When Girl Scout leaders go BAD!

[Aroura33]

I'm just MS. DRAMA lately, le sigh.

Seriously I have a funny but annoying (and fairly alarming) situation I've gotten myself into now.  It's kind of long.  Scroll to the bottom for the TL;DR version.

Some of you may remember I volunteered as a Girl Scout Leader last year.  My husband was too stressed by MY stress (especially during cookie season, where my cookie mom quit halfway through and left me with about $2000 worth of cookies to handle all by myself) last season, so I told the Council Ladies I couldn't continue as leader, but I hated to break up our troop as the girls had really gotten close.  We were a VERY active troop , did lots of events and stuff together.  Anyway, they said there was this lady who'd moved from Colorado and volunteered to as a leader but all her girls had quit, and she was willing to take over the troop.  Yay!  Henceforth, she will be referred to as The Woman.

So I set up a meeting with her (this is early last spring mind you, well before school got out), and she never showed. She finally answered her phone and said she had just forgot. Ok, people make mistakes.  I made arrangements to meet her at a different date.  That time she called and had an emergency or illness, I forget which.  The third time she finally showed up and we chatted.  I invited her to the final 2 months of meetings to get to know the girls as a troop.

She was supposed to come to 5 troop meetings. She came to 2.  She did not inform us she was not coming to the others, she just didn't show.  She made excuses if I did email and ask.  At this point I'm already thinking this isn't going to work, as is the co-leader and a couple of the (more attentive) moms.  But I didn't feel like I had a choice. I am going on a thin thread of hope.

So this year starts, The Woman changes to meeting time to e very late. Remember this is for 7 and 8 year olds.  Now it's fine if she needs it late because she can't get there until then, but she said parents requested the later time. I KNOW ALL the parents, so I asked. Not one had asked for a later time. So now she's a liar too. Well, I suspect she'd already lied to us quite a bit, but this was the first time I caught her in it.

At any rate, the first meeting rolls around, and she changes the time again at the very last minute. Half the troop doesn't get the news, and misses it.  The Woman herself calls me 15 minutes before the meeting and says she'll be late and can I run things until she get's there?  Fine.  It has begun. 
The second meeting she has another dead relative or health emergency, I forget which, and calls me about 1 hour before the meeting to fill in for her.  She leaves us the wrong materials, so the girls have almost nothing to do for an hour.  We make up some games and sing camp songs and color.  Wow, this is awesome.....And she has never told the co-leader anything about anything, is treating her very disrespectfully, worse than a regular parent. Parents are emailing me with concerns, she isn't communicating, she's changing meeting times and dates without letting them know, she isn't telling them about local GS events (like parties, parades and such, of which there are at least 2 a month).  They want to do these things, where is the INFO? I email her and ask her to please email out the local event fliers, even if she can't do it as a troop, lots of the girls and parents like to go individually.  She does NOT even respond. So.  I get the fliers for events and start emailing info parents.  I get asked repeatedly by a few parents if I'm sure I'm not the leader?  Ha, freaking HA!!

Third meeting she actually showed up for, and she is handing out the nut sales forms, so she's actually there (because I think she's only in it for the money...I think she's skimming little girls cookie and candy money. There is NO OTHER explanation I can come up with for why she even wants to be a leader.) Anyway, I digress....for now.  So she showed up for that one and did some stupid craft with the kids that had nothing to do with Girl Scouts or their badges or even just the fun stuff GS do.
The fourth meeting, guess what?  That's RIGHT! You are so smart.  She calls me an hour before and has ANOTHER dead relative (this one I remember, I was furious), and what can I do?  I agree to fill in, but I am going to talk to the parents. Mind you all this time there have been emails to her requesting she give out more info, emails to me asking who to complain to, etc.  It's becoming waaaay worse than just being the freaking leader.

This one meeting she leaves us some paper bags to make puppets, and a sheet of facts about the founder of Girl Scouts to read to these 7 and 8 year olds.  HOW FUN!!  It's supposed to be a memory game, but she was too busy not caring to get the items to make it a game, so it's just a sheet of facts.  The co-leader and I use blank paper and markers to turn it into a game.  But we again have about 20 minutes after making stupid paper bag puppets and playing this little game with nothing to do.  Good thing I know a lot of camp songs!
A couple of parents tell me this needs fixing or they will pull out their kids. I agree, I feel the same, but I cannot do it! One mom says she has a new work schedule, she can take cookies 100%, I won't have to be more than a normal mom for cookie season.  I am begged by these 2 moms to please PLEASE be leader again. I ask my husband, he agrees he is fine with me being leader if I'm not in charge of cookies.  The co-leader agrees to take on more meeting responsibilities, and I'm in charge mostly of paperwork and external events.  This is good, we have a 3 person team ready to step in.  I decide to confront The Woman about her behavior and the situation.

