CNYScouter

The pack I help out with hosts an overnight at the local drive-in.

This event draws anywhere from 650-950 attendees (plus staff).

We have packs from every district in our council and packs from other 3 or 4 councils attend.

However the largest district in our council has very few packs attend.

We found out this year that packs in this district have been told that they can't attend events outside the district unless it's a council event.

This kind of stuff happens

Personally I have attended Venturing Leader training, Woodbadge, Powderhorn and have gone to Scoutng U's in other council's.

the Troop and Crew I work with attend events in other council's all the time.

At Scouting U this weekend the person promoting Okpik (Cold weather training) said that it was BSA National policy that cold weather camping is considered temperatures below 50 degrees - for all levels Cubs, Boy Scouts and Venturing.

He went on to say that Cub Scouts are not allowed to camp in cold weather.

I have to say that over the years I have heard so many variations of this

When I took Baloo many years ago the trainer said it was below 40

when I taught Baloo a few years later another trainer said was 45 degrees.

another time it was said was there is no actual temperature but to use your common sense (it was explained what is cold weather in Florida is entirely different than Maine or Alaska)

In an article from Scouting magazine (2010) it says 32 degrees.

The one district event our Troop does every year is the Klondike Derby held in Jan or Feb. at our Council’s camp.

As soon as the District calendar comes out our Troop books one of the large cabins for the weekend.

What happened last year is that around Christmas a new calendar came out and the date for the Klondike Derby had been moved.

All the cabins had been reserved for that weekend.  

I made the suggestion that with 4 patrols we could hold our own Klondike Derby.

With only a couple of weeks to put it together myself and a couple of the other adults came up with a patrol competition.

At this years planning session the PLC said that they wanted to have the troop level Klondike Derby again and I was asked to put this together.

So I am looking for ideas for events. I am from the NE and had the weather be anywhere from mid 40's and sunny to -5 with a blinding snow storm (The camp is in a snoe belt)

What unusual events have you seen at your Klondike Derby’s?

Any fire building events besides “burn the string�

What events do your scouts enjoy the most?

I am thinking a “Star Wars†theme (survival on the Ice world of Hoth from the beginning of “The Empire Strikes Back)

What I am looking at doing is a morning head to head completion between patrols – knot relay- some type of lashing and a round robin of 4 quick events after dinner.

The afternoon would be a series of activities each patrol would do at they own pace. When finished with these activities they would then do a “secret missionâ€.  

This is one event I am really stuck for an idea.

I am thinking a patrol would use a Klondike sled with a map/compass and have to hit control points.  What do we use for control points? – Last year I had each patrol get a coin from each spot to show they were there.

I still have a couple of months to get this together but want to make sure I get everything organized in time to make this a fun event for our scouts.

I just received an email from my council about a new council resource fee being added to 2017 re-charters.

This is due to the changes from the 

Did the SM know your son was doing the MB at the Merit Badge days?

I would think that this would have been part of the discussion between your son and his SM when he asked for a blue card.

In our council merit badge days/classes are highly discouraged.

There is a form you are supposed to fill out and get approved by the council advancement committee for any Merit Badge Day or for any time you are teaching more than 6 Scouts together.

Kind of off topic but you said that the SM's wife is the Troop Committee Chair?

Back in my Commissioner days, the units that had this kind of leadership (where the unit Key 3 are related), were the ones that seemed to have a lot of issues like this and as a ommissioner spent a great deal of our time dealing with them.

We have Districts in our council who have existed this way for years.

A few years back I was talking with one of the other District Commissioners in our council

the entire Key 3 and District Committee consisted of her and the DE

Recently we had 2 DE's quit.

One of our District's now only has a District Chair - nothing else

I have no idea how they function but they still exist.

My District has 25 people on the roster...and they still can't put a camporee together.

Unless your SE/Executive board decides to merge districts they will exist with whoever is willing to step up

My son has gotten involved with a Venturing Crew and started attending the Council VOA (Venturing Officer Association) meetings.

