Overnight Mass. camps stunned after being quietly moved to Phase 4

SPENCER, Mass. — Late Thursday, the Baker Administration dropped a bombshell on the camp industry. Overnight camps have been told all along they could open in Massachusetts in Phase three, which starts Monday, July 6. But Thursday they were suddenly bumped - without explanation - to Phase four, meaning overnight camps now can't open at all this summer.

"Absolutely shocking. Completely blindsided," said Sheryl Moore, the Executive Director of Camp Marshall in Spencer. "I've run the gamut of emotions to this point. I don't know kind of where I sit right now."

Camp Marshall was planning to welcome the first wave of overnight campers Monday with the start of Phase three in Massachusetts. But late Thursday, the state's website changed and overnight camps found themselves pushed to Phase four, with no openings permitted until next summer.

Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker did not mention the change at his Thursday press conference, and staff at Camp Marshall were excited to get going, until they got a call from the state camp association Thursday evening.

"We were really led to believe right up until the eleventh hour that we were sitting in Phase three," Moore said. "This whole time we're making investments. We're investing in staff, hiring. We're investing in training. We're investing in our property."

To accommodate social distancing and pandemic-related changes, Camp Marshall was planning to host about 40 campers a week, where a typical summer might have seen 100. The reduced numbers already meant a steep hill to climb financially, as Camp Marshall is a non-profit.

"We already operate on a shoestring budget and now we've invested in something that was really just kind of pulled out from under us at the last minute," Moore said. "That's a hard pill to swallow."

Bette Bussel, Director of the New England Chapter of the American Camp Association, told us this week most overnight camps in Massachusetts had already decided to stay closed for the summer before the state's change, largely because the guidelines from the state would have come so late. Still, the financial impact of a season without revenue - especially for the handful of camps planning to open - will have long-term consequences.

"There are some camps that are just not going to recover from this," Bussel said.

Those consequences filter down to the children - the campers - who were hoping for a week of something as close to normal as possible in the midst of a pandemic.

"It's a lot of tears," Moore said. "It's a lot of parents trying to console their child."

The Administration would only say that the list of businesses allowed to open is subject to change based on the latest health data.