CEO of the Palmetto Council of the Boy Scouts of America to resign June 30

A week after national leaders of the Boy Scouts of America approved accepting openly gay boys as members, an area Boy Scout executive director and CEO announced that he will resign.

Rob Green, Scout executive of the Palmetto Council of the Boy Scouts of America, announced Friday that he will resign June 30.

The announcement was made in a five-page letter to friends and Scout associates. The resignation letter was anonymously forwarded to media outlets. Green confirmed his resignation to the Herald-Journal, but did not want to be interviewed.

The Palmetto Council supports Scouting programs in Spartanburg, Cherokee, Union, Chester, Lancaster and York counties. According to its statistics, more than 5,500 youth are members of the programs. Green has served as its leader for nine years.

Green wrote that it became clear in recent months that the National Boy Scouts of America's "progressive values" and his "Biblical values were diverging" and that he had decided to resign regardless of last month's vote on the policy, due to "lost trust and confidence in this movement's top national leadership."

Green noted that his letter reflected his personal opinions, not those of the Palmetto Council.

The Upstate organization posted its response to the policy change on its website. The response, reads in part:

"The Palmetto Council believes these national policy changes will have little or no effect on our local Scouting programs. The values of our local council and individual Scouting units are a reflection of our local leadership, not of the national leadership. Our program is delivered by parents from our communities who serve as Scoutmasters, Den Leaders, Cub Masters and Committee Members. Furthermore, we reinforce that Scouting is a youth program, and any sexual conduct, whether heterosexual or homosexual, by youth of Scouting age is contrary to the virtues of Scouting. Discussions of sexuality are not appropriate in any Scouting setting."

In his letter, Green wrote that a nationwide survey found that a majority of respondents opposed the policy change. Green said local constituents overwhelmingly favored the traditional stance — more than 97 percent.

Green wrote that he's never kicked out or denied membership to a gay child during his 20 years of serving in two councils, nor does he know of any other Scout executive who has done so.

Writing of his decision to step down, Green said that he "cannot in good conscience" endorse the organization's new direction. He said the issue had left him and many others "disillusioned." He expressed hope in his faith amid change.

"I am not sure where the Green family will go next, or what career I will venture into at this point. Our desire is eventually to serve in overseas missions," Green wrote.

Darwin Simpson, president of the Palmetto Council, called Green a "very, very capable Scout leader" and said he had done an outstanding job for area Scouts. Simpson said Green resigned due to certain religious beliefs and values.

"That's a personal decision that people have to make," Simpson said. "We're always sorry and disappointed to lose really good people, but we will continue to move forward."

The council is in the process of putting together a 9-12 person team of those experienced in Scouting to choose a new leader. The team will review applications, narrow down the field and conduct interviews, with the hope that by Sept. 1, the Palmetto Council will have a new executive director, Simpson said. Assistant Executive Jim Nickelson will fill in until then.

As for local Scouting programs, nothing will change under the new policy, which goes into effect Jan. 1, 2014. No Scouts will be excluded, Simpson said.

"They're all God's children and we treat them all the same," he said. "The new policy was voted in and that's the way it is. We are an all inclusive organization."

16 Powerful letter with many more details than I have seen elsewhere, including OnMyHonor.net, on the voting “process” and the actions of the Key-3 national leadership. Makes me sick....

6/06/2013 – An Eagle scout posted his comments about the 5/23/2013 vote. In his post he included the excerpt below …

http://www.onmyhonor.net/join-the-discussion/organization-name/why-not-try-and-change-the-existing-bsa/

“Why Not Try and Change the Existing BSA?”
June 6, 2013
8:53 pm
By NRAdudeMember

“… here is the words of a National Board member who I know personally. As he states, our cause is not lost and we do have a chance. I'm not going to name him for obvious reasons.”

"Chris, I have a few minutes this morning so I will try and address a few of the issues you raise.

1) I agree that I was surprised the resolution to change the membership standards as they pertain to youth members actually passed. However, you have to look a little deeper to understand the survey results that led to that resolution being the one proposed. The survey’s you mention had a series of questions. The members of the Scouting family that responded - ten of thousands of them - were not in favor of changing membership standards related to adult leadership, but the numbers varied by geographic region of the country. Actually, in the North East, parts of Western and parts of Central there was support to change the policy regarding both youth and adults. However, nationally it was still a majority that did not want change for adult leaders.

2) there was majority support to change the policy for youth. This was based on one question which asked if a boy joined scouts as a tiger cub and went all the way thru scouting and at his eagle board of review declared he was homosexual, should he receive his Eagle. Well, it was a very biased question but the majority supported him getting his Eagle. So that is what the resolution was based on.

3) The National Board (62 people of which I am one) was NOT the only people that voted on this. It was voted on by the 1400 volunteers (professionals could not vote) that were called “national voting members”. They consist of the following people:

a) The council President and council Commissioner of every scout council in America - 288 councils. All volunteers
b) one national voting member for each 5000 traditional scouts in a council, so in the case of longhorn council we had an additional 4 or 5 that were proposed and voted on by the volunteer membership of the council that attended the annual business meeting of the council back in April
c) national board members, national committee chairs, regional board members ect.

The vast majority of the voting members - probably 8 or 900 were the local volunteers from councils. So it was not a small group of people but our peers that voted on this.

4) the vote was not even close. It was 61% in favor and 39% opposed. Of the 1400 voting members, I believe 1188 (~ 85% turnout) or so showed up to vote. Even if everyone of the voting members who did not show up to vote had voted in opposition to the proposal, it would have still passed.

5) So, it is what it is. The real question is what happens in a couple of years when we start tossing out 18 year old Eagle scouts that cannot remain involved in Scouting as adults because they have come out as homosexual? Then will there be another motion to admit homosexual adults as leaders? We shall see.

6) A lot of us see this as an opportunity to provide positive adult male role models to teenagers that may be confused about who they are. We shall see how that works, since sex education and sexuality issues are not part of Scouting and never have been.

7) Will there be resolutions in the future to reverse this policy? I think that is a distinct possibility. We shall see if they can be passed.

I am staying involved at this point because I want to continue to make a difference in the lives of the youth of the country. We shall see if Scouting eventually leaves me with additional changes."

Guys, if all of us leave the BSA then it will be inevitable that they allow homosexual leaders in because only the left-wing scouts and scout leaders will remain to vote and elect board members. We cannot let that happen.

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