Chapter 11 announced - Part 3 - BSA's Toggle Plan

[Eagledad]

31 minutes ago, ThenNow said:

Like others who have similarly unleashed on me (personally), you really have no idea what I did or did not "invest into the program" and continue to assume. I would ask you not do that, please.

As I said before, why are you here? 

Barry

[ThenNow]

1 hour ago, Owls_are_cool said:

I'll put you on the side that wants my son to pay instead of those responsible.

This is what you said. You put me on a "side." You've not read my posts nor, I guess, seen those about me from others on your "side." Do I think perpetrators should've been or should be punished? Yup. Did I try? Yup. Do i think the BSA has vicarious liability? That is irrelevant. The law says they do. That's where we find ourselves. Both of us. All of us. I would go into the "what if" your son were me (albeit me 50 years ago), but that's probably not worth it. Most people tell me it would make no difference. I'm not saying you would, but still.

5 minutes ago, Owls_are_cool said:

All I did is point out is that the lawsuit will punish the scouts in my troop and punish the adults associated with the troop who invested time and money into the program. The wrong people are being punished.

I'm sorry, but you don't know my story, you don't know my history subsequent to my departure from Scouting, you don't know what I have or haven't invested in the program and you don't know how I ended up a claimant in this case. The vast majority of that has already been said here though it's definitely a spelunking expedition to find it all. I don't care to re-re-reiterate. 

[ThenNow]

22 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

As I said before, why are you here? 

Ha. Refer to the posts by others, please. This is starting to get humorous. I'm making a tick chart of all the times I get blasted or asked to leave, in multiple ways.

Eagle1993

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Posted Thursday at 02:14 PM On 4/8/2021 at 10:39 AM, Eagledad said:

"But, I don't know why you are even here."

I'll do my best to explain what I have seen in this thread, so hopefully I don't misconstrue the message.  The one thing I would say about @ThenNow is that it does seem that he cares about the BSA and sees the value of the program.  He has mentioned how impressed he is by what he sees from many of the comments .... volunteers who spend much if not most of their free time working to provide children an experience that is unique and provides life long value.  That said, he was sexually abused in the worst way by his Scoutmaster.  No one within the BSA prevented it or took action (as far as he can tell).  I think its good for us to hear from victims that don't simply say lets eliminate the BSA.  It doesn't mean you or anyone has to agree with everything or anything said, but it's not bad to hear the message.

Now there are victims out there that are simply saying end the BSA.  I would agree with you that there is no point for them to join our forums.  @ThenNow doesn't seem to be in that group.

David CO

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Posted April 8

  On 4/8/2021 at 10:39 AM, Eagledad said:

The BSA and it's members are not your problem or enemy.  

Anyone who completed the Boy Scout program from 11 to 17 has a valid right to express his opinions on scouting.  

Edited April 14, 2021 by ThenNow

[RememberSchiff]

16 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

As I said before, why are you here? 

Barry

Maybe because I asked him to stay. 

 

So blame me. I'm Spartacus.

RS

[DavidLeeLambert]

So I read through the new Plan, and the major differences from before are:

• An estimate of total abuse liability from $2.4 billion to $7.1 billion, prepared by Bates & White after analysis of a statistical sample of the abuse claims and comparison with "comparable" settlements and judgements
• The Trust Distribution Procedures, with a rough guide to how much different levels of abuse would relatively be worth, and a list of factors the Trustee might use of increase or decrease a particular claimant's payout
• The "Toggle Plan", under which neither COs nor LCs would pay in anything, and would get no releases of liability; but might still be drawing insurance against the same policy limits
• An "Expedited Distribution" of $1500 cash for claimants who vote for the plan and choose that option

Page 172 of the Plan (179 of the PDF) gives the following estimates of recovery for the abuse-claimant class...

Under the Global Resolution Plan: Estimated Percentage Recovery 8-23% plus insurance rights, expected to yield up to 100% recovery.

Under the BSA Toggle Plan: 1-4% plus insurance rights, expected to have limited value.

In Chapter 7: 0.0% - 0.2% (yes, that's fractions of a percent)

Also,

• The expected Local Council contribution is now $455 million, up from $300 million. The increase and the not-so-round figure suggests that it's an actual total of tentatively-committed feasible amounts per Council, not just a wild guess.

I'm still not clear on whether the Plan can go forward if some, but not all, of the LCs participate; or why a CO would participate, and how likely any of them are to do so.

