Omaha-Area Boy souts go to Iraq

Omaha-area Boy Scouts are doing "a good turn" for children in Iraq. The Scouts are donating money and camping equipment to help restart Boy Scout and Girl Guide programs there.
Saddam Hussein outlawed Scouting programs. In June, the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad authorized Scouting groups to use a former military camp, now in ruins, on the Tigris River as a campground and headquarters.
American organizers of the effort to revive Scouting programs in Iraq invite the public to a free program to hear about their plans at 8 a.m. Saturday at Chalco Hills Recreation Area (near 154th Street and Giles Road).
The presentation by the Iraqi International Foundation (formerly the Iraqi American Foundation) will be part of a weekend camp-out sponsored by the Soaring Eagle District of Boy Scouts and attended by approximately 1,500 Scouts.
Among those speaking is Barakat Jassem, vice chairman of the foundation, a native of Iraq and a current Fulbright scholar at Dartmouth College.
Michael R. Bradle of Lampasas, Texas, and chairman of the foundation, will comment on volunteer efforts under way to clean up the campground in Iraq. Bradle, an Eagle Scout since 1981, created the nonprofit foundation.
Since September, Scouts have been saving change and collecting new or nearly new camping equipment to donate to the Iraqi initiative, said Sandra J. Gunselman of Omaha.
Gunselman, a cancer researcher at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, is the national community coordinator for the foundation.
She says the foundation's first goal is to raise $40,000 to train leaders for Scout troops in 18 Iraqi provinces. The second goal is to raise $4 million for the campground, a headquarters and a national program to serve Iraqi boys and girls of all ethnic and cultural backgrounds.
Gunselman said Scout programs teach good citizenship, community service, individual honor and self-confidence and will help create a positive atmosphere in Iraq.