SiouxRanger

“The moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it. -- Omar Khayyam. And to whomever has the poster name of "Just Ku Kluxin Around" you have a beyond offensive poster name. The Ku Klux Klan lynched innocents, yet your name makes it sound like the Klan is a light-hearted, jovial, carefree organization-except they are ruthless killers. And they made themselves feel empowered by taking on the defenseless. A pox on your house.

This one puzzling aspect of the bankruptcy: time barred claims being given any consideration whatsoever. I don't believe that the bankruptcy judge can make time-barred claims viable again. If the SOL has expired, time-barred claims are barred, and that is it, that is, at least as a matter of judicial compulsion. Having no legal interest in the bankruptcy proceeding, they do not have standing, and should have no vote. (Hence, my belief that claims should be vetted for viability prior to any vote.) Insurance companies won't support any payment by them to time-barred claimants. Insurance companies rely heavily on statues of limitation and whether the policy coverage type is claims-made or occurrence, and set premiums accordingly. To change policy terms after losses have been incurred (AFTER the result is known-vision is 20/20 in hindsight) and thereby obligate the insurers to pay claims which could never have been in the the formula for setting premiums and policy levels in the first place, is an unconstitutional taking of property without just compensation, in my opinion . Judge: "You agreed to build a 300 foot chain link fence for $5,000, but now that your customer is in bankruptcy, I am ordering you to build a 1,400 foot fence for the same money. Welcome to bankruptcy court." On the other hand, from a marketing perspective from National's point of view, National wants to appear that it is working to "equitably compensate survivors" it includes time-barred claimants in its Plan. "Hey, look- National is fighting for us-we are included in the Plan!" Well, there are several aspects to this: 1. National does not care how many claimants end up receiving an award. National's interest is in how much does National have to pay. Whether paid to one claimant, or 82,500 is of no concern to National. 2. The cynical view is that time-barred claimants were included in National's Plan and given a vote in order to constitute a huge block of voters who, having already learned that their claims are worthless in state court because they are time-barred, and thereby having nothing to lose, would vote to approve National's very "National favorable Plan," and coincidently very favorable to the time-barred-claimants who could turn worthless claims into cash with their vote. "We National, are really bothered by how long this is taking-let every claimant vote so we can get on with getting away from bankruptcy and let the Settlement folks sort it out later." As I have posted before, the law works on two principles: compulsion and agreement. The "grease" between them is threat (that is, leverage-"pressures" to my way of thinking. There can be many pressures and counter-pressures present at any given time, and each party involved can have their own evaluation of the degree of threat or pressure and counter-pressure.). So, there are two aspects to including time-barred claimants in the Plan. 1. On a compulsion theory: States that have not reopened their statutes of limitation, just might do so in the future-perhaps in response to the proceedings in National's bankruptcy. Claimants in those states would suddenly have valid, non-time-barred claims. I don't think that the insurers would be liable for those claims. I just don't see how a bankruptcy court can rewrite contractual obligations. That statutes of limitation were opened in any state amazes me. 2. On an agreement theory: Time-barred claimants are included in the Plan to receive a payment, on the hope that non-time barred claimants will approve (by agreement) the payment of some award to time-barred claimants. This still assumes that time-barred claimants have no vote, for the voting claimants will be lowering their recovery by agreeing that time-barred claimants receive a settlement. Letting someone who has no legal rights in a matter vote and control the outcome, particularly when they can vote a benefit to themselves with no legally enforceable right to compel payment of that benefit to themselves is legally absurd.

I have no doubt that you are right on both counts. The "bloated NEB" is likely right in line with BSA's "pay to play" for the distinction of being named to the NEB. In my council, no decisions of any consequence are ever presented to the Council Executive Board-at least in my day on theExecutive Board. And decades later, a senior professional with true talent asked me to go on the Executive Board to counteract the large number of Executive Board members who had no idea what was going on and lend direction and power to the Executive Board. I declined having 4 years of Executive Board participation and another 20± observing and always keeping a finger on the pulse. The Executive Board model, in my council is simply hopelessly ineffective. (I tend to spell out the "alphabet shorthand" so that folks who are not conversant, forum guests, can follow along more readily.)

So, an LC goes it alone. No suits are filed, so it "wins." Or, It gets hit by lawsuits in state court and after the usual preliminaries, decides to file bankruptcy. Its territory gets absorbed by another council, and Scouting continues. If the camp(s) and office lost are camp(s) and offices that should/could/ought be lost anyway-not much of a downside. The SE retires or is moved to replace a retiring SE, the DE's remain to serve the council's former territory...

