PACAN

2) Merit Badge Counselors will be now be picked by a select council panel and Merit Badge Counselors will now be available to every scout/scout troop in the entire council area instead of just a local district option.. Other than what is a "select council panel", this is essentially Chapter 7 of the Guide to Advancement. It didn't say if they were going to eliminate MBCs which would be foolish. The Council Advancement Committee is the approval authority for MBCs. There are badges listed in the GTA with specific qualifications needed. Most times approval is passed to the District Advancement Chairman and the app is signed by the SE or DE. They are eliminating the Troop only option which is good especially for badges that there are few MBCs. MBCs always have the option to tell a scout they aren't available right now.

Some other random thoughts I don't care about any particular categorization of professionals or volunteers. What I want to see from all these folks is customer service by answering in a reasonable time not weeks (if at all) after the question . Even an interim answer vice crickets is okay. Also having accurate information as particularly the Commissioner force is not current (e.g didn't know there was a Guide to Advancement). Wood badgers that never do much after their beading. This is supposed to be a group that the council can turn problems over to and come up with solutions. Back to numbers carebear covered the urban scouting "accounting " girl units....the push to get numbers of units resulting in 5 troops of 5 or even less instead of building one strong unit like cburkhardt sets up units struggling to meet and get outdoors or even recharter. JMHO

Good grief.

If the professionals would actually trust the volunteers (they aren't bonded or we might get sued if something went wrong) to do the "mundane" tasks maybe the DE could focus on the important stuff. Is the job title "executive" even mean anything or is it a "feel good" title? Like the companies that have more VPs than workers. The definition of an executive is : senior managerial responsibility in a business organization. carebear told us in another post that the professionals don't really get any training on the people (volunteers) they are supposed to have managerial responsibility for or any real customer service training. 40 hours a week for an executive is wishful thinking....I have been an executive in many organizations most way more than any DE including the new CSE (or whatever) and thousands of employees. Never saw a 40 hour or even a 60 hour week. JMHO

@carebear3895 Incredible. Thanks for explaining what I guessed. How long has the "method of membership accounting" been going on? How do you register a scout without the parent signature? Do these scouts actually follow the program? I guess this is also now a way to beef up the female numbers as well??? Our scoutreach numbers went up almost 300 in December so we "grew" in 2019. This tactic could wipe out the LDS leaving in about 15 minutes. Anyone else that has this program see similar results?

@carebear3895. What is the deal with urban scouting and how they are accounted for in the membership stats? I thought this was going into elementary schools and essentially signing up all the boys and they might meet after school but almost none of them ever seem to stay to Boy Scouts ? Their fees are paid by whom? Quick way to add numbers? Seems like they would be a separate category like LFL.

Thanks carebear3895 and Eagle94 and Jameson for your info. This inability to retain professionals (good ones anyway) is something critical the new CSE needs to fix asap. Of course he has no control of the council's personnel actions. We have gone through so many DEs the volunteers joke about "he won't be here long). Maybe they need to use the same model used to hire Mr. Mosby and use that to hire SEs from outside the organization especially for failing councils and/or mergers about to come.

Since Mr. Mosby's intro included mentioning 33 years of volunteer service, I'm guessing he has experienced or heard of the issues in the majority of these posts. Some of these I lay at the feet of the respective Executive Boards to actually do something to correct them. Most are name only, haven't been associated with a unit for sometimes years and serve as lemmings to the professionals. For one of our resident professionals, Carebear....do professionals get any training in customer service or how to work with a volunteer workforce? Seems like they tell you what you want to hear and then forget it.

What is the difference between the top numbers and the "sub district " ones? Not heard the term sub district used. wonder how many boys dropped since these numbers include girls?

