Boy Scouts Lose Philadelphia Lease in Gay-Rights Fight

New York Times ^ | December 6, 2007 | Ia Urbina

[Girlene]

Here's a better link to the original TownHall column Post Sugarcoats Thuggery Against Philadelphia’s Boy Scouts . From the article,

· The architect of the harassment against the Scouts, City Solicitor Diaz, is openly homosexual, as has been reported in the Philadelphia press.

· The Scouts built the building with their own money, and then gave it to the city in 1928.

· The Scouts had a lease “in perpetuity” with the city, an agreement the City Council broke.

· The Scouts bar openly homosexual Scoutmasters and members for moral reasons and for the sake of protecting young boys from possible harm, .....

· Philadelphia suffers from the leading murder and violent crime rate among top 10 cities in the United States. Most of it is being committed by fatherless young men.

As for the ongoing slaughter in the streets, Philadelphia had 406 homicides in 2006, courtesy of fatherless barbarians who could have benefited from character building offered by the Boy Scouts. .....

Over at City Hall, the City Council and the mayor are doing their part by blessing the city solicitor’s ambitious social agenda. If the Scouts are forced out of town, it might not make Philadelphia a more livable place. ...

[Balding_Eagle]

If it was another private organization, say the ACLU, or NAMBLA, that was getting free rent from the government, are you honestly saying that you'd be fine with it? Wouldn't you say that they're getting something valuable from the government, and that that a cash value could be applied to it? Or are you only okay with goverment handouts to private organizations that you agree with?

You are aware, are you not, that the Boy Scouts themselves built the building in 1928, then gifted it to the city, in return for a perpetual lease back to them to use it for $1 per year?

[yorkie]

Here is an interseting article by World Net Daily (yeah, I know. But check the links. This article is full of viable information.)

Boy Scouts ignore 'pay-up-or-move' ultimatum.

[Pikachu_Dad]

Where is the squeeze from the Prez on the city?

[lilycicero]

I had no idea you found all this info. Thanks for the ping.

[Greg F]

Guess the City of Brotherly Love really does mean “Brotherly Love (ala NAMBLA).”

The City of (insert a perversion here).

[Tribune7]

ping

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

You are aware, are you not, that the Boy Scouts themselves built the building in 1928, then gifted it to the city, in return for a perpetual lease back to them to use it for $1 per year?

Yes, I am aware of that. Are you aware that the lot was city land, and that the lease included a clause that allowed for the termination of the deal with one year's notice?

[Balding_Eagle]

I was not.

However, from the information you presented upthread, it isn’t entirely clear who owned, or now owns, the land on which the building was built.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

However, from the information you presented upthread, it isn’t entirely clear who owned, or now owns, the land on which the building was built.

I don't think there's any dispute that the city owns the land now. If they didn't, how could they claim rent? From what I can figure out from the bits and pieces is that the land was owned by the city, part of the same parcel that the large adjacent park and the nearby museums were built on. The Scouts offered to build a building on one lot, then give it to the city in return for the $1/year rent, which was "perpetual," but included a clause that allowed the city to end it with one year's notice.

What I've noticed in all of this is that the Scouts don't seem to be claiming any particular legal leg to stand on. They're making a moral argument instead. It seems that if they did have some legal grounds to fight this, they'd be all over it.

[puroresu]

But surely the rampant homophobia of an organization that won’t send boys on camping trips with homosexual men is the most pressing problem in Philadelphia today. Granted, if someone hangs a noose in a warehouse and a black guy wanders in and sees it, it might rival the Scout horror. But to even think that murders, rapes, muggings, assaults, armed robberies, urban decay, drug dealers, STDs, teen pregnancy, illegitimacy, and neighborhoods that resemble the Third World are an equivalent problem shows your lack of perspective.

[puroresu]

Just for the record, do you support “gay rights” legislation and do you favor booting the scouts out of these facilities unless they agree to accept homosexuality?

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

Just for the record, do you support “gay rights” legislation and do you favor booting the scouts out of these facilities unless they agree to accept homosexuality?

Hmm. "gay rights legislation" covers a lot of territory. You'll have to be more specific. Let's say I don't believe in special privileges for anyone, and I don't like discrimination in general. On gay marriage, I usually come back to asking why the government's in the marriage business at all. Do I favor booting the scouts out in this case? No, I don't. I think the Scouts do good work. But since I'm neither a Scout nor a resident of the Philadelphia metro area, I don't feel much passion for this particular issue either way. I'm just an interested onlooker.

[Balding_Eagle]

It seems that if they did have some legal grounds to fight this, they'd be all over it.

I agree that if that's true they should be all over it, but there are a lot of examples of where they clearly are on the moral and legal side, and yet they do nothing.

I can't come up with a specific case right now, but I do remember O'Reilly taking the Scouts to task for just letting someone run all over them when they had the legal high ground without as much as a whimper.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

The problem facing the Scouts legally is the precedent set in the Berkeley Sea Scouts case, which I linked to above in the thread. It’s a similar case in that the Sea Scouts were getting free dock space at the city marina, but when the city decided they didn’t like the Scouts gay policy, they took away that deal, offering instead to let them rent at normal market rate. The Scouts lost in the California Supreme Court (no surprise there), and the USSC declined to review, so there it stands.

[cschroe]

Easily done. Just hire former Philly mayor Wilson Goode. He’s an expert in firebombing Philadelphia city blocks.

[Girlene]

Yes, I guess I do lack that kind of perspective. :-).

[goldstategop]

That says a lot about our elites telling people traditional values are "discriminatory." Its an assault on Judeo-Christian values - and the Boy Scouts temerity in upholding them is the real crime in the City Of Philadelphia's eyes.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[ZULU]

City of “Brotherly” Love.

[puroresu]

Let's say I don't believe in special privileges for anyone, and I don't like discrimination in general.

The problem with laws against discrimination, is that to enforce some of them, you have to engage in other types of discrimination. For example, this Philadelphia ordinance forbidding "discrimination" against homosexuals, requires discrimination against people of faith who do not sanction homosexuality. You can only access certain public facilities, or avail yourself of certain public benefits, if you reject your faith's teachings on homosexuality. This is an inherent problem when you start banning "discrimination" based on conduct.

The city of Philadelphia is basically saying that traditional moral values which find unnatural sexual conduct to be immoral are not something to be encouraged. In fact, they're to be marginalized or suppressed on behalf of male-on-male sodomy, which the city has chosen to honor and elevate to a position of legitimacy.