earn the rank of Eagle. (hopefully before the gas and girls syndrome takes effect!) But long after he has gone from the youth side of scouting, I expect to stay around. Not only because I enjoy it, but because of my experiences or lack of experiences as a youth in Scouting and my desire for no boy who wants to be in scouting being left behind.

Also about the double edged knives. Our scout shop sells a double edged rescue/dive knife it has a blunt/squared tip and two extremely sharp edges. Has a nice molded sheath that will strap nicely to your life jacket or even to your ankle which is real handy in the canoe. We don't let our boys carry them as a regluar scout knife though only for canoe or water related activities.

Something simple something small... I carry a Gerber mini Paraframe both at scouts and daily. It's light, easy to clean, stays sharp and has a clip. It fits right in the watch pocket of your jeans and the clip makes it easy to slide on your scout belt or the chest harness on your backpack.

One more thing, I know that every training you go too is different depending on the instructors. But I went to WLOT about four years ago and then a few years ago I went to OLS, In fact I was in the first class in our Council to go through the New OLS rigth after it was changed from SMF. Basically WLOT and OLS were the same. They had the same basic fundamentals of camping in each class. In WLOT we were split up into dens and had to do everything just as Webelos scouts for THREE days not one over nighter. We went in on a Friday afternoon and left Sunday afternoon. And in OLS we did the same thing only it was patrols instead of dens. The only differences between the two is the breakouts during the day. In WLOT you did activities dealing with Webelos activity pins and in OLS you did activities dealing with First Class Scout requirements. We still did campfire planning and had to come up with skits in both. We had to do our own camp site selections, tent pitching and cooking in both. WLOT and OLS are basically identical trainings in so far as they teach the same skills. Just one is more advanced than the other and is geared towards a different set of requirements for the boys.

WOW One time when I can finally totally agree with Bob! If your taking your Cubs camping to a place where you need map, compass or GPS then you have no business taking them camping no matter how much training you think you have. The most rugged our Cub campouts ever get is when the pack comes to my farm to camp and they have to use the home made porta potty/latrine!

One thing I do want to put my opinion in on is the training. One as we talked about before you do PACK FAMILY CAMPING. So that in mind you have all the dens and leaders in your pack there. SO, you have someone Baloo Trained and you should also have a Webelos leader who has taken WLOT. So all the bases should be covered as far as trained leaders being there. Second thing, I don't know about your pack families, but I only have one or two in our pack that are completely new to camping. Most of them have had camping experience before. Now true they might be lost if you took them into the backcountry, but were not doing that in the Pack! Most of them had all the camping gear they needed before they came into scouts and new how to use it. Also, it's not just about leaders kknowing how to do something, use your parents that aren't leaders as resources for camping. Sure they might not know all the BSA policies about camping, but they know how to camp and with a little instruction in the do's and dont's they can help you with some of your program and with assisting other less capable families with camping. Also it is a good idea for you as a leader to have some advanced First Aid and Safety training, but how many of us don't have parents in the pack that are EMT's or nurses? I know in our parents that normally go camping we have two nurses, one EMT and a Red Cross First Aid and CPR instructor! So know what resources you have in your own pack and use them! After all, it is Pack Family Camping and we are all the FAMILY in scouts and we have to look out for one another and help each other. Don't try to do it all on your own. When you do, you get stressed and strung out and then it will cause your pack and program to suffer.

