August 2006 - arrl-odv - reflector.arrl.org

RE: Young People in Amateur Radio
by Wade 21 Aug '06

21 Aug '06

I ran into the same lament at the KS State Convention today in Salina, KS. Someone was concerned about the number of gray heads at the forum (60+ in attendance!). One response can be a question, "Did you bring your kids or grandkids today?" This is really not an ARRL problem, but an individual problem. I wonder if we need to ratchet up our mentor program several notches, too. 73, Wade W0EJ PS Arrived home safely. The lady at the Hertz counter had a hard time believing the car was really driven over 1000 miles in less than 2 days. It was! -----Original Message----- From: Joel Harrison [mailto:w5zn@arrl.org] Sent: Sunday, August 20, 2006 10:29 PM To: arrl-odv Subject: Young People in Amateur Radio We've all heard comments (and have voiced some ourselves) about the aging amateur radio population and the need to get more young people into amateur radio. I find it quite interesting that I hear this same comment many places. Even though I work in a high-tech industry there is a concern about our aging work force, the length of time it takes to acquire the required certifications and our need to recruit young people. I also hear comments of this nature in my church and many other places about "attracting" youth into whatever the organization of the day is. Fact is, nearly everyone is fighting for the limited time youth seem to have these days for "other" activities. I often wonder if we have such a shortfall of youth in amateur radio or if it is just a perception we have convinced ourselves of. Of course, we certainly don't hear young people on the HF bands like we used. With that in mind, if you will take a moment and look in September QST, pages 84-85 and 102-103 you can't help but smile and think the matter is not a bleak as we think. If you will also read the article on page 103 along with the Soapbox I think you will find comments reminiscent of the old "Novice Roundup" days. If nothing else, it should at least bring a smile and a brief comforting moment to us old timers! 73 Joel W5ZN

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Young People in Amateur Radio
by Joel Harrison 21 Aug '06

21 Aug '06

We've all heard comments (and have voiced some ourselves) about the aging amateur radio population and the need to get more young people into amateur radio. I find it quite interesting that I hear this same comment many places. Even though I work in a high-tech industry there is a concern about our aging work force, the length of time it takes to acquire the required certifications and our need to recruit young people. I also hear comments of this nature in my church and many other places about "attracting" youth into whatever the organization of the day is. Fact is, nearly everyone is fighting for the limited time youth seem to have these days for "other" activities. I often wonder if we have such a shortfall of youth in amateur radio or if it is just a perception we have convinced ourselves of. Of course, we certainly don't hear young people on the HF bands like we used. With that in mind, if you will take a moment and look in September QST, pages 84-85 and 102-103 you can't help but smile and think the matter is not a bleak as we think. If you will also read the article on page 103 along with the Soapbox I think you will find comments reminiscent of the old "Novice Roundup" days. If nothing else, it should at least bring a smile and a brief comforting moment to us old timers! 73 Joel W5ZN

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Report on Alabama State Convention - Huntsville Hamfest
by Joel Harrison 21 Aug '06

