Minutes of the East River Amateur Radio Club meeting. April 6, 2009 Ryan’s Steakhouse Bluefield, VA. http://www.erarc.com The April meeting of the ERARC was opened at 700pm by Lonnie Underwood, ERARC President. There were 18 members and guests in attendance. Don Andersons WD8OOR gave the Treasurer’s report. Don paid a phone bill and P.O. Box rent (which was$42.00). He has received all renewals for Sam’s Club memberships including Cathy Underwood KG4CTK who signed up tonight. Don received a donation from the Bluefield Regional Medical Center’s Medical Laboratory employees in memory of Jerry Connelly KC8TES-SK, Mercer County, WV ARES Emergency Coordinator. Don said that he received confirmation that we are tax exempt in Bland County, Va. and do not owe them any taxes on our radio equipment. Lonnie Underwood asked Gary Kadar N8GK, ERARC ARRL VEC, for an update concerning the VE team. Gary said that the next ARRL test session would be on May 9, 2009 at the Mercer County 911 Center. He talked about inventorying the equipment that Jerry Connelly had donated to the Club/Mercer ARES for emergency use. Hooger Fisher W4OF passed around the detailed inventory list for the members to read. All of this is currently being stored at Communications Technology, Inc. (Jay Belt’s K8CTI business) on Bland Street. John Riddle N8RIG said that he had feed lines, antennas, etc. that needed to be stored with the ARES stuff and that he would take it to CTI. Gary also mentioned that there is paperwork, books, etc. for the new EC, Ronnie Childress KD8HBO within Jerry’s donation. Gary said that Bob Adams W8GU, the WV Club Affiliate Coordinator in Charleston, sent a letter concerning funding from the WV Department of Homeland Security for training Public Emergency Responders (PER), as well as the public, for Technician licensing. All PER will test for free and the general public will have to pay the $15.00 testing fee. This is being billed as a “Cram Session” with all of the Technician questions and answers being studied and then testing performed, all within a 4 to 5 hour window. All that the state wants to know is: 1> is the ERARC interested 2> can the ERARC find a facility to hold the instruction and testing and 3> will the ERARC VE testing team perform the testing for the candidates. There was much discussion. Bottom line: We will look into this proposal as Gary contacts Mr. Adams to seeing if June 6 will be OK and see if all PER must be from West Virginia in order to have the ‘free’ testing. We were given a press release for the class and testing and will use it with modifications if all works out. We discussed facilities for the event. Robert Cook KA8MDZ works at Bluefield State College and will check on the availability of an auditorium, class, etc. in which to hold the class. By the May meeting, maybe before via email, we may have a firm date for the instructional/testing event. After that meeting, the Club will actively begin to advertise and ask for pre-registration for the class. Gary is worried that we could possibly have 50 or more candidates and needs a heads-up before the testing takes place. Lonnie asked Hooger Fisher for his report. Hooger went over the March minutes with no additions or corrections noted. He read a thank-you note from the family of Jerry Connelly. Hooger mentioned an email that he received from Michael Davis KD8KRA, a paramedic with Bluefield (WV) Rescue Squad. Michael and two other medics from BRS had recently taken the ‘crash course’ for the Technician license in Charleston and all three had passed their tests. WV Homeland Security offered BRS an Amateur dual-band radio if they would get at least three of their employees licensed. Michael and Justin Adams were present at the meeting tonight and expressed interest in getting the radio, antenna, etc. setup properly and needed help in doing so. He also said that Princeton Rescue had three new Hams. Lonnie said that he would contact PRS and see what we could do to help them out also. Michael was not impressed with the ‘cram class’ and said that he’s in the dark about Ham radio still yet. John Riddle suggested going to one of the local libraries and borrowing the ARRL’s book “Now You’re Talking”, read it and what they were tested on would make much more sense. Lonnie introduced the new Mercer County EC, Ronnie Childress KD8HBO. Ronnie had passed out ARES sign-ups to those present tonight. Robert Cook KA8MDZ won the 50/50 drawing for the Flower fund. ARES net control positions were overlooked for April but Lonnie said that he and others would fill the positions. The meeting was over at 810pm. Submitted by Hooger Fisher W4OF, ERARC Secretary. TO DO LIST: 1. Equipment inventory with serial numbers for insurance reasons 2. Antenna for the Bluefield, Va. Rescue Squad 3. Cathy Underwood KG4CTK would like us to look into possible funding via the Office of Homeland Security. 4. The Communications Bus/ RV that the Club began to work on. 5. Communications class for the Mercer Co. Civil Air Patrol 6. Trailer for storing equipment. Also used for deployment. Check out a radio-active site at: http://www.erarc.com , The East River Amateur Radio Club. We'll be glad that you did!