hsscouts

I know what you mean about the negative balances and borrowing from them as well, I totally can see the same thing. I think everyone just figured it was them who should pay since they chose that fundraiser over a cheaper one we could have done. Good to know that's wrong I was told last night my son is the one with the negative account of 58.00. I was upset I had no idea he was negative this was the first I was hearing about it. She told me 10.00 of it was for advancement from crossover in March however my son had 60.00 in his account a few weeks before summer camp in May or June, so we were under the impression because again she never told us there were outstanding charges to his account that he had 60.00 to use for camp so we depleted it for that purpose, now she says we still owe for march. Not cool if you ask me personally, the other negatives are for similar reasons. A breakdown roughly of his account was this: 10.00 for scout rank, 1 merit badge and a trailer repair. 25.00 for merit badges and tenderfoot rank. 28.00 for summer camp unexpected expenses. I haven't had time to ask my hubby how much the trailer repair was because I know scout rank was no more than 3.00 total and the MB is 2.50 and she said all 8 boys split the cost of the repair, so 4.50 times 8 is 36.00 for that repair, I never heard about it so I wonder what it was for exactly. Interesting how this stuff is working in my troop isn't it, it's sure so confusing to me and honestly I didn't think we should have been put in the negative for the 10.00 charge because we thought it had already come out of the 60.00 and were not informed of anything different but I also don't want to anger anyone.

It does sound crazy doesn't it I was talking to people and getting confused myself, I thought our account was negative the general fund that is, this is what I was being told, then I was hearing this weekend there was only 60.00 available, then my husband looked into the bank account at the bank and there is a balance of 580.00 with nothing pending, then we looked at the escrow and there is about 600.00 in there but our flag is pending so there is an actual balance of 400.00 there I think, there may be one other pending on that one but it would be only 200 leaving at least 200.00 there. This was one reason people were talking about having one account instead of 2, on paper that is. Our last treasurers report was this: boy 1 - -27.00 boy 2 - -58.00 boy 3 - 0.00 boy 4 - 50.00 boy 5 - 50.00 boy 6 - 50.00 boy 7 - -25.00 boy 8 - 0.00 Troop fund - 60.00 out: -360.00 - pizza cards -25.00 - patrol patches That's it that's how she explained it in that detail, she said the negatives were from expenses and awards, she keeps saying this at every meeting that we are borrowing from accounts to pay certain things, however the boys should have paid in my opinion for thier own pizza cards it whould have been split between them evenly. But she they say we are borrowing every month, but I don't see anything going out really, advancements and this fundraiser is all that has gone out, the reports are so generalized we don't know what's going on. She has super detailed records in her book and will gladly show us if we ask but we are only seeing our kids stuff not the whole shebang. I know it's hard to convey what is going on it's hard for me to form my thoughts to make sense sometimes, it's confusing to me too on top of it all. but see how the numbers don't match, the bank says 580.00 and her report says 210.00 positive? But when my husband questions the difference she says there are things out that haven't come in that we aren't looking at, well my thing is it's been 3 months since a check has come into that account, what is still pending 3 months later? I would as a treasurer be questioning that check being lost. it's only good for 90 days I think or maybe it's 12 months, it doesn't matter it still doesn't make sense. Then there is the escrow balance that she says is 0.00 but has at least 200.00 in it. There are issues I can see that (especially now that I write it out) I really need to see if I can find a sample treasurers report on the net so she can see how to tell us more at the meetings, it seems we just are not seeing the whole picture any of us that is. I know everyone here is just trying to offer good advice it is just frustrating to hear over and over again that there is an issue and things are horrible etc. ok I know somethings not right that's why I came here let's move on to just giving good advice and stop telling me I should stay out of it I am just gathering info on my own to have a good idea what to say at the next meeting.

yes so we can sell popcorn, they have to say our budget is ok or we can't sell. Now they help you do a better one if your interested though. thier goal is to help us.

I am actually not involved in any of this, all of it is from outside observations between the cc and the treasurer. All I did as I stated here quite a few times was simply come and ask one question, it was my own personal question no one else in the troop asked it. I merely wanted to know had anyone heard of just having scout accounts and no gerneral fund or vice versa a general and no scouts accounts. I was just curious I was somewhere with some members of our troop when this came up from someone else I simply wanted to be informed is all. I do not have conflicts with the cc we are actually very good friends, our families hang out and have bbq's all the time. The cc is bipolar hence her emotional issues. I told those things because she has said to me as a freind she is afraid they are going to ask her to leave due to what has happened. As stated before our troop has no other issues period we are one of the top troops in our district as far as boys being taught right and boys learning etc. I as well as everyone else is fully trained, I am a district and council trainer as well. Our budget is fine, it's perfect, it's been turned in and approved by the district, we just have not started our yearly fundraising yet is all. In reality our troop has about 600.00 in our general fund right now. She is mistaken on the 60.00 ranting is all the CC that is. She was told this evening there is money so let it go. We do not need anything but seam sealer right now, we have everything we need to run our troop efficiently until we finish popcorn at least. Man it was just a question and people assume everything is falling apart, it's not I just was curious if anyone had ever heard of it because I could'nt find it on the internet. I learned some things here and most of you were helpful not harmful. Thanks and just let it go stop badgering me and telling me over and over again we are failing ad we need a better budget and things are going down fast. We are fine I am not in the middle of anything I just personally wanted to know. No one else knows I was even here not even my husband. It was just a curious question is all. With obviously too much background info.