I agree 100%. I've been mulling your "Bankruptcy will not end Scouting" tag for a long time. Existing (and prior) management, they may well kill Scouting-unless they go. The corporate culture that got Scouting to this point has to change-and that is only accomplished by a clean sweep. Will the shamed senior management remain in place to shout down junior level management's "we-told-you-so's?" National's management has been a catastrophic moral failure. That alone is reason enough for the clean sweep. Never mind the disastrous financial consequences, and the gutting of relationships with active volunteers (who understand all of this), CO's, and insurers. "You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency?" Attorney Joseph Welch to Senator Joseph McCarthy. Time for retirements and resignations. But the greatest damage done is National's denial and debasing of the principles it espouses.

In 1946, Dr. Louis Slotin, while demonstrating how to assemble two spheres of fissionable material, which together were enough for critical mass, slipped. He was using screwdrivers on a lab bench to keep the two spheres apart and thereby prevent a sustained nuclear reaction. When he slipped, the spheres connected, and he received a lethal dose.. It is called "tickling the dragon's tail." Mr. K might read "The Strange Death of Louis Slotin." Judges have very long memories.

I took Wood Badge a few years back. I did't get much guidance on designing my ticket. Staff was leaving it all rather vague-I think as a way to encourage participants to be creative and devise a ticket that wasn't influenced by WB staff (they did suggest refinements to my ticket items). It wasn't until into the second weekend that an off hand comment from a staff member finally showed me the reason they encouraged more than 5 ticket items though only 5 had to be completed to fulfill one's ticket. What if you only had 5 ticket items and for reasons beyond your control, it could not or ever be completed? Then you fail because you don't have a 6th, 7th, 8th...fallback item(s). Such as: "Form 5 new units in Americas 52nd state." That's great if 2 more states are added to the Union. But if not, you are done. "Have your troop's cub feeder pack Webelos attend 5 troop meetings (in preparation for crossover)." What if you invite the Webelos and they never show up? "Conduct a Klondike derby with sled racing, igloo building, ice fishing..." And you don't get sufficient ice or snow? (Plus there are only so many winter weekends, and even those are reduced by weekends available to the units you seek to invite. Just lots of conditions beyond your control.) So, your ticket ought to include more than 5 ticket items. Include the 5 "Grand Slam" ticket items you really believe will advance that part of the Movement in which you volunteer-and craft each item to reduce or eliminate conditions controlled by others and over which you have no control and which might cause you to fail to complete them. (Such as, "Help Tom put on 3 Round Table presentations." Tom gets run over by an errant Klondike sled and laid up. Hmmm. Better: "Assist with 3 Round Table presentations." Now, you are not limited by Tom's availability, nor are you limited to Tom's Round Table in Tom's district. You can assist with ANY Round Table in any district in your council, and any Round Table in the country for that matter. Not entirely what you had in mind, but at least can accomplish a ticket item doing something useful-and that's the point of it all.) Also include 4 or 5 items that, though they may not be as dear to your heart as your Grand Slammers, but which you can clearly complete without relying on anyone but yourself. Such as, "Write out a complete Eagle Scout Court Of Honor Ceremony and make it available to 5 troops." You write, you photocopy, you email or hand deliver it to 5 units and you are done. If you add the element of "and have it performed at an Eagle Court Of Honor," now you have to persuade a unit to actually use it-that is out of your control and adds a huge measure of uncertainty. What if the 5 units don't have an Eagle who needs a ceremony during your ticket window? Finally, a word on complexity and difficulty of ticket items. Your "Grand Slammers" should be items you know in your heart-of-hearts, will advance the Movement. Things that make a difference. That doesn't necessarily mean dozens of hours, or lots of expense. Your backup ticket items, No. 6-10± could be items that are less time-consuming, less complicated, involve fewer folks having to get on-board, perhaps even simple compared to the Grand Slammers. You'll have to obtain your WB staff approval, but having a simple ticket item or two in reserve is reassuring. Try to do all your Grand Slammers, but if you can't get them all, fall back to an easier one. I am sure WB as a concept would rather have an enthused, successful Wood Badge graduate than a disappointed and unsuccessful Wood Badge candidate. After all, this is a volunteer organization, and nothing is perfect. By way of examples: One of my items was to help my troop have better troop meetings, so I prepared a troop meeting planning form, put several dozen forms in a 3 ring binder clearly labeled, and then worked with the senior scouts to plan 12 meetings. Each month 4 meetings were planned. The scouts recorded their plan on the meeting forms, and then executed the meetings. To coordinate with meeting planning, one of my ticket items was to devise a number of troop activities (this reinforces my other goal of troop meeting planning by providing some of the activities to be used at the meetings they planned. For the disability awareness ticket item, I devised some games involving "impaired" scouts. I bought a bunch of safety glasses, then taped the lenses with electrical tape to restrict vision. Half the glasses were somewhat obstructed, and the other half were very restricted. So, I'd tape off a pair of glasses to leave a very narrow horizontal slit on one lens, and a very narrow vertical slit on the other. the scout would have to use the horizontal slit to watch things moving left and right, and the vertical slit to watch things moving up and down. Another pair I completely covered the lenses with tape, except for a single paper punch hole to look through-however, I intentionally offset the holes so that the scout could only look through one at a time. And there were other patterns. So, thus outfitted with these glasses, the scouts formed up into buddy teams and played a number of games involving tossing and bouncing tennis balls between them, their performances being scored by a couple of scout scorekeepers. The first set of games were played with the somewhat restricted glasses, and scores tallied, and then the games were replayed with the very restrictive glasses, and those scores tallied. The results were discussed with the scouts. The scouts had fun-pretty much chaos. Perfect. They were challenged-did something hard they could not have practiced for. Data was taken and discussed: scientific method. And they experienced a disability, safely, and learned how valuable good vision is. (I used to be a Bobwhite...")

