Belleville Cub Scouts Go Through Restructuring

Belleville Cub Scout Troop 350 is an active organization in town with 34 registered scouts.

Besides performing community service, the scouts also take part in other activities, including the Columbus Day and Veterans Day parades.

But the group is going through an official “restructuring” and is moving its decision-making powers so they are spread amongst a group of parents, according to Troop Leader Will Gonzalez. A special meeting by the scout troop was held on Feb. 29 where parents aired their concerns about the previous structure.

All troops are members of a Boy Scouts of America chartering organization. The Troop 350 charter representative attended the Feb. 29 meeting where parents spoke and the leaders of the scout troop initiated a restructuring, explained Manny Molina, who is the leader of the wolf scouts, the second-grade branch of cub scouts.

Gonzalez did not blame any one person involved with the scout troop for the current change  but said, "The point is we want to grow as an organization, and we can't have any one person be against everything and keep us from that.”

The parents in attendance at the last regular Friday meeting declined comment on the restructuring, but one parent contacted BellevillePatch with an alert about the situation.

Gonzalez said there are several parents and residents that want to help out more and add a lot of other activities, including allowing new technology to be a part of scouting.

So now people in the organization will have assigned roles to help the troop continue to move forward, he said,"We kind of felt like we were being held back," Gonzalez said.

The troop has added new activities in the past year. For example, the scouts camped out in Fairway Park, something that had not been done in many years, and the troop is scheduled again for this year, according to Gonzalez.

One of the major goals of the restructuring is to increase the number of boys on the roster, which now stands at 34 but Gonzalez said could rise to 50 fairly soon.

He put in a pitch to parents who think scouting and sports are incompatible.

"Some parents don't understand that they can do both," Gonzalez said. "But it's all on the parents."