We are doing really well at being boy led, our male leaders are very on top of things when it comes to teaching the boys how to run the troop. We currently have 2 patrols with 3 in one patrol and 4 in another, plus a senior patrol leader as well. We had 4 and 4 but one of our scouts is a paranoid schizophrenic (not sure if that's spelled right) he dropped out for awhile without telling anyone and wouldn't talk to anyone when we called. Finally he told his mother he just "knew" the other kids were making fun of him and talking about him and everyone hated him. It's not true it's a side effect of his disorder the paranoia side makes this stuff come out. So he is taking a break for a little while until he feels compfortable enough to come back, but has been told it was not true and that everyone misses him. Anyway back to our patrols, each patrol has a patrol leader and a quartermaster as elected positions we just went through or second election of the year. The SPL is elected as well. We also have an appointed Webmaster and Historian for the Troop itself. We have been talking about apointing a scribe to keep track of money and expenses and meet with the patrol leaders about how much things are costing and what can they do to cut back etc. and what are thier long term goals as a troop. Our major issue is not enough boys and we do not want anyone getting overwhelmed with 2 jobs. My son is currently the only kid with 2 positions he is the troop historian and a patrol leader. However he does not do his historian stuff at meetings of course it's something done in his down time. He basically is creating a scrapbook or year book for every year he is there, he really likes doing that kind of stuff and was doing it on his own anyway so the SM asked him if would be something he would like to do for the Troop. He makes up the pages and then sets them in a glue based hard bound book outside, I screen print so he has taken our troop logo and screened it on the front of the book, then takes a silver paint marker and write the year on the spine. We will be putting these in a troop bookcase so new scouts can come and look at the exciting things our boy have done. Plus being founding members of this troop is very important to these boys. They think of themselves as leaders already in that they feel they need to set the example for new scouts coming in. The boys all have a great attitude. Right now we have 7 Tenderfoot scouts and 1 Second Class scout, after tonight which is our monthly board of review, I expect to have at most 3 new Second Class scouts at the least one new 2nd class, My son will be the highest ranked soon as he will be ready for 1st class in a few weeks as well he only has 3 things to do for it and they are super easy things. He had the drive for it though he is an overachiever for sure when it comes to scouting, he gave up doing more MB classes at camp so he could take the class called Wings at TK summer camp, it's where they have different levels and they worked on things with each class, so he got about 30% of his stuff for both ranks done then, then he got the rest for 2nd done at his second week and about 50% more for 1st, he has had trouble swimming so he took learn to swim at the second week thinking it would help learn to swimm faster and for a longer time so he could pass the test, funny thing was he was too good for the class it was for non-swimmers kids afraid to even get into the water. So the scout giving the class took my son aside and asked him if he would help teach the class all week since he really knew so much about swimming and that afterward he would work with him on techniques and tricks to pass the test. He did very well at it. My son ran for SPL this election but ended up dropping out at the last minute knowing he was going to win because he knew the other boy running wanted it really bad and had not been a leader yet, and mine had been the acting SPL at camp already. So he ran for Patrol leader instead and got that. He is very thoughtful. But back to the boy led troop, yes they decide on thier campouts, thier food, where to go etc. they decide on what fundraisers to do and waht not to do, they are begining to run the meetings in more of a patrol setting instead of just a big troop doing things together. It's coming along nicely. Troops in our area do not run this way most of them run a leader run program, we checked out a lot, well actually all the troops in our area, and every single one told us (and we saw for ourselves since we attened troop meetings) that thier boys are given 2-3 merit badges to work on as a troop each month, we saw how they taught the boys new ranks, we actually witnessed in most of the troops them teaching skills in this way: they would tie the know in front of the boy, then have the boy tie it, if he tied it correctly he got signed off, our current second class scout came from one of these troops and canot tell you anything from his previous ranks or current one for that matter so the SM had to go over everything briefly again with him and try and help him actually learn it all. We teach them the skill then practice it a few times over a few weeks and then test them on it without showing it to them again, this way we know they mastered the skill. Anyone can repeat what you just did but may not have retained it, ask these scouts a month later and 90% of them cannot remember what they learned or were taught. I really hate eagle mills and unfourtunately that is what our district is, we have the highest eagle rate but they are doing projects like one boy collected 500 pound of dog food and donated it to an organization, what did that project teach him? All he did was go to pet stores and grocery stores and ask to put up big boxes with signs he made asking for donated dry dog food and to which charity it was going. 30 days later he was done. Not challenging if you ask me. Anyway thanks for all the great info guys his is awesome Oh and the threatning a scout with the police thing was dealt with, the SM had a talk with her and told her it was very wrong of her to do that, that is was inappropriate. She claimed she was super tired her husband the acting SM said the same thing to him too, they both said they were exhuasted had not slept in 2 days and were frustrated and din't know what they were saying. The ASM also ripped a flashlight out of his hand and broke the strap on it, because he was mad he had the light on, she cannot sleep with lights on, he said he was afraid of the SM's in the other troop if he was to shine it in thier eyes, he said he thought they might be angry and attack him. Excuses if you ask me they were awesome guys not the violant type at all very laid back. they actually took the scout into the shared pavillion and sat with him for a few hours so the SM could get some sleep. But we did deal with it and told her she would not be an acting adult at any campout or function again, if another leader was not available they would have to change the dates. She accepted it and said she didn't want to be in that position anyway. Crazy people

