LongHaul

I'm not going to say that Cubmaster Randy is wrong but as I understand it the Webelos Knot can be worn by Boy Scouts. The AOL patch and the knot mean the same thing just as the Eagle badge and the knot do. Once a boy becomes a Boy Scout replacing his original AOL award is difficult,at least in our council, because and advancement report is needed and only one badge is sold per boy. The knot is used when the AOL patch is not available. After the age of 18 the AOL patch can only be worn by Eagle Scouts who are entitled to wear thier youth rank patch and thus can wear their AOl patch under it. Could be wrong but this is what I've been told. LongHaul

I would also like to know where this kind of Scouting HIstory can be found. I know Chicago's number is 118 and thought it was one of the oldest. I don't recall ever hearing that we merged with anyone. We did change our name at one point from Chicago Council to Chicago Area Council to reflect that we covered more than just the city proper. I do know that our Camp Owasippe was formed in 1911 by the Chicago Boy Scouts. I don't however dispute the title of oldest council, I think Trevorum and Miki101 should be givin a "Class A" salute. Remebering where we came from helps us retain who we are as Scouters. LongHaul

Jschlich, I too have no expectations that a new Board of Directors will succeed in rescinding the sale agreement. My hope is that we will prevail on January 14th and a new Board will be faced with a united community opposed to the sale made up of people local to the camp and those registered CAC members here in Chicago who know the value of retaining our last piece Nature. So as not to seem duplicitous I must state that you are far more concerned with the residents of Blue Lake Township et.al. that I am. The impact of the re zoning and sale to the local community will be nothing less than devastating but the community would survive. White Hall and Holton would not become ghost towns they would become larger cities only the rural lifestyle would be lost. The loss of this camp to the youth would be irreparable. Where else does the Boy Scouts of America control close to 5000 acres on a local Council basis? We are but one camp in that area, check the going rates for a week at camp with all of them and you find BSA charges about half what everybody else does. With out Owasippe most of the boys we serve will not have the opportunity to get back to Nature in a controlled, organized, and educational environment. This is in deed and in fact MY camp, I paid for it with over 20 summers of attendance and countless hours of service and will fight with every available opportunity to prevent anyone from selling it to pad the bank account. The likelihood of CAC being merged due to the falling numbers is very real and it will only be with the complete cooperation of any future Board that the OOEC will come to be realized. You could win the day in Blue Lake and loose the camp in Chicago. Together we can yet triumph. LongHaul For those unfamiliar with our fight, the OOEC is a not for profit entity set up to create a self sustaining preserve which will be free of BSA Corporate greed. We hope to actually buy the camp and get it away from Board influence.

Just came across this link thought Id share. Its viewable in Quicktime. After viewing it I have to wonder if the people who put it together ever actually served as front line leaders. It does not seem to answer the questions and concerns we see here in the forums, in some cases it raises more questions. http://www.scouting.org/boyscouts/videos/advancement/index.html LongHaul

OGE, In respose to your "what would happen then" question we won't get to that point in two years if we win this fight. First, the assests at our Camps have been managed poorly for years. CAC owned two plots of land, one forty miles west of Chicago and another in White Hall Michigan. The local camp (Hoover) has been sold for around 18 million dollars, the Michigan camp, Owasippe Scout Reservation hosts five scout camps and a family camp. When those who camped there in the 60's returned with our sons and scouts in the late 80's we saw the problems and moved to correct them. Use of the camps was more than doubled and the opening of two camps which had been closed resulted. New "outposts" were created and a very good High Adventure base created. Parts of the camp were leased to LDS groups and PLAST (European Scouts), opportunities to use the camp in off season for football and soccer camps was being researched. The "money pit" was shrinking and a self sustaining facility was on the horizon when our Council came "under new management". "We don't belong in the real-estate buisness" replaced "Be Prepared" and those responsible for the new interest and life of our camp were forced out. Attendance dropped and that drop was used to defend the sale of all of our camps. The decision to sell the camps and bank the cash was made before the issuse was reshearched or put to the board. The person responsible has a history of selling scout camps, his motives were clear when he arrived but warnings fell upon deaf ears. With the 18 million we now have to insure start up capitol and a vision to make the OOEC a self sustaining entiy we do not need to sell our camp, we need to manage our assests in the best interest of the youth members not the paid profesionals. LongHaul(This message has been edited by LongHaul)

