Monday Memo 

Joseph Daniszewski Scout Executive

Good day and welcome to our June 22nd Monday Memo

1. National BSA  Registration Fee Increase

This question-and-answer document is provided to support the decision made by the Boy Scouts of America National Executive Board to increase the traditional membership registration fee for all youth and adults to $15 from its current $10 effective January 1, 2010.

Why is the membership fee being increased, especially now, during such difficult economic times?

The National Council is committed to providing added benefits to local councils and volunteers to support the delivery of high-quality Scouting programs in every community. A key investment continues to be in providing more user-friendly Web-based resources. For example, via MyScouting, volunteers will be able to complete even more training requirements on their own schedule, 24 hours a day, via online resources. This will complement their current ability to recharter and manage advancement records online, complete and submit tour permits, and participate in the Scouting Community social network, which continues to grow. Also, in the future, new-member registration will be available online.

As good stewards, we strive to keep costs to a minimum. And, we are proud that, even with this increase, youth can receive the full benefits of Scouting membership for only $1.25 per month.

The National Executive Board reviewed revenue and expense projections along with the planned initiatives over the next several years, recognizing that the annual registration fee would not meet expenses. The Board decided that the fee could be increased each year or every other year to keep pace with the expected expenditures, or that it could be raised to the level chosen and held in place over the next several years.

When was the last registration fee increase?

In 2003, the registration fee increased to $10 from $7-an increase of 43 percent. The new registration fee will be implemented a full 7 years since the last increase and at 50 percent, only slightly higher than the 2003 increase.

How long do you expect this fee to be in place?

The National Executive Board, in its approved resolution, noted that it would endeavor to hold this new fee level at least three years.

Fee Increase FAQs for Field staff and Registrars

Q. When does the registration fee increase take effect?

A. All traditional Scouting registrations with an effective date of January 1, 2010, or later will pay the new $15 registration fee or prorated fee of $1.25 per month.

Q. How do you determine who pays the current $10 registration fee and who pays the increased $15 registration fee?

A. The registration fee is based on the effective date of the registration. Any registration for traditional Scouting with an effective date before January 1, 2010, will pay the $10 registration fee or prorated fee of $0.85 a month. Any registration for traditional Scouting with an effective date after December 2009 will pay the $15 registration fee or prorated fee of $1.25 per month.

Q. If a unit that expires December 31, 2009, submits its registration renewal online through Internet Rechartering before January 1, 2010, should they pay the current $10 registration fee or the increased $15 registration fee?

A. They should pay the$15 registration fee because the effective date of the renewal will be January 1, 2010.

Q. If a renewal for a lapsed unit that expired November 30, 2009, is received in the council office after January 1, 2010, but the effective date is backdated to December 1, 2009, what registration fee should the unit pay?

A. They should pay the$10 registration fee because the effective date of the renewal is before January 1, 2010.

Q. If a separated reregistered unit is received in the council office on June 14, 2010, but the unit is backdating its renewal to be effective October 1, 2009, what registration fee should the unit pay?

A. They should pay$10 registration fee because the effective date of the renewal is before January 1, 2010.

Q. If a new unit is organized in December 2009 for 14 months with a December 1, 2009, effective date and a January 31, 2011, expiration date, do they pay 1 month prorated at the $10 fee ($0.85 a month) and 13 months prorated at the $15 fee ($1.25 per month)?

A. No. The unit will pay 14 months prorated at the $10 registration fee ($0.85 a month) because the effective date of the new unit is before January 1, 2010.

Q. When assembling charter renewal packets for units with a December 31, 2009, expiration date, which Youth and Adult Application, Unit Budget Plan, and Fee Chart (Registration and Subscription Information form) should be included?

A. The applications and form that reflects the $15 registration fee should be included since ALL registrations with a January 1, 2010, effective date or later will pay the new $15 registration fee. (Adult and Youth Applications with the new registration fee are in the process of being printed.)

