By Elise Viebeck, May 9, 2018<\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts of America, which acknowledged last year that it has taken a financial hit from settlements in child abuse cases, has lobbied against proposals in multiple states that would expose the organization to more lawsuits, according to victim advocates and proponents of the legislation.<\/p>\n
The group retained lobbyists in Georgia and New York, where lawmakers say such action helped stall proposals that included \u201clookback\u201d windows allowing adults to take legal action over decades-old claims. It has hired lobbyists in Michigan, where similar proposals are being debated. The bills would give adults who were abused as children a second chance to file suit if they missed their first opportunity under state law.<\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts\u2019 lobbying push comes as the 108-year-old group, an institution long associated with leadership training and outdoorsmanship for American boys, sees pressure on multiple fronts. In addition to declining membership, the group has faced financial uncertainty and public relations problems related to accusations of child sex abuse against former adult volunteers.<\/p>\n
Those accusations have led to dozens of lawsuits against the Boy Scouts in recent years, some of which have resulted in expensive settlements. The group\u2019s exposure to lawsuits over sex abuse has drawn comparisons with the Catholic Church.<\/p>\n
Opponents of the state proposals, including the Boy Scouts and Catholic archdioceses,<\/b> argue that open-ended \u201clookback\u201d periods violate due process and would put groups in the tough position of defending themselves in cases from the distant past.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to defend cases decades old in which evidence has been lost, or witnesses are unavailable,\u201d Effie Delimarkos, director of national communications for the Boy Scouts, wrote in an email.<\/p>\n
Proponents called the bills crucial for holding groups such as the Boy Scouts accountable for past abuse.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s reprehensible that the Boy Scouts of America has hired lobbyists to kill legislation that would help the adult survivors of child sexual abuse,\u201d New York bill sponsor Brad Hoylman, a Democratic state senator, said in an interview.<\/b><\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts, like the Catholic church, has faced a steady stream of lawsuits alleging it knew about child abuse perpetrated by its adult leaders. With 2.3\u00a0million youth members and more than 900,000 adult volunteers, the organization has been a defendant in at least 200 federal lawsuits since 2008, many alleging abuse of young members. Some suits are still playing out in court.<\/p>\n
Some experts said the number of lawsuits rose after 2010, when an Oregon jury ordered the Boy Scouts to pay $18.5\u00a0million in damages to a former scout who claimed he was abused during the 1980s. Two years later, the Oregon Supreme Court approved the release of more than 14,500 pages of Boy Scouts records that exposed alleged abuse dating back to 1965.<\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts\u2019 lobbying efforts in the states have taken place against the backdrop of the group\u2019s simmering financial woes.<\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts hiked annual membership fees from $24 to $33 late last year in what some regional councils said was an effort to bolster the insurance fund used to pay victim settlements. In his financial report for 2016, Boy Scouts Treasurer and Vice President for Finance Joseph P. Landy stated that the group\u2019s financial condition in the coming years will depend \u201cin large part\u201d on the outcome of victims\u2019 legal claims.<\/p>\n
Declining membership has also been a problem for the group.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the Mormon Church said it was ending its century-old affiliation with the Boy Scouts, a move that could deprive the group of up to 20 percent of its youth members. The BSA is admitting girls for the first time in a move to bolster its numbers, and announced last week that it will drop \u201cBoy\u201d from its title and go by the name Scouts BSA starting in 2019.<\/p>\n
Delimarkos stressed that the group has taken critical steps to protect children, including screening adult leaders, requiring them to undergo training and mandating that they report signs or suspicions of abuse. Additionally, she said, the group provides counseling and other resources to former scouts who say they were molested.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf someone was abused and we had prior knowledge of the perpetrator we try to find a way to help the victim heal by whatever means is appropriate,\u201d Delimarkos wrote in an email.