May 2007 - arrl-odv - reflector.arrl.org

[arrl-odv:15581] Action Plan for BPL/FCC Study
by Joel Harrison 23 May '07

23 May '07

Greetings, While in Washington on May 9, Dave and I met with John Chwat & Janet Worthington to develop a 60-day plan to incorporate our efforts and enhance our grassroots action network. In the 60-day plan, we are concentrating on House bill, H.R. 462, since a bill has been introduced. We will have a similar action plan ready for the Senate, in which we expect to activate pending introduction of legislation, hopefully before June 1. In the House, our priority is to ask all members to cosponsor H.R. 462. I have attached a general letter that you and your grass roots people can send to all members to request their co-sponsorship. Further, we will focus on 64 members (55 Energy and Commerce Committee Members, 9 leadership members) with a more detailed letter to request their support, co-sponsorship, and passage in Committee and on the floor. I have attached a draft letter specifically for those 64 members we are targeting. Janet has provided a cross-reference of the Division Directors with those 64 members we are targeting. Division Directors should coordinate with DLACs, LACs, LAAs and members to get these letters sent to all Representatives, and to the 64 House members we are specifically targeting. Our goal is to have as many letters sent to the House Member as possible. Chwat's office needs copies of each letter sent (then when we visit their offices, they can present the letters to the appropriate staff, to redouble our efforts). In addition to getting the letters generated, Chwat will continue to meet with the 64 targeted members to educate them about the issue and request their support and co-sponsorship. Again, it is imperative that Chwat is copied on all letters. To complement sending the letters, it would also be helpful if some of you could try to arrange meetings with the Congressmen/women in their district offices to discuss H.R. 462. Most members travel home on the weekends, so you could request meetings then. Since that time may not be ideal, meetings during the week can be arranged during the "District work periods." Members should expect to be home in their districts the week of May 28 - June 1 (Memorial Day), and July 2 - July 6 (4th of July), and throughout the month of August. If you have any questions, please let Dave or me know. 73 Joel W5ZN

1 0

[arrl-odv:15580] Trip Report - IARU Administrative Council Meeting May 14-15
by Joel Harrison 23 May '07

23 May '07

On May 14-15 I attended the IARU Administrative Council (AC) meeting in Boston, MA. The IARU AC is comprised of the IARU President, Vice President, Secretary and two representatives from each IARU region, usually the Region President/Chairman and one other officer. The AC meeting deals with a number of international matters, including preparation and work at WRC's. Attendees at the Boston meeting were: IARU President Larry Price, W4RA IARU Vice President Tim Ellam, VE6SH/G4HUA IARU Secretary Dave Sumner, K1ZZ IARU Region 1 Chairman Ole Garpestad, LA2RR IARU Region 1 Secretary Don Beattie, G3BJ IARU Region 2 President Rod Stafford, W6ROD IARU Region 2 Secretary Reinaldo Leandro, YV5AMH IARU Region 3 President Michael Owen, VK3KI IARU Region 3 Vice President Dr. Joong-Geun Rhee, HL1AQQ Also present were: IARU Region 1 Director Hans Blondeel Timmerman, PB2T Region 2 Director Daniel Lamoureux, VE2KA Recording Secretary Paul Rinaldo, W4RI. My purpose in attending was, as President of the society serving as the International Secretariat, to open the consultative process for the next round of IARU officer elections. IARU President Larry Price, W4RA, will be retiring at the end of this term. Guidelines for the election of the IARU President and Vice President were adopted by the IARU Administrative Council in 2001 and were revised in 2003. They read as follows: 1. No later than 12 months, and preferably between 18 and 14 months, prior to the expiration of the term of office of the President then in office, the International Secretariat shall initiate discussions with the Administrative Council to identify suitably qualified candidates available to serve as President. If a member of the Administrative Council is the subject of such discussion, he or she may be asked to withdraw from the meeting during that portion of the discussions. 2. The purpose of these discussions shall be to assemble a list of available candidates who the International Secretariat and the Administrative Council agree are suitably qualified, do not have professional interests that conflict with the objectives of the IARU, and who, prior to taking office, will relinquish any elected position with a regional organization. The list shall be completed no later than 10 months prior to the end of the current term. The International Secretariat shall immediately notify the Regional Organization of any proposed candidate or candidates that have not been designated as a candidate by the appropriate Regional Organization. The International Secretariat shall immediately consult with the appropriate Regional Organization as to that person's qualifications to serve as an IARU officer. 3. No later than the meeting of the Administrative Council immediately following the completion of the list and after due consideration, the International Secretariat shall select its nominee from the list of candidates and shall advise the Administrative Council of its selection together with supporting material. 4. The International Secretariat shall be invited to this meeting of the Administrative Council to present its nomination. 5. The same procedure shall be used in the case of the Vice President. The current term expires on May 9, 2009. Thus, the preferred period for the initiation of discussions (between 18 and 14 months prior) is November 2007 to March 2008. However, because no meeting of the Administrative Council is scheduled or anticipated to be scheduled during that period, and because the 2008 meeting may well not be held prior to 9 May 2008, the initiation of discussions had to take place in Boston. So, the process is now open and discussion has already started with many of the member societies within IARU. While the nominations won't be firm for at least another year, I will tell you that the current "front runner" for President is IARU Vice President Tim Ellam, VE6SH. You will have an opportunity to meet Tim, if you haven't already, at our meeting in July as he will be present to give you an update on WRC-07 preparations. I will be pleased to address any questions you may have regarding this report. Please remember that I will be unavailable until May 31. 73 Joel W5ZN

