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Did Yawgoog dismiss scout for being gay?
August 7, 1999
by JENNIFER LEVITZ
Providence Journal
HOPKINTON -- The Boy Scout motto is ``Be prepared,'' but a 16-year-old Eagle Scout was anything but when an official at Camp Yawgoog asked him on Tuesday: ``Are you gay?''
The question
arose as the camp official was refusing the student's request to return for a summer job there that he had left last month.
 Accounts differ over exactly what happened, but the incident threw Camp Yawgoog into turmoil and sparked a sit-in in support of the scout by adult and youth staff members that shut the camp down on
Wednesday morning.
Scout leaders concede that they asked the boy if he is gay, but insist his answer -- ``yes'' -- had nothing to do with their decision not to rehire him. The Boy Scout's national policy is to ban
gays, atheists and women.
``He was asked if the rumors were true, if he was gay, but it was just part of a casual conversation,'' said Lyle Antonides, director of
the Naragansett Council of the Boy Scouts of America. ``Kind of like if someone asked you, `I heard you were at the movies Monday night, is that true?' ''
The teen, whose mother asked that his name be withheld, is an
honor student who spent five years earning enough badges to become an Eagle Scout. He's active in school clubs and is a member of his school's Gay-Straight Alliance.
This is the second summer the scout has come to live and work for nine weeks at Yawgoog, considered to be one of the premier Boy Scout camps in the country.
The 84-year-old camp, which accommodates 800 campers each week
throughout the summer, is so steeped in tradition that each day, everyone stops and sits quietly when the Memorial Bell rings 12 times in honor of scouts who have died.
It's a place with hundreds of acres of streams for canoeing and trees for climbing. A place where pine scents the air.
But, while the camp is considered by many to be a haven, working
conditions are less than idyllic, the Eagle Scout said. He worked in the business office, where the staff was thin and the hours long, despite promises made in April that things would be better than last year, he said.
So on July 6, he left the job on good terms, he said. He moved home, and took a better paying job with his father's company.
He continued to work Sundays at the camp, however, and soon
realized that he missed being there full-time.
When he told Patrick Willis, the business manager, that he wanted to come back, Willis said his spot was open, the teen said.
``He said: `Great, I'll take care of everything,' '' the scout said. ``He was very pleased that I was coming back, as was the whole staff.''
The scout worked on Sunday, then said he'd be in Tuesday to start again full-time. He canceled a trip to Cleveland, trained his replacement at his father's business, and packed up his clothes to move back to camp.
But at the end of the workday on Tuesday, he said, his carefree camp days came to an end.
The scout said Gary Savignano, director of Camp Yawgoog, called him into the office. Willis accompanied him.
The scout gave his account of a conversation with Savignano:
``This isn't an easy question to ask,'' Savignano reportedly asked, ``but we've heard from several reliable third-party sources that
you're gay. Is it true?''
The teen said he choked up, and explained that it was only partly true. ``Yes,'' he was gay, he said, but he didn't go around proclaiming it.
``I'm going to ask you again,'' Savignano reportedly said. ``Are you gay?''
``I said `yes, but why are you asking me that,' '' the Eagle Scout recounted.
Savignano explained that because of the molestation allegations that had been made earlier that week against a leader of a visiting East Providence troop, the camp ``needed to take some precautions,'' said the teen.
``[Savignano] said, `you must understand that as a gay individual, you can't be a member of the Boy Scouts of America, and if you're not a member of the Boy Scouts, you can't work on my staff,' '' the teen recalled.
The teen said he handed over his Eagle Scout card. Then he went to the storage area, took off his name tag, and changed out of his green shorts, khaki shirt and scout socks. He put on plain clothes.
``I was sobbing,'' he said.
But Boy Scout officials tell a different story.
Antonides said the teen was called into Savignano's office and told
that he didn't have a job because someone hadn't gone through proper channels in hiring him back.
It looked bad to rehire someone who'd just quit, he said.
``The staff chose not to rehire him because he resigned on his own, and they didn't feel -- and I agree -- that bringing him back would set a good example,'' said Antonides, who added that he would be
the only spokesman for the Boy Scouts on this issue.
After Savignano told the teen he didn't have a job, Antonides said, Savignano asked the teen if he was gay.
``I think it was a casual conversation and that this young man has made more of it than it was,'' Antonides said. ``He wanted to come back on staff and he was unhappy.''
Antonides said it's not camp policy to ask campers or employees if they're gay, and that furthermore, it doesn't matter. The camp has never kicked out a scout for being gay, he said, despite the Boy Scout policy.
``It's just not something we ever get into,'' he said.
Antonides confirmed the molestation allegation, but he said there is ``absolutely no link'' between the allegations against the East
Providence troop leader and the teen's situation. He said the Boy Scouts may not have rehired him as a counselor, but the organization did not strip him of his Eagle Scout rank.
``I think this young man is just trying to get a headline,'' he said.
But the teen has already filed a complaint with the state's Human Rights Commission, which will review his case, according to Joanne
Goulet, a project director there.
The state's Fair Employment Practices Act was updated in 1995 to make it illegal to ask about an employee's sexual orientation.
The scout's case is also boosted by Wednesday's New Jersey Supreme Court decision, which ruled that the Boy Scouts' ban on gays is illegal under New Jersey's anti-discrimination law, said
Steven Brown, of the Rhode Island Affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union.
