The growth in numbers of Amateurs over the past decade has been
overwhelmingly via the Technician license. This segment of the Amateur
population does not seem highly attracted to ARRL membership, nor
affiliative with the "national association" nature of ARRL.

Interestingly, however, these new Amateurs are "local joiners". They
attach some importance to public service communications events such as
disaster drills, SkyWarn, flood relief, marathons, parade
communications, and similar functions of a local nature. Interestingly,
even though their on-the-air participation is limited, they represent a
significant portion of the crew at Field Day, hamfest staffs, and
similar "local" events. They are also well represented on the rosters of
many local clubs.

Following is a PBI (Partially Baked Idea) to favorably position ARRL
(and Amateur Radio in general) with these newcomers to our hobby.

I propose that the ARRL BoD consider an initiative to attract these
newcomers to an interest in ARRL by establishment of a new "Department
of Community Support".

The mission of this department of ARRL would be to organize, train,
support, and nurture a system of tactical communications teams on the
LOCAL level. I use the term "tactical" as opposed to "emergency"
intentionally to broaden the scope of the mission to include a wide
variety of community-level communications needs.

This "department" would be outside the current Field Organization, and
given VISIBLE and COMMITTED volunteer leadership at Director or Vice
President rank.

Did I hear someone muttering "Isn't that what ARES is all about?" or
"Our current field organization already provides for this." Good
points -- ARRL already has some of the pieces in place, and it looks
good on paper. Unfortunately these "pieces" tend to be scattered around
the ARRL organization and are not linked into a cohesive program.
Support and leadership responsibility, from Newington all the way down
to the local level, is often a collateral duty and the attention level
is spotty and often diluted by competing responsibilities and personal
interests. Leadership attention at the SM level is widely variable, and
SM's have a diminished mindshare of the general membership by the
unfortunate H.Q. decision to remove "Section News" from the national
journal of our Association. Without dwelling overlong on the
shortcomings of the current situation, I think we can all agree on four
points:

1) A focused national program with Director (or higher) level leadership
would have more impact than the current fragmented attention to "local"
Amateur Radio.

2) Such a program, if successful, would give Amateur Radio valuable
credibility in the regulatory and legislative arenas, and with national
organizations like Homeland Security, FEMA, and the Red Cross.

3) Such a program, if successful, would serve to elevate the perceived
value of Amateur Radio with local civil authorities, perhaps softening
the effects of issues like tower ordinances, etc.

4) Such a program, strongly identified with the League, would provide a
membership "attractor" to those classes of Amateurs that are now only
locally "affiliative". Gaining some traction into this huge reservoir of
potential members would be a godsend to the health and growth of ARRL.

What would need to be done to implement such a plan. Here are some "off
the top of my head" thoughts.

-- Define the mission and organizational structure.

-- Many of the people (SEC/EC's, etc) are already in place. The
organization structure would need to include a short chain-of-command
headed by a focused leader at Newington.

-- Move Field Day and SET into this organization as "their" events.

-- Devise a recognition vehicle to give visibility to noteworthy work by
individuals and teams in this Department. This visibility (QST?) should
extend outside the organization to the "general population" of hams as a
recruiting tool.

-- Establish a new periodical (like NCJ for contesters and QEX for
experimenters) to help build a "sense of community" among the
participants.

-- Educate local civil authorities about this organization, their
capabilities, and how to best interface with them to take advantage of
their capabilities.

In order to build some critical mass and gain traction, the outreach
effort to build these teams should not initially stress ARRL membership
for "grassroots" level players, but rather depend on a strong ARRL
identity to build esprit de corps and lead to an attitude of support and
affiliation with the parent organization. Perhaps appointment to team
leadership positions would be conditioned on ARRL membership.

Obviously a lot of this proposal needs a great deal of "fleshing out"
and refinement, but I present it in the spirit of a "topic for
discussion". I'm sure that the minds gathered here will not be bashful
about improving my PBI.

73, de Hans, K0HB

Subject: ARRL and the local scene
From: "KØHB"
Date: 5/15/2004 7:26 PM Central Standard Time
Message-id: et

I propose that the ARRL BoD consider an initiative to attract these
newcomers to an interest in ARRL by establishment of a new "Department
of Community Support".

Just what the ARRL needs...Yet another partially staffed, under-funded
program to manage.

