Selected Achievements

Throughout 20 years with the Boy Scouts of America, I've grown Scouting by recruiting some of the best volunteers and partnering with them to recruit families, raise funds and expand Scouting's impact. I believe that in this day and age, the best way to grow Scouting's membership is to create a strong, sustainable funding model that harnesses community investment in our mission. 

Here's some of the things I am most proud of. 

• Direct Support - Exceeded $1,000,000 in direct support for the first time in Seneca Waterways Council history and consistently exceeded it 2016-2022. Strategies included executing a multi-year giving strategy to create planned revenue on January 1, doubling growth of grant & foundation funding, and focusing on high net special events that given donors experiences they can't get elsewhere. 

• 21 Stories for Scouts - Successfully recruited and led a team of volunteers to grow this annual experience-based event into the largest fundraiser in Council history. 21 Stories gives approximately 80-90 volunteers the opportunity to rappel 240' down a landmark building. Strategies involved recruiting "high profile volunteers" and finding a peer-to-peer platform that reduced expenses and made the donor experience better.  

• Special Event Enhancements - Our Eagle Scout Dinner nets $40K each year with over 400 Scouts and parents in attendance. This is done building on tried-and-true methods, but also by identifying and successfully submitting individuals for National recognition as Distinguished Eagle Scouts and leveraging their networks for support. Under my leadership, we added mobile bidding and the ability for guests to support events on site with the click of a button. 

• Grants & Foundations - Cultivated an area Foundation to grow from annual support of $15K to $75K+ per year based on quality reporting and relationships. Through skilled research, cultivation and submissions, I have been able to secure over $75K in new capital and operating funding this year alone. 

• Major Donor Cultivation - Scouting is all about relationships and trust. I was able to take a senior gentleman who wanted to drop off a shoebox full of old Scout camp patches and cultivate him to becoming one of the single largest annual fund donors to my current Council. We regularly stay in contact throughout the year and my friend asks me what he can support and how best to do so. 

• Leveraging Resources - While others have bemoaned the resources National puts forward, I found ways to learn the in's and out's of Blackbaud CRM to create linkages, identify volunteers, screen donors and laser focus appeals. I have recently begun working with "Prospect Lists" function in CRM to find diamonds in the rough, aka Alumni with high net potential. 

• Alumni Development - I worked through volunteers to organize a series of Eagle Scout alumni gatherings. Through these events, we have identified new supporters, potential Board members, and also volunteers to assist with events, popcorn sale, etc. 

• STEM Day Camps - One of the proudest achievements throughout my career was organizing and writing a grant for $50K that would fund a six-week STEM Daycamp program serving one of the most diverse and underprivileged neighborhoods in Connecticut Yankee Council. 

• Building Trades Merit Badge Workshop - I worked with special event committee volunteers to organize an annual event that introduced Scouts to building trades through the merit badge program. This event helped to solidify support among the labor partners.