At the last meeting, one of the Advisors made a comment that they had read that a portion of FOS money collected by the council should be designated to an account to be used by the VOA.

The person who saw this cannot remember where they saw this nor can they re-find it doing an internet search.

Does anyone know of any BSA publication that states this?

The council next to ours is doing something similar to this.

They are offering a program for Scouts to attend day camp to finish up any partial Merit Badges they may have earned will attending week-long camp.

I took a class in college called "Organizational Behavior". 

One of the sections was about teams.

Back in the 60's (I think) businesses did a study (and spent millions of $$$) on team size.

They concluded that the most effective team size was 6 to 8 and this was how many people a manager could efficiently  handle

I remember thinking back then that BP figured this out 75 years earlier and for a lot less too.

The previous SM with the Troop I am associated with was just the one in the OP (before my time with the Troop)

The CC didn't complain about what was going on either.

I don't think the CO/COR knew exactly what was going on but when enough parents complained and they saw that membership had dropped drastically since the SM had taken over he was replaced.

I saw the same issue a couple of times when I was a District Commissioner. In one case there was no involvement between the unit and CO. The other the SM and COR were husband and wife and the CO had little to do with the unit.

In both cases parents had legitimate concerns on what was going on but with no help from the CO/council not much could be done from my standpoint to help.

Both of these units folded as enough parents/scouts voted with the feet and transferred to other units they didn't have enough scouts left to recharter.

I think the bigger issue is the lack of involvement and interaction between our council and the Charter Orgs.

I know the DE's in my council have no interaction with COR or CO's.

Our DE's start new units and then disappear.

The charter agreement is given to each unit and are told it is their responsibility to get it signed.

Had an issue with a VFW that holding up a charter because they wouldn't appoint a new COR when the old one quit.

Our DE refused to visit or contact the VFW and left t up to the unit to work things out with the CO.

I posted how the pack/troop/crew I work with need to find a new CO.

We got no assistance from District or Council.

Even after letting the DE know we were meeting with a new CO the only answer was to "make sure we send in the paperwork ASAP" when things got finalized.

Maybe Council's need to do a better job vetting CO's and work with them on what the Boy Scout program is about.

It seems that building a relationship and working with the CO's would grow membership and bring in more fundraising than popcorn ever will.

Troop dues are $75 per year per Scout. Payable in a lump sum or on a monthly basis ($7.50 a month for 10 months)

This pays for new equipment, registration, awards, badges, camping fees (site fees/cabin rentals) and other general Troop expenses (trailer insurance for example).

There is also a yearly fundraiser that helps to offset these and helps pay for the bus rental for summer camp.

Monthly outings, summer camp and HA trips are above and beyond this fee and are payed by the attendee.

The costs vary from anywhere from a couple of dollars into the Hundreds ($430 for summer camp this year) depending on the trip.

A basic weekend camp out runs about ~$15 per Scout for food.

Troop still uses ISA's and all these costs can be taken from the account.

I have lost track on how many fundraisers that have been done this year alone (over a dozen so far)

We are seeing the same thing as meyerc13 at the Troop level.

We see most WEBELOS crossover but about 50% drop after 1 or 2 meeting.

I think one big issue is camping. The Troop starts inviting WEBELOS to camping trips when they first become WEBELOS.

Very few sign up to join us. (and we have trained Den Chiefs working with them)

It seems every year most of the WEBELOS wait until the last minute to do the "outdoor activity with a Boy Scout Troop".

And every year at least half are "sick" and don't show up.

I can't put 100% blame on the Den Leader, the parents are the ones who won't usually come camping with their Cubs.

Most of the ones that do make AOL and cross into the Troop stay.

The ones that don't make AOL are invited to start coming to Troop meeting and work on finishing AOL.

Only one in the last few years has ever finished and stayed with the Troop.

What is happening is the COR from the old defunct church (and CO) is now part of the merged church and has been signing apps.

