walk in the woods

It's not questionable, it's a clear violation of standards. https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2018/10/23/can-packs-troops-teams-or-crews-participate-in-political-rallies/

Crass politicians using children to pander to their voter base?

Where I grew up in Western Illinois mail is still delivered to RR1. Everyone one the route has a FPD number based on the county grid.

Sure it's possible. If the area is that remote the person delivering the mail knows the recipient.

Story from CNN on the 2/1 Scouts BSA launch at https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/01/us/boy-scouts-girls-trnd/index.html. Nothing particularly exciting about the story, but, there was this from the article that I hadn't seen elsewhere:

I suspect this is the canary in the coal mine. More and more organizations will refuse business with the BSA due to the bankruptcy threat hanging over the BSA and the potential taint of being associated with the BSA when the inevitable ”BSA Avoiding Payment to Abuse Survivors" start running.

And now there are reports that Philips and others attempted to disrupt a Catholic Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/nathan-phillips-rally-attempted-to-disrupt-mass-at-dcs-national-shrine-91038

My default answer is maybe.....Here's what I believe the requirement states (from https://oa-bsa.org/about/membership): Have experienced 15 nights of camping while registered with a troop, crew, or ship within the two years immediately prior to the election. The 15 nights must include one, but no more than one, long-term camp consisting of at least five consecutive nights of overnight camping, approved and under the auspices and standards of the Boy Scouts of America. Only five nights of the long-term camp may be credited toward the 15-night camping requirement; the balance of the camping (10 nights) must be overnight, weekend, or other short-term camps of, at most, three nights each. Ship nights may be counted as camping for Sea Scouts. Now, beyond the fact the final clause could be interpreted to mean any camping is acceptable for the 10 nights, (it specifically doesn't say BSA), the Cub family camp is clearly BSA. My decision point would be this, if they were along to help with the camp out, putting on an event, cooking, even participating/being an example to the Cubs, I'd be inclined to say yes they count. If they were drug along by mom and/or dad and spent the weekend playing on their phones, I'd say no.

The BSA might consider the turmoil of the Mic-O-Say spin off Tribe of the Silver Tomahawk. There's a semi-official history at http://usscouts.org/honorsociety/silvertom.asp. This was the lodge of my youth. It's been almost 15 years since the last split. My understanding is feelings are still strong. The BSA might be surprised to discover where actual loyalties lie if they take on Mic-O-Say.

Could be. I've worked in a number of places outside Scouting that had formal mentorship programs. For me that's a fairly clear outside counterpart to Commissioner Service. The way Commissioner service is defined today (JTE police, FOS, recharter), it's no wonder it's hard to find UCs. If the role was more program focused I suspect it might be easier. I'm curious who you see doing these things? In my mind these are exactly the types of things the Commissioner Corps should be staffing. @ParkMan, my apologies for the thread derail.

So what do you suggest?

@ParkMan, my apologies in the delay in getting back to this thread. I agree that the district could and should be active in the community in a way that's helpful to the units in the district. If I knew the answer to how I'd be rich! I do like @Eagledad's idea of Scouting for Food. I think a district could provide a nice service (handling the logistics of drop-offs, coordinating press releases, etc.), but, that only works if the units have bought into the idea and trust the district to perform. This I think is the crux of the problem. The relationship between districts and units is broken. I think a solid commissioner corps could be the source of the fix, but, the UCs need to show up to help at service projects, work the serving line at Blue and Golds, etc. Something beyond FOS, JTE, and recharter in order to build relationships with the unit leadership and families. More importantly they have to meet units where they are and not try to fix everything they think is broken. Nudge more than direct. I think we might miss opportunities here. Does a district need a membership committee, or, does it need a membership chair that builds relationships with the various unit committee membership chairs? Same for Advancement, Activities, Camping, etc. I wonder if it wouldn't be more fruitful in the end than building a district committee of people who are disconnected at some level. Plus I think it builds a bench for the district committee chairpersonships and perhaps would help strengthen some unit committees. This runs a bit counter to my earlier comment about not engaging active members of the committee but I'm reserving the right to rethink my original post. It's a tough row to hoe no doubt. I think there are process things that need to change as well. Meetings like Roundtable and District Committee Meetings that consist of announcements and status reports are horrible. They need to be remade or allowed to die. If we're going to hold meetings they need to educate or solve problems. I also think we need to make video/audio conferencing an option. Not as good as face-to-face but it needs to be an option in 2019. Well, that was a rambling non-answer answer. In the end I think a successful district comes down to successful relationships. Those have to be built first.

