On 1/20/2024 at 9:47 PM, Ojoman said:

Does your council/district foster a positive or toxic volunteer environment? What can be done to improve it and make it more positive or take it from toxic to positive or are you happy with where it is at?

My council has sold off 3 of its 4 camps over the last decade or so.  Each time, they promised to reinvest the funds in the remaining camp(s).  I saw nothing of the sort, only investment in new hires whose sole purpose seems to be gathering videos to help fundraising efforts. 

We had some tremendous volunteers in my district who planned an amazing celebration of our Cub Scout camp many years ago (when the camp was turning 100 years old ... before it was sold off).  The idea was a council wide camporee, climbing walls, various scouting events, food trucks, fireworks, etc.  Council leadership cancelled it as it had the chance to lose money (ignoring the publicity it would have generated).  This led to a few of our key district volunteers leaving, never to return.

Our council does almost nothing for Scouts BSA outside of merit badge clinics.  They invest heavily in Cub Scouts but seem to think the program ends at 5th grade.  

Our Troop has a few members of the executive board, but it seems like they have become disillusioned with what they have been able to impact.

Personally, I hope my council is absorbed my one of our neighboring ones, which seem to be better at putting on events for Scouts BSA and investing in their camps.  

2 hours ago, Eagle1993 said:

  I could see volunteering at council/district level at that point.

Please do... district committees are vital to the health of the district. 

 

On 2/16/2025 at 3:05 PM, Eagle1993 said:

I think one issue is that too many try and recruit from unit volunteers, many if not most are parents of youth.  District/council would be best served finding younger adults (21 - 30) before they have kids or former unit volunteers (50+).  I used to be more active at the district level, but as my kids got older and their interests were varied, I ran out of volunteer hours to give ... and all of mine will be at the unit level.  That said, my kids are aging, one will be headed to college in 2026 and the other a few years later.  I could see volunteering at council/district level at that point.

The bad thing is that in some areas the paid scouters are running out the volunteers because they question what is going on. By the time they get to the 50+ years old with their kids out of the unit level stuff, they have seen enough of the districts and councils to ask "why do we do this like this?" Many times it's not a slam, just an honest question. The paid scouters get mad and see it as rebellion then they start over reacting to things. 

I ran across my councils strategic plan last night. With what I learned from it I ask the question; are toxic district and councils the product of DEI? My councils strategic plan is a decade old, about a third of it has to do with "leadership and membership reflecting all of our community" and a SOLID smidge of "we need to implement plans where 'regular units' take scoutreach units on campouts". 

My council has been on the chopping block for several years, we're shrinking year-over-year, every attempt to merge with a surrounding council is rebuked because no other council in our area will touch us with a ten foot pole. Is this strategic plan why no other council will work with us?

Forget the reflecting our community part; how does the make regular units take scoutreach units on campouts even work with YPT and GTSS? Was it that some maniac wrote this garbage or were the early 2010s a YPT wild west? 

@Prime00, 110% correct. But sometimes, just sometimes, the pros are so bad, that new Scouters with kids still in the program back away.

As to why it happens? Sometimes the pros move from one areas where stuff they are proposing/mandating/changing is successful, but in the area they move it doesn't work. One example I can give is packs having designated schools they recruit from. Great idea when you are in an area with neighborhood schools. But when you move to an area with forced bussing, not such a good idea.

47 minutes ago, Tron said:

Forget the reflecting our community part; how does the make regular units take scoutreach units on campouts even work with YPT and GTSS? Was it that some maniac wrote this garbage or were the early 2010s a YPT wild west? 

Until recently, multiple units could camp together with no issues. I think National tightened the multiple units policy because some were creating their own events like camporees and summer camp  even. As long as the YPT policies OF THE DAY (emphasis, YPT has become significantly tighter, i.e. only 21 year olds count towards YPT, parents are not allowed to camp, etc) you were fine.

 

My council is a culture of cash is king.  The professional motto is ABF - Always Be Fundraising.  Everything the council puts out on any platform are the council sponsored events.  If they are not able to monetize something (like promote a unit doing a cool outing or a unit providing good service) they do not care.  Quite actually more than 1/2 of the paid employees in the council are "Development" or "Marketing" staff.  Now you might think marketing is promoting the program, nope, it's about marketing fundraising.

Any DE, when they are hired, the description of duties in the announcement first reads leading FOS, popcorn, and camp cards.  Oh, maybe recruiting and unit growth, but that is waaaaaay down the list.

My council operates with this question: "Do we raise money to have Scouting - OR - Do we have Scouting to be able to raise money?".  They are 100% focused in the latter part of this question.

Edited February 25, 20251 yr by Jameson76

22 hours ago, Eagle94-A1 said:

Until recently, multiple units could camp together with no issues. I think National tightened the multiple units policy because some were creating their own events like camporees and summer camp  even. As long as the YPT policies OF THE DAY (emphasis, YPT has become significantly tighter, i.e. only 21 year olds count towards YPT, parents are not allowed to camp, etc) you were fine.

