Scout councils (Boy Scouts of America): Difference between revisions
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==History== |
==History== |
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[[File:BSA National HQ.jpg|thumb|[[BSA National Council]] office in [[Irving, Texas]]]] |
[[File:BSA National HQ.jpg|thumb|[[BSA National Council]] office in [[Irving, Texas]]]] |
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In the first days of the BSA, a local council was formed when men in a community<ref>until the late 70s, women were not considered a formal part of the BSA in any role</ref> decided that they needed their own local organization to operate Scouting.<ref name="history">http://historyofscouting.com/history/history-1910.htm</ref> |
In the first days of the BSA, a local council was formed when men in a community<ref name="needactualcite">{{cite web |url= |title= until the late 70s, women were not considered a formal part of the BSA in any role|last1= |first1= |last2= |first2= |date= |work= |publisher=}}</ref> decided that they needed their own local organization to operate Scouting.<ref name="history">{{cite web |url= http://historyofscouting.com/history/history-1910.htm |title= History of Scouting |last1= Scout |first1= Old |accessdate=18 February 2013}}</ref> |
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In 1913, the first local council charters were issued to first-class and second-class councils.<ref name="history" /> These were located in America's largest cities at the that time: New York City, Boston, Washington DC, and Chicago. Other locations received charters to operate what was called (and still called today) "Area Councils" which served entire states and portions of other states: Philadelphia, Atlanta, Denver, Seattle, Los Angeles, and a couple others.<ref>http://www.scouttrader.org/References/images/ISCAChecklist-Council-CSP.pdf</ref> |
In 1913, the first local council charters were issued to first-class and second-class councils.<ref name="history" /> These were located in America's largest cities at the that time: New York City, Boston, Washington DC, and Chicago. Other locations received charters to operate what was called (and still called today) "Area Councils" which served entire states and portions of other states: Philadelphia, Atlanta, Denver, Seattle, Los Angeles, and a couple others.<ref name="scouttrader">{{cite web |url=http://www.scouttrader.org/References/images/ISCAChecklist-Council-CSP.pdf |title=ISCA CSP Checklist |publisher= International Scouting Collectors Association |accessdate=18 February 2013}}</ref> |
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Because there were so few local councils, the BSA never considered assigning them numbers—they were simply known by their names. This worked until the explosion of interest which resulted in a larger number of local councils. BSA papers say that in 1931 alone, more than 100 local councils were formed. {{citation needed|date=February 2013}} |
Because there were so few local councils, the BSA never considered assigning them numbers—they were simply known by their names. This worked until the explosion of interest which resulted in a larger number of local councils. BSA papers say that in 1931 alone, more than 100 local councils were formed. {{citation needed|date=February 2013}} |
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A "local Council" could consist of eleven blocks and a state forest as in the case of councils like [[Thatcher Woods Council]], which was located in a western suburb of Chicago; or Santa Ana's [[Orange County Council]] or the Milwalkee County Councils, taking up just that county. It could be as expansive as the entire Philippines Islands as in the case of the [[Boy Scouts of the Philippines#Philippine Council, Boy Scouts of America|Philippines Council]].<ref>http://bsp-spcf.webs.com/aboutscouting.htm</ref> |
A "local Council" could consist of eleven blocks and a state forest as in the case of councils like [[Thatcher Woods Council]], which was located in a western suburb of Chicago; or Santa Ana's [[Orange County Council]] or the Milwalkee County Councils, taking up just that county. It could be as expansive as the entire Philippines Islands as in the case of the [[Boy Scouts of the Philippines#Philippine Council, Boy Scouts of America|Philippines Council]].<ref name=""BSPSPCF">{{cite web |url= http://bsp-spcf.webs.com/aboutscouting.htm|title= The Birth and the Development of the BSP |accessdate=18 February 2013}}</ref><ref name=""Book">{{cite book |last=Wills|first=Chuck |authorlink= |title= Boy Scouts of America: A Centennial History |url= |accessdate= |year= 2009 |publisher= DK Adult |location= |isbn=978-0756656348 |page= |pages=}}</ref> |