Jschlich, Sir, I didnt respond to your first post because we are on the same side. Your work and that of the OOEC is much appreciated by us rank and file volunteers. I feel I must respond now because you keep claiming that the fight with the board and the fight to retain Owasippe are totally seperate. While the sale of Owasippe is not the reason for the law suit brought against the Board, it (the sale) is a result of the refusal of that Board to act in good faith with the CORs and youth it is supposed to represent. The OOEC (Owasippe Outdoor Education Center) was not even formed until the Board was convinced that Boy Scouts dont belong in the real-estate business and the decision to divest the Council of all land holdings was acted upon. You want to separate the effect from the cause to the extent that you forget why the OOEC was formed. Was the concern that the residents of Blue Lake Township were being treated unfairly or was it because the scouts and scouters were about to lose their camps? Do you think that those of us who will be present at the public hearings January 14, 2006 will be there because we feel the residents of BLT need our support or do think we are coming to express our dissatisfaction with the sale? I can say for certain that we are coming to seek the aid of the residents of BLT in our struggle to prevent the sale of our camp. The law suit seeks to reinstate a slate of officers who would probably oppose the sale of Owasippe, thats why the current Board wanted to prevent a vote on it. This current fight can be drawn along for the sale or against the sale lines, even though the sale is not the reason for the fight. The sale was just the straw that broke the back of the volunteers. It is a shame that it took the sale of our camps to unit the volunteer base after the long years of mismanagement of our Councils assets, resources and volunteer base. The suit and fight against the Board and the fight to prevent the sale of Owasippe are two fronts in the same war. LongHaul

Ed, What you or I may see as constituting hazing may not be what the next person sees as hazing. Here is another fine example of an ambiguous policy National wants us to follow but refuses to clearly define or explain. When I was a scout we would engage in Snipe hunts at summer camp. This was a traditional practice, completely voluntary on the part of each participant and no one was made to feel foolish. Today it is considered hazing because younger and nave scouts are the brunt of the activity. We all know about Campsite levels, Tent Stretchers, 50 feet of Shore Line, Smoke benders etc. sending a boy after any of these is now hazing. One of my ASMs brought dry ice up to camp to keep some special ingredients for a dutch oven delight frozen till needed. When a boy came looking for A Bucket of steam he was given our large pot with about an inch of water and some dry ice. When he returned to his site and handed the bucket to his SPL the laughs were shared by all with the SPL becoming the brunt of the joke. This, as was explained to me later by a lawyer, was indeed hazing on the part of the SPL and my ASM was guilty of breaking State law because he didnt report it to the Camp Master and file an incident report. Where we camp all adults are required to sign a form containing several state laws on child abuse, and agree to follow all them. Not reporting ANY INCIDENT is a violation of one of these State laws. Those of us who have been around since before every third action ended up in court must accept that the tide has turned. Like it or not forcing the newest members to wait till last, singles them out and draws attention to their inexperience regardless of why we are dong it. In todays BSA we are not allowed to cause stress or anxiety to a scout by singling him out from the group. Rank has its Privileges can not extend to the point that those privileges cause undue hardship to those outside the group. Having the New Scout Patrol cook for the Senior Patrol may not be wrong but forcing the New Scouts to wait till the Senior Patrol is finished eating and then be left with the leftovers as their meal is wrong. Making the least experienced wait till last to put up their tent could be just poor leadership but when the inexperienced scouts are then made to feel as if they are holding things up and inconveniencing others the pivotal point comes. Hazing is indeed defined by the reaction of the person being hazed. What is funny to one could be demeaning to his patrol mate. If Lisabobs son felt singled out and pressured, if he felt as if he was being treated unfairly, if he felt this treatment was because he was one of the new guys then its hazing. Thats the way is was explained to me in Youth Protection. LongHaul (This message has been edited by LongHaul)

Holaka, A Scoutmaster's Conference can be done at any point, though it is normally done after all the other requirements have been met. The BOR, on the other hand, is the last step in the advancement cycle before recognition. The boy must have completed all of the requirements before he can be reviewed on them. LongHaul