The next week is the Volunteer meeting, all of local council goes.  I ask The Woman and she says she plans to go, because it's also the first meeting talking about cookies next seasons, and she just LOVES selling cookies.  I tell her I'd like to talk with her before the meeting.
So I go....and SHE ISN'T THERE!!! 

Council knows me.  Like I said, we are a very active troop, I went to all these volunteer meetings last year, I volunteered at summer camp and fall camp, I make costumes for some of these ladies.  The lady in charge of recruitment asks me what's up, I explain the concerns of the parents, and how I had planned to talk to her in person, but....some of the other ladies overhear and are like "Oh, just accept that you're with us forever now! You are the leader of that troop, mwahahahahaha."  Seriously, it was kind of like that.

Whatever. They have a point.  I sit through the meeting and sign our troop up for a couple of upcoming events and take notes on other events, and basically do what they all said, and just accept I'm already doing it all, so I may as well just DO IT.  You know?

I double check with the other parents who'd promised me help, they are ready to do this!  So I email The Woman and tell her we'd like to talk to her.  She get's huffy, I explain nicely the concerns, that maybe she is just too busy for this, she gets furious, I realize I'm not equipped to have this conversation, but I keep my calm. Basically, I just explain she's never there anyway, and there are a lot of other concerns about communication and event participation, and maybe it would be better, even for her, if she stayed in the troop but not as leader.  She accuses me and council of going behind her back to "get her".  It isn't a happy conversation.

2 days later, someone steels all the art supplies from our cupboard, and a few art supplies from most of the other troop cupboards in the Girl Scout Center.  Also, a few simple tools and some camping cooking gear, tablecloths, and cleaning supplies are stolen. The computer, printer, microwave, etc are untouched.  No damage.
In 14 years, that building has never been robbed.  Also, there was no break in, whoever did it had the door code.
Coincidence????????  I think not.

So we ALL bring our concerns about who we think did it and why to council.  Turns out there may have been a witness from the church next door.  The description is a woman and her daughter in uniform with a man who took stuff from the shed and office.  It's so totally her. But there isn't much (police-wise) they can do with just one eyewitness from a distance.

In the meantime, we try and carry on troop meetings with a handful of markers and glue from home, but we still get a lot done (because we are a team and we are communicating!).  The girls learn a new song, earn a badge, and sign up for the Holiday Light Parade.

I've passed my concerns onto council, and the woman in charge has assured me things will get taken care of. None of us are likely to get our craft supplies back, but she'll get The Woman to turn in the Nut money (which she has not put into the account!), and get all the supplies and summer badges and stuff she has and is, basically, refusing to give us.  She owes our troop about $60 in nut money, plus the supplies and badges we know for a fact she has.

Then I get a phone call today and this council person says she's spoken to The Woman, and she wants to be back in our troop, and to be cookie mom!  I thought, seriously?  This is a joke, right?  Even if she didn't rob hundreds of little girls of their art and camping supplies, she lost her troop last year, blamed it on the girls, was losing another troop this year, and has shown herself to be completely unreliable and dishonest on a regular basis. She would destroy the troop from the inside out of spite. She would lose cookie money, or cookies, or both, or just not show up.  No, I'm not ok with it!  The council woman suggests that taking more things away from her will just make her more upset.  I'm like, I didn't TAKE anything from her, she LOST it all on her own!  I didn't want to do this, I quit last year, remember???  I was BEGGED to do it again.  WTF. She wants proof from me of her unreliability.  I give her some emails I still had where parents were very upset, and the contact info to talk to other parents to back up my side of the story (even The Woman admits to being unreliable, she can't deny that), she apparently said what a good leader I am, and how sorry she is about all of this MISUNDERTANDING.  And I'm again like, this woman is a liar, and she is pulling the wool over this council woman's eyes, tricking her with pretty words.  I told her outright, she is a liar, and I'm not the only one who does not trust her.  She asks me to please consider keeping The Woman and her kid in our troop.  I.AM.FLOORED.

My coleader and the actual cookie mom agree they will tell the council woman, when contacted, that The Woman is not to be trusted, and that we will all leave if they insist on letting her remain in our troop, even just as a regular mom, because she's a destructive person.

In the meantime, I'm left sitting here steaming.  I really did not mean to take this over again, she sort of dropped it all on me and then blamed me.  I will not let this woman around my child, and she shouldn't be around there people's either.