boomerscout: That is an awesome list of gear thanks so much I copied that into word and printed off a few copies for leaders to look over as well. You know there are small lists in the boy scout handbooks I think on what kind of stuff scouts need but nothing as thourough as that, or broken up into troop provided scout provided. The items for scouts to purchase was in reference to us depositing money into escrow to pay in the shop with no tax for non troop items. Someone said it was illegal or they thought it moght be I was replying saying these were not frivilous pruchases these were things like MB books and gear for individual scouts not bought at the same time or on the same receipt as advancements. An example would be little Johnny Jones comes to me with 10.00 and says he needs to buy 2 MB books for the upcoming SAW weekend event, we don't have what he needs in our library and no one else has them, I am going to the shop anyway so I take the money along with say 2 other scouts who would give me money for something scout related like uniform upgrades or a backpack, etc. I would then deposit it all as one lump sum into the escrow account and purchase each thing individually for each scout with no tax. This is not just for the no tax it is to keep a record of the purchases for us, our council would label the deposit "60.00 for John Jones, Blake Bones, and Jeff Jones for scout gear purchased in scout shop" this is recorded in thier computer, so when we pull our monthly statement from them we can see what was bought and for whom. Normal troop checks for advancements are labeled in the computer as "troop XXX check #XXX for advancements". Nolesrule: I understand what your saying about the advancements being broken down individually you know until you said that I actually had not thought of it like that. Your right in the pack we pay 10.00 a month in dues to the pack itself and then we pay 5.00 a month in den dues. The 10 is for advancement and general operating fees. We used to have a top out though that parents who submitted more than 5.00 worth of advancemets a month had to pay the extra. This was done to keep the advancement chair (me) from paying for extra stuff out of her own pocket and not getting the money back. Honestly we had parents submitting 10 belt loops for tigers in thier first month of scouts, I told my district commish because I was a unit commish for another pack and was wondering if there was something we could do as I thought there was no way these kids (who by the way sat in the corner and did not participate during meetings weekly) were actually earning these. He said we were not allowed to question it, I made an announcement to the pack at a meeting that they had 5 years to do these things and would need to do them again in Webelos so don't feel the need to rush through the program, that there were ways to entertain and keep the kids interested in scouts and make it last. If they let thier shild do everything in the first year they would be bored by the time they got to Bear level. It didn't stop so that's when we put the top out on it this stopped them from doing it. Honestly the boy scouts have so few advancements, maybe 1 MB a month but that's rare 4 ranks in the first year and 4-10 MB's over the summer so I think I can come up with a monthly fee to cover all of that. Thanks for making me see that differently See somtimes it is good to have an outside view of what your doing to point out or ask why

Wow this hs gotten way off I think it's all my fault though sorry. it's not illegal as far as I know troops and packs have been doing it in our council for at least the 6 years I have been here and probably before I came. We are purchasing things for someone in the troop a boy or a game for the boys perhaps, not going in and buying uniforms and t-shirts and stupid things. All we ever buy is Merit Badge books that I am currently building a library out of for the troop as well as the game we bought and some things for boys in the troop itself. An escrow is not just for advancement. It's interesting to hear people say they don't think it's the boys responsibility or the parents to pay for advancements, do the packs in your area work the same way? This stuff is seriously expensive and every single troop and pack in our council as far as I know does it this way, making them pay for it. We would not withold advancement because say Johnny has issues at home and both parents lost thier jobs and are scraping just to eat. We would pay for them and apply for a scholarship for him. In our council the scholarship money is to be used for that boys individual things he needs, be it advancements, a new shirt, etc. so if we as a troop paid for advancement and did not charge them individually this would make things like that hard to give out, would we just put the money in the general fund? No we wouldn't we would put it all in his account and he would pay for his things. Maybe I am wrong but I thought we were supposed to be teaching the boys how to be thrifty, how to save thier money and spend it as well on the things they need and want. If we don't give them items to purchase they will never know what it is like if everything is just handed to them. Plus our troop cannot afford to pay for advancements for every boy just can't and niether can any other in our area except a few who have massive sponsors who pay for it all. We do not have underlying issues or bigger problems, I think things don't come out right in emails or written form, it's hard sometimes to form my thoughts in a way that sounds right. We are doing great we are the best troop in our district as far as honest advancement, spirit and just overall morale in the whole troop. Now I said we have some issues with our CC it's not a big deal really she is just super controlling she wants to control the world and is frustrated she can't do that here. She doesn't get that it's a boy run troop she wants to hand them thier choice and say this is what you can do, she doesn't like that they plan thier own meals she wants them to be given a choice of X or X but we just ignore her and the men do it the right way not whichever way she wants. Our Sm and ASM's are all trained very well, my hubby and I are trainers we didn't do the training but he was there so he knows what was taught, he then taught them anything that was left out. Unfourtunately the women are not trained excpet in committee training stuff and it's hard for them to understand the boy lead thing. Like I said our Unit Commish comes to our meetings and the COR comes too there isn't anything bad going on they know how it works and how we are working things, it's just this one women really causeing a few rifts but nothing huge that cannot be dealt with. This topic really got out of hand and I feel it's my fault I think a lot of what I said may have been confusing to some and didn't come out just right. I only really wanted to know if anyone else had worked thier accounts that way, had anyone else made boys pay for everything. We have quite a few troops that work the same way so I mean this isn't an idea out of nowhere I was just curious if out in the real world was it done the same. That said I totally love my position in the troop I like advancements and keeping good records, I agree we do not need expensive software for 8 boys, there are plenty of free things out there that work just as well. I think the big thing is there are some people in my troop who are trying to make this something bigger than it should and like someone else said make it more complicated than it has to be Again I am now truely in favor or rules or bylaws of some kind where this stuff is put down in writing and it is adheared to. This way when something or someone isn't doing it right they can be directed to the rules and see no one is picking on them it's just the way we wrote it to be and for a good reason. You cannot run a troop saying one thing one month and saying another thing the next month, it cannot be run without full honesty and personal issues left at the door, it's not a hard job to do this I don't know why everyone has to make it so hard. Again our troop is not in trouble and is not failing or having major issues, it may have seemed that way from waht I said but our boys advance and honestly not like some troops who fudge rank requirements, our boys meetings are run the correct way, the kids are super happy, learning bunches of new stuff and practicing all the time, some are starting to teach others even so it's awesome and all of them are 11. I am in it for them I could honestly give a rats bum what happens as long as the boys have what they need to succeed. So I apologize for all this I didn't mean to confuse or rile anyone up really I again am still learning as well.