While I'm sure we all wish him to succeed there are a few questions that need to be addressed (bankruptcy and solvency aside): 1. Will he have any real authority to do anything or will it get buried in the current organization morass and Executive Board "rules"? 2. Will be be able to flip the organization upside down where the professionals work for the customers (scouts)? 3. Will he be able to get a "one team" organization since now the councils are their own feifdoms and run from any hard issues with national. e.g. Not our fault, national raised the rates. 4. For the functions proposed to be shed from national back to councils, can the councils actually do the work since they all cry poor mouth and no staffing for what they are supposed to do now. Surely all councils will impose a fee for these "new services" 5. Will he be able to eliminate poor councils, force mergers, property sales and allow units to pick the council that best suits their needs meaning councils have to earn the unit's business? 6. How will he fix the National culture ? We all report bad or non existent service and when we do, it is made our fault, or our responsibility to fix or asked to just go away. 7. And the last, hire some "outsiders" into the Scout Exec positions at the council level. JMHO.

Oops. 9.0.2.7

The Troop Committee decides how they want to handle approvals on Eagle Proposals. GTA 9.0.1.7

If you know your unit the JTE form should take no more than 10 minutes to fill it out. Districts want you to fill it out because it is one of the JTE items they get judged on. They don't necessarily do anything with the form except file it. councils can get Gold if they are Silver points in all categories. The 2020 form has a caveat about not counting LDS losses.

@carebear3895 It doesn't work the other way either. A poorly run council or one that violates the charter agreement doesn't get shut down by National and units are trapped to move to other councils by the geographic franchise rule.

I heard that some councils will be changing their names to Leave No Trace council numbers x, y, z etc on December 31st. 😉

@ValleyBoy Returned to council with letters yes. Sent to National no. Application is electronically sent to national 99% of the time. SEs like to flip through their project binders prior to signing the application.

@mrkstvnsThanks.

Pardon my lack of knowledge but does the GS have a required YPT course like the BSA does? And are GS leaders mandated reporters? Thanks.

@shortridge Amen to that. My beef with commissioners are they don't stay current with what's actually going on in the program and telling units absolutely false information which is particularly dangerous to newer units. The biggest problem of course is that there would be no one working on their Doctorate of Commissioner Science...the dumbest thing the BSA has. Also they need to hire from the outside for senior positions. Get from expertise from financial, change management and IT to fix these long standing functional and organizational issues. The Franchise model the BSA uses which traps units in poorly run councils/districts needs to go. Why not let units sign on with councils for service with any council that provides them with better than they get locally, in other words get councils to earn your business by treating you as a customer...not the other way around. Just my big nirvana thoughts.

@ParkMan These are all things that have been said on the forums/blogs. Instead of quoting those folks Individually I just wanted to show the wide range of reactions to the fee increase. Clearly the WTH one has the most hits.

From going through various forums and blog: The Don't worry be happy..."we have a benefactor who is paying the 2000 increase.....nothing to see here" The ones getting a council bail out or assistance vs the crickets The OMG...we are out of business. thanks BSA The WTH...how incompetent is national announcing this just before recharters. No Transparency with the risk analysis. A lot of folks concurring with this one. The look down the nosers ...It's only $5 a month or two cups of coffee, suck it up not knowing the individual financial situation of others or volunteering to pay it for them. The "it's a bargain" compared to sports ..of course never actually calculating the total annual cost of scouting and comparing apples to oranges. Probably a few others.

Ask your DE how you can tap into this magic assistance fund the BSA put in their announcement. we all know that both national and councils completed a comprehensive risk analysis on the effects of this decision.

Are adults who are just MB counselors still no charge?

@mds3d Letting us know your EP was 2002 would have been good to know. The Current procedures were started in 2011.

Back on topic...I saw a facebook post from a SE which points out the glaring disconnects between the National and Council organizations. He says he has to wait by the phone on the 23rd just like everyone else. All SE's have a weekly conference call with National every sunday. For the over 250 SEs which are the direct contacts of the 2M BSA customers to have zero idea what is going to happen to their operations is ridiculous if true. If they haven't done their own risk analysis on the impacts to their operations shame on them. They have to know each dollar increase, especially if off the rails, which be one less dollar for them and likely a loss of membership and units. They also pay a $1000 Charter fee to the BSA, unless you turn your paperwork in on time (silly) will that also be increased?