Dirty Camp

Now that your kid is safely back in school, the Gay Uncle can tell you the story of a summer camp from hell. Don’t worry, it’s not the one that Jason Voorhees haunted in the 47 Friday the 13th movies, so no one gets a knife stuffed through their chest or has their limbs cut off by a powerboat motor. No, this camp was run by a Hassidic sect up here in the Catskills for roughly 300 kids, at a rundown old resort community which had seen better days when it went out of business in 1981. But did these folks spruce it up? Give it a fresh coat of paint? At least patch the leaky roofs? Nah. Then it wouldn’t be camp! More importantly, they didn’t even bother to obtain the proper county or state permits to run a children’s summer getaway, so when a heating oil spill (!) in mid-July brought the camp to the attention of the state Department of Environmental Conservation, other regulators started poking around. What did they find? Nothing much. Just the usual minor violations like water running over electrical boxes, broken fire extinguishers and windows, and what they called “pervasive mold”. (In fact, when they arrived, many of the campers were apparently wearing white surgical masks while engaged in their activities, in order to foster this little thing called “breathing”). When they moved to shut the camp down, they ended up in a Ruby Ridge-like standoff, in which the directors refused to leave or send the kids home. “Their parents are on vacation!” they told authorities. “Where would you like them to go?” So the little cuties had to spend a couple more days in Dirty Camp. Gunc hopes they have no lasting damage. He also wonders if he could send a few of his nieces there next year, once they fix the whole rotting walls and carpets full of spores issue. It’s close by, and he could sneak snacks in to them through the cyclone fence.