Q. In November 2009, new boys join a traditional Scouting unit that expires January 31, 2010. What registration fee do they pay?

A. The new registrants will pay 2 months prorated registration fee at the $10 rate ($0.85 per month). Then when their unit renews, all renewing and new registrants will pay the increased $15 registration fee.

Q. Who pays the new $15 registration fee?

A. All youth and adults registrations for traditional Scouting with an effective date of January 1, 2010, or later will pay a registration fee based on the $15 registration fee rate of $1.25 per month. This includes all additional enrollments to current units, new units, and charter renewals.

Q. Who pays the current $10 registration fee?

A. All youth and adult registrations for traditional Scouting with an effective date of December 1, 2009, or earlier will pay a registration fee based on the $10 registration fee rate of $0.85 a month. This includes all additional enrollments to current units, new units, and charter renewals.

Q. What is the registration fee for Exploring?

A. The Exploring registration fee remains $10 for both youth and adults.

Click Here for Registration Fee Chart

2. Changes to Scouting.org

Changes that you are seeing this month on www.scouting.org are the first steps toward providing a better experience for all Web site visitors. Those who log into MyScouting are also seeing changes designed for better access to Scouting tools, as well as the beginning of personalized content delivery based on your Scouting role or position.

Login Change

Converting logins from e-mail addresses to user names is one of the changes that will ultimately improve the user experience. There are countless systems behind the scene within scouting.org and MyScouting. User name access provides these benefits:

• User names allow us to implement stronger security standards to protect our member and volunteer data.
• A user name login makes the transition to any of these systems seamless.
• User name is an industry standard for login names.

This "e-mail address to user name" change will happen the first time someone with a MyScouting account logs into the new MyScouting. After that, the user will log in with the new user name and continue into the system as normal.

Please follow the directions on the login page to change your e-mail login to a user name login. And remember that MyBSA and MyScouting are two different systems that each requires unique login names, meaning you cannot use your MyBSA user name as a MyScouting user name. The system will return a message that the name is already taken.

Issues

There are two other issues we want to make you aware of as well. The first is the "403 Access forbidden" error message. This error message is the result, in most cases, of an incompatibility between the Microsoft Office Live browser add-in for Internet Explorer and Firefox and the Microsoft SharePoint server that powers the new MyScouting; both are Microsoft products. We have opened a support case with Microsoft and hope to have this issue resolved soon. In the meantime, users wishing to access the MyScouting site will need to uninstall the plug-in, then retry accessing the site. We will post a message on MyScouting and MyBSA when this issue has been resolved.

Additionally, about 5 percent of users in the Scouting Community had corrupted data in their account profiles. This corruption was caused by a security flaw discovered during the recent updates, and it allowed some people access without a valid BSA member ID. This corruption was the cause of a number of previously reported Scouting Community issues. The upgrade team spent a great deal of time searching the MyScouting and PAS database in an attempt to tie the accounts back to a valid member; however, in some cases this was not possible. As a result, and with the enforcement of stronger security policies as the site goes from Beta to production, it became necessary to remove these users from the system. The posts and discussions were merged into the account of one of the team members, so the data remains in the Scouting Community; however, it is attributed to another person. While this is regrettable, it's important that this flaw was discovered now and fixed before we had thousands of corrupted profiles. This only affected the Scouting Community; it did not affect any training or membership records.

Support

Finally, the National Service Desk is fully supporting the rollout of Scouting.org and MyScouting.  Volunteers and staff that  are in need of assistance or need to report concerns or problems, may  call 800-627-3025 or send an e-mail to myscouting@scouting.org.

