Suppressed Report Becomes Public

The Ad Hoc HF Digital Committee Dissenting Recommendation Finally Revealed

The Ad Hoc HF Digital Committee Dissenting Recommendation has just been secured from the ARRL Newington by K3HRN. There is little doubt from the alleged threats of litigation and general acts of obfuscation that some in the ARRL did not want the general membership to see this plan.  The plan can now be viewed at http://www.zerobeat.net/bandplan-dissent.html

History

Last month the American Radio Relay League (ARRL) of Newington, Ct. released the draft of a basic frequency allocation plan based on bandwidth( http://www.arrl.org/announce/bandwidth.html ). The plan was as a result of reccommendations by a digital Ad-Hoc Committee formed two years earlier by League officials. The plan stirred lively debate when it became evident that the Ad Hoc Committee was not totally behind the report, and that the supporters of Winlink 2000 had allegedly taken over the meetings.  

The Ad-Hoc Committee report alluded to another report forthcoming by dissenting member Skip Teller, but as time progressed it came to the attention of many Amateurs that Newington was reportedly putting significant pressure on Teller not to release the plan. In conversations with Mr. Teller, he refused to reveal report contents until legal threats had been addressed by his lawyer. Thanks to efforts by Thomas LaCosta, k3HRN, we now have a window into the process.

What the Dissenting Plan Reveals

The first paragraphs of the Dissenting Plan seem to confirm all suspicions about the irregularities thus far only rumored from the Ad-Hoc Committee.

Alleged efforts to suppress the Dissenting Plan could be understandable in light of the "dirty laundry" it airs.  It offers a rare glimpse into the politics and workings of the League that have only been rumored in the past. The League could be putting itself in a position where credibility is weakened just when it is needed the most, to fight the BPL menace. Likewise, it casts a shadow over their Petition for Rulemaking which called for a new "Novice" class operator and removal of telegraphy testing. Members had no say in that plan as well.

What The ARRL Plan Does

In a recent article on QRZ.COM, Harold "Skip" Teller (KH6TY) highlighted his impression of what the plan does:

Other ARRL members have been concerned that the plan was not voted on by the membership and therefore does not represent the feelings of ARRL members.  Then as more information became available, the schism within the Ad-Hoc Committee and the overbearing presence of the Winlink 2000 people is becomming evident.

Although the ARRL requested comments on the plan ( bandwidth@arrl.org ), there have been no statistics offered by the League as to how many responses have been received, and how many either support or do not support the plan.  Several members have written letters to ARRL President Jim Haynie asking the plan be pulled and issues concerning the irregularities with the Ad-Hoc Committee be addressed.  Thus far from Newington, "mum" has been the word.

In the Dissenting Plan, Skip Teller offers his reccomendation for immediate League action:

The eyes of Amateurs everywhere are on the ARRL to see if they admit their problems and offer plans to remedy any shortcommings, or if League officials continue in the denial mode. Members should make their feelings known to League Directors. http://www.arrl.org/divisions/

Whatever side you find yourself on in this issue, make your feelings known.

 

Okay, I read the outline that Skip detailed.  I complained to the ARRL, and they replied that the new bandplan proposal would fix a lot of these problems that are supposedly going to occur if the new bandplan is approved.  What gives?

Since I don't know who to believe any more, can someone direct me to a spot where I can 1) read the actual proposed bandplan and 2) see where these possible "holes" are occurring?  I'm sure it's buried in legal-language mumbo-jumbo, but I'd sure like to know more info. before I decide to unleash the attack dogs on somebody.

**PS - I do agree that all this backroom decisionmaking seems counter-intuitive to the democratic process.  If I can vote in national elections or cast a ballot as a company shareholder, why in the world don't we as ARRL members get to vote on stuff like this?**

Tnx...DL

 

I'd like to point out that the threat of legal action was made by a member of the Ad Hoc HF Digital Committee, and NOT by the ARRL as a whole, but since it will never be known how many were actually behind the threat, I had to take it seriously and refuse to personally publish the Dissenting Recommendation, because it is an internal ARRL document. I am glad to see that the ARRL has now seen fit to release the document upon request.

As you can see from the ARRL announcement of August 10, the Dissenting Recommendation was not published along with the committee majority report, but merely noted, and I do not know if it even was available to the Board members when the proposed petition was twice reviewed by Board members as reported. One would hope that it must not have been!

It would only be fair to all the members for ARRL to publish the Dissenting Recommendation online, for everyone to see, as was done with the majority recomendation, so final comments can be based the merits of both recommendations, and not just one.

However, to insure that it is completely unbiased in the details, any proposed petition that affects everyone so greatly should be produced by a NEW, balanced, committee of experts, representing ALL interests and not just those of a special interest, with the goal of providing a space for everyone to operate his chosen way without undue interference to everyone else.

In this regard, ANY form of unattended, automatic, operation must be legally separated from every other type of operation by confining it to a separate, contiguous, space, because the unattended operations have steadfastly refused to voluntarily do so. That way, everyone else will know where the unattended operations are so they can be avoided, and the unattended operations will not interfere with everyone else. This form of essential forced separation is a totally separate issue, and must not be confused with the benefits that might be gained from a bandplan that segments the bands by emitted bandwidth.