I note there's still an absence of concrete commitment to additional outside oversight of YPT, or additional protections, or limits on executive compensation. Even though the TCC already published the claim-counts by state, Council, and CO, I think the plan disclosure would be more informative if it included graphs and charts reflecting those statistics.

But I think the new Plan is a move in the right direction.

[skeptic]

Let me simply ask please.  

Can anyone realistically;

Make any of the claimants whole, if their claims are accurate?

How much effect was there from families if the report was made?

How much outside pressure from societal forces occurred when reported?

How, especially when BSA was not yet a required reporter, were they to override the community responses common at the time?

Today, IF the actual perpetrator(s) or even their families are still around, is anything being done to bring them into the case?  And, if the facts should suggest that the family, or someone in it, was aware of the propensity that led to the abuse, should they too then be held accountable along with the BSA, any authorities that chose to look away or pass it off as minor?

Can ANYONE seriously suggest that killing the BSA and other youth serving organizations EVER STOP perpetrators?  NO; they are part of human nature, though the darker part.  

Should this whole mess lead to a complete restructuring of our legal system so as to take away much of the good old boy, money, and power factors?inally, can most of us with rational thought really want the current youth to be punished for the crimes of past adults and organizational problems?

 

For me, the answer to most of these is no, other than the last one, realistically.  Further, the ruin of the BSA will serve no purpose, other than that of the vulture lawyers.  ALL of us with any kind of longevity know that the community good the BSA gives far outweighs most of this.  We also know that BSA is only a target among many, but one the lawyers found easier to attack.  Now some of them are already salivating over the Y, Boys and Girls Club, and 4-H, as well as GSA.

 

[elitts]

7 minutes ago, Eagle1993 said:

 

That should determine liability regardless of any systemic issue.

The second question ... should the BSA have recognized, through their massive file system and decades of reports, that there was an epidemic of sex abusers within the BSA ranks.  Should they have seen that simply removing and keeping leaders removed, after the fact, was no longer sufficient.  If they should have realized there was an epidemic of sex abuse, then I agree they are liable for ALL cases.  I think many claimants would state that BSA should have realized they had a systemic problem and fixed it proactively (perhaps we better vetting, random checks, etc.).  So ... my question ... did the leaders within BSA know (or should have known), at some point, that they had a problem but the solutions were too painful so they didn't implement change?  To me, that is the $10B question.  If that answer is yes, then we deserve the losses.

Unfortunately, our court system isn't great at working these out at a reasonable cost, so we are in bankruptcy.  All we are left to settle on is how much & when.  

I'm sure that's one of the core arguments for liability; the problem with conducting this analysis, as I see it, is threefold:

1. It appears to be very difficult for most people to consider the issue in the context of the time in which it was occurring.  I regularly read comments and posts (not necessarily on here) from people talking about how "The BSA should have always been doing background checks" or "There's no excuse for not letting other agencies know someone was a pedophile".  This of course ignores the fact that until the 1990s, there wasn't really such a thing as a background check (outside of the government) because electronic data storage and retrieval wasn't a thing.  And even then, most government agencies didn't start being able to effectively share data until the 2000s.
2. Many people, including some on here, tend to operate from a standpoint of thinking "Any cases of sexual abuse are too many and mean someone hasn't done enough", and so when they consider steps that might/should have been taken, everything that was done and is being done is automatically insufficient, because if any child is still at risk, we aren't doing enough.  But in reality zero cases of abuse is an impossible goal and any evaluation of preventive measures must take that into account.  The ONLY way for any youth serving program to guarantee no child is ever abused "on their watch" would be to shut the program down.  So any rational standard for evaluating abuse will HAVE to allow for the idea that sometimes someone will still be sneaky enough to slip through the cracks.
3. We don't actually know what the incidence of abuse was over the past 100 years within other youth serving organizations in order to know how the BSA compares.  From what I've read, most other organizations didn't even bother to collect and consolidate data on abuse allegations until 20-30 years ago.

[RememberSchiff]

4 minutes ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

...

Under the Global Resolution Plan: Estimated Percentage Recovery 8-23% plus insurance rights, expected to yield up to 100% recovery.

Under the BSA Toggle Plan: 1-4% plus insurance rights, expected to have limited value.

In Chapter 7: 0.0% - 0.2% (yes, that's fractions of a percent)

 

What do these % reference?