The mission of this department of ARRL would be to organize, train,
support, and nurture a system of tactical communications teams on the
LOCAL level. I use the term "tactical" as opposed to "emergency"
intentionally to broaden the scope of the mission to include a wide
variety of community-level communications needs.

Someone/somewhere already got THAT message becasue that's exactly what
most ARES organizations (at least hee in Tennessee) do.

1) A focused national program with Director (or higher) level leadership
would have more impact than the current fragmented attention to "local"
Amateur Radio.

Wait-a-minute...First you're promoting a "local" ARRL prograsm, then you go
right back and put the "leadership" as a "national" proram.

2) Such a program, if successful, would give Amateur Radio valuable
credibility in the regulatory and legislative arenas, and with national
organizations like Homeland Security, FEMA, and the Red Cross.

Huh....?!?!

Again, you ae NOT paying attention to current events, Master Chief. Again,
I can only make reference to Tennessee and what I know of programs on-going in
neighboring states (I sit right against AL and GA), but loal ARES managers are
knee-deep in those exact issues.

And the LAST thing the HS folks need is yet-another alphabet soup
organization showing up purporting to represent some other sector of an already
finite subset of responders.

3) Such a program, if successful, would serve to elevate the perceived
value of Amateur Radio with local civil authorities, perhaps softening
the effects of issues like tower ordinances, etc.

Local civil authorities already HAVE that "perceived value",
Hans...otherwise UHF-REACT would suffice.

4) Such a program, strongly identified with the League, would provide a
membership "attractor" to those classes of Amateurs that are now only
locally "affiliative". Gaining some traction into this huge reservoir of
potential members would be a godsend to the health and growth of ARRL.

What would need to be done to implement such a plan. Here are some "off
the top of my head" thoughts.

Obviously you are sincerely motivated, but are having a bit of a "Senior
Moment" in as much as you've used a lot of bandwidth to suggest things that are
already in place.

Bunch of snippage....

Obviously a lot of this proposal needs a great deal of "fleshing out"
and refinement, but I present it in the spirit of a "topic for
discussion". I'm sure that the minds gathered here will not be bashful
about improving my PBI.

What you COULD do is take the existing programs and put a bit of polish on
them and more effectively accomplish them without creating yet-another ARRL
bureaucracy, Hans.

73

Steve, K4YZ

"KØHB" wrote in message ink.net...

. . . . would have more impact than the current fragmented attention to "local"
Amateur Radio.


Obviously a lot of this proposal needs a great deal of "fleshing out"
and refinement, but I present it in the spirit of a "topic for
discussion". I'm sure that the minds gathered here will not be bashful
about improving my PBI.

Hans your heart and head are clearly in several right directions.
Whilst, of course, some of it is utter nonsense too. No surprise there
eh?

I'm not a clubbie, I haven't been able to raise any interest in that
whole scene since my Novice days back in the stone age. However I do
know a bunch of 'em peripherally mostly via the machines and via
holding down a few CW seats during their Field Day operations, some
socializing here and there, etc. In a nutshell many if not a majority
of those in this group have no interest in highly-organized activities
and/or don't care enough about any of it to even cough up the forty
bucks a year for a subscription to QST. Methinks you'd have a very
hard sell on your hands with your proposal.

73, de Hans, K0HB

w3rv

KØHB wrote:
The growth in numbers of Amateurs over the past decade has been
overwhelmingly via the Technician license. This segment of the Amateur
population does not seem highly attracted to ARRL membership, nor
affiliative with the "national association" nature of ARRL.


Therein lies the whole problem. Somewhere along the line Technicians
were left out of the mix. ARRL has tried some things. When I got my
Technician's license in '99, I received a nice introductory letter and
even a little magazine supplement with a project or two in it. But I
think even that is more oriented to Hams like myself, that intend to go
on in the hobby beyond Technician.

I agree with you that many of the Tech's help with the public service.
Many of the volunteers that help in events that I work are Technicians.

Rather than a "department", I would suggest that ARRL might have some
articles that relate to these folk.

I suppose that will P**s off some hams, but that's okay, they were
already that way.

I think the problem as you not it is a big part of ARRL wanting to give
the Tech's a free General license. I think they figure if the give 'm HF
access, they might join up.

Bad way to do it.....


- Mike KB3EIA -