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By the end of the 1930s, the BSA had catalogued more than 750 local councils. It presented a management as well as just a "numbering/naming problem." So in the middle 1940s, the national office decided to do a study to determine the best way to manage all of these big, middle and small councils. {{citation needed|date=February 2013}} |
By the end of the 1930s, the BSA had catalogued more than 750 local councils. It presented a management as well as just a "numbering/naming problem." So in the middle 1940s, the national office decided to do a study to determine the best way to manage all of these big, middle and small councils. {{citation needed|date=February 2013}} |
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Revision as of 19:13, 18 February 2013
| Local councils of the Boy Scouts of America | |||
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 The Ideal Scout, a statue by R. Tait McKenzie in front of the Bruce S. Marks Scout Resource Center in the Cradle of Liberty Council in Philadelphia | |||
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The program of the Boy Scouts of America is administered through 272 local councils, with each council covering a geographic area that may vary from a single city to an entire state. Each council receives an annual charter from the National Council and are usually incorporated as a charitable organization.[1] Most councils are administratively divided into districts that directly serve Scout units.
Councils fall into one of four regions—Western, Central, Southern and Northeast.[1] Each region is then subdivided into areas.
Organization
The council level organization is similar to that of the National Council. Councils are headed by a collective of three people known as the 'Key 3'. The Key 3 consists of the Scout executive, a paid employee who administers a staff of professional Scouters; a council president, a volunteer, serves as the chairman of a volunteer board of directors; and a council commissioner, also a volunteer, coordinates the efforts of trained volunteers who provide direct service to the units (Cub Scout packs, Boy Scout troops, etc.).
The council executive board is headed by the council president and is made up of annually elected local community leaders.[2] The board establishes the council program and carries out the resolutions, policies, and activities of the council. Board members serve without pay and some are volunteer Scouters working at the unit level. Youth members may be selected to the council executive board according to the council by-laws.
The Scout executive manages council operations—including finance, property management, advancement and awards, registrations, and Scout Shop sales—with a staff of other professionals and para-professionals. Volunteer commissioners lead the unit service functions of the council, help maintain the standards of the BSA, and assures a healthy unit program.[3]
Councils are divided into districts with leadership provided by the district executive, district chairman, and the district commissioner.[1] Districts are directly responsible for the operation of Scouting units and, except for the district executive, are mostly staffed with volunteers.[2] The voting members of each district consist of volunteer representatives from each chartered organization having at least one BSA unit, plus annually elected members-at-large who in turn elect the district chairman. Boroughs and districts are subdivisions of the local council and do not have a separate corporate status.[4]
History
In the first days of the BSA, a local council was formed when men in a community[5] decided that they needed their own local organization to operate Scouting.[6]
In 1913, the first local council charters were issued to first-class and second-class councils.[6] These were located in America's largest cities at the that time: New York City, Boston, Washington DC, and Chicago. Other locations received charters to operate what was called (and still called today) "Area Councils" which served entire states and portions of other states: Philadelphia, Atlanta, Denver, Seattle, Los Angeles, and a couple others.[7]
Because there were so few local councils, the BSA never considered assigning them numbers—they were simply known by their names. This worked until the explosion of interest which resulted in a larger number of local councils. BSA papers say that in 1931 alone, more than 100 local councils were formed. [citation needed]