Staff members at the camp have also offered support to the teen.
A group of employees met from 10:30 p.m. Tuesday to 4 a.m.
Wednesday. Later Wednesday morning, 90 staffers held a sit-in in support of the Eagle Scout in front of the main office. Program centers, where campers practice sports and crafts, closed for the morning.
The employees handed out fliers that apologized for the closings, but stated that ``as fellow scouts and staff men and women, we cannot sit by idly while this individual's human rights are violated.''
Now, staff members are mounting a letter-writing campaign aimed at Boy Scout officials.
``There are a lot of scared people here right now,'' said Drew Riley,
21, an assistant director at the camp. ``If they can ask him that, then can they ask us that, too?''
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Scouts will try to settle dispute
August 8, 1999
By LYNN ARDITI and JENNIFER LEVITZ
Providence Journal
HOPKINTON -- A 16-year-old Eagle Scout who says he was not rehired at Camp Yawgoog after acknowledging he is gay is scheduled to meet this morning with the Rhode Island head of the Boy Scouts to try to work out the dispute.
Lyle Antonides, director of the Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts of America, said late yesterday that he had spoken to the scout and his parents and they agreed to get together to attempt to settle the matter.
``We all agree that this has been blown way out of proportion and nobody wanted this to happen,'' Antonides said. ``I have complete confidence that the entire matter is going to be resolved.''
Antonides declined to discuss specifics about any proposed settlement or to say whether the scout would get his job back until after the meeting, which he said was arranged by an adult volunteer from another troop.
The talks are the latest development in a tumultuous week at the bucolic Boy Scout camp, where about 90 staffers staged a sit-in Wednesday that virtually shut down the camp after the well-liked scout was refused a job.
The trouble began when the scout, whose mother requested that his name be withheld, asked to return to the full-time job he held earlier in the summer in the camp's business office.
The teenager left that job on July 6, moving back home to take a better-paying job with his father's company. But he continued to work Sundays at the camp, and soon decided he missed being there full-time.
Precisely what happened next is in dispute. But one thing is undisputed: At some point, the camp director asked the teenager whether he is gay.
The teenager said the incident occurred when he returned to work on
Tuesday, after getting the approval of the camp's business manager. At the end of the day, he said, the camp director, Gary Savignano, called him into the office. In the presence of the camp's business
manager, the teenager said, Savignano said that ``several reliable third-party sources (say) that you're gay. Is it true?''
The teenager, who is a member of his school's Gay-Straight Alliance,
said he replied ``yes, but why are you asking me that?''
He said Savignano explained that because of allegations of molestation that had been made earlier last week against a leader
of a visiting troop, the camp ``needed to take some precaution.''
The teenager said Savignano also told him that ``as a gay individual, you can't be a member of the Boy Scouts of America,'' and
therefore ``you can't work on my staff.''
But Boy Scout officials tell a different story.
Antonides, the Boy Scout director, said Savignano told the teenager
that he didn't have a job because someone hadn't gone through the proper channels in rehiring him.
It looked bad to rehire someone who had just quit, Antonides said.
Antonides said the alleged molestation by a troop leader, which is being investigated by Hopkinton police, had nothing to do with the way the scout was treated. He added that the accused leader was
asked to leave the camp and the Boy Scouts and parents have been contacted to assure them that their boys are safe.
Antonides also said that he wasn't aware that the Eagle Scout still
worked at the camp on Sundays. (The teenager has a paycheck, dated Aug. 1, for $91 in hourly wages for Sunday work.)
According to Antonides, it was only after the teenager was told he
didn't have a job at the camp that Savignano inquired if the boy is gay.
Antonides said it was a ``casual conversation and that this young man has made more of it than it was.
``He wanted to come back on staff and he was unhappy,'' Antonides said.
The state's Fair Employment Practices Act, which was updated in 1995, makes it illegal in some situations to ask about an employee's
sexual orientation.
How that rule applies, however, depends on the context in which the questioning takes place.
For example, an employer is prohibited from asking a person about
his or her sexual orientation in the ``pre-employment'' phase, or when that person is seeking a job, but the employer is not barred from discussing it after that person becomes an employee, according
to Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island Affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union.
The issue then becomes what the employer does with that information.
If an employer ``take(s) any action,'' such as firing the employee, based on information about his or her age or sexual orientation, Brown said, that's illegal.
Last week, the teenager filed a complaint with the state Human Rights Commission, which will review the case.
YESTERDAY, community leaders as well as current and former
members of the Boy Scout community expressed strong feelings in support of both the teenager and the Boy Scouts.
``It's very troubling,'' said Brown, of the ACLU. ``I certainly think it
puts the Boy Scouts in a bad light.''
Brown said that ``based on the information I've heard'' about the incident, ``this person was terminated because he acknowledged he
was gay. And that's illegal.''
Brown said the teenager had called the ACLU's office in Providence and that the agency asked for more information about the incident and is considering representing him.
A group of employees also began a letter-writing campaign, in support of the youth, aimed at Boy Scout officials, said Drew Riley, 21, an assistant camp director.
Staffers also contacted the federal Equal Employment Opportunities
Commission, and are considering filing a complaint, he said.
``I think we've done what we can at this camp and that we need to put our effort into changing the national policy,'' said Riley.
Kate Monteiro, president of Rhode Island Alliance for Lesbian & Gay Civil Rights, said she was impressed by the camp staff's support of the teenager.