 

look at the controls set up under the short-term camp program. The fix is easy, but it helps cover the various troops COR.  if a scouter from Troop A has an issue dealing with a scout of another unit YP or injury, where does the liability fall > lets all COR know that it's a mixed group

22 hours ago, jcousino said:

look at the controls set up under the short-term camp program. The fix is easy, but it helps cover the various troops COR.  if a scouter from Troop A has an issue dealing with a scout of another unit YP or injury, where does the liability fall > lets all COR know that it's a mixed group

Our Council got pretty tight about that stuff. They tried to hang some of our adults out to dry for having a multiple unit campout, (just like we had been having for YEARS) without the Council permission. They went right down the YPT route and accused leaders of violating YPT policies for something that NONE of us knew existed. They even used it as part of the grounds for why they revoked a member's registration. No incidents happened, they just wanted to prove a point that they could do that. Then they started getting pushback from others and they started doing "awareness" in the Council to make sure people knew about it. How convenient they left out the fact they used that as grounds to dismiss a member. 

On 2/25/2025 at 5:23 PM, Jameson76 said:

My council is a culture of cash is king.  The professional motto is ABF - Always Be Fundraising.  Everything the council puts out on any platform are the council sponsored events.  If they are not able to monetize something (like promote a unit doing a cool outing or a unit providing good service) they do not care.  Quite actually more than 1/2 of the paid employees in the council are "Development" or "Marketing" staff.  Now you might think marketing is promoting the program, nope, it's about marketing fundraising.

Any DE, when they are hired, the description of duties in the announcement first reads leading FOS, popcorn, and camp cards.  Oh, maybe recruiting and unit growth, but that is waaaaaay down the list.

My council operates with this question: "Do we raise money to have Scouting - OR - Do we have Scouting to be able to raise money?".  They are 100% focused in the latter part of this question.

I have heard from inside sources, that 2 large factors in Scout Executive pay are fundraising results and size of staff they manage. This creates a perfect self-fulfilling prophecy. You have to hire more people to fundraise the money that you want. Then when you fundraise enough, you can hire even more people. Then those people can go fundraise even more which repeats the cycle. Unfortunately, this cycle will break down, it is just a question which link breaks first.

Do not know about staff size, but guarantee that fundraising is a factor. 

I don't know about staff size either. Based on my council the staff size is very small but the pay is high (on par for an executive in the area though). I will say that DE to CE pay gap is huge though, my understanding is that our newest DE in the council is only getting like 40k while the CE is getting 200k. 

I LOVED Scouting as a youth and always figured I'd be a hands-on parent / leader - attending Roundtables, serving on committees, staffing district events, etc. I'm happy to be a Den Leader as long as my son and his friends are having fun. If he decides to continue with Scouts, I'll support the Troop, but don't have the enthusiasm I once had.

I think the change comes down to three things:

1. Scouting is in a death loop and I can feel it. Look no further than this message board. I used to lurk here 10 years ago and it felt like there was double the amount of activity (mods, can you confirm?). As a youth, I met a lot of neat people through Scouting. I always figured I'd see those people on the trail with their own kids, but many have either moved away from my mid-size city or don't have kids in the program.
2. I'm terrified of liability and have no desire to attend overnight events with some of the poorly behaved kids in our Pack (even though most of the kids and families are great).
3. My son loves basketball. Our town has recently won state championships in basketball, baseball, and hockey. These programs are pillars of our community. It's very different than when I was a kid and we played organized sports 1x per week at the YMCA.

As for my local council, I know they have their challenges, but I've received sufficient support since re-joining as an adult. I even have a text chain with my DE. He's very responsive and makes me feel valued. I can only imagine how some of you feel when you're not getting ample support from your local professionals.

On 2/27/2025 at 9:51 AM, Prime00 said:

I have heard from inside sources, that 2 large factors in Scout Executive pay are fundraising results and size of staff they manage. This creates a perfect self-fulfilling prophecy. You have to hire more people to fundraise the money that you want. Then when you fundraise enough, you can hire even more people. Then those people can go fundraise even more which repeats the cycle. Unfortunately, this cycle will break down, it is just a question which link breaks first.

That is it 100% in our council.  Waaay less Scouts and units, waaaaay more staff.  There are districts that 40 years ago were massive, they broke those into 3 or 4 districts, overall same geography but far less scouts and 3 times the number of DE's.  The structure is like IBM of the 70's, layer upon layer.  DE reports to a senior DE who reports to a Field Director who reports to a Are Director who reports to some sort of Council Operations person who I think reports to the Deputy SE who then reports to the SE  sorry CEO.  The poor rangers at camp have like 5 professional from various levels / areas giving direction.  

Raise money and hire more people to raise money

 

4 minutes ago, Jameson76 said:

Raise money and hire more people to raise money

One of the primary reasons the organization is failing, IMO.