Posted: Jun 8, 2011 10:53 PM
Updated: Jun 9, 2011 3:14 AM
TUCSON - With Mount Lemmon closing, the fun is being cancelled for hundreds of Girls and Boys Scouts, and it's inconveniencing others who had plans on the mountain.
With Boy and Girl Scout camps canceled, the scouts' alternative is to be rerouted to camps, located hours away.
Ken Tucker, the Scout Executive for the Boy Scout Council said, "We're doing everything we can to help kids get to other experiences and camping programs, but there is going to be some fall out."
Kevin Thompson, a 14 year old Boy Scout was planning on going to camp this summer. He was disappointed in the change of plans. He said, "right now I just need a couple more merit badges to get, so I was going to get them up at Mount Lemmon."
As many as 1000 Girl Scouts are affected, and just under 700 Boy Scouts, which will be a big hit financially to the organization. Tucker said, "It will be over $100,000 in impact. The revenue that they would have paid to camp in our area now will go to those other councils for kids to attend camp in those areas."
Ski Valley on Mount Lemmon remains open, there's just no stopping on the way there. Graham Davies, Ski Valley area manager said "It would be a real hardship for the company to shut down in the middle of the prime time season so it's very beneficial for us and people can still come up and get out of the heat."
For some however, it's enough of an inconvenience to forget about going. Anthony Spencer, a resident of Oracle, Arizona visiting Mount Lemmon said, "I probably won't come up during that time because I would rather check things out, I don't think it would be worth it anymore."
Boy Scout Kevin just hopes they fix the problem fast so he can still earn his merit badges. He said, "I think it's a unique experience that lets you go camping and do a bunch of other stuff you don't normally do."
The boy scouts are hoping to have all their campers go up north to different locations. The girl scouts however, say their sister camp only has about 100 openings, which doesn't come close for all the girls to be able to go.
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