Just about says it all, doesn't it?

Things happen in the legal realm either by agreement or by compulsion. One leverages an agreement out of the opposition by presenting a strong case of compulsion. Only National has filed bankruptcy, so when it filed bankruptcy, it was the only "party" to the proceeding and thereby subject to the compulsion of the court. Creditors (holders of business type, claims of a known amount), and Abuse Claimants (holders of claims of unknown amount) who receive notice can agree to become a party by filing a claim or can decide not to file a claim. Either way, they will be bound by the orders of the court. Where Creditors and Abuse Claimants of National are legally postured if they are not notified until after critical dates pass (the claim date), escapes me a bit. Assuming they have not received notice, if they are bound by the court anyway, it is a denial of the fundamental elements of due process and equal protection embodied in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments: notice, and an opportunity to be heard. National is attempting a sophisticated finesse. The LC's and CO's are not parties to the bankruptcy and thereby neither bound by court rulings nor directly entitled to the protection of a bankruptcy discharge. Except on account of National's finesse. Clearly, if a good measure of LC's and CO's are pushed into bankruptcy the chaos will be extreme as it would involve thousands of entities. So, National's finesse is using Nationa's assets, LC assets, CO assets, and insurer's assets to assemble a basket of funds so attractive to Abuse Claimants that they will AGREE to release the LC's and CO's from their abuse claims even though those entities have not filed bankruptcy. "Attractive" can mean any or all of: an acceptable monetary award, sense that all responsible are paying something, avoidance of state court proceedings on a case-by-case basis, resolution now instead of years from now, etc. The LC's and CO's not being debtors should be liable to suit being filed against them despite National's bankruptcy. When a petition in bankruptcy is filed it operates as a stay of legal proceedings against the debtor. The stay should have no bearing on the LC's and CO's which have not filed their own bankruptcy. Abuse claimants may be forbearing suit against LC's and CO's at the moment awaiting the outcome of National's bankruptcy.

In a single council? Nationally?

That comment triggered a spontaneous chuckle. It is sad however, that individuals who have risen to the SE level are so deficient.So man of them. Of my council's last 5 SE's, 3 of them evoked the "Champagne Kill Goodbye." And, just anecdotal, for how many councils can any one of us experience in any depth, but enough anecdotes posted here can show a trend. Well, this is actually encouraging. I don't think any of my council's DE created units were anything but phantom. I would be very interested if you could post the 10 or 12 steps a DE was to follow to create a new unit. That there is a "process" is encouraging. At least someone has thought it all through. And thanks for your contributions to the Movement. It lives irrespective of the BSA.

My recollection is that there was huge BSA membership fraud. Way back to A. G. Barber's day. The United States Postal Marshalls raided Circle Ten's offices seeking membership records, and the Atlanta Council, I believe, agreed to strike somewhere around 14,000 names from its membership role. Mames aybe c. 2000±? Whichever council it was, struck more names than registered in my council. A huge scandal. And BSA gets a "pass." "Well, anyone can make a mistake." The day of BSA getting a "pass" has passed.

Got to show a 2% growth to Congress. (I think 2% is National's Standard for annual growth). Knowing not where else to mention this: Does anyone here have experience observing a DE actually creating a bona fide "new unit?" In my council, phantom units appeared on the books, but they never functioned at all. I was told by a reporter that a group of kids who toured the newspaper's printing facility were all required to fill out a Scouting Application before the tour. Behold: "A NEW UNIT," and the miracles continue unabated. Yet the ship still sank.

My version of this site must be broken, as I tried to upvote in scientific notation, something on the order of X times 10 to the seventh, but it would not work. I have not heard anything from my council nor from my many contacts about the bankruptcy and its effect on my council, and I maintain constant contact with many of them. Finally, my council's last SE, had, I believe, 27 DE's leave during his term of office of 5 years. We have 5 districts with one DE per district. His departure was not mourned by volunteers or professionals alike. No one I have met in our council had a good thing to say of him.

