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Boy Scouts membership scandal may extend beyond Tampa Bay
an ABC Action News report
03/03/05
TAMPA - Membership numbers are crucial to the amount of funding the Boy Scouts of America organization gets every year.
But the Action News investigators found proof that the Gulf Ridge Council of the scouts was falsifying membership numbers using phony applications and rosters.
Now, we've learned the scandal spreads beyond Tampa Bay.
Former
cubmaster Juanita Smith is convinced the Gulf Ridge Council inflated the number of scouts actually enrolled. Her roster listed boys who were not in her troop.
"You should not have fictitious children on there, or children who
are not in the system or in the Boy Scouts on there and get credit for it. I think that it is wrong," Smith said.
Former Boy Scouts registrar Rhonda Johnson audited dozens of phony applications and repeatedly told higher-ups.
"Nothing was done because I found more applications in 2003. This was when I brought it up again to the office manager," Johnson explained.
Action News investigator Robin Guess confirmed Johnson's allegations by
visiting the addresses listed on several suspicious applications. One address lead back to a vacant lot; a phone number lead to this radio station, and another address was a home with no children.
Former federal prosecutor John
Lauro says what Robin uncovered could amount to criminal activity.
"Any type of misrepresentation or material omission can put you in a fraud situation, and the federal statutes are very, very significant and very stringent.
And if you are engaged in raising money and you are not telling the truth -- under any circumstances -- that is a crime," he stated.
The national office of the Boy Scouts has said problems with phony applications and
membership numbers are isolated, but that's just not the case. The FBI is investigating identical problems in Alabama, and the Atlanta area Boy Scouts council is in the midst of its own membership scandal.
A police detective blew
the whistle on the leaders of the Birmingham Boy Scouts council, who enjoy a lavish headquarters building. The Atlanta council is accused of fabricating entire scout troops and the U.S. attorney there has been asked to press charges.
Bob Kent and Cedric Samuels say the Atlanta numbers are inflated.
"We just had people show up on our roster all of a sudden. Thirty to 35 boys would show up and we didn't know where they came from," Bob Kent, an
Atlanta scout coordinator, said. "We begged them to stop it, to stop fabricating the numbers and to do something about setting up real troops; we were just not successful."
Robin took her findings to the United Way of
Tampa Bay, which provided $282,000 in funding to the Gulf Ridge Council in 2003.
In a written response, the agency stated, "United Way's expectation is that the Boy Scouts will, in fact, follow through with their internal
procedures to fully investigate any allegations and will make those findings public."
Before part one of her report, Robin offered to show local scout leaders evidence of the phony applications, they refused to meet with her.
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Investigation reveals Boy Scouts membership discrepancies
an ABC Action News report 03/02/05
"On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country, and keep myself morally straight."
That's the promise every Boy Scout makes. But some of the adults involved with the local council may not have been upholding those beliefs.
Action News investigator Robin Guess discovered records used to determine
annual funding for the organization have been falsified.
There's no question the Boy Scout organization does wonderful things for children in our community. This is not a story about the children or the scouting programs;
this is a story about how the local council is managed.
Rhonda Johnson was registrar for the Gulf Ridge Council for four years. In April of 2002, Rhonda says, a scoutmaster alerted her to a roster with the names of boys
he did not recognize; she became suspicious.
"I found some phony applications, and I wanted to get down to the bottom of it," she recalled.
Rhonda could not find dozens of boys who were listed as active scouts.
Former cub master Juanita Smith also found names of boys on her official roster that did not belong there. One of the boys on her roster was living in another state.
"Here on my 03-04 paper, his name is listed. How can he be here when he's thousands of miles away in Hawaii? But he's on that paper, and he's not there. I
mean, it's impossible," she said. "They are getting credit for kids that aren't actually in the program."
You might be wondering why having accurate rosters and registrations even
matters. The Boy Scouts organization gets hundreds of thousands of dollars a year from organizations like the United Way, whose annual contribution is based, in part, on membership numbers.
Meanwhile, tax records for the last three years show contributions to the Gulf Ridge Council have steadily declined from $2.1-million in 2001 to $1.5-million in 2003.
"When those goals are not met by the district executives, they could lose their jobs. They have to work really hard trying to find the extra kids," Johnson explained.
The allegations made by Rhonda Johnson and Juanita Smith are so serious, we did not just take their word for it. We did our own research and started looking for some of the boys listed on the rosters and applications that Johnson and Smith
claim are phony.
One of those applications was for Joseph Kwiatowski. The application places Joseph's home and phone number with Don and Kathy Kwiatowski, but the Kwiatowskis' children are grown, and none of them is named Joseph.
"I may have an uncle named Joseph in New York, and I think he's passed away," a puzzled Don Kwiatowski told Robin Guess.
There was a similar case with an application for a boy named Matthew. As with
Joseph's case, Rhonda Johnson says a receipt proves he was counted as an active member. But, when Robin called the phone number on Matthew's application, she reached a radio station. When she went to the address listed, she found an
empty lot.
Robin did find one child who does actually exist. His name is Thomas Johnson. But his mother said he dropped out of the Boy Scouts, and the application is phony.
Rhonda Johnson came up with the same results when she tried to locate dozens of boys whose applications were suspicious.
"I was shocked. I couldn't believe it," she exclaimed. "I had to actually go back and
call them again to make sure I wasn't dreaming, because I thought, this can't be happening."
Johnson was fired a year and a half after she reported the phony applications to her supervisors.
Action News offered the Gulf Ridge Council's executive director, Warren Wenner, an opportunity to review the applications of more than 20 boys we could not locate.
We also offered Wenner an opportunity to explain why the paperwork appears to be falsified.
He declined our invitation, sending this written statement instead: "Falsification of
membership is not tolerated. If anyone is in possession of any information which suggests that any of our council's membership records are incorrect, we would welcome their submissions...And we will investigate it immediately."
But we did offer to show Boy Scouts executives all of the evidence we uncovered, and they declined our offer.
Meanwhile, Juanita Smith plans to keep her three boys active in the scouts. She
just wants to see more honesty and integrity in an organization that says honesty and integrity are its fundamental principles.
"That's not honesty and trust, so what are you really teaching them?" she wondered.
Wednesday night at 11, we'll tell you what the local United Way is saying about all this, and you'll hear from whistleblowers in other states.
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GULF RIDGE RELEASE TO MEDIA REPORT
The Boy Scouts of America is dedicated to accurate reporting of its membership. The BSA was built on honesty, integrity and truthfulness, and we require our
employees, volunteers and chartered organizations to act in accordance with the Scout Oath and Law. Falsification of membership is not tolerated. We feel that one
incident of misreporting information is one too many, and we work hard to prevent it.
There are several procedures to ensure accurate reporting. Each member, youth
and adult, must submit an application as part of a unit (troop, pack, crew or post.) Those units charter with their local council, and the local council must report their
membership or participation numbers to the national council and in their own local annual report.
Within the local council, the division of functions among departments creates a system of checks and balances to ensure accuracy.
The report to the national council (Annual Local Council Membership Validation Procedure) requires the signature of the Scout Executive and key personnel that those reporting units are existent and active.
In addition, the national council, through the regional office, conducts periodic reviews of local membership and occasional administrative reviews. Here in Tampa, a membership review was conducted last year when requested by the
Scout Executive upon the dismissal of an employee.
Another review was conducted four months ago prior to naming a new Scout Executive. At both times the reviews did not uncover serious flaws in the operations of the council.
If anyone is in possession of any information which suggests that any of our council's membership records are incorrect, we would welcome their submissions
of the information to us and we will investigate it immediately and make our findings public.
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