nolesrule: We have a great set of parents in our troop who started it together and have never grumbled or complained about sharing expenses for big items, however it also has never been a mandatory thing it's always if you can afford it or if you want to no explanation needed if you can't help or just plain don't want to. Our boys fourtunately do not know of any this money stuff right now, thank goodness becasue your right it would be a bad example. It's not the treasurer complaining of the money it's the comitte chair, she has issues with so much we do and say and is very controlling we have tried to talk to her but she just says we can't do anything so we need to live with her, which is true I guess we just try to walk lightly around her. She has mental problems and honstly shouldn't be in charge but I digress on that subject. Her attitude at meetings is atrocious I had to snap at her this last comittee meeting because I was talking to the treasurer telling her and everyone else for that matter that I had gone and gotten a quote for the patrol patches had printouts of the final cost etc. and said I would be willing to put them on my credit card and be paid back, that I would bring in the final reciepts from the online order. She in the middle of this conversation she snapped at me and said it needed to be tabled because we need to move away from the treasurers time as we had gone over the alloted time for that portion of the meeting and we could discuss it next meeting. I snapped at her and said no I need to say this now everyone needs to hear it and kept talking. These are the kinds of things we deal with from her, she is supposed to contact our charter about things we need like we have been requesting another night to met from the church because the pack meets on the same night and it makes it impossible for the boy scouts to work inside if needed because the little cubbies run in and out of the classrooms and try and join our meetings. She says she is asking and being told no, but when we asked at the comittee meeting the COR he said sure he would ask the elders like he had never heard of us asking before. He comes to our comittee meetings we invite him so he can see where things are and what is going on. She went to summer camp as a second adult because no one else could go, she told a child who wouldn't sleep that she was going to call the sheriff and have him picked up so he could wait for his parents there so she could sleep. Very inappropriate, we understand some people without sleep especially those on heavy medications can have issues and can snap and say things they don't mean under stress but it was taken very hard when she told his mother the same thing on the phone at 3am. We talked to her about it though and is was resolved I guess and apologized for I assume. Every single member excluding the COR and her husband would like her to step down from the CC position but she won't do it and we cannot make her. She called off a campout because my husband the SM could not attend it, even though there were 3 other ASM's that could. She claimed the SM needed to be at all cmapouts and activities. Her and her husband have changed dates of things because of thier schedules. We had to put a foot down about this and told everyone as to not single them out that under no circumstances would things be moved or changed because 1 leader or child could not attend, including summer camp. We chose week 2 of summer camp which happens to fall during someones family vacation we reserved in advance to get the campsite we wanted and also because we will be camping with another troop from GA. I told these parents I was sorry but it's not fair to the men who already requested the time off and the other boys to change everything for 1 child. We said we would look into it but that we can't enforce rules for 1 and not the the others. We talked today we are planing a family meeting to get together and discuss what is troop expenses and what is a boy expense and how things should and should not be paid for. How everyone should be trusted and if you don't trust someone with money it needs to be brought out as to why you don't trust them. In the past and some people may not agree with this but in the past we have allowed certain people the ones on the escrow account to deposit thier cash or use thier credit card to deposit money into the troop escrow account at the scout shop, this way they could buy uniforms and books and things of a scout nature tax free, it helps even though it's only a few dollars it still helps. Well we did this recently we bought 170.00 worth of stuff but they told us the total with tax instead so we paid 176.00 into the escrow account, well that made thier be a 6.00 plus to the account. this greatly upset the CC she was so upset we did this even though we have done it in the past and so has she and it's allowed. She said we screwed up the account making things not come out right. It's just a stupid statement but she didn't want to give him a bank check for the campout because of that, I found that out today. Because of this she says she doesn't trust him with money now she thinks he can't manage money correctly. Also it has to do with the fact that I gave them a round about figure of 178.00 for advancements but it ended up costing 206.00 so she was upset about that saying I should have not bought some things i should have used what I said I was going to spend and nothing more and then go back and get the rest later. I get no reimbursement for my gas and I have to drive an hour to buy these things so i am not going back 2 days later to get things I could have gotten then, it would cost me more money in gas, as it is I spend on my own dime about 20.00 in gas for both ways. Anyway I have some budget stuff I got from the net to help me show them the right way to approach this money stuff, I have learned a lot from all of you as well and again wanted to say thanks so much for all your help. I understand fully your all just trying to help and not being mean so don't be afraid to tell me I am doing it wrong I have been a leader for 6 years but cubbies and scouts are 2 different things so i know I as well as all of my troop have so much to learn It would be nice to have this stuff in our trainings but alas we didn't get properly trained either.

I wasn't implying that we would do 30 MB in one session I was just saying we are qualified to teach about that many if we wanted or needed to. I am all for the hands on of teaching I agree retention is bet that way. We even go so far as to have scouts who already have it help teach it the skill that is because you truely learn and retain something when you teach it. Tana Keeta was bad, I give them the benefit though it was the first week of a year with a new camp director and about 85% new boy staff, but there was just a lack of training for them, it wasn't thier fault it just wasn't provided so they knew nothing. If you stopped a boy in charge and asked where something was they could not tell you, we were told we had to buy ice from the camp because they did not have enough ice to provide it to us. We were told to drink from the hose at the campsite. There was no water at each MB class or along the trails. We were there on a week that reached 106 degrees, our SM's decided to get ice and water outside camp because we had 3 scouts down with heat issues the first day. We told the council head about everything. and it has been taken care of but we just felt that the second camp we went to La No Che in Orlando (and yes I know they are a rich camp and council) had such a better moral, attitude and just everything was better all around and it was week 7. We paid less got 2 free leaders, and actually got 4 free since I had to go up to help with the kid who was having sleep issues, the camp fed me my 3 kids another women her 1 child and 3 other adults for free just to make sure the scouts were happy and taken care of. We did not pay one penny more for any of us that were extra. I speak so highly of that camp it was the best experience I have ever had.