``For the record,'' Monteiro added, ``no one in a position of
authority like that just asks, `Oh, are you gay?' to a 16-year-old the way they ask, `Did you go to a movie?' ''
But others defended the Boy Scouts' handling of the matter.
One scout leader, who declined to be identified, said that if Boy Scout officials did ask the youth to leave because he's gay, it would be within their rights.
``That's the policy, just like it's the policy that you must believe in God to be a Boy Scout,'' he said.
Ari Lowenstein, 28, who said he worked at the camp for nine years,
until 1995, said that regardless of whether the teenager is gay, ``the rule is, if somebody quits they're gone -- they don't come back'' that summer, he said. ``You just don't hire somebody back
who left. You just don't do it.''
Lowenstein, who said he was one of three directors at the camp in 1995, said that if the camp allowed staffers who left in mid-summer
to return to their jobs, it would be ``too disruptive'' and set a bad example for other staffers.
``Yawgoog is not ogres. It's not an evil place,'' said Lowenstein,
who is living in Rome, Italy, but is visiting his parents in Barrington this week. ``It's a wonderful place . . . It is the Boy Scouts.''
The incident has divided the camp's staff.
One long-time employee who asked not to be named said that many staffers are scared, and no longer speak their minds so freely. Terms such as ``gay lovers'' are hurled like epithets by some.
The employee said the Boy Scouts' leadership is now trying to ``cover up'' the truth.
``It's a very sticky situation,'' said Justin Rose, a water sports
director. ``This is a tradition-filled place and this kind of thing never happens here.''
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Boy Scouts apologize to gay teen, offer job back
August 9, 1999
by JENNIFER LEVITZ
Providence Journal
HOPKINTON -- After a tumultuous week that rocked one of the premier summer camps in New England, Boy Scout officials yesterday returned a Scout's honor: They apologized to the popular 16-year-old
for asking him if he was gay and gave him back his job at Camp Yawgoog.
``The Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts of America acknowledges that this honorable young man is an Eagle Scout and
member of Boy Scouts with good standing,'' according to a statement released by the Boy Scouts and the youth's family yesterday.
The statement said that the Scout's job at Camp Yawgoog is ``still
available to him if he chooses to accept it.''
``All parties agree that the importance of every individual's sacred right to privacy should be honored always.''
The South Kingstown Eagle Scout, whose mother requested that he not be named, hasn't decided yet whether he wants his job back, but is relieved that the ordeal is over, his father said yesterday.
Staff members questioned the teenager's sexual orientation on Tuesday night, about the time they told him he couldn't return to a full-time position he'd left a month before. He couldn't keep his part
-time Sunday hours either, they said.
Some 90 staff members staged a sit-in, in support of the teenager, the next morning. The protest temporarily closed down the sprawling Boy Scout camp for the first time in 84 years.
``It's been a long two or three days and we're just happy it's resolved,'' the boy's father said.
The family won't pursue a complaint filed Friday with the state
Human Rights Commission, or other legal action, he said.
``We feel that it was a misunderstanding that's been resolved,'' he said.
BOY SCOUT officials wouldn't comment beyond their statement
yesterday, but civil rights organizations said the decision was likely affected by a recent New Jersey Supreme Court ruling and also by tough antidiscrimination laws in Rhode Island.
The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the Boy Scouts' ban on gays is illegal under that state's antidiscrimination law.
The ruling also challenged a Boy Scouts' position that the
organization is a private one that can exclude certain groups of people. The judge called the Boy Scouts a ``public accommodation,'' like restaurants or parks.
``Certainly, the New Jersey decision is one the Boy Scouts have to be cognizant of in deciding how to treat something like this,'' Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island Affiliate of the
American Civil Liberties Union, said yesterday.
Brown said Rhode Island's Fair Employment Practices Act is among the toughest in the country. Legislators updated the law in 1995,
making it illegal in some cases to ask about an employee's sexual orientation.
An employer can discuss the issue after an employee is hired, but using that information to fire an employee is illegal, Brown said.
The Scout had resigned from a full-time salaried post in the business office, but still received a Boy Scout paycheck for answering phones and doing clerical work on Sundays.
``I think that because Rhode Island has a specific law against discrimination based on sexual orientation, the Boy Scouts didn't have the same leeway they might have had in other states,'' Brown said.
THE TEENAGER, a high school junior, had come back to work at the camp for the second summer. Unhappy with long hours and a threadbare staff, he resigned on July 6 to work for this father.
He continued to work on Sundays, and at some point asked his manager if he could come back full-time.
The Scout said he was told that he could. So on Tuesday, he showed up for work.
What happened next depends on whom you ask -- the boy or Boy Scout officials.
At the end of the workday Tuesday, camp director Gary Savignano called him into his office, the teenager said, and told him that he'd
heard the Scout was gay. ``Is it true?'' the director reportedly asked.
The Scout, a member of his school's Gay-Straight Alliance, said it was.
The Boy Scouts have a policy that bans homosexuals, atheists, and
women from the organization.
Savignano then reportedly told the teenager that because of allegations the night before, of a molestation of a camper by a Scout
leader, that the camp needed to ``take precautions,'' the youth recounted. The teenager couldn't work at the camp, he said Savignano told him.
Hopkinton police are investigating a reported molestation at the
camp, but haven't filed any charges.
In accordance with their policy, Boy Scout officials kicked the troop leader out of camp and the Boy Scouts, and called parents of boys in
the troop Monday night to assure them their children were safe.
