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I for one have never understood the motivation for personal attacks in a forum such as this, Man of Steele, and I am sorry that you have been subjected to that. Please continue to provide us with your valuable point of view, knowledge, and experience. Enjoy your vacation.

Responding further to one of the points in an earlier post.... OA is one of those things within scouting where the age cutoff for youth versus adult is different. For OA purposes, a person is considered a youth until age 21. Thus a person who is registered as an assistant scout master, male or female, between the ages of 18 and 21 would be subject to the same election criteria and procedures as youth under 18. Persons over 21 can be selected by the committee of the unit. However that unit must elect at least one youth during the election cylce. Thus those units such as cub scout packs cannot nominate adults because they can never elect a youth. I have never personally seen a person between 18 and 21 appear on a ballot of which I was aware. However the rules do contemplate this possibility. To repeat a point made earlier, to the best of my knowledge there is nothing to prevent a Venture Crew from holding an election, but the eligibility rules effectively limit the possible candidates to those who were a boy scout long enough to earn the rank of First Class, in addition to meeting the other criteria.

Venture crews may hold elections for OA. However, the eligibility criteria are the same as for boy scouts. Under these criteria, female youth members of Venture Crews are not eligible because one of the criteria is holding the rank of First Class Scout. Since this rank does not exist in the Venture program, female youth members cannot be elected. This is an inequity but it is a fact. I would hope that OA national would take a serious look at the ranks in the Venture program and establish a rank requirement based on the Venture program. Male youth members also would be affected by this rule if they never were in a scout troop.

Littlebillie is right on. I thought of this after my prior post when I was away from my computer. Polytheism per se cannot be an objection to the BSA not having a religious award for Wiccan. Nor can it be held to contradict the scout oath and law.

I was on an eagle board that turned a scout down because of the procedural aspects of the way the project was handled. This board had not problem with the project, just the way it was handled. I voted to approve this scout's eagle. In your situation, I don't think you would be out of line to call the DAC directly and find out more about his alleged approval, including the date of the telephone conversation if possible. If a scout or his parents are intent on abusing the system, it is hard to deal with. A lot of hurt feelings will result and you are already there. I think that one of your concerns being the integrity of the program is absolutely proper, regardless of what happens in this case. One troop I was in initiated an informal procedure where a life scout would present his idea for his project to a friendly group of disinterested adults (ASMs and the like). This avoided fiascos such as you describe and resulted in better planned and executed projects. All the scouts who did this found it very helpful and were genuinely appreciative. Often the projects were reduced in scope to something that was more doable. Of course this is a little late for your situation.

Hey, if the supreme court can ignore the plain meaning of the 14th amendment, we can ignore the use of the singular in the scout oath and law.

Many units (not our troop) maintain accounts for their youth members of funds earned through fund raising activities. These funds can be applied to any purpose prescribed by the committee. This does not entail separate checking accounts. The funds are typically co mingled with other unit funds. It is just a set of sub accounts tracking earnings and withdrawals. The idea of having boys write a "check" on the account as part of education in the use of monies is an interesting concept. Mainly this is a lot of extra work for the treasurer of the unit. Personally I think it is a good idea. There are other issues that arise as well.

This is an unfortunate, but not surprising turn of events. The scouts in San Diego went through a similar round, although their legal footing was probably better. The City of Berserkly...oops...Berkeley successfully reneged on a decades old contract where the scouts provided construction material for the city's breakwater at no cost for a promise of perpetual free access to the marina created thereby. We will see more of this sort of thing around the country.

Thank you neicie for your input. In earlier discussions in this forum about Spiral Scouts the consensus was that BSA could not prevent the use of the word "scouts". I personally was not aware that the word "scouting" was controlled by BSA, although that is plausible. While I personally agree with BSA's policies, I wish your organization luck.

Naprosyn for arthritis.

D Steele is the best one to answer in detail. Essentially they have to represent a bona fide organization (legal entity) that can enter into a contractual relationship with the BSA council. Councils are actually non profit corporations that can enter into contractual relationships. I don't know what all the criteria are that the council considers in deciding whether to enter into a charter agreement with any particular organization. I could guess, but I will let D Steele pick up on this.

What part of now do you not understand? Sorry for the sarcasm. Do not delay further.

All of the above is sound advice. Let these other parties take the responsibility off of your back. All you are reporting is a suspicion and that is the way it should be characterized. Given your special responsibilities as a peace officer I would suggest keeping a diary of your conversations to document what steps you take, should that ever become an issue. Put the responsibility where it belongs.

Sounds reasonable to me. The only other thing that I might suggest is talking to another parent in whom you have confidence and who is close to what goes on to see what confirmation you can get about what takes place at the meetings.

