24 October 2008
These Are My People
Posted by admin under: community service .
This is from my local newspaper. These are my people. I’ve Scouted with some of them. When others try to say Boy Scouts aren’t relevant, it’s stories like this that allow me to not take offense because the accusers just don’t know my people.
The night of the Sept. 12 Metrolink crash, the Salays, like a lot of families, were home watching the tragic scene unfold on TV.
But Les and his wife, Melissa - both deeply involved with their kids in Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts - decided to do more than just watch. They put on their uniforms from Boy Scout Troop 921 in Northridge and spent more than 12 hours at the scene, handing out food and water to firefighters and police officers, then went to Chatsworth High School to help comfort anxious relatives of crash victims gathered at the evacuation center.
A month later, their house on Clymer Street in Northridge - almost seven miles from the Sesnon Fire - burned. It was the only house on the street to catch fire.
Investigators determined that embers blown by the Santa Ana winds got under the garage overhang, spread through the attic and destroyed most of the Salays’ home.
…
They cried a few tears when their house went up in flames, but they’ve cried more tears from all the support they’ve received from their Scouting community, Les Salay says.
“I am a proud man who prefers to give than to get, so this is hard for me. But without them, we’d be lost.”
Word of their plight had spread quickly from e-mails sent throughout the Scouting network.
…
Maybe the most touching response was a call from a man in Scouting who had been injured in the Metrolink crash.
“He was in the third car and wanted to thank us for being at the Metrolink crash to help,” Les said. “Now he wanted to know if he could help us. Funny how life turns, isn’t it?”
I take pride in this being in my area, but it could have happened anywhere in the country. This is Scouting.
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