BOY SCOUT officials acknowledge that they asked the Eagle Scout if he was gay, but say it was only casual conversation. They say the
question came after -- and had nothing to do with -- their decision not to let him work at the camp.
The staff felt that letting the Scout come back, after he'd resigned,
would look bad, according to Lyle Antonides, director of the Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts and the spokesman for the Scouts.
Antonides said Friday that he didn't realize that the boy had continued to work on Sundays.
On Saturday, Antonides called the Scout's family and asked for a meeting, the teen's father said, saying it was all a misunderstanding.
Kate Monteiro, president of the Rhode Island Alliance for Lesbian &
Gay Civil Rights, said the ``Boy Scouts did the right thing'' in backing down.
``It sounds like it's a victory for people's fundamental rights to
privacy and more importantly, it's a victory for Boy Scouts' fundamental belief in the worth of individualism and Americanism,'' she said.
But the incident has divided Scout leaders.
Some believe that the Boy Scouts of America is a private organization with the right to its policies. Others say Scouts need to open doors more widely.
The Scout's Oath contains a clause about ``keeping myself . . .
morally straight,'' language that Boy Scouts say is incompatible with homosexuality.
``I'm glad it's coming to an end, but I don't judge the Boy Scouts or
anyone for what they believe,'' said Tossie Taylor, head of the Providence District of Boy Scouts. ``Everyone has his or her own beliefs, whether they are conservative or liberal beliefs.''
But William Dickie, leader of the Thundermist District in Blackstone Valley, said while he supports Boy Scout bans on atheists or female Boy Scouts, he's against the ban on gays.
``You need to have certain foundations, but a boy is a boy and sexual preference should not come into it,'' he said. ``Maybe in the time that the policies were written, it was proper, but society has
changed, and perhaps the organization needs to rethink that stand.''
Boy Scout leaders should simply interpret the oath differently, said the Eagle Scout, who put 200 hours into a community service project
to earn his Eagle badge. It's an honor only 2 percent of Scouts ever attain.
``I think being `morally straight' means you are a good person,'' he said, ``a person with strong character and values.''
THE INCIDENT clouded the normally tranquil Camp Yawgoog last week. Campers collected memories on which they hadn't counted.
``If he's gay, let him be gay,'' said Andrew Pelser, 15, of Exeter, as
he strolled away from the trading post on Saturday, chips and soda in his hand. ``What's the big deal?''
But as hundreds of Scouts streamed from Camp Yawgoog yesterday,
talk centered around arts and crafts and campfire songs.
Hundreds of Scouts of all ages tramped through the mud and rain, fishing poles in hand, to meet the parents who traveled from New
York, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island to pick up their Scouts.
Another week of Camp Yawgoog had come to an end.
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Gay Scout might work at camp, but not as a Scout
August 9, 1999
PROVIDENCE, RI. (AP) A gay Eagle Scout may be able get his job back at a local camp but he can't remain a Scout if he's an avowed
homosexual, a spokesman for the national organization said Monday.
Gregg Shields, national spokesman for the 5.8 million member Boy Scouts of America, said Monday avowed homosexuals can't be the
kind of role models the organization needs. When a Scout admits he is gay, he will receive a notification from the organization that he is no longer a Boy Scout, said Shields.
''That is a national policy,'' Shields said.
Local scout organizations must follow the policy or risk losing their charter, Shields said.
Here, the Boy Scout leaders who swayed from the national policy by telling the gay Scout that his sexual orientation is his own business,
weren't talking Monday about their decision to allow the scout to work at camp.
The Scout, who is 16, worked in the business office at Camp Yawgoog in Hopkinton. He claimed camp staff members refused to
rehire him after finding out he is gay. The teen also claimed that he was told he couldn't continue to be a member of the Boy Scouts of America.
Local Boy Scout leaders deny the youth was told he wouldn't be rehired because he is gay. They also deny telling him he couldn't be a Boy Scout.
In a statement issued Sunday, the local Boy Scout council called the teen-ager an ''honorable young man'' and reaffirmed his right to be a
Scout even though the Boy Scouts' national policy is to ban gays, atheists and women, The Providence Journal reported.
The statement said ''all parties agree that the importance of every individual's sacred right to privacy should be honored always...''
''The Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts of America acknowledge that this honorable young man is an Eagle Scout and member of Boy
Scouts with good standing,'' the statement said.
The council also said the teen can have his job back.
Civil rights activists said the statement was likely affected by the state's tough anti-discrimination laws and by a New Jersey Supreme
Court ruling last week. That court ruling said the Boy Scouts' ban on gays is illegal under the state's anti-discrimination laws.
The Boy Scouts of America plan to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold its ban on homosexuals.
Camp Yawgoog director Gary Savignano on Monday referred all questions to Lyle Antonides, director of the Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts.
''Right now the Scout executive is the official spokesperson,'' Savignano said. ''At this time I cannot comment.''
The Narragansett Council offices were closed Monday for Victory Day, a Rhode Island holiday. Mr. Antonides could not be reached at his North Kingstown home.
A reporter was told to leave Camp Yawgoog grounds Monday when he tried to seek comment from camp staffers.
The allegations by the boy who has not been identified caused a furor at Camp Yawgoog. Ninety staffers held a sit-in last Wednesday
in the Scout's support, forcing part of the camp to be closed that morning.