Ok I read through about 3 of the 6 pages of replys and got tired of reading the same thing over and over so I decided to put my two cents in. The main reason that BSA policy doesn't allow Tiger, Wolf and Bear dens to do camping as a den is in my opinion the same reason it doesn't let 12 and 13 yr old Boy Scouts do High Adventure. It's not because they can't mentally or physically do it, it's because they want to keep the Boys in scouting by giving them something to look foward too as they get older and grow in scouting. Personally I don't like it because we have lost alot of Cub Scouts in the last couple of years because Tiger, Wolf and Bear dens are not suppose to camp as dens. We are a small pack less than 25 boys, in a very small community that has to compete with very popular sports programs and church sponsored boy programs such as Royal Rangers and Royal Ambasadors. In the last couple of years the majority of boys that have come into the Pack joined because they and their fathers wanted to get out and go camping. They came into scouts with a presumption that Scouts was all about camping. Our Pack only camps about three times a year, Spring Camporee, Fall Camporee and maybe one Pack Family Camp a year. Webelos get two more opritunities to camp other than these three. We would love to plan more camping but it is just not feasable because you don't get 100% participation from the Pack either from boys, leaders or parents. We have a couple of dens that every boy in the den will be there for a campout then we have other dens where no one comes. The den leaders in the dens that want to camp have on several occasions wanted to do just den camping but we have put a stop to it trying to adhere to the BSA policy. Last year alone we had one leader and three families leave the pack because of this policy. They went over to a church based group that does allow more liberal camping of younger boys and camps more frequently than our pack does. Now I know your gona say, just plan more pack family camping. But that's not really feasable in our pack. We only have two Baloo Trained people and those two happen to be me and my wife the Cub Master. None of the other leaders in the pack have ever taken the Baloo training because either they weren't interested or they didn't have the time. We did have three trained but the leader that left because we wouldn't let him do den camping was the other trained person. There is no real point to all this or any real answers. But I do want to ask this to the forum. Does anyone else see a trend in their pack of boys who do not cross over to the Troop or cross over and then drop out after a couple of months? We are seeing this trend over the last 3 or 4 years in our Pack and Troop. Majority of the ones that do drop out either do it because they get to the troop and find out they really don't like camping, or they get into that Middle School age and get overly involved in sports or other school activities and drop Scouts because they are too busy.

Our troop has two setups. First about 90% of what we do is backpacking so light weight is our first method. The only time we do any sort of car camping is at District or Council events. When we go to these, we have a giant chuck box on wheels. Basically it's a home made 8 x 10 trailer with fold out sides. One side for the scouts one side for the leaders. Each side is equiped with a set of cook ware, utinsels, stove, lantern, etc... Then in the center of the trailer we carry patrol tables and a large frame tarp. Each of the boys basically brings their own gear (same stuff they bring for backpacking) the only changes being the food they bring.

We don't allow our scouts to wear ponchos. One reason is because we do alot of multi day canoe trips and Ponchos don't mix with canoing obviously because if you turn over you can't get out of them or swim very well in them. So to keep the boys from having to buy two sets of rain gear we just tell them no ponchos period. Most of our guys use light weight packable two piece rain gear.

Finally I think most in here can agree on a couple of points. One contrary to popular beliefs, I do think that the uniform is an important part of scouting. It does put all scouts on some equal ground as far as looking alike and feeling part of a group and being accepted. We do try in our troop to enforce the uniform policies of BSA and encourage all scouts in our troop to wear full field uniforms to meetings and other special occasions. And the biggest thing I think is agreed on is that the new uniforms are not practical or durable. It kind of hit me last night at our meeting. I put on my scout pants which even though I got one size bigger than I normally wear, do not fit worth a dime! The are so uncomfortable, but I tolarate it for a couple of hours ever week because I do try to lead by example when it comes to uniforms. I think if BSA would just go back to the old styles where you can activly do things in the field uniform, we wouldn't have as much problem trying to get scouts to wear them. That is why when we are out doing an activity we allow our scouts to wear the field uniform shirt with any pants that they are comfortable wearing but don't look gaudy or too loud. Wearing that field shirt just gives us more visibility which is exactly what you need when your out in the community doing activities. None of the scouts in our troop are ashamed to wear their uniform out in public when we are doing things, although we do sometimes have a problem with one or two of the older high school age kids. Who doesn't have problems with them. But it's not that we are trying to go against any policy or make our own rules, it's just because the field uniform is not practicle for anything other than meetings, parades, ceremonies, etc... You sometimes have to come up with alternative ways to wear the uniform for visibility while still wearing clothing that is functional for the activity you are doing. No one in scouting is ever going to totally agree on everything. Everyone has their own opinions and beliefs. But one thing we should all agree on is it's not about shirts or pants or socks... it's about helping to make men of character and integrity. And when they change the scout law from 12 points to 13 and it says, ... Brave, Clean, Reverant, and in Full Uniform at all Times, then I will worry more about uniforms.

