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My suggestions would be: Just like other businesses (restaurant chains, retail operations? close down (merge) underperforming councils. No discussion just do it. As much as it pains close/sell camps who have so much outstanding maintenance that cannot be supported by the council they are affiliated with. or their capacity is less than x% (each camp is probably different) Downsize and Reorganize councils by function vs districts. Districts are historically under staffed with holes in areas that should be under one person Customer service is poor...fix it...waiting weeks for answers is unsatisfactory and make the volunteers thing they don't care so they ignore the councils/districts I count 3 councils who have more scouts in April than they did in December. I would propose - but no one cares what I think - to reorg by function: Finance, Budget, fundraising Operations, Membership, registrar, advancement, eagle process, clearances, data analysis Unit Support, Commissioners, training Facilities, camps Camping, outdoor programs, summer camps, camporees,etc Anyway as I said no one would even try but the "traditional org" is not working.

I dont think we can cut enough salary bloat to save the camps; save some maybe, but there is going to be winners and losers.

s; service to the units. If this metric is not met, the funds raised are not being used, or used improperly. I would be happy to go toe-to-toe with any council executive. Correct. This is correct. The fundraising is supposed to go towards funding program and training; however, so much is being spent to just subsidize professional salaries. We absolutely have the technology to eliminate councils. We have to do a 360 analysis and realize that we could easily get rid of 100 or more councils.

Your council has the secret sauce, you should share with everyone and save the camps.

Lose the bloated jobs... save the camps.

We have the technology to eliminate most of what paid professionals at councils do now. And, I have been thinking about this a lot lately... what SHOULD council do for units, other than provide program opportunities that units cannot get (easily) on their own? Shooting sports (SORRY!! Range and Target Activities), higher level aquatics (sailing , kayaking, canoeing, rowing, lifesaving), and climbing.... You do not need swimming pools. (Although they are helpful.) But you do need a safe swimming hole You do not need dining halls. (I would submit these are actually detrimental to the skills needed for outdoorsmanship and campcraft .) Scouts should be cooking for themselves. You do not need hot showers. (Although they are nice.) Scouts should learn field hygiene and sanitation. You do not need flush toilets. (Although they are nice, too.) See above. I would admit that, due to the number of people you'd like to access your camp, that pit toilets would be a most helpful concession. And local laws may be prohibitive in many places... Heck, you do not even need running water. (But you do need a potable water source, which could include bringing your own.) You need a patch of decent ground or woods. Imagine how easy and cost effective this would be if we did not have all that infrastructure. A local council should have a good sized camp to provide access to the outdoors. It really isn't that difficult to live under canvas for a week. When BP said "A week of camp life is worth six months of theoretical teaching in the meeting room" he was not talking about the monster of summer camp merit badge mills we have created across the country.

That is a critical issue that affects retention. There is too much spiraling and repetition in program elements, and the revamp to make it easier for adult volunteers to run multi rank meetings only made it worse. The program also repeats some of the K-5 school curriculum.

Some good suggestions @PACAN. I would add a change to the mission of the Councils and Districts to solely be "support the units". Nothing else matters. All metrics used to assess performance of Councils, Districts and their staff should be based only on their support of the units.

One of the reasons why they dropped Webelos from 5th grade to 4th & 5th grade circa 1989. Webelos was meant to be a transition, doing things more ont he order of Boy Scouts, and prepping them. When Webelos DLs no longer got separate training with an emphasis on transitioning from Cubs to Scouts, a lot was lost. Folks were not doing the 18-24 month Webelos properly, and it became a continuation of Cubs. And now that is the norm

Corporations with Strategic plan big ideas but no execution other than (tell units membership is down - go recruit! 🙃) will continue to slide into obvilion. 56 councils with conditional charters is 25% of the total numbers - some of these probably won't meet the metrics 22% of the latest total membership is in 10 councils -membership more than 10000 18% of councils have less than 1000 youth and 9 of those less than 500. camps at 30% capacity even having only 3 weeks of scout camp - kids want a entire summer job so they don't apply or come back. Councils are individual competing feifdoms and there is no incentive to merge. Yet the basic management model hasn't changed. I hope for the best and not just more of circling the wagons and shooting inwards. JMHO.

Councils with failed camps often have such a history. Poor stewardship, poor management, and no strategic, mission related oversight by anyone who should care (but doesn't), like National. Land assets in scouting are generally viewed through a lens that favors larceny over legacy.

Even moneymaker camps will get sold. We had a local Scout camp on the border of 2 additional councils. So folks from 3 councils used it. Heck one of those councils even held district events there because of proximity. Additionally it was about 15 minutes off the interstate, so units travelling would use it too. The small primitive camp made enough money to support itself, and subsidize some of the costs of the main camp. Someone decided to move as much infrastructure as possible to the main camp, sell it, and use the money to improve the main camp. Yeah, the main camp is still poorly run and only has 4 weeks of camp.

I fear the mistakes were in the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, etc. All those leaders are long gone. For example, most companies in the mid-1990s started having email retention policies because a huge store of emails and electronic documents virtually guarantees having something that can be twisted to be incriminating during litigation discovery. Even if you are the best and most altruistic corporation, a huge store of outdated, obsolete documents is just not a good practice. There should have been a retention period ... not to hide bad practices ... but to protect against dangerous litigation.

You do realize you don't need to be a Lone Scout to work on requirements outside of Den Meetings? Do the requirements, have your son talk to his Den Leader about them and get them signed off.