Scouts still face
funding gauntlet

While some state and federal lawmakers are trying to protect the Boy Scouts of America, the youth organization still faces unrelenting local and national opposition from a range of political opponents and has lost considerable financial support -- even from some churches -- because of the group's policy of barring homosexual scoutmasters.

More than eight months after the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Boy Scouts of America -- like other private organizations -- has a constitutional right to define the parameters of membership and can exclude homosexuals and atheists, outrage at the decision is still strong among homosexual activists and some civil-rights groups.

Accordingly, some major funding sources, including the United Way, have begun to withhold financial support from certain local BSA chapters, even as some corporations like Levi Strauss and Wells Fargo have ended support altogether.

Nevertheless, the group has managed to hold on to key support in many areas of the country.

Still supportive despite the ban

In California, for example, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department has announced it would continue to participate in the Scouts' Explorer program, which allows youths ages 14 to 21 to help deputies on search missions and perform routine police work such as report writing.

Last year the department was considering severing its ties to the Scout-sponsored program, just as the Los Angeles City Council had voted to end the relationship between the Explorers program and the Los Angeles Police Department.

Lee Baca, sheriff of Los Angeles County -- whose department polices unincorporated Los Angeles County areas and contracts to provide service in many suburbs -- said he believes the city council erred in its judgment.

"I think it was wrong, a knee-jerk reaction to an important issue," Baca said, according to published reports Sunday. "I think disagreement occurs in all organizations, but you don't quit your family because you disagree."

The Boy Scouts Alumni Association had petitioned the sheriff's department, urging it to continue to support the Explorer program.

Also, following five hours of debate, the Wisconsin State Assembly voted 80-15 last week to adopt a resolution commending the Boy Scouts.

The resolution described the BSA as a "cherished tradition of our nation." Although originally the measure had "acknowledged a controversy since the Scouts enforced a ban on gay scoutmasters," Wisconsin newspapers reported that provision was eventually removed before the Assembly voted and sent the resolution to the state Senate.

"Boy Scouts can be a refuge and a safe haven from the troubles of the world," said Rep. Steven Nass, a Republican from Whitewater, who sponsored the resolution. "The Scouts are the constant echo of what is good in America."

Currently, about 5 million youths and 1.2 million adults are actively involved in the Boy Scouts of America and its programs.

Nass's resolution calls on citizens and organizations to support the diverse viewpoints the Boy Scouts bring to the public.

Funding trouble persists

Despite these and other successes, the BSA continues to be battered by threats or actual loss of funding, as well as loss of direct sponsorship and support -- sometimes even from churches.

Last week, the United Way of Central Massachusetts voted to withhold future funding to "agencies that discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation" -- a group that now includes the Boy Scouts, the Massachusetts chapter says.

"The purpose of the United Way is to bring people together, even people with opposing points of view, for a greater community good," said Fairman C. Cowan, chairman of the United Way's non-discrimination task force, during an interview with the Worchester (Mass.) Telegram and Gazette.

"Our objective was to treat each point of view with respect and, ultimately, to reach consensus on policy that we could recommend to the UWCM (United Way Chapter of Massachusetts) board of directors," Cowan said.

The UWCM board said the policy does not apply to designated gifts, and that donors can continue to direct their financial gifts to specific non-profit organizations providing "health and human services, regardless of whether they adopt the policy," the paper said.

Even press organizations have come out against supporting the Boy Scouts. Orlando Sentinel Communications, the parent company of the Orlando Sentinel newspaper, said Feb. 15 that it "will no longer give grants to programs run by the Boy Scouts … that discriminate because of sexual orientation or religion."

The paper said publisher and company President Kathleen M. Waltz announced the policy change on Valentine's Day, and said the decision would immediately affect a $17,500 grant request from local Scouts for money raised through Sentinel Santa, "a series of stories that runs in the newspaper from Thanksgiving until Christmas and raises money for local children in need."

Last year, the paper said, Scouts requested and received a $16,000 grant from the communications group for a "program targeted at children and teens who cannot afford to join" the scouting organization.

Waltz said she encouraged the Scouts to submit another application for funding during the next cycle, "as long as the program is non-discriminatory and open to all children," the paper said.

Tico Perez, head of the local BSA council, voiced disappointment over the decision. "That's money raised through Sentinel Santa, and I believe some of those donors may be supporters of the Boy Scouts or at least not averse to supporting the Boy Scouts," he told the newspaper.

And, in August 2000, the Knight Ridder newspaper group asked the local United Way affiliate in San Jose, Calif., to stop sending company donations to the Boy Scouts of America.

Determining that the BSA's policies conflicted with Knight Ridder's anti-discrimination policies, corporate officials "wrote United Way Silicon Valley asking that it not spend any of Knight Ridder's $250,000 gift on the local Boy Scouts troops this year," said a report by Editor & Publisher magazine.

Steve Rothaus, who writes on homosexual issues for the Miami Herald -- a Knight Ridder newspaper -- said he was "not surprised, only because the company has treated gay and lesbian employees really well."