[ThenNow]

2 hours ago, elitts said:

Scouts was never 100% safe.  Just like sports, the promise is only "this program is as safe as it reasonably can be while doing dangerous activities and deliberately having scouts interact with a variety of other adults on both group and individual levels"

We're talking about sexual abuse, not monkey bridge height restrictions or the dreaded and verboten dodge ball. 

2 hours ago, elitts said:

Scouts has never (at least since I became involved in  the 1980s told parents "please drop off your kids and leave, we'll take care of everything".  In every troop I've ever been a a part of they've been desperately looking for adults to stay and get involved. (barring of course the parents who can't watch or help without going overboard)

This was in quotes and pretty clearly meant to magnify a point. As per your fellows, 20% of the parents help. A few wander around and watch, then leave. A goodly number drop and run. This is what I was told.

Also, by the by, that's not even what I actually said. This is: "It's all good. We got this. You can trust us 100%!" It was about the perception of parents. Not involvement. So, by implication, parents are involving their kids and thinking, "Hm. Crap. My kid might be abused while they go out in the woods. Hm. 20% chance? 2%. It's fine. We'll see what happens." 

2 hours ago, elitts said:

Fees paid for entry and services are very clearly identified as going to pay for administrative operations, program development and materials, NOT a robust system of safety checks and other measures to keep the kids safe as a bug in a rug. [emphasis mine]

And, the parents and public perceive it as such? Does the BSA waving the YPT Is the Platinum Standard banner far and wide indicate anything to the contrary? Maybe. Just maybe. Ok. It does. And, we're talking about sexual abuse, thus I mention YPT, not whittling. 

2 hours ago, elitts said:

I've never seen Scouts advertised as "Clean and wholesome".  They advertise that a good Scout should strive to be Clean (and everything else in the Scout Law) and that those are the ideals we try and instill in the youth, but in day to day practice?  Only a complete idiot would think you could do anything with a group of boys, with limited parental involvement, and have it be strictly "clean and wholesome".  At the very least, I would hope no parent is that naive. (You've been listening to a certain other user's rants about organizational "hypocrisy" too much)

What? Are you kidding me? I don't know of another organization other than the Youth Group at the local Holiness Church (casting NO aspersions) set forth as more "clean and wholesome." Call me a "complete idiot." Oh. You already did. Never mind...

2 hours ago, elitts said:

The BSA doesn't "anoint" Scoutmasters or other leaders, they merely do a basic check for obvious problems with a person and then put their name on the list.  This is also fairly clearly spelled out.

Anoint effectively means to, "set apart to fulfill a calling." If my Scoutmaster and Executive weren't set apart among the others and seen as such by parents, volunteers and Scouts then I'm 6'6" and play for the Chiefs.

2 hours ago, elitts said:

The BSA doesn't regularly recruit "staff" for direct involvement at the troop level.  The local council may occasionally direct a volunteer without a home to a troop in need, but it's still strictly voluntary.

Fair enough. Delete that point.

[DavidLeeLambert]

5 minutes ago, RememberSchiff said:

What do these % reference?

As I understand it, the amount that the claimant could get if they took their case individually though settlement or a jury verdict, on the merits of that case alone, not limited by the amounts due all other claimants.

So for example, consider the following pleading by a claimant lawyer who posted the exact same document twice to the docket (once for each of his two clients; although maybe he has others who weren't on board with this particular motion), and appears to be working from a template that was shared among multiple claimant lawyers:

https://casedocs.omniagentsolutions.com/cmsvol2/pub_47373/886200_2586.pdf
https://casedocs.omniagentsolutions.com/cmsvol2/pub_47373/886198_2585.pdf

Each of his clients says he was abused by the Scoutmaster's son, at Scout Camp. It was the "worst" level of abuse, but a youth perpetrator, so 450,000 "Base Points" for each claimant. As far as we know, for each claimant, the abuser was accused by at least one other claimant, but not five or more; so that's a multiplier of 1.25. From the pleading, I can't see any mitigating factors, but I can't see the claim form or the details of any state-court case, so there may well be some. Let's assume, however, that there aren't any.

BSA is saying, basically, that each of these claimants could probably expect a judgement or settlement of $562,500 (out of which his lawyer gets a big cut). With the Global Plan, they'll probably get roughly $45,000 to $129,000 near-term cash, plus a good chance of an insurance payout to make up the rest of that $562,500. With the Toggle Plan, they get roughly maybe $5600 to $22500 near-term cash, plus a poorer chance of an insurance payout, plus the possibility that they could get a judgement or settlement against the Local Council. In Chapter Seven, they could well get nothing in cash, and an even poorer prospect against insurance, and be facing a Local Council that is also bankrupt and get nothing there either. But they might get some cash from BSA even in Chapter 7, maybe $1000.