In my 10 year applicable year range, the candidates "offered" were 100% manipulated. I have NO confidence in any B..S.A. governance document. (I have read all of them-they are trash legal drafting, unless you represent National. Then they make perfect sense.)

I find this to be a very curious comment. So, perhaps, could it be, that the "Duty to God" element was introduced to U.S. Scouting to entice religious denominations to accept the Chartered Organization role on a denomination-wide basis? And, perhaps, so adopted because the SOLE religious denomination in Great Britain was the Church of England (courtesy of some arrogant King), but in America, many denominations were active and Constitutionally NEVER to be circumscribed. Does anyone have any further insight beyond my limited knowledge?

Don't take CS seriously the minute he/she departs from commenting on btcy pleadings.

What I know of Mosby comes largely from this forum. But I see a pattern here, and it troubles me. My experience with my local council, at district and council level, was that when there was bad news to deliver to a volunteer (we no longer want you to be Chairperson of District Boy Scout Outdoor...etc.) the appropriate level professional, DE, or mid level council staffer, would recruit a volunteer senior to the volunteer to be ousted, and have the senior volunteer to the dirty work. Thereby, the face of the "ugly" would be that of a volunteer, not a professional. I saw it time and again. And so, Mosby, not of the Movement, it appears to me that he has been hired as the "senior volunteer" in my example, to deliver the bad news and he will be out the door when the dust settles. He may or may not be complicit in this. And thereby, senior National staff will remain nameless and faceless. (So, the proof of my prediction will be how long does Mosby stay on post-bankruptcy?)

My understanding is that when there is an SE vacancy, Area or Region submits the names of 3 SE candidates along with documentation regarding those 3 candidates. The LC search committee is limited to selecting one of those 3 candidates, and are to consider nothing other than the documentation provided by Area/Region, and interviews with the 3 candidates, and make their selection based on solely that. In fact, a search committee member had a good scouter friend in the council of one of the 3 candidates and contacted that good scouter friend for inside information, and when that contact became known to Area/Region, the search committee was told never to do that again. Considering that only 2 of the last 5 SE's were considered good and 3 were considered horrible, by both volunteers and many professional staff, the appearance is that Area/Region selects the 3 candidates on its criteria, such as, (who deserves a promotion, who needs to move on having worn out their welcome in their current council, and occasionally, they have sent a good one. But with a 5 year average term of office here, we have had 15 years of bad SE's over 25 years. Only ONE SE put any money into fixing up a deteriorating camp. So, 20 years of camp neglect. It sounds as if your experience is several levels above mine, which may explain the difference in view and likely our opinions. I have no doubt that there are many good scouters trying to make things work and improve them. And I understand the governance documents of National to troop and pack level. Things don't work in real life the way they are laid out on paper. My understanding is that an SE's salary is set by Area/Region/National. That the EC or EB has nominal control, it is not exercised. It is not meaningful control. No professional in my council makes anything but token efforts to run a decent program at summer camp. This summer the site manager told me of basket weaving materials being ORDERED during the second week of camp. They never arrived in time. Woodcarving knives and chisels were in horrible condition and would not cut even carvable wood. A volunteer came out and sharpened them so they were ready for the second week of camp. The total cost of all these materials and new carving tools was probably no more than $1,000. Per National's bankruptcy Exhibits, our council has some millions in liquid assets-cash and cash equivalents. And our camp had shortages of program materials.

So, this may be the best recruitment year in the last 3 or so? Maybe there will be a post-covid, bankruptcy-pending rebound.

This is just another of those aspects of all of this which has so many levels. From my understanding of compensation, governance, and promotions, successful fundraising does not increase the salary of any staff member of an LC. Directly. I am not aware of "commission" income based on fundraising. However, it is also my understanding that the SE, at least, and likely any Development Director, are judged as far a job performance on the success of LC fundraising. That might lead to an incremental raise, but the big money is an SE being promoted to a larger LC with a larger staff and greater income, and a Development Director being promoted to an SE of a small council. And, of course, the junior staff may get promoted up the ladder within the LC, and a new SE will come from outside the LC. And earning a Quality Council Award-I don't know-but expect that it includes fundraising goals, which if met, enhance promotion prospects. If anyone has specific knowledge of specific metrics, please enlighten us.

I'll just say, people are not machines. It is very difficult to tell masses of folks to do one thing, and then, when conditions change, flip the switch and expect a complete reversal of the momentum. There is likely to be loss of CO's, scouts, parents, and leaders after any reversal. People will have moved on or be fatigued by the whole mess.

Tiring, isn't it;?

Back in the Jere Ratcliff era, I read or heard from a scouter that the combined salary of the CEO of The Salvation Army and top aide (his wife) was $86,000. (per year). My SE is making over $100,000 in deferred compensation (per year).

@Gilwell_1919: If Churchill had said it, it would be called "oratory."