Gulf Stream is our council, we don't live there though we live north of there. Our other fundraiser is Mega Scout Show tickets. I know what you mean about the finances being confusing, it is for me as well, this was why we were questioning this person saying we needed so much money all the time. When we really don't. The pizza cards are national cards not local pizza shops, big mistake I know. We do a lot of community service projects, we cleaned the fairgrounds, they planted trees at TK, they do about 4 hours a month at least doing TK service at the camp things like the trees, cleaning up etc., we do a cleanup for the church every month it can be trimming the trees or cleaning the grounds or cleaning the church itself, we do the street cleanup and we do a beach cleanup a few times a year also. The boys make cards from donated stuff for a nursing home, they are for the people living there to have to give to each other, so if mrs. jones knows it is mrs. johnsons birthday and they can't get out they can ask the nurse and look through the box of premade cards we make and donate the residents really love this.

nolesrule: the 25.00 a month fee is optional in a way, we made it basically a rule that they need to have a minimum balance of at least that to participate in the activity, other wise mom and/or dad needs to pay for the cost of it. We have things like for instance the Indian Lore Merit badge workshop (a ripoff for the cost if you ask me) it was 30.00 a person to attend including SM and ASM it did not give an option to not eat dinner and the SM did not do anything while there but walk with the troop to each station. We were not happy but this is the way our district and council rus things it's very expensive to be a scout here, we are not a huge city we don't have large corporate funding for either the Dst or the Cncl so they rely heavily on us to fund thier expenses. Our boys want to go to the Scout Advancement Weekend or SAW as it's called here, it's 45.00 a person and does not include meals, they can choose 2 merit badges from the list to work on over the weekend, I honestly don't think it's worth the money but we can't tell them no they can't go, we advise them on alternatives like holding our own SAW sort of, we have like 10 people qulified to teach at least 10 different merit badges in reality our troop is qaulified to teach about 30 merit badges. If we did it on our own it would cost a heck of a lot less than 45.00 each person. Like I said before the cost to run the troop every month is minimal and the charter fees are small in comparison litteraly it costs a boys 25.00 a year to charter with boys life that comes down about 3.00 a month roughly maybe 2.50 with extra money left over. We have no camp membership fees we have to pay, we have no monthly expenses at all, so technically thier dues are 2.50 a month the extra is just telling the parents if they want to go camping that's how much it will cost.

Well first of all, we bought the monopoly game for the boys to have for rainy days at campouts, we never in a million years would expect to be paid for it never! We are not hurting for equipment we have enough tents for all our boys to double up and for 4 SM's to go as well, we have a trailer that my husband and I donated to the troop, and we filled it with stuff, there is a fire cooking grate, giant pots and cooking gear, pretty much everything they need at the size we are right now. I don't personally think we "need" anything. I have to say once again it is other people who are saying we need more troop money, the boys came in with pack fundraising money some used it for camp some didn't so that left us wth about 2 boys with a balance of 200.00 each and I tink one more with a balance of 100.00, then there are about 2 boys with a negative balance I did not know this was going on, I would not have bought thier advancements had I known they had a negative balance already. I just learned one is negative 50.00 another negative at least 40.00. I had a talk with the treasurer and told her from now on I do not think this needs to go on, if they do not have the money in thier account the parents need to be told in enough time they will need to pay for something we are going to do, or how much patches will be. Our Fall Court of Honor is September 20th however it will not cost much at all, I have all the pocket cards already, we gave patches out months ago at the time they earned them (we are imeadiate recognition district), I will need to buy I think 6 patches at most for this, 2 are for my son which I don't have a problem paying for them he finished second class a couple of weeks ago and is about to finish first class in a week or so, I told him he would be getting his patches at the COH since it was so close. We are doing it at our charter after a church service to involve the church, it's small and almost all the congregation knows of us and loves the troop since we help them at least once every month with something, we like to involve those who like to be involved on this type of thing so we get them to come to our breakfasts and dinners later. I agree I hate SPGTI dinners I will not do that one ever again, I like pancake breakfasts they are super cheap and you make a lot of money. We are not allowed to do just any kind of fundraiser, we can't stand outside of stores and beg for money, we can't sell certain things, we are technically only allowed to do 2 fundraisers a year per our council rules and they convienantly have 2 they sponser. We do our other fundraisers as friends of Troop XXX. Our Pizza cards are a bust they are a rip off, the person who researched it did not think about what it said and how much it cost, to her it sounded like a deal. We cannot return them because they printed our name on it. We took 3 ideas to the boys explained them all and gave them the choice this is the one they chose, it's a learning experience for them, they had a choice of a card that cost us 50 cents to print up but they had to get the vendors and the deals to print on it at leat 2 or 3 each boy, they didn't want to do the work so they chose the easy one or so they thought. We have been unable to sell any cards out in public most people are buying them for thier kids or family is buying them from them. Like I said it's a bad deal and a learning experience. So anyway we aren't in need of money really badly, it's just this one person the CC who keeps saying we have no money, we have no money, and making it such a big deal that we borrowed money from the boys, for instance the pizza cards cost 360.00 to order the money was taken from boys accounts to pay for them, however they get the money back if they sell the cards. I didn't see this as a bad thing, they chose this route why shouldn't they pay for it initially? I just thought by doing away with the troop fund account for a little while the CC would stop saying a million times during the TR report that the troop itself has 60.00 and that we are so poor and we need money, blah blah blah, I think it comes down to the fact that someone just needs to stand up and tell her we know we don't have much money right now but we also know we don't really need to buy anything right now as a troop either, so she just needs calm down and let them earn some money and then we can look at new expenses but for now we are good. See I think I know what it is, I think after sitting here I have figured it out, the CC and her hubby a ASM want us to have better things like they have said they would like to see the boys have nicer tents that will last a long time, not the walmart ones we have now, I can see the advantage of having nicer brand name hiking tents but it's not a priority it's a luxery and we just don't need them. We donated the equipment we have now and it's great new stuff it works fine no need for better things. I have been reading on the net that a lot of troops require a family to pay an initial fee of 50.00 to 75.00 when they join to help seed the troop fund and cover extra expenses like say buying a tent to cover the extra child. That sounds like it might be a good idea for new scouts, does anyone do this? The camp that we went to that did not provide Ice and Water was Tana Keeta in West Palm Beach, unfourtunately it was our home camp, it's more expensive than the other one we went to and provides so much less. I don't recommend this camp for a summer camp choice to anyone.