21 Aug '06

Greetings, I have just returned from Huntsville, Alabama where I attended the 2006 ARRL Alabama State Convention and site of the 2007 ARRL National Convention with Director Butler, Vice Director Donahue, IARU President Price and DXCC Manager Bill Moore. Also in attendance were Delta Division Vice Director Karl Bullock, WA5TMC, Alabama SM Greg Sarratt, W4OZK, South Florida SM and PRC Chairman Sherri Brower, W4STB, North Florida SM Rudy Hubbard, WA4PUP and Mississippi SM Malcolm Keown, W5XX. Notable "non-ARRL" amateur radio celebrities present were Gordon West, Chip Margelli and Bob Allphin. CQ had a booth but I did not know any of the staff in present. Huntsville, Alabama is located in the northern part of the state within 200 miles of Atlanta, Birmingham, Memphis, Nashville and Knoxville. This convention is held each year in downtown Huntsville at the Von Braun Convention Center. The center is comprised of an arena and two very large connected halls. This year's event was held in the south hall. Adjacent to the convention center is a Holiday Inn which served as the convention hotel. A number of other hotels are nearby as is the U.S. Rocket and Space Center where "Space Camp" is held. Under construction is an Embassy Suites Hotel scheduled to open in early 2007 that is connected to the convention center via a "skywalk". The large hall where the convention was held had plenty of room for the many commercial dealers that included Giga-Parts, Ham Radio Outlet, and WB0W among others. Icom, Kenwood, MFJ and Yaesu each had large booths where their products were on display. The flea market area is all held indoors in a separate part of the hall. On Friday Director Butler, Vice Director Donahue and IARU President Price set up the ARRL booth that was in a prime location just inside the main entrance of the hall. The convention opened Saturday morning at 9 AM to an awaiting crowd. I did not obtain any preliminary attendance numbers but I can tell you from observation the crowd was robust. Five separate rooms were available for forums with one additional room dedicated to VE exams. A forum was scheduled each hour on the hour in each room throughout the day beginning at 10 AM and ending at 4 PM. A total of 30 forums were held ranging in topics from emergency communications, hurricane Katrina response review, ARISS, propagation, DX, APRS, YLRL, antenna modeling, Alabama linked D-Star repeater project and the IARU effort to obtain an international amateur radio allocation at 5 MHz. The greatest forum attendance (standing room only) was for a presentation on Icom's D-Star. Alabama has deployed more D-Star systems than anyone else in the country and is a vital part of their emergency communications repeater link. The ARRL forum was held at 11 AM with approximately 50 people attending. SM Sarratt began the meeting with follow-up comments from Director Butler. The program was then turn over to me for comments. My first order of business was to present a 50 year membership plaque to Larry Price. I then presented brief comments on a number of topics we are currently involved in and then opened the forum up to questions from the floor. Questions included the status of FCC license restructuring/Morse requirement, BPL, congressional activity, restrictive antenna regulations and a compliment about the friendly reception a local radio amateur had received during a recent visit to HQ that was followed by another similar testimonial. One attendee advised us of a new BPL deployment in Andalusia, Alabama and noted Ed Hare had been alerted. Overall, a positive atmosphere during the ARRL forum. Notable questions that I addressed at the ARRL booth included: * A member who was upset that we are charging members a fee to handle renewal of vanity callsign licenses. * An inquiry as to when we would update the King Schools Technician Class Video course to reflect the new Technician question pool material * A suggestion to not use funding from Emcomm courses as a profitable revenue generating mechanism * A request that the ARRL Board consider ARRL serving as a clearing house for people wishing to donate/sell equipment to members who reside in disaster areas and have lost radio equipment as a result of the disaster. * Steve Waterman and I discussed his desire to help generate reply comments to FCC in support of our regulation by bandwidth proposal once FCC issues an NPRM * A concern about a WRRL (Jerry Boyd) concept with FEMA that appears in our Emcomm Level III training course * A number of positive comments about the League's direction and member support. "Business" at the ARRL booth seemed brisk however that was under the able control of Frank and Sandy among others and I have no specific numbers for publication sales or new/renewal membership numbers. The Saturday activities concluded at 4:30 PM with a Saturday prize drawing. That evening, the Northern Alabama DX Association hosted a banquet. The program was "The 3Y0X Experience" presented by Bob Allphin, K4UEE. I chose not to attend the DX banquet for a number of reasons, one being that I have now seen "The 3Y0X Experience" four times this year, three of those presented by Bob. I extended my regrets to Bob and told him how many times I had seen the presentation and while it was an excellent program professionally prepared and presented I felt that I had seen it enough to be able to stand in for him if he became ill! Bob's wife, Mary, told me she certainly understood and wished she could decline attending as well as she had unfortunately seen "The 3Y0X Experience" now 18 times! That made my excuse seem flimsy although it didn't change my decision. Bob, of course, is a good friend and League supporter and was not offended in any way. The convention door's opened again Sunday morning at 9 AM to an expected smaller crowd than Saturday and was scheduled to close at 4 PM. Around 11:30 I left the convention in the capable hands of Frank and Sandy and departed for the airport for my flight home. I arrived home at 9:30 PM, over three hours late due to a weather delayed flight from Atlanta, however I have arrived in time to relax a bit before facing Monday morning where I was scheduled to head to my Princeton office but I've put that off for a day! The Huntsville hamfest committee is quite excited about the opportunity to host the 2007 ARRL National Convention. It has been a number of years since I last attended this convention but from my observation this weekend we will have a successful and productive national convention next year. All in all, a very successful 2006 ARRL Alabama State Convention. I wish to extend my thanks to Director Butler and Vice Director Donahue for their kind and gracious hospitality during the weekend. 73 Joel W5ZN