Ok excuse me for being OLD SCHOOL, there is no Class A or Class B by official policy, its OFFICIALLY called Field uniform and Activity uniform. But every troop and district in our council and even council still refers to it as Class A and Class B. And I never said that Our OFFICIAL uniform requirements are anything but BSA policy. I just said we tolarate it because 1, alot of our boys cant afford scout pants and two we have much bigger battles to fight than whether they do wear full uniforms. I never said we dont push full uniforms or dont try to get them to follow BSA Guides for uniforming. If you look at most troops ACTIVITY uniform referecnes you will see it says non logo clean jeans or shorts. So lets go back to the original question, is camo acceptable. In my opinion NO! But not because BSA policy says no and not because I think it makes BSA look like its military affiliated nor because I think someone is trying to mimic military uniforms. I don't think its acceptable because it just doesnt match or look good with the BSA Field Uniform Shirt! BUT I am not going to tell a scout he can't wear it if he want's to in a situation where we are doing activities and not at meetings or ceremonies or parades etc... If you really want to get ticked off, come to our spring camporee, all the activities are going to be held at night and probably 90% of the boys and leaders (District and Council leaders included) are going to wear camo! In fact its being encouraged!

It's not that I or anyone in my troop is trying to find ways to violate BSA policy, because we are not. Your talking to a person in a troop that makes sure that every I is dotted and T is crossed when it comes to filling out tour permits! And we are the ONLY troop in our whole council that fills out a tour permit to the letter every time we go somewhere! So don't say that im trying to find ways to violate policy just from the few comments that have been made in this forum. Look at what you just said in your last post, its not the uniform that makes the football player its the way you play the game. Scouting is no different, its not about a uniform its about everything else that scouting is about. You can't say that just because a boy or a leader doesn't wear their uniform correctly that they are not scouts! If you don't like the way we wear our uniforms then call the uniform police! I don't know of a single District Exec who is going to jump down your throat for not following uniform policy. We preach constantly in our troop UNIFORM UNIFORM UNIFORM but what are you going to do tell a boy he cant come back to scouts because he won't wear his uniform correctly? If we did that half our boys would leave! Im sorry but there are bigger battles that you should be fighting than is your uniform correct. And just because you don't wear your uniform 100% correctly doesn't mean your bad leaders or bad scouts and it doesn't mean that your always trying to find ways to violate policy. There is not a person in this forum you Bob included that has not at some point in time in your BSA history violated something in policy.

This is the reason I quit replying to forums with other scouters. True there are many lessons to learn and alot of experience to gain from others, but then there are some that want to preach BSA policy till they run it in the ground. I know what the policy is and I know why they have uniforming policies, BUT I'm sorry if everyone doesn't agree but policy doesn't work for everyone in every situation. FOR instance... Sure your suppose to wear your uniform a certain way, but here is a good example of when we don't wear it by policy but it works to our troop's advantage. Last summer we went on a 7 day backpacking trip. Now as I stated in an earlier post class A uniforms are not practicle for backpacking. On some days when we were on the trip, especially in populated areas, we had our guys wear their class A top with what ever pants they were comfortable wearing. Sure it's not regulation and it probably breaks dozens of uniforming policies but... we were visible as scouts! People commented on how nice our scouts looked... they took notice of us that we were SCOUTS! Now I'm sorry if that offends some in the scouting community, but it gets us noticed and in a positive light! If we had been wearing class B type uniforms like tee shirts or something different, chances are no one would have noticed us at all. This is not the 1800's its 2004! And I dare to say that there are very few people if any in the United States that doesn't know what the Boy Scouts of America are all about. They know we are not paramilitary and they know we arent hunters! We do not allow our scouts to wear Class A uniforms with camo unlike what was presumed in another post. We encourage them to wear only official BSA issue, but we don't condem them if they wear other style pants of the same or simmilar color. We have a few boys that just can't comfortably wear scout pants. But they have found dress slacks or other type of pants that unless you look at the buttons or tags, you wouldnt know they weren't BSA issue. BSA has many other issues that we all need to be worrying about more than whether a scout wears camo pants or not!

We too live close to a military base so military issue clothing and gear is very abundant. We also have a number of scouts who's parents are in the military. We are very lax on our enforcement of uniforming policies. For a number of reasons. First of all a scout uniform is VERY expensive. As everyone knows a full uniform with all the accessories is well over $100. I have some parents that won't let their scout wear their uniform to anything but scout meetings and special events because they are afraid they will mess it up. So we don't push the policy that strictly. Most of the time we say if you have your shirt on your good to go. Something else that discourages us from wearing full uniforms to everyting is the pants are not comfortable at all! We backpack and those pants just don't give you the full range of montion you need for some activities. We have been able to find some pants at a military surplus that are the basic 6 pocket pants like camos but are OD Green and wear a whole lot better than the BSA pants and cost about 1/4th the price. Maybe BSA should go to some of the military contractors and get better deals on clothing.