[Eagledad]

55 minutes ago, RememberSchiff said:

Maybe because I asked him to stay. 

 

So blame me. I'm Spartacus.

RS

OK, but ThenNow is saying that he is here to provide information, but in providing information, he keeps giving a personal, not so kind opinion, of the BSA, Then defends himself as just the messenger. Continued Unleasing on him. All of us here whine now and then about National, but at least we admit it. He needs to be a scout like with us as he says the BSA is supposed to be. 

[ThenNow]

16 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

ThenNow is saying that he is here to provide information

When did I say that?

 

16 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

in providing information, he keeps giving a personal, not so kind opinion, of the BSA

I was repeatedly sexually abused by my SM. That's some personal not so kind business by virtue of it being the truth. What to do? There it is. Again, see my story for more. I've provided a ton more than personal information, if I do say so myself. Once again, I do.

18 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

Then defends himself as just the messenger

When defense is called for, it's called for. I'm not "just a messenger," didn't claim to be and I'm not setting myself up as the authority or end all be all. I've said that many times.

19 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

All of us here whine now and then about National,

Not true as to this forum anyway. Many have not whined. Many don't "speak," rather read and contemplate. Many who whine don't "admit it" or view it as such. Whining is not the same as speaking your mind from your experience or simply telling the truth. The truth can be pretty offensive. It is also understandable why some choose to deflect by calling it something else. There are a few fellas on here who make my assaults on the castle look like a front line comprised of potato guns, slingshots, pea shooters and spitballs. 

23 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

He needs to be a scout like with us

Hm. I've seen some fairly off the Scouting path commentary, not by me and not followed by a Scout-like admission of too much whine and stinky cheese. What isn't Scout-like in what I'm posting? Telling the truth and not "admitting" it's "whining"? Calling bs is not allowed? Speaking for myself as one abused in Scouting and saying what others say here and elsewhere?

I'm going to stop answering this now and follow what the guys are saying about percentages and all that fun, productive bankruptcy stuff. Thanks for the repartee.  

[David CO]

4 hours ago, elitts said:

• Only a complete idiot would think you could do anything with a group of boys, with limited parental involvement, and have it be strictly "clean and wholesome".  

I'm stunned.  The entire premise of scouting is that boys can be trusted.  They can go camping with their buddies, with limited parental involvement, and have it be strictly clean and wholesome.  That is scouting.  Take away the trust, and it is no longer a scouting program. 

 

Edited April 14, 2021 by David CO

[fred8033]

5 hours ago, ThenNow said:

Now, let's imagine you host a 100-year party for boys where you (your predecessors and successors) tell parents, "It's all good. We got this. You can trust us 100%!", recruit and anoint adult men to staff your party, ask for entry and recurrent fees, charge for various goods and services, advertise your party as the most pure and wholesome event going...and almost 1000 boys are sexually abused by your volunteer (and paid) staff each year over the course of your hosting services. Then what? At the party I attended for almost 8 years, it now looks like upwards of 10 kids were repeatedly sexually abused. That's 1+ kid per year. For one of them (me) it was multiple times per year. Realistically, that's the same story for most if not all of them. Now what? How do most people feel about that?

Your anger is understandable.  People have to put their anger somewhere.  

Statistically, scouts is not that much different than other organizations.  We've been thru this.  I don't see the 1000 reference you are producing and don't accept the premise.  You say 1000.  So high school sports has 17,.000 over four years.  That's over 4,000 per year in high school sports.  Perhaps it is best for kids to stay home and do nothing.  

Edited April 14, 2021 by fred8033

[fred8033]

6 hours ago, elitts said:

These are all very specialized properties because Philmont at least is too large to sell to a single buyer outside of a government; getting maximum value out of them would likely take years.  They could probably get one of the major logging companies to buy it, but it would be at a fairly steep discount.  Other than that, it would need to be broken up into pieces to truly maximize the sale price.

 

 

The more I think about this ... the more I'd 100% support Philmont National Park created to be used by youth organizations throughout the nation.  It matches many of the core goals of scouting and at the same time preserves a real national treasure.   If Summit is not reserved via the recent donation, I'd 100% hope we could have the Summit National Park.  

Edited April 14, 2021 by fred8033