1 0

[arrl-odv:15582] Trip Report - May 9 Washington D.C.
by Joel Harrison 23 May '07

23 May '07

On the evening of May 8 I traveled to Washington for the purpose of a meeting at the ARRL Technical Relations Office with Sumner, Rinaldo and Imlay in the morning, to be followed by a meeting at Chwat & Company with Dave tagged with a late afternoon meeting with Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor at his office to discuss introduction of the Senate version of HR 462. On May 9 at 8:20 AM I met with CEO Sumner, CTO Rinaldo and General Counsel Imlay to review and discuss RM-11306. Our purpose was to review the comments generated as a result of both the original petition and the ex-parte filing and evaluate the concern expressed among the amateur community. The result was a new draft that still focuses on our objective of providing a regulatory framework to promote development of new technology and also protect existing modes and neighborhood user groups as well as the opposition comments with the exception of those that just said they were opposed to change for no specific reason. The draft write-up is still being completed and I hope to have it to you in the next two weeks. My idea of what I would like to accomplish in July is first to decide if you want to re-file a new petition at some future date. If the board decides to do so, then we should debate and finalize a draft to be submitted for review by the membership. It would not be my intent to approve a new petition for re-filing at this meeting, but rather move forward with the idea of doing so in January 2008 so as to allow input during the time between July 2007 and January 2008. At 2:00 PM Dave and I arrived at the office of Chwat & Co. in Arlington, VA to review and discuss our legislative agenda. We discussed and outlined a 60-day plan to move forward with our BPL bill as well as our antenna legislation. The intent was to focus on an increased effort to obtain additional co-sponsors for HR 462, but also concentrate on key Representatives that sit on the House Energy & Commerce Committee. Shortly you will receive an email calling our grass roots program to action to address the objective of this plan. At 4:00 PM, Dave, John, Janet and I made the very short trip from Chwat & Company to the Hill where I had a previously scheduled meeting with Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor. My purpose was to further discuss the Senator's introduction of a Senate version of HR 462. We have been working with the Senator's staff for a few weeks, and progress had stalled. I spoke briefly with Senator Pryor and his Chief of Staff, Bob Russell but spent the majority of our 20 minutes with Senator Pryor's legislative assistant. Senator Pryor's staff had contacted Entergy, the major utility in Arkansas, about our proposed bill. This was neither surprising our alarming to me. I expected this would occur, however Entergy has been sensitive to the interference issue and the concerns of radio amateurs. Entergy does not have a subscriber BPL installation in Arkansas but they do have a test installation in Little Rock for the purpose of monitoring commercial electric usage. Prior to the installation, they contacted the ARRL Arkansas Section Manager to schedule an in-person meeting to review and discuss matters. To date, this open relationship has worked well and Entergy's response to Senator Pryor's inquiry was to ensure the bill was not opposed to BPL. Of course, we made it clear to the Senator's staff that our opposition is not with the utilities or BPL, but interference to licensed services, spectrum pollution and the FCC's refusal to base the rules on sound technical data. We left with the understanding that in the next few days the Senator's staff would work with us to revise our draft text of the bill to incorporate our findings and move forward. As of this writing, we are still involved in that process. Following the meeting Dave headed to the airport for a late flight. I was unable to schedule an evening flight so I departed on a 6:00 AM flight the following day. I will be out of pocket until May 31 but will be happy to address any questions you may have upon my return. 73 Joel W5ZN

