K.C. Jordan – LJI reporter
A group of volunteers at the scout camp in Otter Lake is relieved this week after narrowly avoiding having to close a camp that has been in operation for more than 50 years.
Over the years the camp has been a playground for thousands of young people, offering outdoor adventures for scouting groups as well as other community organizations.
Earlier this year, Scouts Canada informed the committee that operates the camp of its recommendation to put the Picanoc Road property up for divestment, citing financial deficits, distance from urban centres and lack of utilities among the factors leading to the decision.
“We were shocked,” said committee member Dan Drummond of the moment they heard the news, adding that he and other volunteers felt that some of Scouts Canada’s claims were inaccurate.
In an official letter sent to Scouts Canada on July 15, committee chair Perry Schippers requested the board of governors re-evaluate its recommendations.
“On behalf of the Scout Camp Otter Lake QC Property Committee and the hundreds of persons who have encouraged me to respond, we formally request the Board of Governors and those involved in the decision-making process to remove Camp Otter Lake QC from the divestment list,” the letter reads.
Last week, the committee received an official response from Scouts Canada, saying that the board had considered their request and that it had been accepted.
“We are so happy the camp is being saved,” said committee member Alain Guy, who has been involved with the group for almost 10 years.
Guy said Scouts Canada’s claims that the camp is running deficits is not exactly accurate, since the volunteer committee does its own fundraising which usually results in a small surplus at the end of every year.
“Our camp is a volunteer camp, and we’ve been running it for so many years successfully [ . . . ] It’s always been financially viable,” he said.
Scouts Canada also argued that the property has no utilities, but Guy said the committee has been working on getting hydro for quite some time and has in fact been waiting to get the final approval from Scouts Canada.
“Everything is done, the wiring is done, everything is in place, the pole is there. It’s just a matter of connecting the pole and getting our electricity network wiring certified,” he said.
“We’ve been asking on a repeated basis since last year to complete the whole work, but we’re not getting anywhere yet.”
Guy said after a tough post-pandemic period when the camp was forced to close, reservation numbers have started to climb again and the committee is anticipating a bright future.
“We went from being a beehive to nothing, and we are building back our clientele because it took time to build everything back and put everything back to snuff,” he said.
Scouts Canada’s executive director of commercial ventures Tim Bennett said the post-pandemic decline has been felt nationwide, with membership numbers dropping from 60,000 pre-pandemic to now 45,000.
“We have been on the decline as an organization for a while, and we just have not been able to come up to that level through covid. That’s resulted in things such as decrease in revenue [ . . . ] and that has contributed to an increased cost to operate.”
He said this decline prompted a re-evaluation of the properties it wanted to keep, including those in Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec.
He said one of the major factors why Otter Lake was recommended for divestment was its distance from major population centres.
“We have areas of the province where there are nine or 10 camps within a 90-minute drive time of [a] members base, and there’s not enough membership to sustain and grow nine properties. That was one of the things we were looking at,” he said.
In the end, Bennett said the response from the Otter Lake volunteers was enough to convince the board that the property had a bright enough future.
“There was great communication back from the camp committee regarding the property [ . . . ] It was noted over the last couple of years the camp committee has done great work to ensure we’re bringing the budget back into a break-even or small surplus of a property,” he said.
Drummond, who was one of the very first scouts to attend the Otter Lake camp when it opened in the ’70s, said the camp’s remote location and wilderness feel make it unique within the Scouts Canada ecosystem.
“What’s exceptional about the camp is that while it’s relatively close to the town, it feels very much like a wilderness experience [ . . . ] there aren’t many that have that feel,” he said.
Guy said he expects the upward trend to continue at the camp as the committee expands the amount of activities available, adding that the existing canoeing, archery, bicycle rentals and trails, and an obstacle course will be supplemented with sailing and other new additions this fall.
Drummond said the fact that the camp doesn’t have many expenses throughout the year should help it be sustainable.
Guy, who got involved in scouting in the 90s when his own kids joined, said he is happy to have the opportunity to continue making outdoor experiences accessible to younger generations.
“We have an affordable camp. It may not be top-notch, which is not our intent, but we have a great outdoor program that offers wilderness-style activities [ . . . ] It’s a great adventure where kids can disconnect from technology and actually enjoy the wilderness.”