FCC Proposed Rulemaking about paid employees and emergency drills

Whats your beef with the hospitals-- you owe them a lot of money or something?

I never said anything about a hospital !!
I was making a scenario of you local 911 center

 

I have no beef with hospitals. I'm asking for the answer to a real-world scenario. Two competing users for one frequency... one an individual, one a hospital... during a disaster.

The first discriminator is 'emergency', right? Both are going to be considered emergency. Next discriminator seems to be 'first on frequency'. Will that continue to be the case? Will the hospital employees understand that they can't order the ham down the street off the frequency? Or will the unthinkable happen - the ham down the street gets arrested for interfering with official business?


If you don't think these things can happen, listen during a contest weekend. Now put life or death in there.

 

The same reason that when a military unit deploys for an actual contigency (not just a drill) they have to waste valuable time requesting frequencies, satallite access etc. It's part of the job.

 

I understand that the amateur aspect of emergency communications is suppose to be the backup to the backup and could never get used but why such a hard drive on the issue? If we know that our Part 90 comm systems are weak, why not reinforce those systems. Why not grant money for mobile generators, radios and antennas? Why go to all the trouble to uproot another form of radio communications and it's laws? There has got to be more to this than meets the eye. It's just my opinion but I feel the EMCOMMers are fighting so hard for this that they can't see the forest for the trees. This seems like a well thought out methodic plan to change amateur radio from it's present state to something else. I know some of you are thinking "conspiracy theory." Just look back a few years at the elimination of code. How many new EMCOMM recruites do you think would have pressed though the code test? I'm guessing not many. You see a trend developing yet? The requirements for a license are getting easier and easier. I would wager a months pay that in short time more HF privileges will be granted to techs. With todays plug and play radios very little electrical and electronic knowledge is needed so maybe the tech license will fade away the general will be made so easy a caveman could do it. Or maybe the ARRL will petition the FCC to grant unlimited band privileges in times of disaster. I have looked at both sides of the fence and yes I do understand that a rule change would make things a lot easier for EMCOMMers to do their thing in the radio community but this is a slippery slope. There will be no take backs or do overs. This rule change to me is like the elimination of code to the old timers. This is going to change things forever and not necessarily for the good of amateur radio.

 

continuation of previous rant

It just occurred to me that the reason why amateur radio works when most else fails is because of the number of experienced and knowledgeable radio operators. What happens when you chase off all the knowledge and experience and what's left remaining is a group of wannabes that cannot even formulate a dipole? Who's going to build your emergency radio network? What happens when the balloon goes up and there's structural damage to the station that the last guy built and newbie radio operator doesn't know his PL-259 from his Ringo Ranger? How effective is all the rule changes going to be then? The more I think about it the madder I get.

 

Remove amateur radio and I have a professional, trained dispatcher. He or she is trained in medical emergencies, how to communicate, and has access to a wide range of radios and frequencies, none of them on the ham bands. He can dispatch one or more ambulances, police cars, fire fighters electric utility company personnel to shut off the power if needed, gas company officials to shut off the gas if needed. He can do all of that without moving out of his chair and he can do it much faster than any ham.

Been there, done that. Have had to call ambulances myself, for myself as well as for my mother. Have had to call the fire department to report a fire in a neighbor's house. Have reported suspicious cars in the area, and drunk drivers on the highway.

All with ONE phone number, and ONE dispatcher, and ONE phone call. It sure works wonderfully!

Sure glad I have a professional to call, instead of a wannabee.

No ham radio involved at all!

Ed

 

That's what we are doing - trying to get the amateur radio service to do what it was designed for. It was permitted to perform personal emergency communications on a volunteer basis, but it was NEVER "designed" to be a police/fire/hospital backup communications serivce. Never.

Ed

 

Is the guy who operates W1AW a paid employee in the evenings when he is running bulletins and code practice? I do not know, I admit. I thought it was volunteers.

If it IS volunteers, then publishing articles about ham radio is not 'using' ham radio in pecuniary interest. Just like we are not using it in pecuniary interest posting here on Fred's sponsored site. We are not using ham radio at all, in fact. Neither are the guys in the ARRL lab, testing equipment on a dummy load. Neither are the publishers of the ARRL books. "Using" ham radio requires transmitting.

So if the guy running the code practice session is paid to do so, then that is, in my opinion, a violation of the rules. Sorry, ARRL.