Lynda J, CAREFULL with that word "donate"!!! If a parent donates equiptment it becomes property of the Pack and thereby the CO, been down this road! If the parent allowes the Pack to use personal property then the parent is liable for anything that happens related to the use of that property. This is all legal stuff but that is in fact what this thread is about. Setting up a 501(?) is really the only way to cover all the bases relating to property rights and liability. LongHaul

Welcome Rising Smoke, When I took Woodbadge our trainer told our group that we could not use fire by friction in our area (Chicago) because we didnt have the right kind of trees to make the receiver block. I told him that I was sure glad I didnt know that thirty years ago when we used to do it every time we came to camp as a means of awing the new scouts. We used to have a Stalking Merit Badge and the field book taught trapping, snares, and how to dress game for the table. I wanted to teach my scouts some of this but was cautioned against it. PETA wants BSA to drop all fishing merit badges on the grounds that it is cruel to the fish. I wanted to have the boys actually kill live chickens, dress them and prepare them for dinner. My DE was horrified. Troops near my relatives in Wisconsin do these things as a matter of course in daily life but down here in da city Im not even supposed to talk about it. LongHaul

This all comes down to How far is the old CO willing to go to regain the assets? The old CO can not force the members to come back but it does still have legal rights to all assets acquired by the unit while chartered by the old CO. The old CO has grounds to file suit for theft of property and funds. Just because a unit allows a charter to lapse does not give that unit the right to seize property. If you lease a building and allow the lease to lapse you dont take ownership of the building. Is the old CO willing to go to court to press its legal rights? The old CO would have to file suit against the CC, SM, Treasurer or CFO, and all members of the Troop Committee, seeking an accounting of funds and assets for the time the troop was chartered. Is the cost of litigation worth the return or is this a matter of principle? The Council may or may not get involved but the chances of National getting involved are so slim as to be non existent. This happened in my District and the old Co decided it was not worth the aggravation and didnt fight. The problem here was that only half the troop members left but they took most or all of the equipment and funds. LongHaul

It sounds to me like the troop Committee need to reevaluate its role in this troop. Just because its the way we have always done it does not make it correct. I wonder what will happen if the Troop Committee were to say that an exception could be made in this case but the PLC, when they met, decided that they felt the rules were important and that no exception should be made. This should be a PLC decision and the Troop Committee should then review that decision based on safety and practicality not past practice. LongHaul

I think most of us agree the SM has acted improperly. Scout-parent, is this SM trained in his position? If so how long ago. Seems he has missed some of the very basic premises of Scouting and the Patrol Method. First in response to your statement that he rejiggers the patrol makeups, the patrols should be formed by the boys themselves with the exception of the New Scout patrol which is just that New Scouts or more specifically transitioning Webelos or 11 year old new boys. This should be a team of their choosing and should not be altered by outsiders. Second he must have missed the Patrol/Troop concept. The Troop is made up of Patrols formed by the boys, the Troop is NOT broken down into patrols. I usually us our country as an example. The Nation is made up of States it is not broken down into States. The Scoutmaster should no more realign the membership of the patrols than Congress should redraw State borders. The Venture Patrol should also be made up of boys choosing to be members of that patrol. Congress should not tell citizens which State they must live in. A meeting with the PLC,SM and the Troop Committee to discuss the removal of the PLs is needed to establish the policy for Leadership Roles within the Troop. If elected youth leaders are to be removed by the SM at his discretion without recourse how can the Troop members feel they have a boy run organization? The PL I elect is my leader not the SMs leader. If the person I chose does not get the job done the boys should be counseled to replace him if that is what the SM feels is necessary. The Patrol Method only works when the members of the patrol feel they can rely on one another and chose to work as a team. This seldom happens in groups made up of members not of their own choosing. The final decision here should rest with the PLC, it is after all their Troop. Whether the ousted PLs have a vote or not could be a question if elections are held before the meeting. LongHaul

IMO Woodbadge is no longer program based but is now leadership based. When should you learn how to be an effective leader? Sign up and take the course at your earliest convenience. LongHaul

Spiney Norman, Check this link to the GTSS http://www.scouting.org/nav/enter.jsp?s=xx&c=ds&terms=Guide+to+Safe+Scouting&x=24&y=9 There are several restrictions, single shot firearms being a major one. We also do this type of outing and the boys love it. LongHaul

No matter what you may read in these forums about the changes made to the Woodbadge training I do not think you will find anyone that has said it is not worth the time to take. In answer to your questions another YES! YES! YES! YES! LongHaul used to be a BEAR

Just so long as we acknowledge that a lie is a lie not matter why we may choose to tell it.