In 1995 on the trail at Philmont two members of our group ran into trouble. One with altitude sickness and the other with a pulled muscle. We had a long way to go, several hundred feet yet to ascend, and were carrying four days worth of food. We had no choice but to off loadas much as we could from the two injured trekkers. One obnoxious kid, who had been criticizing my own son for going to slow, absolutely refused to carry anything more. What this other kid did not know was that my son was still recovering from a sprained ankle. Well everybody but the obnoxious kid took more weight. My son at the time probably weighed no more than 80 lbs soaking wet, ended up cheerfully carrying close to his own weight, and set the pace up the rest of the ascent. I didn't think he had it in him, but he sure taught me something that day.

Scouts still help out in disasters and always will. In widespread disasters such as major earthquakes or large tornados or hurricanes the normal emergency services are simply overwhelmed. What about the incident a few years ago of a Philmont crew traveling by train when the train derailed? That crew was the first response team and did themselves and scouting proud.

Judges on the Supreme Court in California are appointed and subject to periodic retention elections under what is sometimes called the "Missouri ballot." The idea is that voters have a chance to periodically vote to remove a sitting judge on a non partisan ballot. This is how we got rid of Rose Bird from the California Supreme Court in the late 80's. It is called a "Missouri ballot" because this idea of a retention election originated in Missouri when the state constitution was re-written in the middle of the last century. I have lived in California for several years now and am embarrased to say that I really don't recall right now if we elect judges below the Supreme Court or if they are appointed. Be that as it may, litigants have always had a general right to challenge any judge, but this right is exercised rarely and only for very good cause. Disclosure of interests by judges is an important part of this process. There is a joke about a judge starting a trial with an announcement, "Before we begin I have to announce that the plaintiff's attorney gave me a $2,000 bribe to favor his client. The defendant's attorney gave me a $3,000 bribe to favor her client. To maintain fairness, I am hereby returning $1,000 to the defendant's attorney."

D Steele, Apologies for what was a cheap shot at council offices in my last post. Problem is, that on many issues I can get more answers from our council office than there are people there to supply answers.

Where accident insurance is available through councils locally the coverages I have seen offered are also "no fault" coverage. That is to say, if there is an accident, the coverage applies regardless of who, if anybody, is responsible. The coverage is also secondary to any medical coverage carried by individuals. The coverages I have seen offered deal only with medical expenses and sometimes fixed amounts of additional indemnity for specific losses. Economic losses such as inability to earn an income are not covered. The coverages I have seen specifically apply only to registered adult and youth members. All these still leaves open the question of coverage availability for non members. If you have access to supplemental accident coverage locally and this is an issue for you, contact either the underwriting insurance company of some (knowledgeable) person at the council office.

Learn something new every day. Including non-member guests in the head count on the tour permit is a good idea. While we are on the subject... In other threads in the past, most posters seem to come down on the side of "there is no such thing as family camping" in BSA. I never was satisfied with that. Man of Steele, since this was before your active participation in this forum, perhaps you can shed some more light on this. What do we mean by family camping? What does BSA policy have to say about this?

Where is Jayson Blair when you need him?

My understanding is the same as BW's. Thus parents who are not registered volunteers and siblings who, by virtue of age or gender, are not eligible to join, would not be covered.

If your question is, are such non members covered by the liability insurance carried by the council, my guess is that they are not.

Thank you for clearing that up. You will notice that I supplied a question mark in my subject title.

If the following story off of Reuters is accurate, state judges in California will have to disclose their affiliation with BSA is asked to do so. Presumably this may become a basis for disqualification or recusal in some kinds of cases. This could cut both ways. Judges who may be affiliated with gay support groups could be compelled to disclose that information as well. One wonders if this would go so far as requiring judges to to disclose their sexual orientation. ____________________ June 19 SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California judges may have to disqualify themselves from certain cases if they are involved with the Boy Scouts of America, according to new rules approved by the state's Supreme Court. Lynn Holton, a spokeswoman for the state Supreme Court, said on Thursday that several California judges are leaders or members of the Boy Scouts, a group that has come under legal fire from gay groups because it bars "avowed homosexuals" from membership. According to the new rules approved on Wednesday for state judges, "A judge should disclose to the parties his or her membership in an organization, in any proceeding in which the judge believes the parties or their lawyers might consider this information relevant to the question of disqualification, even if the judge concludes there is no actual basis for disqualification." The Supreme Court did not, however, limit judges from being associated with the youth group, which has about 3.3 million youth members and 1.2 million adult leaders. More than 110 million Americans have joined the Boy Scouts since the organization was founded in 1910. "We're pleased that the Supreme Court rejected a proposal to bar judges from membership in the Boy Scouts," said Gregg Shields, national spokesman for the BSA based in Irving, Texas. "The proposal which they declined to adopt would have unconstitutionally interfered with First Amendment association rights." The Scouts' approach to homosexuality has long fueled controversy. In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Boy Scouts had the right to exclude homosexuals.