Up until yesterday I haven't been involved too much with finding a new CO.

From what I have found out everyone is acting like the merged church is the CO.

So far no one I have talked with know if the council is even aware for this situation.

The Pack and Crew don't have much in the way of assets or a large bank accounts so it's not such a big deal for them to move to new CO.

The Troop has a great deal of assets.

With a Troop of 40+ Scouts there is over $15k just for summer camp fees alone so there quite a bit of money in the bank account

Even with after paying this off there is still a pretty large sum left as the Troop just had their yearly big fundraiser.

With all the tents, stoves, troop trailer and other equipment it becomes quite a bit to deal with.

The Troop leadership is "pretty sure" the merged church will turn over the assets and seems to be taking this pretty causally.

People can get crazy when dealing these amounts.

It was financial reasons they merged the church's and sold the building - they were not bankrupt but just could no longer afford the building and its upkeep.

I just got a email from one of the Troop Committee members

The new church that bought our old CO's building gave our units 3 weeks to get all of our equipment out of the building or it's going in the dumpster.

This new church has been dragging their feet about units meeting there for months.

So much for community relations

When the charter was renewed back in Feb. our CO was still in existence but moving towards the merger.

The building was also for sale but but no interested party until about a month later.

I am not sure how the merger between the churches and the Scouts units effect each other

I know the merged church still supports the units as much as they can as one of our scouts had to move his Eagle banquet there because the church in the new building won't let him hold it.

As I was just asked to get involved I don't know if anyone has talked with the old (merged) CO or not

Our DE is pretty clueless. She is a very attractive recent college grad with no Scouting background.

I have heard she is very good at fundraising (and daddy was a golfing buddy of our old SE)

The only thing I really see her do is forward messages from someone else about stuff happening n our council (usually 3 or 4 days after everyone else in the council sees it)

I thought I would start a new topic than to lump all of these questions together

I know that a CO owns the unit number, equipment and money in a units bank account.

Our CO, a church, merged with another church and the non-profit entity that was our Co was dissolved.

I don't think any discussion was done in this merger about the Scout units the old church chartered

The new merged church is too far away for us to keep as a CO. I don't think it is even in the same district.

What would need to be done to switch a unit to a new CO?

In my other thread I outlined how the Pack, Troop and Crew I am associated with need to find a new CO.

I have been asked to attend a meeting next week with a church that maybe interested in being the CO or these units

What questions would you ask at this meeting?

The private schools were the first place that we asked.

The issue with them is that because they don't have the restrictions of the public schools every outside group has gone to them and they just don't have any open nights for us to meet.

The public schools charge to meet there. They even charge the PTA/PTG if they want an open house at the school.

Same with all the community centers - they all charge a fee to use their facilities.

There is a church less than a quarter mile down the road whose troop folded less than a year ago. They have been very wishy-washy about us moving there - first they said no, they then contacted us saying  we could meet there but we had to switch meeting nights - then it was OK to meet on the night we wanted - they now came back with they are not sure.

We have a couple of other churches who said that were interested in being a CO - but had to check with their board first - this was 3 or 4 months ago and still haven't decided yet.

One of the things that the old CO did was for a community outreach they allowed Scouts (Boy and Girl Scouts both) along with many other non-profit group (like a square dance) group meet there for free or little change. The new church doesn't seem to want to let outside groups in.

I am pretty sure we will find a place it's just finding the right one or ones

These units are in a pretty urban area where the towns all border each other.

Between the town where the current meeting location is there is one other town to the south and then the city of Syracuse, NY.

This is where the majority of our youth are recruited from.

We are the only Troop left in these northern suburbs (and I don't think there is a Troop left on the north end of the city either).
Back in the 60's, 70's and 80's there were well over a dozen Troops in this area.

One of the big issues is none of the organizations have a place big enough for the troop to meet (40+ Scouts plus adult leaders and parents).

