Scouts hint at policy change

Statement suggests organization to lift ban on gay leaders

Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates talks with CBS's "Face the Nation" in this May 2013 file photo.
Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates talks with CBS's "Face the Nation" in this May 2013 file photo.

The Boy Scouts of America is expected today to end its blanket ban on gay leaders -- a turning point for an organization that has been in turmoil over the issue, according to a statement that the Scouts' top executives sent this month to regional board members.

But some scouting groups will still be able to limit leadership jobs to heterosexuals.

To gain the acquiescence of conservative religious groups that sponsor many dens and troops, like the Mormon and Roman Catholic churches, the policy will allow church-run units to pick leaders who agree with their moral precepts.

"There are differences of opinion, and we need to be respectful of them," said Michael Harrison, a businessman who led the Boy Scouts in Orange County, Calif., and is one of many leaders who lobbied internally for change. "It doesn't mean the Mormons have to pick a gay scoutmaster, but please don't tell the Unitarians they can't."

Already struggling to reverse a decline in membership, the Boy Scouts have been increasingly consumed over the past two decades by battles over the exclusion of gay people, divisions that threatened to fracture the organization. Conservative partners saw the policy as a bulwark against unwanted social change, but the Boy Scouts' anti-gay stance was costing it public support and cachet as well as corporate funders, and lately has brought the threat of costly lawsuits.

In a contentious meeting in 2013, the Scouts decided to permit participation by gay youths -- but not adults. Today, bowing to shifts in opinion and law, the Scouts will relax their policy barring openly gay adults from serving as den leaders, scoutmasters and camp counselors.

The Scouts today will also bar discrimination based on sexual orientation in all official facilities and paying jobs across the country, heading off potential suits and violations of employment discrimination laws.

But to keep some of the larger church sponsors in the fold, Scout executives concluded that they must allow for diverse policies for local volunteers. Church-based units may "continue to choose adult leaders whose beliefs are consistent with their own," according to the statement.

The proposal follows a public warning in May by Robert Gates, the Scouts' voluntary two-year president and a former defense secretary, that the ban on gay adults "cannot be sustained." The national governing board, which includes scores of corporate, civic and church leaders who share a devotion to scouting, is expected to provide overwhelming support for the resolution in a meeting to be conducted today by telephone.

With this latest change, Gates and other Scout executives hope to defuse an issue that has caused growing turmoil, even as membership -- more than 2.4 million youths in 2014, with nearly 1 million adult volunteers -- has steadily declined. Over time, the share of units sponsored by churches of all denominations has climbed to 70 percent, with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the United Methodists and the Roman Catholics accounting for the largest shares.

"It's a great day for America and for scouting," David Boies, a prominent lawyer, said of the expected announcement.

His firm helped create pressure for change, threatening to sue the Boy Scouts if the organization tried to bar a gay Eagle Scout from a camp job this summer in New York. Boies has also been a legal champion of same-sex marriage.

But Boies added: "I think this will be a way station on the road to full equality," and he questioned whether the exemption for religious sponsors could endure.

Gates has won praise for acting decisively to resolve a conflict that threatened to fracture the Boy Scouts. An Eagle Scout who ran the CIA and served as defense secretary under Republican and Democratic presidents, he oversaw the end of the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gays in the military.

"Because of his history, he was in a position to exercise leadership on this issue," said Zach Wahls, 24, an Eagle Scout and executive director of Scouts for Equality, which has mounted public campaigns for change. "The people in the Scouts trusted him to handle it well."

A Section on 07/27/2015

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