Jack, I'll disagree. Council contingents are about getting scouts to
Philmont (or NT or DH or ...) period. I'd encourage troops & crews to go
the lottery route, there is alot to be said for a unit high adventure trip,
but I'm willing to let them choose their route to the ranch.
While a troop may have sufficent interest to send a dozen or so scouts in a
given year, that doesn't mean that they have the ability to deal with the
planning and logistics associated with a cross country trip. For those of
us that have done it, I can say it is, at the same time, not difficult and
not easy.
There is also another dimension at work here, one that I posted a year ago
or so, that examines the reality of council reservations at the ranch.
Councils make a reservation for some number of participants, not crews, and
the number that they get is a function of year over year performance. The
numbers can swing a bit to compensate for things like Jamborees, but
significant upward changes are difficult. If a council has a dry year or
two it can take years for them to recover. In the end my experience with
council high adventure committees is that they seek to send as many as they
can, a good thing, and don't really pay that much attention to the fact that
a crew sized group might be from a single crew or troop. A council is loath
to take their numbers down and so will lobby troops on the waiting list, or
even that have won lottery positions, to consider going with the council
contingent to make their numbers. In the end this helps move the waiting
list along. In our case, we participated in the lottery, got a number low
enough on the waiting list to give us hope, but large enough to make the
trip unlikely. In the end going with our council solved a problem for them,
got us to the ranch and freed up a slot on the list for the next guys who
might just get a shot. Ideally a successful council HA committee would end
up sending their number with nobody left on the waiting list, a difficult
outcome.
One suprising factor to me was that the council reservation is a participant
count, not a crew count. As a unit, when you make your reservation you have
some flexibility (from 7 to 12) in the size of the payments you make and
what you are actually committed to, councils do not. As I understand it,
the councils are on the hook for the number of particiants they reserve ...
in our case not even a number evenly divisible by 12. The actual number of
crews (and ranger impact) is determined later, in our case in the January -
February timeframe.
YIS
Jim
SM T6
PSR '74, '04 & '06
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-philmont@troop47.com [mailto:owner-philmont@troop47.com]On
Behalf Of Jack Thornton
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 10:14 PM
To: Multiple recipients of list philmont
Subject: RE: Re: [Philmont]: Back on Topic - was Read the entire comment
before reacting
Donald,
The point of the Council contingents, as I understand
it, is to give kids a chance to go to Philmont who
will not otherwise have the chance, because their unit
will not have a contingent they can join.
The council contingent isn't intended to be a troop
contingent.
Philmont will serve the same number of kids regardless
of where the contingent comes from. Council
contingents displace unit contingents. If a unit
truly has that level of interest, it should take its
place in the lottery like the rest of us.
Thanks,
Jack
--- "Donald S. Roberts" <donald@hummellawfirm.com>
wrote:
> > From: kbarley6@cox.net
> > My personal preference is that no troop (in a
> contingent)
> > form more than 60% of a 12 person crew. This is
> not alway easy.
> >
> > How important does anyone else feel this factor
> is?
> >
> Personally, I disagree. I see no disadvantage to
> having 11 of 12 from
> one troop and the 12th from another. Or even all 12
> in a council
> contingent from one troop. What is your reasoning
> for finding
> this undesireable?
>
> One factor you left out is that though a unit that
> can make
> up a crew of 7 to 12 can POPTENTIALLY get their own
> trek,
> they still only have
> a 1 in 5 chance in the lottery. What happens if
> they fail?
> Do you deprive those kids of the Philmont experience
> when
> they apply to the council contingent? I'm not
> seeing this one.
>
> Regards
> Don Roberts
> (Unit contingents only, so far)
>
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Received on Thu Nov 17 08:04:43 2005
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