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[arrl-odv:14376] Re: Report on FCC Enforcement Bureau Meeting
by w3kd＠aol.com 21 Aug '06

21 Aug '06

Jim, It was hard to restrain myself, hearing the FCC try to tell us that normal ambient noise at HF is S7, but I just said "bull". Not "bull...". But the meeting, and Joel's and my response to that moron Stilwell, was a great catharsis for the both of us. Chris -----Original Message----- From: jfenster(a)pacifier.com To: arrl-odv(a)reflector.arrl.org Cc: arrl-odv(a)reflector.arrl.org Sent: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 8:38 PM Subject: [arrl-odv:14375] Re: Report on FCC Enforcement Bureau Meeting Joel and Chris, Great job and informative report. It is about time we showed the Commission we are both compentent and willing to call their bluff. I expect they were not ready for someone to reply to their false assumptions with "bull...". It will be with anticipation that we see the results of this meeting. 73 Jim K9JF ________________________________________________________________________ Check out AOL.com today. Breaking news, video search, pictures, email and IM. All on demand. Always Free.

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[arrl-odv:14375] Re: Report on FCC Enforcement Bureau Meeting
by jfenster＠pacifier.com 19 Aug '06

19 Aug '06

Joel and Chris, Great job and informative report. It is about time we showed the Commission we are both compentent and willing to call their bluff. I expect they were not ready for someone to reply to their false assumptions with "bull...". It will be with anticipation that we see the results of this meeting. 73 Jim K9JF

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Misc
by Joel Harrison 18 Aug '06

18 Aug '06

I have just sent a report to you concerning the recent FCC Enforcement Bureau meeting. Later tonight I will have an update on our congressional activity but first I must depart now to woof down some fine BBQ with Director Butler, Vice Director Donahue, AL SM Greg Sarratt and IARU President Larry Price. I am currently in Huntsville, Alabama for this year's convention and looking forward to what is shaping up to be an excellent event. More later. 73 Joel W5ZN

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Report on FCC Enforcement Bureau Meeting
by Joel Harrison 18 Aug '06

18 Aug '06

Please find attached a report on the meeting Chris Imlay and I had with the FCC Enforcement Bureau in Washington this past Wednesday. Please note the confidential status of this report. 73 Joel W5ZN

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[arrl-odv:14372] Re: Jim & Sandy?
by w4ru＠bellsouth.net 18 Aug '06

18 Aug '06

Kay and the ODV.. I am out of the hospital and now in Huntsville Al for their hamfest. My left hand does not work well...I am typing with only my right hand..but I am doing therapy. So I should be near perfect in a few months. 73 Sandy > > From: "Kay Craigie" <n3kn(a)comcast.net> > Date: 2006/08/18 Fri AM 08:10:00 EDT > To: "arrl-odv" <arrl-odv(a)reflector.arrl.org> > Subject: [arrl-odv:14370] Jim & Sandy? > > Is there any update on the health situations of Jim McCobb and Sandy Donahue > that would be appropriate to put on the ODV? > > On that subject, we're certainly keeping a good thought for Mr. MFJ at our > house -- thanks for letting us know about that, Karl. > > 73 - Kay N3KN > > > >

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[arrl-odv:14371] Vacation
by Kramer, Harold, WJ1B 18 Aug '06

18 Aug '06

Just a reminder, I'll be out on vacation all next week. I'll be returning on Aug 28. Harold Harold Kramer, WJ1B Chief Operating Officer ARRL - The National Association for Amateur Radio 225 Main Street Newington, CT 06111 860 594 0220 www.arrl.org/ hkramer(a)arrl.org

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[arrl-odv:14370] Jim & Sandy?
by Kay Craigie 18 Aug '06

18 Aug '06

Is there any update on the health situations of Jim McCobb and Sandy Donahue that would be appropriate to put on the ODV? On that subject, we're certainly keeping a good thought for Mr. MFJ at our house -- thanks for letting us know about that, Karl. 73 - Kay N3KN

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