A big Pinewood Derby Slap in the face

[cajuncody]

I apologize up front for the tone of this post. I am angry, livid, furious . . . Words can not describe the way I feel right now. I promise you all that this will be my last post on Pinewood derby cars.

I called National today about the missing cars. Remeber that letter they promised me they were sending to all of the councils? Well it seems that someone at national thinks that it would be inappropriate or offensive for the SE's to get a letter like that about something missing from the luncheon (maybe they would imply they stole something) so they are simply not going to contact any councils at all. I have been lied to and given the run around for over a month now and it all comes down to the fact that these 34+ cars are missing and no one really gives a flying flip about them at all. PC keeps them from asking.

I have received many PM's from folks with the utmost confidence that National would put a significant effort in to locating these cars and that we scouters being the upstanding folks that we are they would be found. Guess what, not going to happen.

It would be different if they tried to locate them and failed, at least an effort would have been put forth. They aren't even going to try. And the big slap in the face about it is that they are going to send a letter to the ones whose cars are missing along with two car kits and tell them that if they want to make a car for the museum that they can and national will foot the bill for shipping. These boys already made a car for the museum once and now they have the audacity to say "DO over", I don't think so! How uncouth can someone be!

This stinks doesn't even begin to describe this situation. Maybe Juris was right about the BSA Inc.

Kristi

[Prairie_Scouter]

Kristi,

You'd think that National would do better. Just further confirms for me that, at the National office level, Scouting isn't necessarily "about the boys".

 

And, telling the boys that they can build another car for the museum is just moronic. Now, THAT's a letter that shouldn't be sent out.

 

I can't imagine why they couldn't just do the simple task of at least contacting the councils. What would it be, 10 minutes of work to put together a simple form letter and generate some mailing labels?

 

You can be sure that an article will pop up some time in the Scouting magazines about the national Pinewood Derby. I wonder if they'll conclude the article by telling everyone how they lost the cars and then refused to do anything about it?

 

I'm getting ticked off just thinking about it!

[evmori]

Kristi,

It sucks when you are let down like that. You would think National would step up to the plate & admit if they made a mistake or lost them or tell the truth about what happened. Kinda make ya wanna drive to Irving & give 'em what for, huh? I feel for ya!

 

I'm gettin' steamed and it's doesn't even involve me!

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[SemperParatus]

Why don't the 35 families involved draft a letter to be signed by all to send to the SE's. Clearly, bsa national could care less.

[Fuzzy Bear]

Let me see, the leaders first use the cars as a centerpieces on the tables instead of displaying them appropriately up front, then other leaders steal them because they think centerpieces should be stolen, then the leaders of the program discover the cars are missing but then they think better about confronting other leaders with their thefts and the sponsors own stupidity, then they try to give the Scouts new car kits for a do-over but without as much as an apology for the multiple injustices served up to several honored youth.

 

This reads like a story about a big bear turned loose in a china shop. I still have to give them credit for not being able to find their own tail with both paws.

 

Please tell your son that not all grown-ups have brains the size of small marbles and are equally discourteous to boot. This program is all about the Scouts and most of us understand and act on that concept regularly.

 

FB

[nldscout]

If I was a betting man, I would bet that they cars were not stolen.

 

While I agree it was a hair brained idea to display them the way they were, I bet they were swept up with the trash and dumped and now no one wants to admit it.

 

 

[GopherJudy]

Kristi,

 

I'm so sorry to hear the answer that you were given & you have every right to be angry. I don't know why they were used as centerpieces in the first place, whoever thought of that was an idiot. It's a real shame.

 

Judy

[orennoah]

This isn't right. National has compounded negligence and stupidity with dishonor. They should be ashamed.

 

My suggestion is that you use google to get the mailing addresses of each BSA council office (and, if available, the names of the Scout Executives). I would then write each of them a letter, explaining the problem (and National's actions/inactions, if you so desire), enclosing a photo of the affected Cubs and asking for their assistance in locating and returning the cars. Heck, I would even send a cc of each letter to National.

 

Don't let them sweep this under the rug. The Cubs deserve so much more!

 

- Oren

[Fuzzy Bear]

nldscout,

 

It never occurred to me that the cars had not been stolen but instead had been swept out with the trash while the sponsors stood around in the hallway chatting and slapping themselves on the back and applauding their great job with their dinner. They probably will be promoted.

 

FB

[NIscouter]

I read this thread Friday and got a BIG lump in my throat. My eyes started to cross and my mind snapped. Boom, I went to the BSA website to put in my 2 cents to National. There was NO e-mail contact for National, surprise, surprise. I wallowed around a bit and hit upon an idea. Go to "Scouting" mag and leave a messege in the letter to the editor section. So I did. I recommend that all of you who are as outraged at this behavior by National as I do the same. If these guys at National were in my troop, they would have had a number of SM conferences on living the Scout Oath and Law by now!

 

[Edited part - My error was saying "Scouter" mag instead of "Scouting".](This message has been edited by NIscouter)

[cajuncody]

Thanks for the idea. I hadn't thought of that.

Unfortunatly most of the scouts with missing cars probably don't know that their cars are missing yet. Maybe if alot of us here send an email to scouting mag it will make up for the boys who don't have a chance to send in an email.

Kristi

[Lynda J]

I ask in the original post. Was this dinner catered. Was there servers that set up the tables and served the meal. If that is the cast I can almost bet that the cars were thrown out.

Had this happen several years ago with a car club Iam a member of. We had displayed material that our national office sent to us. We wanted to keep it. The people that catered the dinner simply took the throw away table cloths and scooped them up with everything inside and dumped them. By the time we realized this our material was gone.

But I still think that National has a responsibility to at least do some checking.

Get people to write to National asking why they are doing so little to try to find the cars. And don't do it with one letter signed by everyone that has cars missing. Every person should send a letter. One letter with a bunch of names doesn't make as big a file as every person on that list sending their own letter.

Believe me. Been there done it. The more letters they get the more attention it receives

[cajuncody]

The dinner was served by the staff at the meeting hall. All of The cars were supposidly removed before the clean up staff arrived. I would love the have everyone with a missing car send a letter but National won't give me a list of people with cars missing, or a list of people who sent cars. They also won't give me the address list for all of the councils or the phone numbers. Any info I am getting is coming from the internet. I simply have no way of contacting anyone else with a missing car as I don't know who they are. Thus is my quandry.

Kristi

[Cubmaster Mike]

Your last post raises a good point about the lack of addresses. How come nobody else has stepped forward on this forum and expressed outrage at their own missing cars? Could it be that the others got their cars back or some other assistance?

 

Take matters into your own hands. write your own letters to the councils. Write Scouting mag. Send a letter to the dinner organizer and cc your council exec. Write a letter to your congressional rep and cc your council exec and the dinner organizer. Good luck.

 

CMM

[Lynda J]

I might suggest that you write to Boys Life and Scouting magazines. You could ask if anyone has any information about the missing cars. You might also ask for anyone else with missing cars to contact you. You might also offer a reward.