Dear Troop 55 parents,

As most of you know, circumstances in my life will demand that I transition out of my current role as Troop 55 Scoutmaster by the end of this school year.  In fact, considering that we have to re-charter with the District and BSA in February, I think it’s most appropriate that I pass the torch (at least formally) before that time, so the new Scoutmaster can be listed on the 2012 charter.

John Rue (Jack’s dad), currently one of our two Assistant Scoutmasters, has expressed a willingness to serve in the Scoutmaster role, at least for next year.  But John has asked me to first be sure that anyone else who is interested in the job also has a chance to volunteer.  John has also asked that we conduct a formal election (even if he turns out to be unopposed), to be held only after John and any other candidates have been given an opportunity to explain how they’d like to see the Troop continue to evolve and grow in the near and medium term future.

One goal that John’s already shared with me, and with which I fully agree, is to revitalize the Troop Committee, so that the Scoutmaster is more clearly implementing decisions made by the Committee, rather than making such decisions on his own.  To that end, Frank Reda (Julian’s dad) has volunteered to be the interim chair of the Committee (just through the next meeting, at which the election of both a new Scoutmaster and a new Committee Chair will take place).  Both in light of how busy folks can be during the holidays, and also to give people a chance to volunteer, we’d like to schedule that meeting right after New Year – probably concurrently with the first weekly Troop meeting of 2012.

So please save the date (tentatively January 9, 2012) for the Committee meeting/election.  And in the meantime, if you would like to volunteer either as Scoutmaster or Committee Chair, please email Frank at frankreda@comcast.net.

Best regards,

Jeff