<\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts has kept its lobbying efforts low-profile. The group has strong political ties nationwide through former Scouts who have been elected to public office. More than a quarter of members of Congress have a connection to the group, a blog sponsored by the Boy Scouts reported last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey typically don\u2019t operate out front because they don\u2019t really want the headline,\u201d said Marci Hamilton, a law professor and president of the advocacy group CHILD USA who has been critical of the Scouts. \u201cThey tend to be in the background, targeting members of the state legislatures who might have some relationships to [the] Boy Scouts.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts declined to answer specific questions about lobbying tactics, including which legislatures it is working to influence and its total advocacy budget for 2017. But Delimarkos said <\/b>the group opposes some bills proposing \u201clookback\u201d periods and has engaged lobbyists to \u201chelp educate policy makers.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur priority is protecting kids and continuing to offer [the] nation\u2019s foremost youth program of character development and values-based leadership training,\u201d she wrote in an email.<\/p>\n
Public records shed some light on the group\u2019s efforts in Georgia, New York and Michigan.<\/p>\n
In Georgia, the group has retained lobbyists from Dentons, a major firm, since last year. Its four current representatives include two former state lawmakers, one of whom is ex-House majority whip Edward Lindsey. The total spent is not detailed in lobbying reports.<\/p>\n
In New York, the BSA spent $137,500 last year on two Dentons lobbyists, including a former state senator. In March, the group hired a prominent Michigan lobbying firm, Public Affairs Associates, for an unknown sum.<\/p>\n
Delimarkos declined to make the group\u2019s lobbyists available for interviews. Those contacted by The Post referred inquiries to the group\u2019s leaders or did not respond.<\/p>\n
The Boy Scouts appears to have approached each legislative debate slightly differently.<\/p>\n
In Georgia, state Rep. Jason Spencer (R) said BSA lobbyists created a legislative \u201ctrap\u201d this spring to block his bill creating a one-year \u201clookback\u201d window.<\/p>\n
Even after his measure unanimously passed the House of Representatives and the state Senate approved a weaker version supported by the BSA, Spencer said there was not enough time to reconcile the two proposals before the end of Georgia\u2019s legislative session in March.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy the end of the session, we were in the red zone,\u201d he said in a phone interview. \u201cThe bill got tangled up in the back and forth.\u201d<\/p>\n
Spencer said he confronted Lindsey in a meeting about delaying the process. Lindsey did not respond to an interview request.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey want to protect the quote-unquote honor of the institution,\u201d Spencer said of the Boy Scouts. \u201cThat\u2019s what they\u2019re concerned about.\u201d<\/p>\n
In New York, a one-year \u201clookback\u201d measure known as the Child Victims Act has been debated for years without reaching a vote in the state Senate, advocates said.<\/p>\n
This year, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo (D) tried proposing the measure as part of his fiscal 2019 budget, but it was excluded from the final bill.<\/p>\n
The lower chamber of the state legislature overwhelmingly approved the measure in a separate vote last week, but Senate leaders gave no indication that they planned to bring the bill to the floor.<\/p>\n
The office of Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan (R) did not respond to an inquiry about the likelihood of a vote.<\/p>\n
Hoylman and other proponents of the Child Victims Act said the Boy Scouts worked hard to keep its influence in the background, though people linked to the Scouts were spotted at events and meetings related to the bill.<\/p>\n
In Michigan, Delimarkos wrote, the Boy Scouts has supported legislative efforts to narrowly tailor \u201clookback\u201d periods so they do not have \u201csuch an open-ended approach.\u201d Delimarkos said the group supports eliminating criminal statutes of limitation for child abuse and extending time limits for civil lawsuits \u201con a prospective basis.\u201d<\/p>\n
The state legislature is considering multiple bills related to child sex abuse after Michigan State University doctor Larry Nassar was sentenced to up to 175 years in prison for molesting young gymnasts under the guise of medical treatment.<\/p>\n
Victim advocates said open-ended \u201clookback\u201d provisions are necessary because many people who were abused as children do not come forward until their 30s, which in some states comes after their opportunity to sue has expired.<\/p>\n
Additionally, lawsuits alert today\u2019s parents about alleged abusers and the institutions that shelter them, advocates say.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe lookback windows protect children now,\u201d said Barbara Dorris, the former executive director of SNAP, an advocacy group for people abused by Catholic priests, who has followed the legislative fights. \u201cLet\u2019s name the predators and let the parents be warned.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alice Crites contributed to this report.<\/p>\n