SR540BEAVER, The IOLS portion is only recommended for most positions, it is not required. Eagle74, Listing members as ASM's instead of Committee members gets you in a bind when it comes to BOR's where SM's and ASM's are not supposed to sit. Having me Activities Chair at every meeting and on every outing means he is doing an ASM's job but he can also "technically" do BOR's. I find it much more efficient to have a full committee some of whom serve as ASM's. This way the committee jobs are assigned and the ASM's job becomes a fill in for whom ever is around. LongHaul

Requiring that you forfit your life rather than speak an untruth? That's got to be the definition of "tough love". LongHaul

When your position is Committee Member all you need is NLE and Troop Committee Challenge. You get no Troop Program instruction, no outdoor instruction, No instruction related to delivering program or working with young boys. What you do have is a set of WOODBADGE BEADS, which says you are as trained as anyone else with woodbadge beads. Problem is it's not the same training. LongHaul

Hunt, From my post of 11/25/2005, "Wrong is defined as 'Not in conformity with fact or truth; incorrect or erroneous.'" There are usually several entries for words in the dictionary, what I'm saying is that we need to pick one and stick with it through the discussion. LongHaul

Hunt, Once again our differences have come down to defining terms. When we use the word right in connection with the word wrong we limit ourselves as to word meaning in that discussion or we end up going in circles. The beginning question of is it OK to ignore policy shifted to is it OK to lie about whether you ignore policy. This puts the definitions of right and wrong into the truth and non truth sections of their respective definitions. Righteous, though it sounds the same is not about truth itself but what is morally correct, something without guilt or sin. Using the Nazi reference, denying knowledge of Anne Franks whereabouts is an un truth and therefore wrong by definition yet it is also morally correct and you could do it without guilt or sin and therefore it would be a righteous act. We must not allow ourselves to lose sight of the differences because that is how we end up thinking about what degree of torture is morally acceptable. We dont want to admit we have lied so we say it isnt lying or we say its the righteous thing to do but never actually get to the admission of lying. If you know where Anne Frank is and the Nazis ask you where she is is it a lie to say that you do not know where she is? Yes or No We must separate the act itself from our reasoning for the act. What we do and why we do it are two different things. In this case what we do is a negative thing (lying)and why we do it is a positive thing. If you are interviewing candidates for a position which would require them to enforce rules and policies set by you and the person you are interviewing says to you that they do not feel that the rules apply to them, that they believe in anarchy and dont acknowledge your having the power to dictate policy to them, that they will interpret your rules as they see fit and implement them according to their own interpretation on a case by case basis, would you hire them? In the Zero Tolerance scenario what we are saying when we support the bending of the rule is that we are in favor of vigilante justice, because when we look up what vigilante means we find that ignoring the rules and taking justice into our own hands makes us a vigilante. How far do we allow this policy to extend now that we have said it is what we advocate? The school board has the duty of establishing the rules and the school administration has the duty of enforcing those rules. What is the purpose of a Zero Tolerance policy? Why would we vote in a school board that would set such a policy? If this is what we want then why condone anything other than Zero Tolerance. In reality we dont want Zero Tolerance we want the flexibility to look at the actual facts and decide what level of tolerance is appropriate but we cant do that. We have problems ever time a case comes up because we decide on a per case basis. We must make rules that are clear and then enforce them blindly or we must be ready to admit that we support vigilante justice. Does the administrations bending of the rules seem as acceptable when we recognize it as vigilante justice. Its when we assign a very negative label to the act, even though that label is 100% accurate, that we start to look for gray areas because we dont want to admit the truth. If we all had William F. Buckleys repertoire of words maybe we could understand each other better, because we could chose just that right word to express our intent. (the fact that fewer people could converse with us and many would be hampered by the constant looking up of terms is something completely different) Instead of asking is it right to lie to the Nazis we should ask is it good to lie to the Nazis, or is it acceptable to lie to the Nazis. Right and wrong, good and bad, positive and negative, righteous and unrighteous what exactly are we trying to decide, they are all different. If we are to have a serious discussion we must clarify our definitions and separate our terms, if on the other hand we are interested in , as packsaddle put it airy persiflage then we simply acknowledge that and lets all have fun. LongHaul

