The executive committee of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) unanimously voted to end the organization's ban on gay adult leaders.

On Monday, BSA officials announced that the 17-member executive committee on Friday voted and approved a resolution that would allow gay adults to serve as leaders in the 105-year-old organization, reports The Associated Press. It will be up to the group's 80-member National Executive Board to meet and ratify the resolution on Monday, July 27, the Boy Scouts said in a statement.

Under the new resolution, individual scout units will be allowed to set their own policy on whether to allow gay adults to work as leaders. That means that local scout units would be able to select adult leaders without regard to sexual orientation, while to choose leaders based on their religious beliefs.

"This change allows Scouting's members and parents to select local units, chartered to organizations with similar beliefs, that best meet the needs of their families," the BSA statement said, reports The AP. "This change would also respect the right of religious chartered organizations to continue to choose adult leaders whose beliefs are consistent with their own."

A number of scout councils have already hired gay adults in defiance of the official national policy.

Earlier this year, BSA president Robert Gates blasted the organization's anti-gay policy during a speech delivered at the group's national meeting. The former U.S. Defense secretary declared that the longstanding ban on participation by openly gay adults was no longer sustainable, reports Reuters. He also warned that upholding the ban "will be the end of us as a national movement."

Back in 2013, the BSA took another huge step towards equality and inclusion when it voted to accept openly gay boys as scouts. That change went into effect in January 2014.