Looming over the Boy Scouts are lawsuits that threaten to tarnish its image, reports of a potential bankruptcy and a struggle to define what it means to be a Scout today. Most recently, a group of lawyers claimed to have uncovered hundreds of previously unreported cases of sexual abuse at the nearly 110-year-old organization.

Parents clutched shiny new folders and shuffled 7-year-olds through crowded, brick-walled hallways. Past the booth with the spirit-wear sale and sign-up forms for the PTA stood Julie Bostian, tan uniform tucked into army-green shorts, ready to recruit.

“You guys thinking about Scouts?” she said to a mother and her son.

“I can’t do Mondays,” one mother said apologetically.

“Football,” said another, shaking her head while walking past.

“Just come in to visit,” said Bostian, 53. “See if it works out.”

Here at back-to-school night at Lewistown Elementary School in Thurmont, Md., a rural town at the foothills of the Catoctin Mountains, Bostian was building a pipeline for a local Boy Scout troop she continues to support long after her sons, now in their 20s, have aged out of the program.

Daniel Dutrow, 18, a leader with Troop 270. (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post)

As the new school year begins, Bostian and Scout leaders across the country are trying to safeguard the future of an organization facing unprecedented threats from several corners.

Looming over the Boy Scouts are lawsuits that threaten to tarnish its image, reports of a potential bankruptcy and a struggle to define what it means to be a Scout today. Most recently, a group of lawyers claimed to have uncovered hundreds of previously unreported cases of sexual abuse at the nearly 110-year-old organization.

It has been a tumultuous time for the Boy Scouts of America. Youth membership has declined more than 26 percent in the past decade. Then, last year, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced it would be cutting ties with the organization. The church had been the largest participant in the Boy Scouts program in the United States, making up nearly 20 percent of all youth members.

Over the past decade, victim lawsuits and media investigations have revealed thousands of internal Boy Scout documents, detailing generations of alleged abusers accused of preying on vulnerable Scouts. An investigator hired by the Scouts revealed in January that her team had identified 12,254 victims and 7,819 perpetrators in internal documents from 1946 through 2016.

But critics of the organization say that these files are incomplete and that hundreds if not thousands more victims of sexual abuse in the Boy Scouts were never documented by the organization.

In a statement, the Boy Scouts of America apologized to “anyone who was harmed during their time in Scouting.”

“We are outraged that there have been times when individuals took advantage of our programs to abuse innocent children,” the statement read. “We believe victims, we support them, we pay for counseling by a provider of their choice, and we encourage them to come forward. It is BSA policy that all incidents of suspected abuse are reported to law enforcement.”

Asked about the path forward for the organization, given the threats it is facing, the Boy Scouts of America pointed to studies showing that Scouting “helps young people become more kind, helpful and prepared for life, and as long as those values remain important to our society, Scouting will continue to be an invaluable partner to families.”

Now, in cities across the country, troops are ramping up for a new school year, and leaders such as Bostian are tasked with convincing parents and youths that, in 2019, it is still worthwhile to be a Boy Scout.

A lifelong Girl Scout, Bostian became involved with the Boy Scouts when her two sons were young. Sixteen years later, she is still the committee chair for her local boys troop and girls troop. Her fellow Scouting parents are some of her closest friends. Her uniform is covered in pins for the six Eagle Scouts she has mentored — not including her two Eagle Scout sons.

She has traveled and camped with her Scouts across the country, showing them “parts of the United States they wouldn’t otherwise see.” She worries that the national organization’s lawsuits and financial fears could jeopardize all of that. But until then, she said, she is going to “Scout till they tell me I can’t Scout anymore.”

“It’s unsettling, but I don’t dwell on it,” Bostian said. “Does it make it harder? Sure. Are we going to stop? Absolutely not.”

In PA, a Lawsuit Hits Home

The Boy Scouts’ past with sexual abuse is no secret to the organization or the public, but in the #MeToo era, a wave of allegations from decades ago are coming to the forefront.

Several states, including New York and New Jersey, are changing their statute-of-limitations laws to allow victims of child sexual abuse an opportunity to seek justice, opening the door to hundreds of potential lawsuits against the Boy Scouts. Last year, The Washington Post reported that the organization had hired lobbyists in several states to push back against potential statute-of-limitations changes.

Michael Pfau, a lawyer who specializes in abuse cases and who has litigated against the Boy Scouts for more than 17 years, said he was representing dozens of victims in New York state, which has just opened a year-long legal window that allows victims of childhood sexual assault to sue long after the state’s original statute of limitations has passed. Pfau and his colleagues have already filed six lawsuits in the state and were preparing more in New Jersey, which opens its own legal window on Dec. 1.

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