[Sca-cooks] Peers, Pressuring the BoD

[jenne at fiedlerfamily.net]

> How hard is it to find a Handicap accessible camp? Aren't all boy scout
> camps supposed to be Accessible?  How about YMCA's?  Does that church
> down the road have a "fellowship hall"?  What's wrong with using that as
> a site?

Here's the deal.  The point of the event is to have a tourney. In the East
Kingdom. In January. That means the tourney has to go on indoors, because
if we have it outdoors, it's just an optional extra because if it snows we
can't have the tourney. But, we also want to have a feast, which means a
kitchen we can use, and other event like activities, which means some
reasonable indoor gathering space for other things to go on.

Think about your church down the road. Suppose we have the fighting in the
fellowship hall. Then where does everyone else go? You've filled the only
large space in the church. Same with Boy scout camps-- they tend to have
only 1 large gathering space.

We've looked into renting other camps than our main event site, the
Ukranian Homestead. Most of them, in PA, are dry.  Dry camping events with
fighting have problems: either they don't have enough attendees, or the
attendees don't think honor applies to not drinking on a dry site. We've
even looked at church camps where the owners objected to the idea that
unrelated people might be sleeping in the same bed.  I wouldn't
characterize the other scout camps in my area as any more handicapped
accessible than anyplace else, though they may have had wheelchair
accessible bathrooms somewhere I didn't see.

I've spent a lot of time looking at sites over the years. Now, we also use
a non-handicapped-accessible schola site, and I'm darned sure that we
could find a better site... but I think it would cost us more than $100 a
day, because of where we are, and that would mean that we couldn't
routinely host scholas that draw 30 to 40 people and have a day fee of $5.

> If the choice is to turn someone away or put down mats, I would suggest
> putting down mats.

Assuming we could get any of the sites that would require mats, just the
site cost would be in excess of $600 more. Then we talk about mat rental,
which is at least $100 for mats to cover the entire fighting area. Mats
make our marshalls nervous. Then we have to pay for wear and tear on the
mats, too. (If we could buy a used portable dance floor, that would work,
but we can't rent one because we would damage it.)

> One suggestion that has worked for us here locally is that one of our
> Ladies did some research and has listed all of the good sites in our
> area online.  She has gotten most of them with a few exceptions.  This
> might help you all out. See if someone is willing to call various places
> for prices and info and then post it where your local grroup can find
> it.

In my local group, I've been that person. I dumped it on someone else
recently.

>Oh another suggestion for sites... VFW Huts.  (I do recommend a
> male Autocrat for that one... military is an even bigger plus)
[snipped]
> Seriously one last thing I could offer when exploring sites... Grab a
> chair and sit in front of the building, now try and figure out how to
> get in if you couldn't get up and had a wheel chair instead. If no entry
> way is readily visible start looking for one.  If you do not find one
> then tell the person in charge of the building that you are not going to
> use their building and why.

I have been looking for a VFW big enough to hold anything bigger than a
bingo game for years.

The hall we currently use for our indoor fighting event is a PA National
Guard Armory. It does have handicapped access to the main floor and part
of the basement, which are the major parts we use, but in order to make
the only toilet on a floor you can get to with a wheelchair handicapped
accessible, they'd have to rip out the entire bathroom if not move the
bathroom. Given the fact that they don't make a lot of money on renting
the place, and that the National Guard doesn't really need a handicapped
bathroom for their own people... I suspect pushing the handicapped
bathroom issue would just end with getting the armory closed.

We'll probably end up renting a port-a-potty if I can figure out how to
keep one secure between delivery and use and use and pickup, and if the
site agrees-- finding a place to put it might be interesting. (And if you
don't think teens can get up to something in a handicapped port-a-potty in
January, you need to relive your adolescence.)

I really think that it's important for us to look for a more handicapped
accessible site for our scholas, and to provide at least one handicapped
accessible port-a-potty.

-- Jadwiga Zajaczkowa
jenne at fiedlerfamily.net OR jenne at tulgey.browser.net OR jahb at lehigh.edu
"Are you finished? If you're finished, you'll have to put down the spoon."