That’s very informative. What could be other reasons for this turn around? New leadership?
Short answer - yes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_Brock
Wayne Brock is the Chief Scout Executive of the Boy Scouts of America, having assumed the BSA's highest professional position in September 2012. He had previously served as Deputy Chief Scout Executive since October 1, 2009. His predecessor was Robert J. Mazzuca (born 1947) who was the 11th Chief Scout Executive of the Boy Scouts of America. His term started in 2007, and he retired on August 31, 2012.
Speculation among volunteers is that Mazzuca saw the handwriting on the wall and got out while he could.
The other major contributing issue is all of the corporate CEOs serving on the national (volunteer) executive board. If you haven't noticed, diversity/LGBTQ rights has completely penetrated corporate America's human resources departments which results in the re-writing of charitable giving rules against organizations which discriminate for whatever reason.
The national council in Irving, TX, has lots of costs which have to be funded. The local councils don't contribute to those usual expenses, e.g., ...
1. payroll
2. benefits
3. real properties, especially the national high adventure bases
4. program support of printed materials - the real core of BSA
It is quid pro quo, BSA gets $$$ from the corporations and the national board of directors get input into the operations of the BSA.
Two CEOs on the BSA national executive board, James Turly of Ernst & Young and Randall Stephenson of AT&T, pledged to work inside BSA to change its membership policy to include homosexuals. Stephenson is expected to be selected as the BSA national president in 2014. 158