Antonides acknowledges the boy was asked if he is gay. But he says the question came up in a casual conversation, and the boy's
affirmative answer had nothing to do with the youth not getting his job back.
As of Monday, the Scout had not yet decided if he wants the job back.
His family said it will not take legal action or pursue a complaint filed Friday with the State Human Rights Commission.
Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, said Monday local Boy Scout leaders
should be ''commended for reversing themselves so quickly.
''It's important that they were willing to reexamine what happened,'' he said.
Brown says local Boy Scout leaders would have ''had a tough time arguing'' they didn't violate the state's anti-discrimination laws, if
the boy's version of events was correct.
Gay scout regains position despite Boy Scouts' policy
By Frank J. Murray
The Washington Times
August 10, 1999
An avowed homosexual Eagle Scout was restored to good standing yesterday and offered his paid camp job back by an official Scout
council despite a strict policy the Boy Scouts of America promised yesterday to defend to the Supreme Court.
After meeting Sunday with the boy and his parents, the BSA Narragansett Council in Providence, RI., overruled the director of
Camp Yawgoog whose Aug. 3 firing of the youth divided the staff.
About 90 camp staffers held a sit-in protest while others jeered them as "gay lovers," the Providence Journal reported before
Sunday's meeting, forcing the camp to close briefly for the first time in 84 years.
"All parties agree that the importance of every individual's sacred right to privacy should be honored always," the council said in an
apologetic statement released jointly with the boy's parents who asked that their 16-year-old son not be identified.
The family said it will drop a discrimination complaint lodged Friday and called the flap a "misunderstanding."
However, lawyers for activist groups who oppose the nationwide Boy Scout bans of homosexuals and atheists called the council's split
with BSA policy stunning. Independent troops have dissented in the past but an open break by a branch of the organization is unique, they said.
"They never permit dissension on this issue. If there was room for dissension they couldn't make the First Amendment argument that is
the core of their defense," said lawyer Lauren Raphael of the American Civil Liberties Union's Chicago office.
"To support its own position, the Boy Scouts either will have to reverse what the Narragansett Council has done or sever their ties
with the Council," said Miss Raphael who expects a decision on a similar hiring issue next week.
The official statement also said: "The Narragansett Council of the
Boy Scouts of America acknowledges that this honorable young man is an Eagle Scout and member of Boy Scouts with good standing."
It offered the teen-ager his job back "if he chooses to accept it."
The youth quit a full-time paid job in the camp office July 6 to work at his father's office and worked at camp on Sundays answering
phones until he was rehired full-time and quickly fired the same day.
The firing was portrayed as a "precaution" one day after a visiting troop leader was accused of molesting a camper, according to the
newspaper, which said parents were assured boys were safe and the Scout leader was kicked out of camp.
Hopkinton police yesterday called the molestation case "an open investigation" with no arrests.
While meeting with the boy and his boss Aug. 3, camp director Gary Savignano asked if it was true he was homosexual, all sides agree.
"Yes, but why are you asking me that?" responded the boy.
"One thing has nothing to do with another," Providence Scout executive Ryan Haimer insisted yesterday while referring most
questions to Lyle Antonides, who was on holiday.
"The boy quit at a time when camp officials had no knowledge he was gay. Just as if any other volunteer or staff member would quit,
they figured to hire him back wouldn't serve as a good example," Mr. Haimer said.
The relevance of homosexuality "has been blown way out of proportion," a local reporter was told by Mr. Antonides, top scouting
official in the council that covers Rhode Island and parts of Connecticut and Massachusetts.
He said the question was part of a casual conversation and had nothing to do with the termination. Mr. Antonides said Mr. Savignano
dismissed the boy because his rehiring did not go through channels, and that it was customary not to rehire staff members or volunteers who recently resigned.
"Based on what I've heard, he was terminated because he acknowledged he was gay. That's illegal," ACLU lawyer Steven Brown
of Providence said in an interview yesterday.
He said it is illegal in Rhode Island even to ask a job applicant's sexual orientation under a state anti-discrimination law amended in
1995 to cover sexual orientation.
Official says gay boy can't be Scout
August 10, 1999
Providence Journal
The national Boy Scouts organization contradicts the Narragansett Council, which told a gay Eagle Scout on Sunday that he could remain a member in good standing.
Rhode Island's Boy Scout brass may believe it is OK to allow a 16-year-old gay Eagle Scout to remain in scouting, but a national Boy
Scout official said yesterday that avowed homosexuals may not belong to the organization.
Gregg Shields, national spokesman for the 5.8-million member Boy Scouts of America, said yesterday that openly homosexual people
cannot be the kind of role models the organization needs. When a Scout admits he is gay, he will receive a notification from the organization that he is no longer a Boy Scout, Shields said.
``That is a national policy,'' Shields said.
Local Scout organizations must follow the policy or risk losing their charter, Shields said.
The national policy is at odds with Rhode Island's top scouting officials, who on Sunday told the gay Scout -- a 16-year-old from
South Kingstown who has not been identified -- that his sexual orientation is his own business and that he could remain a member in ``good standing.''
But the gay Scout, his family and the Rhode Island Boy Scout leaders who broke from the national policy were not commenting last night.
Officials of the Rhode Island Alliance for Lesbian and Gay Civil Rights, which has supported the gay Scout, said last night they were
disappointed at the stance taken by the national Boy Scouts.
