Good Evening,
This is my first post on this forum, I've read a number of the older posts and have found this forum to be very informative.
I have started this post several times now, and deleted several short novels and hope that this "brief" note will convey my thoughts and concerns.
We belong to a pack that would be considered dysfunctional at best. It has for years been run with the "good enough" mentality, and the pack leadership that has been around for a while is firmly intrenched in this mindset. Pack meetings are treated as an after thought. Council members refuse to communicate with each other. The pack schedule for the year was decided by one man who appointed himself the Pack Committee Chair and the other committee members (who don't/wont communicate) just follow his lead. The PCC is un-familiar with the new program and has no idea what is suppose to go on in the pack meeting.
Our pack membership has been declining ever since my oldest son joined; last year we had no Wolves, and only 2 Tigers. The lack of recruitment was blamed on the local council and changes made in our local school district. Being tired of the declining numbers and the poor leadership by our Tiger den leader last year, I was asked to take over the now Wolf den and to handle recruitment. Working with the local council staff we were able to add 15 to 20 new scouts (soccer is huge around here and we have a number of parents that have paid their membership but will not start the program until soccer ends) to our program this year.
Over the summer, I planned my den meetings. I nearly completed the Wolf Den Leader training in the old system until I realized that a new training system would be rolled out later this summer. I attended round tables, I familiarized myself with the new program; and as I did I began to realize how bad things were with our pack.
No one has EVER completed outdoor training. When I brought it up, no one had ever heard of it. We have "committee" members who aren't even registered members of the BSA, have never completed the required training let alone the YPT training. My wife and I went to the training day of another council to complete our Baloo training since our council will not offer it until the spring. We are trying to get our pack back on the straight and narrow but at every turn the more "experienced" leaders are dragging their feet.
I've talked to a few of the local council volunteers and I was told that well the council has been lax on enforcing the rules in the past and that change will happen but slowly and that the best solution would be to move to a different pack; the pack mentioned does have their stuff together. My problem is our new scouts. I personally went to the school and recruited these boys. I was on campus the other day for a meeting with my son's teacher and a few of the scouts saw me and were so excited telling their friends, "Thats my cub scout leader!" They are excited about the program and if it continues the way it has been going they will get discouraged and drop out. Our first pack meeting was so messed up that fewer than half of the scouts stayed for the entire meeting.
My sons and I can move, its not a huge deal. We have put a lot of blood, sweat, toil, and tears into getting ready for our den meetings and planning two other dens programs which did not have leaders yet. But its not about me and my wife, its about the boys. If we have to move to get a quality program then we will move. The rub comes in when you consider our new scouts. Several of them (maybe half or more) come from broken homes. Getting them to meetings takes a lot of effort on their Akala's part and if this program doesn't change they will not be able to simply move across town I cannot in good conscience move to another pack and leave our new scouts.
I am out of ideas to help change our program and I am hoping that my fellow Akalas will have some suggestions to save our program.
Frustrated in California
