Scouts may be thrifty, but some leaders are well paid

A Scout is thrifty, the Boy Scout Law teaches. Many adult leaders put that into

practice by volunteering without pay and sacrificing precious time and vacation

weeks for camps.

But guess how much the Great Salt Lake Council pays its full-time,

professional Scout executive, Paul Moore.

It is $214,000 a year (including a salary of $194,458 and benefits of

$19,544). In comparison, the salary of Vice President Dick Cheney is $215,700 a

year, and the salaries of Chief Justice John Roberts and House Speaker Nancy

Pelosi are both $212,100.

"I know people may drop their toast in their cereal when they read that,"

Moore said.

"But I'm not embarrassed by my compensation. I've worked very hard and been

very successful in this business," he said. "This is a life's work for me that

has purchased 60 to 80 hours (a week) of my time for all of my working life. ...

If I were not making that salary here, I would probably be making a larger

salary in the BSA somewhere else."

He's right. Other similar Scout leaders nationally often make much more. At

the top of that in 2005, the last year for which public data are readily

available, was then-national Scout executive Roy Williams.

His compensation was nearly $1 million (including a salary of $552,379 and

benefits of $436,040). President Bush was paid $400,000 that year.

Such information — of special interest in Utah, home of the nation's largest

Scout councils as measured by membership in traditional troops and packs — is

found in the Forms 990 that tax-exempt organizations must file with the Internal