TL;DR version.
A woman took over my Girl Scout troop, never showed up for meetings, never planned any activities, did not communicate meeting times or dates or other event info to parents, and outright lied on a regular basis.  The parents were understandably upset, asked me to be leader again, another mom promised to help out a lot more, so I could do it.  We decided to go ahead and do it.  We asked her to step down, nicely. This new leader (very likely) stole art supplies from hundreds of little girls, dozens of other troops, in retaliation for this perceived slight, and now she is trying to sweet talk her way back into our troop with her lies.  I don't think she should even be allowed in Girl Scouts at all, let alone back in our troop.

I'm about to just freaking quit, if it weren't for the girls.  I love them, they are a great troop, such good girls!  They deserve a good time in Girl Scouts.  Grrr.  I just want to ditch the freaking drama, ditch this woman, and move on!  Now I'm kind of scared of her though.  If she's capable of stealing what I suspect she did, what else is she capable of??

[aitm]

"there comes a time in every "persons" life when one has to hoist the black flag, spit on your hands and start slitting throats"- HL Mencken.

Put your bitch hat on, you're fighting for little girls. You could very well be fighting for their safety. Think about that!

[AllPurposeAtheist]

Summon the courage and girlscoutedness from my mom.. She was a GS troops leader and would have lead an open rebellion and burned The Woman at the stake in front of the troop as an example for all good little girls.

OK, well maybe not that extreme, but she wouldn't take any shit from the bitch..

Aroura you've renewed my faith in the female gender. Fight on with no mercy for the weak!

[Solitary]

Sometimes you just have to wonder how some people can be the way they are. This woman is an irresponsible monster that thinks she is an adult while being childish beyond the girls in your Troop. What a bad example of a female, and an opportunists that just thinks of herself. 

[AllPurposeAtheist]

Someone has to explain the meaning of TL;DR ..I skipped that class in boy scouts..

[stromboli]

Had a similar thing when I was a Boy Scout leader as a Mormon. I just wanted to do activities and keep the boys interested in stuff. Scout leader was never there and two of the boys, who were not Mormon, were being forced by the bishop to sit in on Mutual (Mormon) activities to try to proselytize them. I told them when they mentioned it that they did not have to sit through Mutual stuff, but the bishop overrode me, and the scout master was off doing whatever.

Yeah, so I feel your pain. Do what you have to, for the girls and god bless you thanks for being there for them, they need people like you. 

[Aroura33]

Someone has to explain the meaning of TL;DR ..I skipped that class in boy scouts..

Too Long; Didn't Read APA.  I did write a short novella there, lol.

Thanks all of you for your words of encouragement!  I will keep fighting.  There is another Volunteer/council meeting on the 6th of Dec.  I plan to go and make a bit of a fuss, something I don't normally do, if the issue still exists by then.  I'm hoping we can resolve it before then.  And by resolve, I mean make it clear to the head of council that our troop will NOT take her back in any way, not even as a regular non-participating adult, and so sadly we can't take her kid either (I hate punishing the kid for bad parents, but her kid is 13 and snotty as hell anyway, she does not belong in a troop of Daisies and Brownies, she needs girls her own age)..  I also want to make it clear that those of us who've dealt with her don't think she belongs in GS at all.  There has to be somewhere even volunteer organizations draw the line.  I should think that being a pathological liar and a thief would disqualify one from being a volunteer who works with kids.  We aren't the Catholic Church here, I don't think we should shuffle this woman off to some other unsuspecting troop.

[aitm]

I think you can sum it up pretty quickly to the council that: "the welfare of your child is not at stake here, but mine is, and I will not put it at risk so anyone here can feel good. Period".

And let me give you a little story about putting on a "bitch hat". My father is/was the nicest guy you could ever meet, he was the president of the school board for 6 years while serving for 18, he was also president of the district school board for 16 years and served for 20. He carried a baseball cap in his briefcase, on the rare occasion that he had to get pissy with anyone he would put his baseball cap on and say, " this is my ass-hole hat, i only wear it when I have to because sometimes one has to be an ass to get what needs to be done done." After he said what he needed to say, he would take his cap off and say, "that was that"

Two years after he "retired" from the school board the townspeople voted him back to office as a write in candidate even though no one asked him. He served another 2 years for them. Being a bitch sometimes does not in any way reflect poorly on you when the cause is just.

[Aroura33]

Thank you for the story aitm, your dad sound amazing and like a very good role model. :) I like your short version of what to say to council, though I would include that I will not put the welfare of other people's children at risk either.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

Too Long; Didn't Read APA.  I did write a short novella there, lol.

I read it all and thought it quite well written mostly. Perhaps you should edit it and present it to the GS's as written with editing only for 'style' only because some people get pissy about bluntness..
Best read I've read in a little while actually. I kinda wish my mom was around to read it..

[stromboli]