Improving CO relationships

[DenZero]

Some of the oldest and most successful units around here are self-chartered. The biggest downside I see is that you would have to search for and probably pay for meeting space. I dont see how having a typical chartered organization adds stability. Last year when our pack nearly folded, no one at the chartered org. would have noticed until someone might have dropped off the key to the hall. In a perfect world they should be involved, but most chartered orgs have their own problems, and cant go babysitting the Scout units they host.

 

Earlier this year I tried to find someone within the chartered org who has an interest in Scouting (with the hope of possibly recruiting a new Chartered Org, Rep.) but I was unable to find anyone able to get involved. Its probably been too many years since any families in the church have had boys in the Scouts.

 

 

[OldGreyEagle]

I guess that is the key reason COs fade out, no one in the CO has a child in the program. And I have to ask, Why not? Why wouldnt the troop be doing the sort of things the youth of the church would want to do? When you come back from an outing on Sunday, is the parking full of church members? I dont understand how a church could not have scout age youth, is this the issue?

[David CO]

What is it called now? It used to be "Chartered Partner" and "Chartered Partner Organization."

[DenZero]

A definite problem for the church that is our chartered organization is that they have an aging congregation, and have very few young families. I went over the church membership with the church secretary, and she said there was one family with a Cub Scout age boy, and he had already been recruited by the other pack in the area. Probably back in the 1940s when the Troop and Pack moved their charters to this church, there were many young families, but things change. Demographics were different in those days, there were twice as many schools and twice as many packs.

 

Having a strong chartered organization can be helpful to a pack. The church that hosts the other pack in our community had a handful of members that had Cub Scout age boys and an interest in Scouting. These boys went to the school where my (now small) pack was started. They decided to join the pack that was hosted by their church. This provided their pack with a group of new leaders, and a strong recruiting foothold at the school where my smaller pack traditionally recruited. They were able to more than double the size of their pack.