A Message From Southern Region

After a career of service spanning 37 years, Southern Region Director Ron Oats signs off on his retirement effective Feb. 15, 2020.

Ron began his professional Scouting career August 23, 1983 in the South Florida Council, Miami, FL as an Associate District Executive for ScoutReach. In June 1987 he was promoted to District Director providing leadership to four traditional District Executives. Then in 1990 he was promoted to Finance Director and ultimately was selected as the council’s Director of Field Service in 1993.

In May 1997, he was selected to serve as Scout Executive of the Gulf Stream Council in West Palm Beach, Fla., where he successfully served for five years. In the spring of 2002, he was selected to serve has Deputy Regional Director for the Southern Region. In this role, he provided leadership to some of the largest metropolitan councils in the nation as well as provided coaching to a team of Area Directors.

In 2006, Ron was selected by Central Florida Council in Orlando, Fla., to serve as Scout Executive.  In addition to his Scouting duties, he was very active in the community of Orlando, having served on the Advisory Board of BB&T Bank, the Advisory Board of Florida Citrus Sports (Citrus Bowl), and Board member of the African American Chamber of Commerce.

In 2016, he was selected as the Regional Director for the Southern Region and as Chief Diversity Officer for the Boy Scouts of America. He provided guidance and support to 87 of the finest Scout Executives in the country serving over 686,736 total youth and participants and created programs and awareness for the importance of diversity and inclusion at all levels of Scouting.

Recently Ron kicked off a regional campaign focusing on Endowment to assist local councils in their efforts to focus on planned gifts. The councils set a combined campaign goal of $300 million by the year 2025 of which $14 million of restricted endowment funds were raised by councils last year.

Also, he launched a new unit organization campaign “TWO-gether We Organize”, where all councils hosted a luncheon on May 1, 2019, inviting new unit prospects to start new Scout units.  Over a thousand new unit commitments were generated.

Throughout his career he’s been a mentor, role model and trailblazer to countless professionals and volunteers. Although never having been a Scout as a youth he believed strongly in the movement and advanced rapidly professionally. Of pride, Ron is proud that 11 of his former staff members have gone on to serve the BSA as Scout Executives.

Ron is also proud of the ground-breaking work the Office of Diversity accomplished. With his leadership, the Office of Diversity launched the National Chair Diversity Award, recognizing local councils that had a significant increase in the diversity of the Council’s local board.

In 2016, the first official BSA Workforce Resource Group, RISE, was organized, which has over 500 members. Subsequently, the following resource groups have been established: LISTOS (a re-source group for Latino professionals), and APAC (a resource group for Asian Pacific professionals). The Office of Diversity partnered with the Brotherhood of Scouting, the African American affinity group, in support of its recognition events and initiatives. The Office of Diversity spear-headed the Diversity Leadership Council, where each National department established internal diversity goals to be reviewed quarterly by BSA’s top leadership.

In his role as Regional Director, the diversity of the Scout Executives hit historical high points… within the last three years, the Southern Region alone had 40 new Scout Executives placements of which 11 were diverse.

In 2018, with the launch of Family Scouting, the Southern Region led the nation in welcoming girls in Scouting. Currently of the 123,000 girls in Cub Scouting, over 53,000 are in the Southern Region and of the over 30,000 girls in Scouts BSA, over 9,000 are from the Southern Region.

Over the last three years, Ron has split time between Dallas and Orlando and is excited to return to the sun-shine state to be near his family and longtime friends.

Ron and his wife Eileen of 33 years, have a son Ronnie, Jr., a daughter-in-law Quenita, and a grandson Jaxon of Tampa, Fla., and a daughter Sheree of Atlanta, Ga.

In the coming days we will announce plans for Ron’s retirement reception to be held at the upcoming National Annual Meeting in May where we can celebrate his legacy in person.

About Carma Henry 24481 Articles
Carma Lynn Henry Westside Gazette Newspaper 545 N.W. 7th Terrace, Fort Lauderdale, Florida 33311 Office: (954) 525-1489 Fax: (954) 525-1861

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