[philmont] tour permits

In Southern New Jersey council, my understanding is that a tour permit is to be filed any time the troop plans an activity at a location other than its regular meeting place or on council owned property. That's the council camp itself, not the geographic area encompassed by the council.

We file for the meeting night where we take the youth to an indoor climbing facility, the meeting night where we reserve the swimming pool at the local college, and the meeting night where we take in a local minor league baseball game, as well as for all overnights and day hikes.

We are told that the council camping committee reviews the forms to find out where the troops are going and to compile a list of suggestions to enhance the program offered by all of the troops in the council. Maybe they do and maybe they don't.

We would not file for an individual Scout's Eagle project, as this is not a troop activity. Although we will accommodate an Eagle candidate who wants to announce his plans at the Troop meeting or attempt to recruit the assistance of his fellow Scouts in the project, it is for the candidate himself to round up the manpower, and many enlist family, friends and neighbors, all non-Scouts, in the project, all of whom provide their own transportation.

My Scoutmaster's handbook (revised 2001) states: "Every troop activity off local council property requires a tour permit...Fill out and file a local tour permit, one month in advance, whenever your troop plans an activity that is off local council property but within five hundred miles from your home base. The same permit is required if the troop plans to camp on another council's property, no matter how close or distant."

My experience is that council camps will most certainly ask to see the tour permit on check in for OOC units. (That's a fancy abbreviation for "out of council"-see also the listing for fees for the campsites, leantos and cabins). Philmont will VERY definitely ask to see your tour permit, even if you are all adults scheduled for an Autumn Adventure trek.

The BSA publication "Passport to High Adventure" states: "The local council has the responsibility to authorize the plans of a Scout or Explorer group to conduct a tour or expedition. Approval is based on meeting high standards for leadership, transportation, equipment, health and safety, and busiiness management as established by the Boy Scouts of America." This sentence could be read as stating that the local council sets the standards or that BSA has set the standards. Probably a combination of the two is the most accurate.

I don't understand how faxing the permit to the local council office the same day as the trip is set to step off allows enough time for council to review the application and fax the permit back. My council could probably accommodate this situation in a pinch, but I would be extremely apologetic in taking that approach and would certainly not follow that route as a matter of course.

Aside to Don and Jim: lawyer to lawyer to lawyer, I find that most lay people are of the opinion that lack of a tour permit will permit an insurance carrier to disclaim coverage. I would doubt that any court or insurance commissioner anywhere would permit an insuror to take this position after collecting a premium for a risk that had been fully vetted by its underwriting department. The company surely knows what the Boy Scouts are all about and we have a 100 year track record upon which to calculate the risk. Certainly no auto insuror could take that position and auto accidents are, I believe, our greatest risk.

One camp commissioner I have met tells all who will listen that if their tour permit mentions only the council camp, it will not cover a troop planning to hike, during its stay at the camp, the popular trail that begins at the camp entrance and continues into the adjacent state park.

Right.

That being said, I agree with Jim that the mere existence of a form called a BSA Tour Permit can create evidence of liability, irrespective of whether the permit is completed and filed or not. For instance, the permit requires the permittee to certify that someone certified in CPR will attend for activities afloat. An attorney for a person who dies of a heart attack on a float trip where no CPR certified individual was present could then argue that this requirement sets a standard that should not be breached, and that the breach caused his client's death. This would apply whether or not the permit was filed, falsely stating that one person was CPR certified, or whether it was not filed at all. If the form did not exist, the attorney would have to present an outside expert to establish that failure to have a CPR trained individual present on such a trip was negligent.

Other calamities which could occur on a Scout trip will or won't occur, irrespective of whether the form is completed properly or whether it is filed at all. We lawyers call that "proximate cause". If a scout is injured by hypothermia or frostbite because he wore cotton clothes and got himself wet, the form itself could not have added or subtracted to his safety and says nothing about the negligence, if any, of the others on the trip. Certainly the form itself (or lack thereof) didn't "cause" the injury.

Well, that's all I've got tonight.

Bill Sheehan, ASM
Troop 55, Pitman, NJ
Philmont '70,'72, Autumn Adventure '01,'03,'05

Attorney at Law, State of New Jersey

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Received on Tue Nov 21 21:35:58 2006