bsa funding nationally and locally

[erjavecj]

I haven't had a chance to look through all the ongoing topics, so my apologies if this is already in discussion somewhere. Anyways, I'm presently trying to prepare a speech for a class about the BSA and its current funding/financial situation, namely in support of the BSA needing funds. One thing I'm aware of is that (to the best of my knowledge) the United Way has dropped annual contributions, as well as many corporate contributers. I'm not sure if that is limited to my own council or is a national action. One other thing I know of is that many councils have had to sell camp properties, likely because of financial reasons. I know for sure that my council is undergoing a committee run properties assesment to determine future action, which may include the sale of some properties. Any help at all will be greatly appreciated, first for preparation of the speech and I would like to know what is going on nationally as well, perhaps some others out there are too. If anyone knows of camps that have already been sold, I would be interested in knowing that as well. If you are compelled to give information of that sort, could you provide a state and council name incase there are multiple postings of the same camp. Thank you

[scoutldr]

Camp Chickahominy...Colonial Virginia Council, Newport News, VA

 

I know it's been sold to developers, but can't verify why.

[NJCubScouter]

The action by United Way in your area is not unique, but neither is it a "national action." Each local United Way chapter (or whatever they call them) is independent, has its own criteria and policies for funding and interprets and administers those criteria for itself. I just did an Internet search and found an article that said about 50 UW's had eliminated funding (other than to pass through dedicated contributions) for BSA programs. That article was from April 2002 (which to my astonishment, is now almost 2 years ago), so the number has probably grown. What percentage of the total chapters that is, I don't know, but 50 chapters obviously is signficant.

 

Different companies have taken different approaches as well.

 

As for sales of camps, I think it would be safe to say that virtually every sale of a camp is due to financial reasons either directly or indirectly, but it does not necessarily mean a council is in "financial trouble." In turn, a council could be in "financial trouble" for reasons having little or nothing to do with cutbacks in support. Consolidations of councils, often resulting from reductions in membership in a given area over many years, is a likely cause of camp sales. I have no statistics, but I do know that in 1999-2000 four councils in New Jersey merged into the Northern New Jersey council, and this was the culmination of a series of mergers over the years. Thirty years ago, there were probably more than 10 councils in what is now Northern New Jersey Council. (I started Scouting in a council consisting of the City of Newark and 2 smaller towns, and my father started in the Bayonne Council, consisting of one not-very-large city. By the end of the 90's these had been subsumed into the Essex County and Hudson County councils respectively, and finally these councils and two other county-wide councils became the one big council.) The result was that after the merger, one council had something like 11 camps (to my understanding, about 7 or 8 regular summer camps in New Jersey and the rest as high-adventure bases in far-northern New York state.) There is no way this council could support so many camps, and I know that at least one has been sold (over a certain amount of protest, but it was sold to a county-government-supported program that rents it out to various groups including the Boy Scouts, and except for the BSA logo being replaced by the Park Commission logo, and probably an increase in use-fees, it still looks very much like a Boy Scout camp.) Was this camp sold for "financial reasons"? Ultimately, sure, but the immediate cause was the reduction in BSA membership in that area, making it untenable to maintain 4 (or 10) councils, and for the same reasons, they did not need so many camps. So I would just caution you to be careful of "cause and effect" in your research.

[erjavecj]

NJCubScouter,

Thank you very much for that bit of information and insight. I don't doubt that the release of the property you mentioned was met with unpleasant feelings by those "alumni" of the camp, previous staffers, attendees, and others in association with it. I also would like to thank you for pointing out what I made less than obvious, is the cause/effect of such actions. My intention was the selling of properties as a direct result of insufficient funding for a council, due to whatever financial circumstances, where there may only be one or two properties. The cause of such a financial condition would possibly then be an effect of the UW or other corporate sponsors discontinuing funds. However, a surplus of properties, which unquestionably is indeed a financial circumstance, is of course a legitimate reason for giving up a camp since a quality program can still be offered with no loss to scouts and scouters. I'm glad to hear that despite selling the camp, the land remained intact and available for camping and recreation use instead of developement. Locally, rapid developement seems to be the main future for any large amount of land given up. Thanks again.

 

YIS,

Jerry Erjavec

[Bob White]

Jerry, you should really talk to your local District Executive. You have a lot of misconceptions about the financing of the BSA and local councils, and about the roll of the United Way.

 

BSA Council funding is totally separate of the national BSA. Each council has its own needs and resources. each county United Way is independent from its national office. In some communities scouting and other traditional UW organizations have seen diminishing funds. The reasons very from political to a growth of the number of organizations within a community getting a piece of the funding pie.

 

Camps are bought and sold across the over 200 BSA councils for a variety of reasons. It is an ongoing process that can change over time with the needs, program goals, and resources of a council.

 

You need more information than could possibly be shared in an internet post or even multiple posts. You need to sit down and talk to the people who deal with this on a daily basis. Contact a local scouting professional.

[Eamonn]

I don't know very much about National Funding. I know that there are a good number of people and companies that support the BSA national level. If you visit the BSA site there is a section about how you can support Scouting. I feel that there may be a need to do a better job in this area.

On a Council level the only Council that I can really talk about is the one that puts up with me. We are a small council with a little under 11,000 youth members. On one side of us we have a big Metro Council, while most of the others around the area are smaller. The budget for the council is $1.2 Million for 2004. A cut from $1.3 in 2003. We have for the last few years had a hard time balancing the budget. If it had not been for some out of the blue bequests we wouldn't have made it. We have not seen any cuts from the United Way and do have a good relationship with them. (We deal with two. One for each county.)

The main camping area for both Scouts and Cub Scouts is in a State Park. The land is on a long term lease. We have a lot of money tied up in buildings and equipment and have in fact just spent almost $200k on a new camp center. We own a camp which was donated to the council in the early 60's. At this time it is still very primitive. There are are couple of buildings, a few water wells and the bathrooms are outhouses. We would very much like to install and bring in city water, but if we do we fear that the near by farms would tap in and be sold off as sub-developments - Not the ideal setting for a camp. Last year we did sell off a small camp which had been donated. It was on the Maryland boarder and even more primitive then the primitive one!! The reason for selling it was that it just wasn't been used.

As a Council we do have a very healthy endowment fund which continues to grow because of really good management and continued donations.

Last year was a very tough year as far as donations went people were just not giving. The popcorn sale was down by 5%. So there is a certain amount of "Belt tightening" this year this goes hand in hand with a renewed spirit of we will do better this year. I have met with the district finance committee and we have set goals that are very specific. I know that the money is out there and I am willing to use all the negative stuff that is being said against the BSA to our advantage and prove that in our communities these people are just plain wrong. We are still the character building organization that we always have been and we are willing to put our money where our mouth is.

Eamonn