Ed

 

The motive is money. More members, including thousands who have zero interest in amateur radio, means more money.

...

 

More "new interest and licensed operators?" In what? Not ham radio. Interested in fire and police and medical radio. They aren't hams; they are public safety volunteers.

And THAT is the perception many REAL public safety people have of amateur radio; a bunch of "wish I was one of you guys" types. In many areas, including where I live, those licensed PS guys and gals are treated with disdain.

Where DO they serve with some degree of satisfaction? And without appearing as wannabes? With Search and Rescue, for one thing. But the hams I know who are in SAR are also guys who rag chew on 75 meters, work a bit of CW, chat on the repeaters. The point is they are ham operators first, and public safety volunteers way down the list.

I, too, can grab an HT and respond to a fire. I won't, but I could. I don't need to. I have a well equipped fire department. If I were needed in that capacity, I would certainly do exactly that. And when I was done, I'd come home, take a shower, sit at the radio and ragchew on 40 CW.

Remember when police departments were allegedly monitoring CB channel 9? Well, they did, at least a lot of them. Eventually CB became so screwed up it was useless and no cop shop I know of has the capability to monitor CB 9 or CB 19.

That is where we are headed. We'll get all these wannabes with the HTs bugging the cops every time a car slips off the road, until we are run out of town. And we are close.

Ed

 

STOP the "Militarization" of Ham Radio

I live about 5 miles from the Pentagon and about 6 miles from FCC HQ.

What I see happening is the gradual Militarization of Amateur Radio.

WHY???

My tiny County (Arlington VA) spent a fortune on Emergency Comms over the past eight years, including constructing a brand new ECOMM Center at a cost to taxpayers of $14 million.

Lately, our County's fire stations are equipped with ham radio equipment (incluudiung DSTAR) that cannot communicate with APCO 25 ECOMM equipment used across the region.

(BTW, the National Guard HQ for the USA is located in Arlington VA and their ALE-based ecomms can't communicate with Arlington County's Red Cross Chapter across the highway from USA NG HQ)

Lately, MARS has been re-organized into an "auxiliary service". What does THAT mean? In 5 years will MARS operators be tasked with coordinating Predator strikes?

Regarding local "first responders" we had a huge snowstorm last month and all I heard Arlington's "first responders" do about it was chat about it on their first responder repeaters. Big "first responder" event during the major storm was when the roof fell in on the first respoinders at a fire-EMS station just over the Arlington border in Fairfax County, and crushed 6 fire and EMS vehicles.

I totally OPPOSE the Militarization of amateur radio. I also believe many "first responders" are cowboys looking for another 9-11-01 to happen. We don't need that in ham radio.

Jim, AB4YP

 

What do you do now when to hams have need for the same frequency
we are not talking about individual v/s hospital we are talking hams v/s ham, case every one involved is a ham..

and it's great you bring up such a scenario as this is exactly why you want all the hams that would be involved in an emergency situation to participate in drills and exercises so that they can learn to deal with frequency sharing issues and such.

[qoute=w0wls]
hat happens when the balloon goes up and there's structural damage to the station that the last guy built and newbie radio operator doesn't know his PL-259 from his Ringo Ranger? [/quote]

Every one was a newbie at some time, and like you through trial and error, drill and exercise your skills were honed. thus will other especially if they have elmers like your self showing them the way.

 

It's perfectly legal, and within the rules. But it is communications on behalf of an employer, so under this "new" interpretation it should be illegal.

There are two provisions of the rules in play here that get convoluted. 97.113(a)(2) and (3). The first prohibits "compensation" except under certain circumstances. The second prohibits "pecuniary interest", which is a different thing.

The ARRL has an exemption for the compensation issue, no-one has an exemption for the second part, except hams that sell personal HR equipment on an occasional basis.

In the past, there was no issue with "pecuniary interest" and the ARRL, but since the FCC has redefined 97.113(a)(3), it looks like they would be in jeopardy.

Joe

 

yea that kind reminds me of the stories from world II when all these military guys came home wanting to tune up their heathkits and hellidrafters.

 

excellent post did you know that the ARRL petitioned the FCC for a rule change to allow their station operators to operate on duty as employees. I didn't hear an up roar then and that only benefited the ARRL a corporation with a pecuniary interest .