``We think that the local Rhode Island council's statement was clear,'' said Kate Monteiro, alliance president. ``This Eagle Scout is and
has always been an honorable young man. I guess at this point it's up to the local council to make it clear to the national organization what their position is.''
AT ISSUE is the Eagle Scout who worked in the business office at Camp Yawgoog in Hopkinton. He said camp staff members refused to
rehire him for a full-time summer job after finding out he is gay. The teen also said he was told he couldn't continue to be a member of the Boy Scouts of America.
Local Boy Scout leaders deny the youth was told he wouldn't be rehired because he is gay. They also deny telling him he couldn't be a Boy Scout.
In a statement issued Sunday, the Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts called the teenager an ``honorable young man'' and
reaffirmed his right to be a Scout -- even though the Boy Scouts' national policy is to ban gays.
The statement said ``all parties agree that the importance of every individual's sacred right to privacy should be honored always . . . ''
And the council also said the teen can have his job back.
Civil rights activists said the statement was probably affected by the state's strong gay civil rights laws and by a New Jersey Supreme
Court ruling last week. That court ruling said the Boy Scouts' ban on gays is illegal under the state's anti-discrimination laws.
The Boy Scouts of America plans to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold its ban on homosexuals.
Camp Yawgoog director Gary Savignano yesterday referred all questions to Lyle Antonides, director of the Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts.
``Right now the Scout executive is the official spokesperson,'' Savignano said. ``At this time I cannot comment.''
The Narragansett Council offices were closed for Victory Day. Antonides could not be reached at his North Kingstown home.
A reporter was told to leave Camp Yawgoog yesterday when he tried to seek comment from camp staffers.
The allegations by the boy caused a furor at Camp Yawgoog. Ninety staffers held a sit-in last Wednesday in support of the Scout, forcing
part of the camp to be closed that morning.
Antonides acknowledges the boy was asked if he is gay. But he says the question came up in a casual conversation, and that the boy's
affirmative answer had nothing to do with the youth's not getting his job back.
As of yesterday, the Scout had not yet decided if he wants the job back.
His family said they will not take legal action or pursue a complaint filed Friday with the state Human Rights Commission.
Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island Affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, said earlier yesterday that local Boy
Scout leaders should be ``commended for reversing themselves so quickly.''
``It's important that they were willing to reexamine what happened,'' he said.
Brown said local Boy Scout leaders would have ``had a tough time arguing'' that they didn't violate the state's anti-discrimination laws,
if the boy's version of events was correct.
R.I., national Scouts reach an agreement on gay teen
By JENNIFER LEVITZ and ELIZABETH ABBOTT
Providence Journal
August 11, 1999
HOPKINTON -- One of the nation's premier getaways for Boy Scouts -- Rhode Island's own Camp Yawgoog -- was swept into turmoil once
again yesterday over issues surrounding sexual orientation and an alleged sexual assault at the pristine, private camp. Three separate, but related, developments conspired to keep the spotlight on Yawgoog:
- In an effort to clarify their position on homosexuals, national and state Boy Scout officials released a joint statement saying gays can't be Boy Scouts, but that it's also Boy Scout policy not to ask
members about their sexual orientation. In other words, don't ask, don't tell -- similar to the military's stand under the Clinton administration.
- A 37-year-old troop leader from Pawtucket was held without bail on a felony molestation charge for allegedly assaulting a 13-year-old Scout while he was sleeping in his tent at Yawgoog on the night of
Aug. 1. Police escorted Michael Chalk, a Riverside troop leader, out of the camp, and the Boy Scouts presented him with a letter severing his ties to the organization.
- Sources said another troop leader was asked to leave the camp last week after using the photograph of a gay Boy Scout as a target on the firing range. The Scout, James Dale, had recently won a New
Jersey Supreme Court ruling that struck down the Boy Scouts' ban on homosexuals in that state.
OFFICIALS RELEASED the joint statement last night, ending a week
in which a 16-year-old Eagle Scout was asked whether he was gay and then told he couldn't return to a summer job he'd left a month earlier.
The statement came after several days of conflicting statements
from the boy, the Narragansett Council and the national organization: On Sunday, Boy Scout leaders, facing a legal challenge, apologized to the avowed homosexual teen for invading his privacy and offered him his job back.
The next day, however, national officials said known homosexuals can't be Scouts.
Yesterday's statement, said, however: ``As a matter of policy, the Boy Scouts of America do not inquire into the sexual orientation of
any member or prospective members,'' the statement said. ``If any questions were put to the youth, it's a departure from BSA policy and should not have occurred.''
But that doesn't mean his acknowledgment that he is gay was okay.
In their statement, the Scouts reaffirmed their position of not allowing gays, a policy that's based on a clause in the Scout oath,
which was written in 1910, and on Scout law.
The oath says a Scout must be ``morally straight,'' and Scout law requires the young men to be ``clean in thought, word and deed.''
Since Scouts and leaders are expected to be ``role models'' of the Boy Scout oath, yesterday's statement said, the organization doesn't accept ``those who openly self-identify as homosexuals, or known
or avowed homosexuals, as Scouts or Scout leaders.''
Boy Scout officials wouldn't comment beyond the statement, but said they ``consider the matter closed.''
The Eagle Scout's parents said they received a copy of the statement and feel the same way.
The Scout, from South Kingstown, returned to his job answering
phones and filing in the business office of Camp Yawgoog yesterday.