scoutldr: Yes I am Woodbadge trained however I feel I walked away still needing to learn more, I mean don't get me wrong it was an awesome training and I love what we did and I worked my tickets but our council is so leanent on what your tickets can be an example would be sign up to be a merit badge counsler, or join the district committee. Now don't get me wrong those are great things we totally need them but I don't feel they as tickets would teach us anything really. No I was not going to be outside alone just me and him, sorry that sounded wrong there were about 10 people outside, and we at camp every now and then walked a boy alone to an activity or they walked with us I should say since I was going to the same area, but there were always people walking around all over the camp so we were never really "alone". I had issues with that regarding the troop we shared with, the camp we were at had great private bathrooms, they were the most private I had ever seen, now knowing we had women in our groop these boys and men from that group would come up and shower next to us, and use the toilet next to us and talk to us at the same time it was a little wierd I didn't do it but some of the other people did. Anyway we do have a budget and a yearly plan we came up with, we had a meeting with the SM and the ASM's and the boys to plan what and when they wanted to do things. For instance our SM and ASM's made a list of the dates they are available for campouts and activities since they all have jobs and work full time, then the boys planned accordingly. We know how much campouts cost at different camps and locally we also know how much certain activities cost. Plus charter fees, and boys life. So we came up with 25.00 a month based on all that. Now we do charge the boys for their awards like rank and merit badges. We do this because we have very active boys, I have said it a bunch of times we have 8 boys period no more no less, that said I purchased 68 merit badges for over the summer, ou lowest earned 5 badges with our highest earning 15 I believe. It was costly believe me it cost me 206.00 for them our troop could not afford to pay for that, plus our cub scouts have always paid monthly dues for thier patches as well, paying more out of pocket each month if they were over thier max allowed. They were allowed 5.00 in advancements a month, now if a boy got crazy and did 20.00 worth or even 30.00 worth which some of these parents claim they do we made the mom or dad pay the cost over 5.00 this stopped our leaders (me in particular) from paying out of pocket for awards and never being reimbursed because the pack didn't have the money. So my point was they are used to paying for thier advancements themselves. As for the water ice at camp thing, well we would not have minded paying for it however no one else that was there offered to help pay, we as a family are not rich and scrape from pay to pay and sometimes are in the red ourselves personally and taking 152.00 out of our pockets to ensure the saftey of our boys was not even a question we did not expect to be paid back but sure as heck appreciate that the parents voted to share the cost and pay us back. In all honesty the money will most likely go back into my sons scout account instead of coming to me anyway, that way he has money. Also we didn't fail to plan properly as to taking money from the boys accounts, you have to understand I stated before we are a new troop we started in March of this year with nothing, no money except the 50.00 each mom and dad paid as a starter fund. So we started with 400.00 period. They had made the mistake in my opinion of telling the parents that the troop would pay for thier charter fees and transfer fees, I think they weren't thinking about all the dads that were not registered in scouts period. Then they supposedly spent 300.00 on spagetti dinner supplies when everything was donated except for the paper goods (cups, plates) and as a wole I think we made 600 dollars so the boys split 300 unevenly based on individual ticket sales and then the troop got the 300.00 dollars it had spent on stuff back, seemed like a waste of time to me. I honestly don't understand the high cost but haven't asked for reciepts to be shown to me either. The point was we are new with nothing which is why everything is like this not that we failed to plan properly. My husband and I came from a charter that had decided it did not want a troop or a pack anymore so we disbanded and everyone went thier seperate ways we came here to the pack without a troop knowing they were wanting to start one that they just needed a SM, and we are friends with some of them as well. The women thing comes from like I said above before in one post, I am fully trained to be a SM however if I were to do it, and honestly I would love to I love working with the older boys it is so great to be teaching this stuff as opposed to the cubbie stuff, however there are other women who are not trained or are almost trained who do not work well with the boys frankly they baby them treat them differently want to do everything for them, don't want them learning knew things. Thier philosophy and is verbally expressed at all meetings that the boys are new scouts and everything should be baby steps not just throw them to the wolves and see what happens. they don't understand the let them make mistakes and them show help them figure out what they did wrong and help them figure out how to solve or fix it. No they think we should show it to them, do it for them, and then tell them the right answers. We have a big eleven year old boy who has issues sleeping anywhere without mom and dad, his mother babies him with this, same for another boy. they just don't seem to understand that they will never learn if we keep doing it for them. The best way to learn something is not to watch but to dive right in and figure it out, work together as a patrol and a troop and try to get it right and if they fall (we would never let them hurt themselves or endanger themselves though) let them try to figure out a way to do it the right way. 95% of the time they figure it out on thier own, there is that small amount of time we need to step in and ask appropriate leading questions to get them thinking in a different way, but still they can do more than thier mothers think they can that's for sure. Now because of that attitude the men of the troop said for now they would prefer women not be involved on the SM and ASM level. I understand the reasons so I keep quiet and I spend my time teaching Merit Badges to them instead, I still get to work with them and get to teach them things so I get to see them learn and use thier skills so for now I am happy Thanks again April