1 0

[arrl-odv:15579] April Financial Reports
by Shelley, Barry, N1VXY 22 May '07

22 May '07

The April financial reports have been posted to the ODV section of the ARRL web page at http://www.arrl.org/members-only/ODV/docs/Financial%20Reports-2007/ . If you have any questions, please let us know. 73, Barry J. Shelley, N1VXY Chief Financial Officer ARRL, Inc.--The national association for Amateur Radio 225 Main St. Newington, CT 06111 Telephone: (860) 594-0212 E-mail: bshelley(a)arrl.org Web: www.arrl.org

1 0

[arrl-odv:15578] Scholarship winners
by Tom Frenaye 21 May '07

21 May '07

In case you missed it while at Dayton, the ARRL Foundation announced scholarship winners in all 15 ARRL Divisions last Friday. http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2007/05/17/102/?nc=1 -- Tom ===== e-mail: k1ki(a)arrl.org President, ARRL Foundation http://www.arrl.org/arrlf/ Tom Frenaye, K1KI, P O Box J, West Suffield CT 06093 Phone: 860-668-5444

1 0

[arrl-odv:15577] Excuse the Dupes
by Joel Harrison 21 May '07

21 May '07

My server had a hiccup and spewed dupes of some messages. If you received the same message from me more than once, please excuse and ignore! Joel

1 0

[arrl-odv:15574] Dayton
by Harrison, Joel 21 May '07

21 May '07

Back home from Dayton. A very good weekend and a very good crowd. A report and info from me (and various others, I'm sure) will appear in the coming days. In a nutshell, everyone was upbeat, interested in and enthusiastic about being on the air and appreciative of ARRL and our work. Only about a half dozen complaints....one of those from Steve Waterman and the other from Tom Blackwell who each bent my ear individually for well over an hour. The other four were trivial issues. No complaints whatsoever to me about regulation by bandwidth. A detailed report as soon as I can catch up. Last week I was in D.C. on Wednesday & Thursday (May 9 & 10), then left Sunday (Mother's Day) to attend the IARU Administrative Council meeting in Boston on Monday & Tuesday to cover an agenda item as President of the society serving as the International Secretariat. I arrived home late Tuesday evening then left early Thursday morning for Dayton. So, needless to say, it has been a fast and furious two weeks. I'll get reports out as quickly as possible during the next few days. One note, though, Kim and I will be out of the continental U.S. beginning Tuesday (May 22) until I return for the Atlantic Division Convention in Rochester on June 1. I will not be answering phone calls or emails during this time although Dave does know how to reach me should the need arise. The fact that we're going to be gone is confidential information so please respect that and do not pass it on to anyone. Thanks. 73 Joel W5ZN

