Rosewood Cub Pack earns name with community support
By Bonnie Edwards
Published in News on May 25, 2004 1:58 PM
Cub Scout Pack 258 at Rosewood is earning a name for itself with an ambitious schedule of service projects.
In April, the group won a national award for helping the M.E.R.C.I. disaster recovery organization pack boxes to send to hurricane victims. Some of the boxes went to Liberia. The project was part of the national Make a Difference Day, sponsored by USA Weekend magazine and the Points of Light Foundation. Den Leader Greg Womack says the pack conducts many projects and wins awards, because 95 percent of the 40 boys' parents stay actively involved in what their sons are doing. The pac has been chartered for 35 years.
The boys celebrated the end of another season of Scouting on Monday at the Pine Forest Methodist Church, where their sponsors, the Methodist Men, treated them to a hot dog cook-out and gave them awards.
"They treat us well financially and any time we ask for help," said Womack of the Methodist Men.
The boys will start meeting again in August.
"About half of our boys will go to summer camp" at Camp Tuscarora near Four Oaks, "earning all sorts of awards and doing fun things," said Womack.
This past year was filled with community service, including a conservation project of planting long-leaf pines at Eagles Nest campsite in southern Wayne County. Claridge State Nursery donated the trees for the boys to plant.
Some of the boys adopted the Sisters II assisted-living group home. The boys visit the residents several times during the year, including holidays, and make gifts for them.
On May 17, the troop went to the Lighthouse shelter for battered women and did some landscaping work.
Next spring, the troop will perform another Make a Difference Day project.
"We have a real active group, and they stay busy," said Womack. Not all Cub Scout packs in Wayne County are that way, he said. "It falls back to parental involvement. Cub Scouts is more of a family oriented organization than Boy Scouts. Everything is centered around doing things with the family."