First off I want to say thank you to all of you for such great info I really have learned alot. I can say it was the scoutmaster, the treasurer and myself who were thinking of changing things. Now I think I have learned that things need to change but in a different way. I am going to meet with them and propose we keep the accounts the way they are with individual scout accounts and the seperate troop fund account. I am planning on proposing that we change our strategy though, I think someone on here had a great idea to make certain fundraisers troop fund only fundrasiers. I think that's a good idea for now anyway when the troop needs the extra money badly. So for now I am going to say if we do something like a spagetti dinner or a pancake breakfast that money should all go to the troop fund and if we do say popcorn or pizza cards or our local council scout show tickets those things should go to each boy individually. Right now currently our split is 50% to the scout 50% to the troop but maybe if we aren't doing the troop fundraisers as much we need to change it 75% troop 25% scout or something similar. The only thing is 100% of our families cannot afford to pay for summer camp out of pocket even locally it is 265.00 to go to camp, our troop has a rule that all extra fees for scoutmasters and ASM's are to be split between familes going so the adult going already taking time off work and whatnot doesn't have to pay the full fee, he will end up paying a portion since his son will be going anyway. My point was I think 50/50 is a good split for fundraising tht way my boys still make enough for thier camp dreams 95% want to go 2 weeks next year and at least 1 has the aspiration of going for all 7 weeks so I told him if he could get the money he could totally go provisionally (he is my son). One huge thing I learned from all of you (thanks so much) is to get together with the boys and adults and come up with bylaws to live by. We have a few issues tht bylaws would certianly solve, if it's in there then they have to abide by what it says in writing. For instance we have an issue with a few moms not getting that they shouldn't be camping with the troop so they take it personally when told no women can go, I understand it because the boys will act differently when we are there. This happened at our second week of summer camp to me, I got duped by a boy who was already having issues and we hd to come up there to the camp and stay because he would not go to sleep unless his mom or dad was there, since dad had to work I took mom and my 3 other kids, her other son came as well and we stayed the whole week. I tried to stay out of troop things but this boy approached me at lunch and told me he wanted to quit scouts and he never wanted to come back to camp again he was having a horrible time, well I took it to heart I realy would hate to see a boy quit just because he was not having a good time at camp, I also didn't want him to have a bad time. So later the troop we were sharing a site with had a campfire with marshmellows and invited us to join in since they had 4 boys and we had 4 boys. Well this boy came in saying he couldn't find a seat he forgot to pack a chair and was really upset, I asked him did he look around or ask around if anyone had a chair he could borrow he said yes, I now didn't want him to have an even worse time so I just said to him let's go outside and I will walk around with you while you look for a chair or a log or a rock something to sit on. OMG my husband the scoutmaster had a fit and basically told me to stay away from the troop to mind my own business. Now I didn't see anything wrong with what I had done, I wasn't doing it for him I wasn't even helping him I was just offering to walk with him since I know he is afraid of the dark. I also didn't want him to have any more bad experiences at camp. My hubby the SM said I was doing it worng I should be helping boys do anything we are teaching them to be independant not to need us to do it for them. But in that I was just going to walk with him I felt I was right, but we just left as a misunderstanding. Anyway to solve this issue bylaws would state family could come at the discretion of the scoutmaster and could not interfere with troop going's on period they could only be on the outside of all of it. So I am going to research bylaws to help us come up with something to fit our troops needs. Again thanks so much for all your help I love scouting for this reason there are so many great people out there who are so willing to help when we truely need it April Psycho Eagle SR-906

