Carter Martinez hopes to be an Eagle Scout by his 14th birthday in March.
While it’s an ambitious goal — scouts must earn the rank before they turn 18, and many attain that status in their later teens — he’s in a good position right now. He’s currently a Life Scout, which is one rank below Eagle Scout status. Martinez thinks he can earn the honor by the deadline he’s given himself.
It’s a bit of a turnaround for the 13-year-old, who wasn’t always as involved in scouting as he is now. Carter is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and his Boy Scout troop was chartered through his church in Meridian, according to the Idaho Press. Up until Jan. 1, Boy Scouts of America and the LDS church had a close relationship — boys in the church were automatically enrolled in Boy Scouts.
But that 100-year partnership ended with the new year. The LDS church and Boy Scouts of America jointly announced the split in 2018.
In the announcement, the church cited a desire to have a uniform scouting program for its growing membership worldwide. The Associated Press, over a year later, quoted a high-ranking church leader who said the Boy Scouts of America’s changing direction pushed the church away.
“The reality there is we didn’t really leave them; they kind of left us,” Elder M. Russell Ballard told the AP in November.
Boy Scouts of America has changed policies in recent years to allow openly gay leaders and scouts, and to allow girl troops.
The separation means the LDS church will no longer “charter,” or sponsor, Boy Scout troops, and Boy Scout troops cannot use churches as meeting spaces. Nor will the church automatically enroll youth in the program; it has since created its own program to replace scouting, something that can be implemented among its growing membership worldwide.
News headlines across the country noted the church would “remove” 400,000 LDS youth from the program, including Cub Scouts, and highlighted the fact that the Boy Scouts’ membership would drop to fewer than 2 million youth for the first time since World War II.
Before the split, the church sponsored about 80% of the troops in southern Idaho and eastern Oregon, the Idaho Press previously reported. In August 2018, officials estimated Scouts BSA — the scouting program for youth ages 11 to 17 — and Cub Scouts numbers in the Treasure Valley could drop from around 14,000 down to 4,000 or 5,000.
In a written statement provided to the Idaho Press, Lynn Gunter, Scout Executive of the Ore-Ida Council, which includes Boise, said the organization expects a drop in membership among LDS youth registered in units chartered to LDS churches.
Youth in the LDS church can choose to stick with Boy Scouts, and scouts from formerly church-chartered troops have come together to form their own troops outside of the church.
“For LDS families who want to continue their participation in Scouting, we are ensuring a smooth transition from LDS-sponsored units to community-sponsored units,” the statement reads. “We can also confirm that there are some units currently chartered with the LDS that have decided to remain with the BSA. These units will be chartered by another organization in their communities.”
Boy Scout leaders in the Treasure Valley have said the split has had some positive impacts, because youths in the program are now involved with scouting only because they want to be, not because they’re required to be there by the church.
“I think it’s a good time to be in scouting here in the Treasure Valley,” said Kip Higby, scoutmaster of Troop 1, which has never been affiliated with the LDS church.
CONTINUING ON
Despite the headlines and Ballard’s characterization of Boy Scouts of America leaving the church, the separation of the two groups appeared to be amicable in the Treasure Valley.
Shortly after the church announced the separation in May 2018, Carter remembered the deacons of his church met with the scouts and asked them if they wanted to continue in the program after Jan. 1. Carter said his Boy Scout leader helped him find a new troop to join.
The program still shares common values with the church, said Matt Nelson, who is both a church member and an adult leader in scouts.
“The purpose of scouting at church has always been to help young men get closer to God,” he said.
Boy Scouts is a faith-influenced organization, but it doesn’t require affiliation with any specific denomination.
“People say scouting is a Christian organization,” said R.D. Hill, a Boise scoutmaster and LDS church member who has been affiliated with Boy Scouts for 40 years. “Well, it’s not. … What name you call God is entirely up to you.”
Still, even though the LDS church is no longer officially associated with the organization, Nelson said he feels the Scout Law — which emphasizes values such as loyalty and reverence — shares common ground with the church’s teachings.
“That all coincides with LDS core teachings,” said Hill.
For 13 years, Hill was the scoutmaster of an LDS-sponsored troop. He said he was “a bit surprised but not very concerned” to hear the church was separating from the scouts.
He knew he wanted to continue on in the program, though. Not long after the church’s announcement, while he was on a 50-mile backpacking trip in the Sawtooth mountains, he and another adult decided they would form a troop after the church’s separation from the scouts.
Hill needed to find another organization to charter the troop, but that wasn’t difficult, he said. The Idaho Outdoor Association agreed to charter the troop. Hill said the troop was even able to keep the same number. The new troop 11 met for the first time Jan. 13 in Boise.
“Some of the boys knew each other before. … Some were just like, ‘We heard you started a unit and it’s kind of close to our house,’” Hill said.
While the split from the LDS church might at first seem tectonic in Idaho, where the church has a strong following, Hill said he knows of people involved in the program from other parts of the country, such as the Kansas City area and Dallas, who didn’t notice the change.
And even in the Treasure Valley, he said he knew of youths like Carter who decided to become more involved with the program as a result of the church’s departure.
‘DON’T WRITE IT OFF’
On Jan. 11, Carter attended the merit badge fair Baird helped coordinate. He completed requirements for his cooking and communications merit badges — two more on the road to the rank of Eagle Scout in March, he said.
The scout was one of about 400 who attended the event over the course of two Saturdays. Baird said that number is a high mark for attendance, and added that good attendance at the event was significant in the year the LDS church left the organization.
“Scouting is still a very vibrant, a very viable, a very optimal outdoor experience for young men and women in the valley,” Hill said. “Don’t write it off just because of some changes.”
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