3. Words to Live By 

A new national recruitment campaign is coming and it will motivate more young people to join Scouting.  It will energize all our California Inland Empire staff and volunteers, parents, and kids.  Please review the attached presentation and share the plan!  Click Here

4. Local Scouts in News

Redlands Explorers bring home the hardware - Jesse B. Gill, Staff Writer
The Redlands Police Explorer Post 61 excelled in two recent competitions by garnering several awards and trophies. View Full Story

Cub Scouts hold Pinewood Derby Championships in Fontana
FONTANA - Ryan Lascano of Pack 421 in Corona was named grand champion at the Pinewood Derby Championship of the Inland Empire Temescal District Cub Scouts earlier this month. View Full Story

Click Here for LDS FOS Report 

7. Father's Day

The idea for an official Father?s Day celebration came to a married daughter, seated in a church in Spokane, Washington, attentive to a Sunday sermon on Mother?s Day in 1910-two years after the first Mother?s Day observance in West Virginia.

The daughter was Mrs. Sonora Smart Dodd. During the sermon, which extolled maternal sacrifices made for children, Mrs. Dodd realized that in her own family it had been her father, William Jackson Smart, a Civil War veteran, who had sacrificed-raising herself and five sons alone, following the early death of his wife in childbirth. For Mrs. Dodd, the hardships her father had endured on their eastern Washington farm called to mind the unsung feats of fathers everywhere.

Her proposed local Father?s Day celebration received strong support from the town?s ministers and members of the Spokane YMCA. The date suggested for the festivities, June 5, Mrs. Dodd?s father?s birthdays were three weeks away-had to be moved back to the nineteenth when ministers claimed they need extra time to prepare sermons on such a new subject as Father.

Newspapers across the country, already endorsing the need for a national Mother?s Day, carried stories about the unique Spokane observance. Interest in Father?s Day increased. Among the first notables to support Mrs. Dodd?s idea nationally was the orator and political leader William Jennings Bryan, who also backed Mother?s Day. Believing that fathers must not be slighted, he wrote to Mrs. Dodd, "too much emphasis cannot be placed upon the relation between parent and child."

Father?s Day, however, was not so quickly accepted as Mother?s Day. Members of the all-male Congress felt that a move to proclaim the day official might be interpreted as a self-congratulatory pat on the back.

In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson and his family personally observed the day. And in 1924, President Calvin Coolidge recommended that states, if they wished, should hold their own Father?s Day observances. He wrote to the nation?s governors that "the widespread observance of this occasion is calculated to establish more intimate relations between fathers and their children, and also to impress upon fathers the full measure of their obligations."

Many people attempted to secure official recognition for Father?s Day. One of the most notable efforts was made in 1957, by Senator Margaret Chase Smith, who wrote forcefully to Congress that "Either we honor both our parents, mother and father, or let us desist from honoring either one. But to single out just one of our two parents and omit the other is the most grievous insult imaginable."

Eventually, in 1972-sixty-two years after it was proposed-Father?s Day was permanently established by President Richard Nixon. Historians seeking an ancient precedent for an official Father?s Day observance have come up with only one: The Romans, every February, honored fathers-but only those deceased.

POSITIVE QUOTE OF THE DAY
 -----------------------------
 
 "Nothing is more endangered in the modern world than the powerful
 combination of hard work toward meaningful goals joined with an
 exuberant embrace of the present moment."

-- Tom Morris

Have a great Scouting week!
Yours in the Spirit of Scouting,

Joe Daniszewski
Scout Executive/CEO
California Inland Empire Council, BSA
1230 Indiana Court
Redlands, CA 92374
909.793.2463, Ext. 120
877.732.1450
909.793.0306 Fax

Monday Memo is from Scout Executive Joe Daniszewski and contains his reflection on what is happening within the Council. The purpose of Monday Memo is to communicate information about the week ahead, to acknowledge the
good things happening around the Council and to address specific issues that the Scout Executive wants to bring
to your attention. Joe welcomes any comments, suggestions or recommendations on how to make this
memo as helpful as possible. If you have something you want publicized in the Monday Memo, please send it
to his attention c/o Monday Memo: Joseph.Daniszewski@scouting.org for Monday Memo Archives Click Here