Well I guess I should have given more info. I am not questioning individual scout accounts we are all for that, we are questioning a troop seperate account, I and some others don't think we need a troop account right now. Ok we started our troop again with seed money for the boys acounts from a council fundraiser, the troop account was started with individual deposits made by parents. These were and are seperate accounts today. However our troop account is in the negative (virtually that is) and we currently owe money to the boys if we were to continue in this fashion. We had a spagetti dinner fundraiser boys were to sell tickets and then any people who paid at the door was to be split between the boys who actually showed up to work the dinner. My son is homeschooled and doesn't have a lot of people to sell tickets too so we sold about 5 tops outside the dinner, he worked the dinner there was about 200.00 taken in at the door and 5 boys worked the diner so per what we had talked about as a committee the money should have been split up and each boy should have gotten 40.00 that worked. however it was done that if a group of people came in and paid at the door and said that they were coming in because of Johnny thier money was paid to Johnny minus the troop cut. I was angry about this because then it was told to us that the actual take in not specified to any particular boy was 30.00 so I think my son made 7.00 for working 6 hours in a kitchen and serving people and he actually did a lot of the cooking, he is only 11 but is very good with cooking so he got stuck in the kitchen doing a bunch of that stuff. Anyway supposedly this dinner cost us 300.00 even though we had 90% of the things donated to the dinner we only had to buy plates and cups and silverware. So after that the troop itself made about 100.00. This somehow made our troop account balance 200.00 total. We had troop expenses being a new troop we had to originally pay charter fees, it was taken out of boy accounts and out of the troop account for the leaders. There were a few other things that came up that the troop paid for I can't remember what they were right now but it basically dwindled the account down to nothing causing us to borrow from boys accounts to run the troop effectively we have expensises that need to be covered one way or the other. Our next fundraiser was voted on and chosen by the boys it cost us 360.00 to get the things so basically the first 4 cards sold at 10.00 each go right back to the troop funds to pay for the cards, then of course that money gets paid back to whomever we borrowed from to square them away. Basically leaving the troop with nothing again. We think (some of us anyway) it should change to just having boy accounts for right now until we make more money this way they are paying for the troop's things. Like I said we need some type of software we had originally voted in the begining to buy troopmaster and troop ledger we feel the boys should pay for this, it's for them it is to help them keep track of thier advancements and keep track of thier expenses as well. Also at summer camp the cost of extra items for the whole troop the 152.00 we believe this should be split up again amongst the boys who attended to defray the cost, the troop should not have to pay for this. Being a newer troop only having 8 boys it has been really hard financially for the troop itself. Also not having the opportunity to do many fundraisers yet has put a damper on all this as well. I appreciate all your advice I really do and I guess we will just leave it the way it is with scout accounts and a troop account, well I should say I will advise to leave it this way. See being a small troop we don't have a PLC, we currently only have 2 patrols so we have 2 patrol leaders, and an SPL we are going to start PLC meetings next month but with summer camp and everything else and no older scouts available we were thrown into it and needed time to teach them how to run it properly, or at least try to Our other leadership positions consist of patrol quatermasters, a webmaster, and a historian that would be it for right now, if we were to have more positions people would be doing more than one job and that isn't good with 11 year old boys. I am not a Scoutmaster I am a mother who is the advancement chair, I hate financial stuff it creates such problems with everyone, unless there is just too much money but that rarely ever happens I asked because we have to fight to get payment for things, it cost 206.00 for advancements from over the summer, this would be merit badges and some merit badges I bought for the class we are teaching so I can give them out at the end of the class. I got the third degree as to why it all cost so much even with the reciept being submitted to them. Then last night we asked for a check for a campout because we needed to pay for low cope, it's 5.00 per boy they wnated to just write the check for the total but we were concerned that some boys would drop out at the last minute and we don't and cannot get a refund from our camp, so we would have been out the money. We just wanted them to write the check to the council and leave it blank, we can't spend money on anything else there wasn't anything to spend money on, we needed to be trusted, so the check was left blank at the end but was given to someone I guess they felt they could trust to write it only for that activity and to not pay for any adults to participate either. It's stupid but apparently it was such a big deal. This all stemmed from my check of 206.00 I know it did, it's a pain in the butt to be questioned on everything, I bought things that we needed I bought patches and I bought the pocket cards and I bought a 3.99 booklet for the scoutmasters that has the new requirements in it so they know and have it on hand. I did not spend money on anything else for anyone else it was stupid. I now must have an acurate total to buy advancements, if not I will not be given a check, if I go over I must submit the reciept for reimbursement of the difference. I can understand this I guess but in the past we have to deposit the money into our escrow account in order to not pay tax on the items, so I woud take a blank check have them add it all up walk across the courtyard and deposit the check for that exact amount. No issues I am not buying things for me. heck we just spent 30.00 on a boy scout 100 year monopoly game out of our own pocket. We spend money out of our own pockets all the time to buy neat stuff for the boys, my husband is the scoutmsater and spent about 50.00 on items to put in a treasure chest for patrol competitions so that the winning members could choose one thing each, little things like whistles, and small pocket knives, collapsable cups, space blankets, etc. things they may need or use in scouting. We never asked for the money back. We also spent the 152.00 at summer camp not expecting to get paid back either, it was later voted on that they would pay us back. We purchased position patches (SPL, PL etc.) on our own dime for the troop as well because we knew there was no money. So we figured if we had one account and all boys paid equally for everything no matter what it was since they will eventually use it or it will benefit them it would stop this "your taking money from my kid" junk, they would get 100% of thier work efforts and then be charged accordingly, if they did not have any money then thier parent would be responsible for thier share period. We did a budget and the 25.00 came out as dues to pay for campouts and associated costs of activities, since we do not have any fundrasing money this is how they would need to pay. Normally to camp it costs 9.00 per boy, plus 10.00 for thier food, plus we are going to add on a trip charge for gas since it's always the same 3 people driving everytime and pulling a trailer is costing each of us a fourtune (we alone pulled it to one week of camp it cost us 60.00 in gas each way, we went back 2 weeks later for something else with no trailer and it cost us 20.00 each way) so just for camping and food it's 19.00 plus another say 2.00 for gas, now your looking at 21.00 leaving only 4.00 to participate in an activity, the cheapes activity at camp is 5.00. So see shere we got the 25.00 from, we don't live in a small community it is very expensive to use our camps we can camp for free at our charter (they have 10 acres) but they still have to pay for food and any other things we buy for them to do. A lot of parents complained about the 25.00 thinking it should be like cubbies and be 5.00 a month, but when it was explained that that would be fine if the parents are willing to pay also for all camping fees and activity fees, they finally understood. We pay for charter and boys life once a year and that is a lump sum for all familes, it is 25.00 each to charter as well for the boys and 10 for the adults. We could have split that up for 12 months but we voted not to it was easier to just do it all at once. Scouts isn't cheap and we all know that, we just don't want one riding on others because they refuse to help out or work. And we do keep excellent books, at this next meeting though I am going to be bringing up the bylaws issue because I think it would solve 90% of the problems we have Again thanks for all the advice and I look forward to any more given April Psycho Eagle SR-906