A "local Council" could consist of eleven blocks and a state forest as in the case of councils like Thatcher Woods Council, which was located in a western suburb of Chicago; or Santa Ana's Orange County Council or the Milwalkee County Councils, taking up just that county. It could be as expansive as the entire Philippines Islands as in the case of the Philippines Council.[8][9]
By the end of the 1930s, the BSA had catalogued more than 750 local councils. It presented a management as well as just a "numbering/naming problem." So in the middle 1940s, the national office decided to do a study to determine the best way to manage all of these big, middle and small councils. [citation needed]
The first phase of this restructuring occurred in 1945. That year, the BSA divided the nation into twelve regions, each with a Roman numeral to distinguish themselves from the council number (Region I - XII). Each Region consisted of states which later federal agencies used as first "National Districts" under the old Civil Defense; and later the Zone Improvement Plan (aka "ZIP" Code). [citation needed]
Councils in each Region was identified by headquarters city and state. Circa 1946, a resolution at the National Meeting from the previous year forced the BSA to assign Council numbers from Maine to California with all of the Councils located outside the United States not to have numbers assigned. [citation needed]
In 1959, the addition of Hawaii and Alaska as states threw off the numbering system. Most Councils ignored the numbers except when it came to providing data once a year to the National Office. They were the "Flint River Council" or the "Four Lakes Council", and that was that. To compound things, some of the smaller local Councils found that it was in the best interest of the Scouts and Scouters to combine with other neighboring Councils. This was is what happened to the Cumberland Council in Somerset, Kentucky as it combined with the Bluegrass Council in Lexington, Kentucky; or the three Councils in northwest Texas which became the Northwest Texas Council out of Wichita Falls. [citation needed]
In 1960 the BSA had 490 local Councils, a large reduction from the 30s. Circa 1960, the BSA renumbered all local Councils in State alphabetical order by headquarters city. That numbering system remains the one in which the BSA uses today. In this sequence, Council "Number 1" (not the 'oldest BSA Council') was the Council which originally was called the Choccolocco Council and was headquartered in Anniston, Alabama. Today that Council, with two others, form the Greater Alabama Council, headquartered from Huntsville, Alabama. There were several breaks in the numbering sequence, because it ended with Council 639, the Jim Bridger Council in Wyoming. [citation needed]
Councils outside the US were assigned either an "800" number, starting with Direct Service Council as council number 800; 801 was assigned to the Panama Canal Zone Council; 802 was assigned to the EUCOM (later Transatlantic Council); 803 was assigned to the Far East Council; 804 was assigned to the Philippines Area Council; and 805 was assigned and then de-assigned as the decision was made to keep Saudi Arabia and parts of the Middle East a part of Direct Service instead of forming a new local Council. [citation needed]
The BSA also encouraged the Districts to be in numerical order by the closeness to the Council office, and units were "recommended to be numbered according to the District in which they reside in." That last thing didn't sit well with lots of "Troop 1s" and others with low numbers. In 1975 the BSA left it to individual councils to provide "local numbers" as they see fit. [citation needed]
In the middle 1960s, the BSA added numbers above 639, when it allowed the Greater New York Councils, consisting of the five boroughs in New York City along with the City itself their own Council number (NYC, 640; then in alphabetical order, Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island). [citation needed] In 1971, the BSA started a new row of Council numbers starting with the Rainbow Council in Morris, Illinois (702). [citation needed]
And in 1979, the BSA allowed the Boston Council and the other councils surrounding Boston (Cambridge, Minuteman (Stoneham), and North Bay (Peabody)) to form a "Consolidated Council" similar to the way that New York City and the five boroughs were organized, assigning them Council 850, but the effort failed. [citation needed]
Councils by size
The BSA categorizes councils by size. Currently, there are five categories of council -- Mega Councils (the top 20 local Councils by youth membership and units), Metro Councils (the next 20 or so local Councils), Medium, Small Market and "Community" (the smallest, normally taking in large neighborhoods or one or two cities.[citation needed]
Largest councils