This is my thought as well. The COR is about the only adult allowed to hold two positions in a single unit and ultimately responsible for approving adult leaders.

"Under Control" is the key word and tricky phrase. I've had HBP my entire adult life. I take my meds, my doc is happy with the numbers, I tell him what I'm doing, he signs the physical. End of story.

I'd start by calling all the Unit Key 3s to try to set up a cup of coffee with them, individual units, (like is supposed to happen with every unit at recharter time). There's only a couple of questions for each person, "what can the district do to help your program?" and "where is the district doing more harm than good?" Then sit back and listen. Take FOS and Council Fundraisers and National dues, etc. completely off the table for this conversation. Don't defend any existing programs or policies or activities. Just listen. Once I'd talked to most of the units I'd summarize my notes for big picture themes and send them back out to the units, "here's what I'm hearing, could you send a representative to the next roundtable to discuss?" Be honest about what the district can and can't change, solicit input on the former. Bring ideas for new activities to see if there's interest, etc. Ask if they might be aware of anyone who would make a good commissioner. Recruit a commissioner core so you can continue the conversation with the units. Now, the hard part is teaching your commissioners they aren't some Sage Scouting Expert with all the answers, but just a person who really wants to help. Commissioners should never talk about FOS or Popcorn or such, at least not for the units they serve directly. They should very regularly be asking how can I help and where should I get out of the way? They absolutely, positively should not be members of the unit direct contact leadership (maybe even not committee members of the MCs are very active in their units). Then tell the Council to stick to their spreadsheets and to quit going around your Commissioners. I guess what I'm saying is it's not the district's job to grow scouting, that belongs to the Unit. It's the district's job to help units grow scouting by creating a conducive environment. Too often districts (and councils and national) get it upside down.

Don't be a hater :)!

Thanks 'Skip. The bit I bolded is what I was most curious about.

@Cambridgeskip I'm curious how the UK model works in rural regions.

Northern Illinois and no I didn't take them winter camping (we did some winter hikes though). We practiced the camp stuff in the fire department bays.

I recently had the opportunity to discuss OA Troop Rep position with a number of Scoutmasters. "Better things to do with their time" was a recurring theme in the discussion about sash and dash. Many of the units in my council do not attend our council summer camp so they have no connection to the service given the camp. I was surprised when I came back to scouting as an adult at what the Ordeal had become. First it was being done multiple times a year instead of just at summer camp (don't want the scouts missing MB class). Second, the Ordeal on the work weekends wrapped up mid afternoon instead of that evening so the scouts could gave social time. The ceremonies are much better in the dark and the early wrap just gave adults the opportunity to grab their scouts and bolt Saturday after supper. And don't get me started on how few members attended or joined the work parties.

Agreed. The Circle 10 letter, in successive bullets, says they pay fees to National, then all money stays local. It can't be both. My council issued substantially the same statement. Nobody cares about the legal structure, BSA is BSA. Going to be an interesting FOS season.

WaPo article criticising BSA on the last G

I think you are missing a wonderful opportunity. Rather than sanitizing all Grace's why not let your Scouts offer their own prayers, in their own ways, then use the opportunity to discuss differences and similarities? We do the scouts a disservice by using vanilla prayers in an attempt not to offend rather than allowing scouts to express themselves and teach actual diversity.

The 136k number was before the LDS departure from Venturing and likely also includes Exploring. The 2015 Annual report had Venturing/Sea Scouts at 142892, 2016 Report at 119626, the 2017 Report (post-LDS departure) at 87827 (https://scoutingwire.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/2017-Annual-Report-Combined-FINAL-App-Version.pdf). .

Again, I say maybe. Girls from Crews as camp staff is different that girls from Troops as participants.