1 0

[arrl-odv:15575] Dayton
by Joel Harrison 21 May '07

21 May '07

Back home from Dayton. A very good weekend and a very good crowd. A report and info from me (and various others, I'm sure) will appear in the coming days. In a nutshell, everyone was upbeat, interested in and enthusiastic about being on the air and appreciative of ARRL and our work. Only about a half dozen complaints..one of those from Steve Waterman and the other from Tom Blackwell who each bent my ear individually for well over an hour. The other four were trivial issues. No complaints whatsoever to me about regulation by bandwidth. A detailed report as soon as I can catch up. Last week I was in D.C. on Wednesday & Thursday (May 9 & 10), then left Sunday (Mother's Day) to attend the IARU Administrative Council meeting in Boston on Monday & Tuesday to cover an agenda item as President of the society serving as the International Secretariat. I arrived home late Tuesday evening then left early Thursday morning for Dayton. So, needless to say, it has been a fast and furious two weeks. I'll get reports out as quickly as possible during the next few days. One note, though, Kim and I will be out of the continental U.S. beginning Tuesday (May 22) until I return for the Atlantic Division Convention in Rochester on June 1. I will not be answering phone calls or emails during this time although Dave does know how to reach me should the need arise. The fact that we're going to be gone is confidential information so please respect that and do not pass it on to anyone. Thanks. 73 Joel W5ZN

1 0

Dayton
by Joel Harrison 21 May '07

21 May '07

Back home from Dayton. A very good weekend and a very good crowd. A report and info from me (and various others, I'm sure) will appear in the coming days. In a nutshell, everyone was upbeat, interested in and enthusiastic about being on the air and appreciative of ARRL and our work. Only about a half dozen complaints..one of those from Steve Waterman and the other from Tom Blackwell who each bent my ear individually for well over an hour. The other four were trivial issues. No complaints whatsoever to me about regulation by bandwidth. A detailed report as soon as I can catch up. Last week I was in D.C. on Wednesday & Thursday (May 9 & 10), then left Sunday (Mother's Day) to attend the IARU Administrative Council meeting in Boston on Monday & Tuesday to cover an agenda item as President of the society serving as the International Secretariat. I arrived home late Tuesday evening then left early Thursday morning for Dayton. So, needless to say, it has been a fast and furious two weeks. I'll get reports out as quickly as possible during the next few days. One note, though, Kim and I will be out of the continental U.S. beginning Tuesday (May 22) until I return for the Atlantic Division Convention in Rochester on June 1. I will not be answering phone calls or emails during this time although Dave does know how to reach me should the need arise. The fact that we're going to be gone is confidential information so please respect that and do not pass it on to anyone. Thanks. 73 Joel W5ZN

1 0

[arrl-odv:15573] Re: Fwd: ARRL Initial Brief FILED
by w3kd＠aol.com 18 May '07

18 May '07

Right, Tom, thanks. Bill Lake at WilmerHale said the same thing I did; we can't wait to see what FCC will say in response (their brief is due July 2). The missing references to the Joint Appendix were necessary because the Joint Appendix is not yet prepared, and won't be until FCC and the intervenors decide what items THEY want in the appendix. So, everyone files their initial briefs, and then once the joint appendix is prepared and filed, the briefs are all refiled. This one is called the "initial brief" and the ones with J.A. citations is called the "final brief" for each party. It is normal procedure. Almost invariably, the parties agree to a "deferred appendix" which is simpler if filed later, but it necessitates the second brief filing with the J.A. citations. Chris -----Original Message----- From: frenaye(a)pcnet.com To: arrl-odv(a)reflector.arrl.org Sent: Fri, 18 May 2007 10:16 AM Subject: [arrl-odv:15572] Re: Fwd: ARRL Initial Brief FILED At 09:33 PM 5/17/2007, w3kd(a)aol.com wrote: >Greetings. Pardon the informality of the means of sending this to ODV, but it was the fastest method of doing so. I really enjoyed reading through the brief - I like the style of writing and explanations. How could a court disagree? Never realized that "hide the peanut" would make a good phrase to use in a federal court brief... -- Tom PS: I assume the missing references to the Joint Appendix will be handled in a follow up version? ===== e-mail: k1ki(a)arrl.org ARRL New England Division Director http://www.arrl.org/ Tom Frenaye, K1KI, P O Box J, West Suffield CT 06093 Phone: 860-668-5444 ________________________________________________________________________ AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com.

1 0