| Name of Organization | Total Units | Total Youth | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Greater New York Councils | 1 | ||
| National Capital Area Council | 2 | ||
| Great Salt Lake Council | 3 | ||
| Sam Houston Area Council | 4 | ||
| Circle Ten Council | 5 | ||
| Northern Star Council | 6 | ||
| Utah National Parks Council | 7 | ||
| South Florida Council | 8 | ||
| Central Florida Council | 9 | ||
| Cradle of Liberty Council | 10 |
| Name of Organization | Total Units | Total Youth | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Great Salt Lake Council | 1 | ||
| Utah National Parks Council | 2 | ||
| National Capital Area Council | 3 | ||
| Sam Houston Area Council | 4 | ||
| Trapper Trails Council | 5 | ||
| Grand Canyon Council | 6 | ||
| Northern Star Council | 7 | ||
| Circle Ten Council | 8 | ||
| Greater Saint Louis Area Council | 9 | ||
| Heart of America Council | 10 |
Smallest councils
| Name of Organization | Total Units | Total Youth | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Annawon Council | 3 | ||
| Alameda Council | 2 | ||
| Piedmont Council | 1 |
Unique councils
The Greater New York Councils are unique in that they are divided into five boroughs with each led by a field director and one or more district directors or district executives. Similarly, due to Scouting population and geographic distance, the Utah National Parks Council is divided into 12 sectors with each led by a volunteer assistant vice president and assistant council commissioner with each sector then divided into districts.[11]
The Organization of the councils in Area 2 of the Central Region is unique to Michigan. The Michigan Crossroads Council was created by the merger of nine councils in the lower peninsula of Michigan. It is a coordinating council that oversees properties, personnel, and program. This MCC is then split into four sub-councils or "Field Service Councils" which are then divided into districts.[12]
Overseas areas
The BSA charters two councils for American Scouts living overseas, largely on military bases in Europe and Asia. The Transatlantic Council, headquartered in Livorno, Italy, serves BSA units in much of Europe, and the Far East Council, headquartered in Japan, serves units in the western Pacific areas. The Aloha Council in Hawaii also serves BSA units in the American territories of American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and in the sovereign countries of the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, and Palau.[13]
The Direct Service branch makes the Scouting movement available to U.S. citizens and their dependents living in countries outside these jurisdictions or in isolated areas.
Defunct councils
The majority of councils of the Boy Scouts of America have gone through thousands of name changes, merges, splits and re-creations since their establishment in the 1910s.[14]
See also
External links
- "Search engine for councils and districts".
- "Local Council Locator for BSA - Boy Scouts of America".
- "Philmont - Council Names and Regions".
Media related to Boy Scouts of America Council maps at Wikimedia Commons
References
- ^ a b c Nelson, Bill. "Organization of the Boy Scouts of America". U.S. Scouting Service Project. Retrieved March 12, 2008.
- ^ a b Rules and Regulations of the Boy Scouts of America. Boy Scouts of America. 1985.
- ^ "Commissioners". Boy Scouts of America. 2008. Retrieved July 4, 2008.
- ^ "How the Council Functions to Carry Out the Purpose of the BSA" (PDF). THE COUNCIL. Boy Scouts of America. Retrieved February 12, 2013.
- ^ "until the late 70s, women were not considered a formal part of the BSA in any role".
{{cite web}}: Missing or empty|url=(help) - ^ a b Scout, Old. "History of Scouting". Retrieved February 18, 2013.
- ^ "ISCA CSP Checklist" (PDF). International Scouting Collectors Association. Retrieved February 18, 2013.
- ^ "The Birth and the Development of the BSP". Retrieved February 18, 2013.
- ^ Wills, Chuck (2009). Boy Scouts of America: A Centennial History. DK Adult. ISBN 978-0756656348.
- ^ a b "Top 10 Largest Councils". Scouting News. January 20009. Retrieved February 15, 2013.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|date=(help) - ^ "Utah National Parks Council Executive Board". List of Executive Board Members and Assignments. Utah National Parks Council. Retrieved September 29, 2011.
- ^ "BSA Area Project". Boy Scouts of America.
- ^ "Aloha Council". Aloha Council, BSA. Archived from the original on May 1, 2008. Retrieved July 3, 2008.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|deadurl=ignored (|url-status=suggested) (help) - ^ Hook, James; Franck, Dave; Austin, Steve (1982). An Aid to Collecting Selected Council Shoulder Patches with Valuation.