Prairie_Scouter, I didnt see the gray areas you were referring to in your examples. Doing something in the name of God doesnt make it right. National never said that they wanted all the gays and atheists weeded out. We are under no mandate to search out undesirables within our program. For the sake of discussion please identify some of these gray areas. Packsaddle, Had to look up persiflage thanks I learned a new word today. You wrote; It is easy to imagine or remember situations in which our mistakes and deceptions cause problems. In some cases the most direct and just solution is indeed to commit one more careful deception. While (in agreement with Trevorum) this is inherently undesirable, the option of doing much greater damage through rigid devotion to truth may be even less desirable. Referring to it as one more careful deception means you know its wrong. Whether it will cause damage or not has no bearing on whether it is right or wrong. You go on to say; I have seen this in action, for example, where the 'zero tolerance' rules in schools are 'bent' to avoid tragic results in certain situations. This just says that the school administrators can not be taken at their word. The school does NOT have a Zero Tolerance Policy what they have is a loop hole which allows those in power to deal harshly with some offenders but not with others. The honorable thing to do would be to amend the policy, not bend it. Just because the results would be tragic does not make the bending of the rule right, once you start to bend you then have to rewrite the rule every time because you have already established that zero tolerance is a fallacy. The hard thing to do is rewrite the law, the easy thing to do is to justify breaking the law. If in the situation you are referring to the guilty parties violated the zero tolerance policy then bending the rule is an injustice to those who obeyed it and those who have been punished under it. If on the other hand the ruling body decided that the infraction didnt fall under the zero tolerance rule then the rule wasnt bent. But to say yes this is a clear infraction but we are going to ignore the rule in this case because the result of not ignoring the rule would be tragic sets precedent and should then be reason to amend the rule so that it is applied this way in the future. Rules may not be perfect but they should be applied equally and when they can't they should be changed so that they can be applied equally. LongHaul (This message has been edited by LongHaul)

Eagle63, Perhaps you missed the intent of this addition. This has nothing to do with the POR req. It addresses being in Command. If you want to fly you must solo, if you want to skipper a ship you have to take the Command. NeilLup, I agree this little pipe dream of ours would never make it past National, even though it is part of the current Sea Scout Program. I dont think it would be for any of the reasons you suggested though. I think National would realize that this would reduce the number of boys being awarded the Eagle Rank and that just wouldnt be acceptable. Addressing your five points, just how close does an adult have to be to a youth to make it acceptable? Unless we have a one to one ratio and we mentally handcuff adult and youth, there will always be a degree of separation. In the Sea Scout req. there are two adults, assumably capable of taking Command, on board ship during the exercise. In our troop we draw a white line down the middle of the campsite, adults on one side youth on the other. This could achieve the same result as the Sea Scout scenario. How much separation is too much becomes the issue and again that is already in place on every campout with less than a one to one ratio. Scoutmasters either accept the boy run concept or dont. Those that do wont have a problem making this req. work. As for point five my answer would be Not all boys are Eagle scout material. We are discussing and additional Eagle Rank requirement. LongHaul (This message has been edited by LongHaul)

Hunt Again we must define terms, I began my last post with the dictionary definition of "wrong". By definition it would be "wrong" to lie to the Nazis. What should we do? We should do the honorable thing and lie through our teeth with a smile on our face and sleep like a baby. My post was intended to point out that lying is lying no matter why you do it. It's when we say it isn't lying that we start on the slippery slope. Ignoring the policy as written is a breach of our agreement when we signed the adult application. When I invite Webelos' to camp with me at a Camporee it is against policy. If I say yes I know that but I see the benefit to the Webelos' as out weighing my breaking my agreement I have done what I believe is the honorable thing. You then judge my character by what I hold to be honorable. If instead I search for the wording loophole i.e. The Webelos are accompanying me on a Troop Overnight which just happens to coincide in time and place with the District Camporee, I've crossed the line because now I'm trying to say I'm not breaking my agreement. In my opinion this is not acting honorably it is deceitful. Right and Wrong is most often Black and White the grays are introduced because we need to justify the wrong things we do. The fact that we are trying to bend the wording or cloud the issues just shows that we knew it was wrong in the first place. LongHaul