``We're happy he's still a Scout, happy that he's still working at the
camp, and we consider it over,'' the teen's mother said yesterday.
THE ISSUE exploded at the normally tranquil camp last week, when the Eagle Scout returned to a full-time job after cutting back his
hours in July to part-time on Sundays.
At the end of one day last week, however, camp director Gary Savignano called the Scout into his office and told him he'd heard
rumors that the teen was gay. He wanted to know if they were true.
The teen said yes.
Savignano reportedly told the teen that, because of allegations the night before that a visiting East Providence Scout leader had
molested a camper, Camp Yawgoog leaders needed to ``take precautions.''
The Eagle Scout, Savignano reportedly said, couldn't work at the camp at all.
Boy Scout officials admit that they asked the teen if he was gay, but say it was part of a casual conversation that came after -- and was unrelated to -- their decision to keep him off the staff.
Boy Scout officials say someone didn't go through the proper channels to bring the teen back full-time, and that they believed it looked bad to give him his old job back after he'd quit, Lyle
Antonides, director of the Narragansett Council of the Boy Scouts of America, said Friday.
The incident sparked a protest by staff members who overwhelmingly supported the teen. They staged a sit-in on Wednesday morning
that shut down activities at the camp for the first time in 84 years.
But over the weekend, after the teen filed a complaint with the state's Human Rights Commission, Antonides called the boy's family
and said it had all been a misunderstanding.
While national officials first reacted by contradicting the state council's position, they must have taken a good look at Rhode
Island's antidiscrimination laws, Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island Affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, said yesterday.
Legislators updated the state's Fair Employment Practices Act in
1995, making it one of the toughest in the nation.
Under the law, an employer can't ask an applicant about sexual orientation. While the employer can discuss the issue after the
person is hired, a company can't use that information to take action -- such as firing.
``I think the national office recognized that they were on thin ice,
because the question asked of the Scout was totally inappropriate under state law,'' Brown said.
Legal experts say the decision to let the youth remain in scouting
may have been influenced by last Wednesday's New Jersey Supreme Court decision, which ruled that the Boy Scout's ban on gays is illegal under that state's anti-discrimination law.
While Boy Scout officials say theirs is a private organization, the New Jersey ruling said the group is a ``public accommodation,'' like a park or a restaurant, and can't arbitrarily exclude groups of people.
Some also believe the organization has public ties, because, among other things, many troops are sponsored by schools and take part in training programs at police and fire stations.
The case of the South Kingstown Eagle Scout drew national attention because it represented a split, if only temporarily, between state Boy Scout officials and the national leadership.
YESTERDAY MORNING,
a construction worker turned himself in to answer the charge of molesting a Scout at the camp. Michael B. Chalk, a scoutmaster from Riverside for the past five years, was then
taken to District Court, South Kingstown, where he was arraigned on one count of first-degree child molestation.
Chalk did not enter a plea, as is customary with felony cases in
District Court. But his lawyer said yesterday he is outraged by the youth's allegation.
``He is absolutely, vehemently denying these charges,'' John P. Larochelle said.
According to Hopkinton Police Chief John Scuncio, the youth said he was molested sometime after 11 p.m. while he was sleeping in a tent with seven other Scouts. The Hopkinton police learned of the
alleged incident the next day, from the Narragansett Council.
``When an allegation of this nature is made, we take it very seriously,'' Anthony D. Gibbs, director of field service for the
Narragansett Council, said yesterday.
The Boy Scouts not only notified the police of the boy's accusation, but also contacted the state's Department of Children, Youth and Families, Gibbs said.
The Hopkinton police escorted Chalk out of the camp Aug. 2, Gibbs said. At the same time, Boy Scout officials handed him a letter telling him his ties to the organization were severed and he should
separate himself from any matters having to do with Boy Scouts. Gibbs said Chalk can apply to be reinstated to the organization if he is proven not guilty, but for the time being the Boy Scouts would
rather ``err on the side of caution.''
Gibbs said that, to his knowledge, the allegation against Chalk is an isolated incident; the Boy Scouts have not received any other complaints about him, he said.
District Court Judge Robert J. Rahill ordered Chalk held without bail at the Adult Correctional Institutions pending a bail hearing set for Aug. 18. At that time, the state must outline its case against Chalk,
a proceeding Larochelle said his client welcomes.
``Everything will come out a week from tomorrow,'' Larochelle said.
AND YET ANOTHER incident shook Camp Yawgoog, a tradition-filled
retreat on 1,800 acres forested with towering pine trees.
On Thursday, the day after the New Jersey ruling, a scoutmaster showed his disdain for James Dale and the Supreme Court decision
by pinning up a photograph of Dale's face at the camp's rifle range, according to two high-ranking staff members at the camp.
The man used a picture, torn from a newspaper, for target practice.
Camp officials kicked the scoutmaster out of camp, saying that they follow strict National Rifle Association guidelines not to use the image of a person as target practice.
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Boy Scouts of America
Narragansett Council 546
Press Release 8/10/99
A recent incident at Camp Yawgoog in the Narragansett Council has led to a considerable amount of confusion. The Narragansett Council,
Boy Scouts of America, would like to take this opportunity to clarify the various issues which have arisen.
1) As a matter of policy, the BSA and the Narragansett Council do not inquire into the sexual orientation of any member or prospective
member. If any such questions were put to this youth, it was a departure from BSA policy and should not have occurred.