He said he didn't believe the company would suffer criticism of being biased over its decision.

"It's not a political decision as much as a corporate decision," Rothaus said. "The company's got the right to contribute to whichever organizations the company sees fit. It's the company's money and thus, it's our money."

Religious groups deny funding

Besides professional fundraising organizations and grant suppliers, some religious groups and churches around the country are also cutting off BSA funding.

The Advocate -- a national homosexual newspaper -- reported Feb. 13 that Reform Judaism leaders "are asking parents to keep scouting out of their homes."

"In a Jan. 5 letter," the Advocate said, "Reform's Joint Commission on Social Action asked parents to withdraw their children from Scout chapters and encouraged congregations to end any sponsorship of Scout troops."

Additionally, the letter asked groups severing ties with Scouts to "publicize [the] reasons for cutting ties," the paper said.

"We as a movement have been very assertive in embracing the full civil liberties of gay men and women," Rabbi Daniel F. Polish, commission director, told the New York Times in an interview.

"From a religious perspective," he added, "we stand for the notion that all people are equally children of God. So if you have a religious movement sponsoring a group with a diametrically opposed set of values, it sets up a terrible conflict."

The Reform movement says it represents about 40 percent of the country's 6 million Jews. By the Feb. 13 publication date, The Advocate said at least one congregation -- in Coral Gables, Fla. -- had followed the recommendation and severed its ties with a Scout troop it had been sponsoring.

Meanwhile, a Wisconsin United Church of Christ congregation has also chosen to withdraw its support of a local BSA troop "because of the national organization's policy of excluding gay Scouts and leaders," the [Madison, Wis.] Capital Times newspaper said last week.

"The scouting policy is inconsistent with our policy of affirming and welcoming gay and lesbian people," Rev. Winton Boyd, pastor of the Orchard Ridge United Church of Christ told the paper.

The decision was made last month by the church's board of directors, and it came on the heels of a policy statement issued by the local BSA Four Lakes Council that was similar to the U.S. military's "Don't ask, don't tell" policy.

"We welcome people to be 'out,' we are affirming of them being 'out,'" he said. "We can't turn around and say, 'We won't tell.'"

The Four Lakes Council's statement, the Capital Times said, noted that council members "adopted a policy endorsing tolerance and diversity within the Scouting ranks." The policy also "stated that prospective youth members and adult leaders are not asked about their sexual preference."

The nearby First Congregational Church, also a United Church of Christ, is similarly considering whether to surrender its sponsorship of a local BSA troop after eight decades, in protest of the BSA's long-standing homosexual policy.

The paper also said some local parents of a Cub Scout den were considering withdrawing their children from the group over disgust with the homosexual issue, but instead have decided to press the national organization to change its policy.

'Morally straight'

Scout leaders and supporters admit there may be growing opposition to the BSA from nearly all sectors of American society. However, they also say that when they receive feedback regarding the BSA's policy against homosexuals and atheists, most support those policies.

Nass said his legislative office received about 500 calls and e-mails from people supporting his resolution and only received four comments from people opposed to it.

Similarly, United Way chapters have reported losing some of their own funding in response to many chapters' decisions to withhold their traditional support from the BSA.

Chuck Dobbins, the Scouting executive for the Four Lakes Council, told the Capital Times paper that indeed some have opposed the BSA's policies. "But," he said, "most of the phone calls I get are very much in our favor. There's been a tremendous amount of support for us."

And, as WorldNetDaily reported Jan. 29, a recent national poll indicated that 75 percent of Americans support the BSA despite its homosexual policy, and many of those support the BSA specifically because of its policy.

That policy, say BSA leaders, derives directly from the Boy Scout promise -- the exact same today as it was 91 years ago -- "to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight."

"The Supreme Court's ruling last year did not change Scouting laws," Dobbins said. "Maybe it heightened people's awareness of [them], but we've been saying for years it is our right to hold these things sacred."

Political protection

Despite funding problems and continued retaliation from activist groups, some politically oriented protections may be forthcoming for the BSA.

Legislators in three states -- Arizona, Georgia and Washington -- have introduced measures to prevent public entities from denying funding or free use of public facilities to Boy Scouts of America troops. In Washington, the legislation is entitled, "The Boy Scouts Protection Act;" in Georgia, the bill is called, "The Defense of Scouting Act."

And President George W. Bush, during his campaign, voiced support for the Scouts, criticizing a government memo indicating that then-President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore supported a federal effort to sever or restrict ties with the BSA.

"I am troubled by this memo appearing to suggest that the Clinton-Gore administration might sever the federal government's long-standing relationship with the Boy Scouts of America," Bush said.

Then-candidate Bush was responding to revelations of a memorandum circulated within a division of the Interior Department that sought information on whether its ties to the Boy Scouts violated Clinton's recent executive order banning discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

Also, several members of Congress have expressed support for the Boy Scouts, and have considered passing federal measures protecting the BSA.

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