Meeting in a park is great for the summer but it's tough when it gets below zero in the winter to meet outside.

The Troop and the Crew are also in kind of a limbo as the CO on the charter has been dissolved and no longer exists.

From further email exchanges it sounds like the unit leadership thinks it can just take everything and just switch CO's.

I just was asked to get involved with this and was asked to attend a meeting next week with a possible new CO.

I am involved with a Pack, a Troop and a Crew that all meet at a church in the center of town and have the same unit number and there are are few of us registered between multiple units.

The Pack is charted by the VFW and only does Pack meets at the VFW

The Troop is co-chartered by the VFW and the church

The Crew is chartered only by the church

This church has charter the Troop for close to 75 years and even though the Pack is not chartered by them they have been holding dens meeting there almost as long. The crew is about 3 years old.

These are currently the only Scout units left in this village.

Early this year this church merged with another church and sold the building where we meet.

We are welcome to meet at the merged church but it is a long ways away (15-20 mins.) and not in the same town.

The church that bought the building doesn't seem interested in charting units.

They have told the Pack and Crew they can no longer meet there and the Troop is on a week to week basis.

The VFW is willing to charter not is really big enough for the Troop to meet at. They also run a bar down stairs and the smell from smoking is pretty bad. The VFW also bump the Scouts anytime they rent out the hall (which is quite a bit)

We have a couple of places that would take all 3 units as a CO but they are outside the village and have other units near by or we have places willing to be a CO for one of the units in the town we currently meet in

Would stay in the village/town you meet in and split up the CO's or move to just outside the town and go with one CO?

Not only should the Scout take the Den Chief training but the Den Leader of the Den the Scout is working with take the training also.

A Cubmaster might want to take it too.

I have seen many times where a Cubmaster asks for Den Chefs and the Den leader has no idea what a Den Chef is there for or how to use them to enhance their Den program

There is a process to allow "Special" need adults to be registered as a "youth" member.

You should talk with your DE about getting this person registered as a "youth" member

In our district there is a Venturing Crew made up of "Special" need adults.

Some are pretty functional as I had the opportunity to work with on of them on Geocaching MB.

He was an Eagle Scout and was working on palms.

I don't know his age but if I had to guess I would put him in his late 20's.

That's because the half of us that do walk on water, know we won't the minute we start thinking about it .... blub ... blub ... gurgle...

People who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.

-Isaac Asimov

"My son also asked if he could schedule time with the beneficiary to go through the book to request their approval and signature, but the SM said that he should not do that."

Why is this up to the SM?

When my son made Eagle he went to the beneficiary and got their signature that he had finished the project and they approved.

The SM wasn't involved (and shouldn't be).

There is no reason why the SM (or any other Troop leaders) need to be present to get this signed

"The SM told my son though that the dates on the Eagle application had to come from Council and that he can't just put them in himself. The SM insists that he has to obtain the dates from Council and that he will do that."

Why is the SM doing this and not leaving it to the Scout?

I (with my son) can go to the council's Registrar and request his records. (tell them you are filling out his Eagle app).

In our council it is suggested that any Scout getting close to Eagle do this to verify that his records (and dates) are correct

They will either print them on the spot or email a copy.

My council, Longhouse in CNY, has had the Lion program for 8 or 9 years.

About 50% of the Packs use this program. It seems the stronger (and bigger) packs are the ones successfully using Lions

Lions was a LFL program that was brought in the BSA.

One of our DE's at the time was one of the people to try and bring this program into the BSA.

From what I can tell retention/burnout is no greater/less with Lions as it is with not.

Packs that use Lions have said that they seem to have more parental involvement latter on with Lions parents.

They attribute this to parents being slowly introduced to the Cub program.

For most of the Packs I know the Lions meet a couple of times a month and come to Pack Meetings and are invited to Pack outings.

The Pack I am involved with has 2 Venturing youth running the Lion meetings.

These 2 young ladies do a very good job and the Lions really like them.