2) As a matter of policy, the BSA and the Narragansett Council comply with all applicable laws, local, state, and federal with regard to employment.
3) BSA regards homosexual conduct as inconsistent with the requirement in the Scout Oath to be morally straight and the Scout
Law to be clean in thought, word and deed. BSA shares this moral position with religions to which a majority of Americans claim adherence.
Since Scouts and leaders are expected to subscribe to and to be role models of the values of the Oath and Law, BSA does not accept
those who openly self-identify as homosexuals - "known or avowed homosexuals" - as Scouts or leaders.
The Narragansett Council has always adhered to this policy and will continue to do so.
4) As a subsequent meeting with the youth, his parents and Council representatives, it was established that no basis existed to question
the eligibility of the youth for membership in the organization.
Accordingly, we now consider the matter closed.
Boy Scout camp 'hell on earth'
August 11, 1999
HOPKINTON, R.I., Aug. 11 (UPI) -- Camp Yawgoog, a premier getaway in Rhode Island for Boy Scouts and their troop leaders for
84 years, is now described as a ``hell on earth'' for national and local Scout administrators, parents and scoutmasters.
The issues surround sexual orientation and an alleged sexual assault at the camp.
Three separate but related developments have conspired to keep Yawgoog in the spotlight:
-- In an attempt to clearly explain their position on homosexuals, both national and state Boy Scout officials have released a joint
statement that essentially proclaims that gays cannot be Boy Scouts, but that it's also their policy not to ask members about their sexual orientation.
This was brought about earlier in the month when a 16-year-old Eagle Scout reapplied for his summer position at the camp office and
after being asked if he was gay, responded in the affirmative and then was told he could not have the job and would lose his status as a scout. In the firestorm that erupted, backed by challenges from the
American Civil Liberties Union, and the filing of a complaint against the Boy Scouts with the state's Human Rights Commission, the Narragansett Council apologized and immediately rehired and reinstated the youth.
The very next day, the national headquarters of Boy Scouts Countermanded the order and said, no, he was not eligible for
reinstatement. Again threatened, they backed down.
-- A 37-year-old scoutmaster from Pawtucket, RI., was arrested at Camp Yawgoog yesterday after one of the youths in his troop
complained that he was molested in his tent on the evening of Aug. 1 by troop leader Michael Chalk, of Riverside, R.I. Chalk has been arraigned and is being held until a hearing set for Aug. 18. A veteran
of five years service with the troop, Chalk has also been presented with a letter severing his ties to the organization.
-- Camp authorities admit that another troop leader has been asked to leave after using a photograph of the gay New Jersey Scout who
had recently won a New Jersey ruling that struck down Boy Scouts' ban on homosexuals in that state as a target for shooting on the rifle range. Two camp staffers observed the troop leader pinning a
newspaper photograph of the scout's face on a target at the rifle range and encouraging the scouts to fire at it. He was immediately ordered off the campgrounds and will receive a letter of termination.
Scouting officials leave jobs in R.I.
By JENNIFER LEVITZ
Providence Journal
January 24, 2000
The Boy Scouts' top administrator in Rhode Island during recent controversies involving a gay Eagle Scout has retired, and another
high-level official has been transferred to another state.
A spokesman for the Narragansett Council said that neither personnel move is related to an incident at Camp Yawgoog,
Hopkinton, in August, when a gay Eagle Scout was denied a request to return to a job at the camp on the same afternoon that a camp director asked if he was gay.
After the youth complained to the state's Human Rights Commission, and staff staged a sit-in in his support, the state Scouting organization offered him his job back.
In November, the executive board of the Narragansett Council became only the second state Scout organization to ask its national parent organization to reconsider an 89-year-old membership policy that bans homosexuals.
Lyle Antonides, executive director of the Scouts for six years, resigned this month from the Narragansett Council of Boy Scouts, and will be replaced by David Anderson, the 39-year-old former
director of the Five Rivers Council in upstate New York.
Anthony Gibbs, the director of field services, moved to a position with the Boy Scouts in Chicago, according to Peter Reid, an executive
board member with the Narragansett Council.
Anderson said he doesn't plan to spend time lobbying the national organization or even focusing on the Scout's antigay policies.
``What I do will have no impact,'' he said. ``The board has spoken and the resolution speaks for itself. The decision will be made [by the national Boy Scout organization] in Dallas, Texas, and at the
Supreme Court.''
Anderson also would not give his personal views on whether gays should be allowed in Scouting, saying ``my personal opinion doesn't
matter.'' His priorities, he said, are to expand the Narragansett Council's urban scouting program and to promote ``Learning for Life,'' a ``character-building'' curriculum offered to teachers.
Reid said the turmoil of the past several months and the entry into the national debate on the Scouts' policy on gays were probably on the minds of search committee members as they selected a new leader.
Antonides, 61, joined Scouting at age 11 and has spent 35 years in the field, leading councils in New Jersey and New York, according to Boy Scout officials. Under his leadership, Rhode Island scout membership topped 20,000.
``Much of the success of Scouting in Rhode Island in the 1990s can be directly attributed to Lyle Antonides's leadership and lifelong commitment,'' Andy Erickson, president of the Narragansett Council
executive board, said in a statement.
Antonides didn't answer a phone message requesting an interview. Reid, the executive board spokesman, said the former director plans
to go into fundraising for a private school in Connecticut.
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