This can be most simply accomplished, without any major revision of the current FCC regulations, just by repealing only Part 97.221, Subpart C, which would also find easy acceptance by all other IARU regions.

73, Howard "Skip" Teller, KH6TY

 

Am I the only one who feels greatly disenfranchised by all this nonsensical hoopla?

Are my feelings justified?

This reminds me of an experience I had when I was going for my first license when I had made a comment to one of the other applicants to the effect that the rules, regulations and bands of amateur radio were always subject to change ... one of the VEs who overheard this remark brazenly and steadfastly refuted this statement, possibly thinking that since I was "new" to amateur radio I wouldn't know otherwise, not realizing I had been interested for quite a number of years prior and had known quite differently.

When I pointed this out to this "gentleman" he quite huffily said that was not the case and proceeded to make himself scarce.

This should've been a sign right then and there what I was in for getting involved in this to begin with.

Now I'm a few years older and, thankfully, a bit wiser as well.

Chuck, AA1MN

 

ARRL officials, and by that we include paid staff and volunteer administrators, are not accustomed to being told what to do by individual members, nor challenged against what some of their ringleaders wish to pursue as a "vision."

They're living in the past, when their proceedings could be held in secret AND the ink would be dry on the results by the time details were published in their magazine, QST.

These days, such activity is discovered and analysed far more quickly, thanks to rapid means of communications and an amateur population with broader interests than the publishing and lobbying activity that are the League's primary concern.

Although it was initially encouraging to see sunlight on a "draft" proposal, it was the result of closed-door (some would say backroom) activity, and presented as a fait accompli for us to react to.

The ARRL's leadership could have avoided the contoversy now seen over its threatened bandwidth petition had they kept in mind the alarmed response generated by the poorly-written "Minute"  from their board meeting a couple of years ago.

ARRL President Haynie,  ARRL CEO Dave Sumner, and various Board Members were grilled by members and non-members alike, and were prompted to explain themselves as to the composition and agenda of the "ad hoc committee" this board meeting had commissioned.

Haynie, in an emailed response to my query, specifically stated a "what if" scenario that the panel could indeed go beyond its mission of trying to find a place for novel digital modes and instead yield a proposal for an overhaul of today's voluntary band planning and coordination of activities.

You see the result.

Don't count on getting a response from this group. I bet the draft is soon quietly withdrawn, accompanied by a vague explanation of there being "technical issues" rather than acknowledgement of the broad opposition seen.

There certainly will be no admission that the idea was poorly conceived, lacked concensus, and did not rest on a solid premise.

Your first clue was from Haynie, as you saw on this website, who vanished from discussions underway when he was unable to answer legitimate and respectfully-expressed questions.

My own director had this to say, and I've seen no other Director comments that shed more light.

-------------- Original message from "Bernard E. Fuller" : --------------

> Paul -
> I appreciate your comments on the bandwidth petition. They obviously
> represent the feelings of the AM special interest segment of Amateur
Radio.
> I will not, however, enter into a discussion of MY support or non-support
of
> the petition.
> Please excuse my delay in answering your email. I have been unavailable
> for several days.
>
> 73, Bernie Fuller-N3EFN
> Director, Atlantic Division
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: WA3VJB
> Sent: Friday, August 27, 2004 9:40 AM
> To: n3efn@arrl.org
> Subject: proposed bandwidth petition
>
>
> Bernie:
>
> Please give me your thoughts that have prompted you to support or dispute
> the ARRL's plans to propose a petition to coordinate our HF activities by
> bandwidth rather than mode.
>
> I am among those in the AM community who are concerned that the tentative
> wording relegates AM as a footnote, rigidly constrains bandwidth
regardless
> of band conditions, and that the basis for the overall proposal is not on
> solid ground.
>
> I have sent to the bandwidth@arrl.org email alias a list of points that
> probably will make its way to you separately, if you are among the people
> signed up as recipients.
>
> I would like to include your response to this email today, including
> point-by-point replies to my concerns expressed to the email alias, in a
> discussion getting underway on the AM website www.amfone.net.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Paul/VJB

 

Hi Skip,

My notes on your quote said ARRL. No problem. You were there and I was not so I edited the quote to reflect your correction. Please understand that I take pride in reporting these issues completely factually. Please read my article again and if there are any other corrections, I will be happy to discuss with you.

Same for the ARRL.

This is a controversial issue to be sure. I have an opinion on the subject, but I will not share it here. I will say that the "silent majority" in the ARRL plays a large part in the reported ARRL disfunction. Being silent implies agreement. Not renewing your membership hurts the rest of the Amateur population, not the ARRL.

I believe that the ARRL officers are good people in bad habits. I feel they want to do the right thing, and in the past, making ad hoc decisions was the status quo. This is not an attack on people, but a comment on "good ol boy" policies that need to be changed.

 

Skip,

I was going to reply privately, but I felt that a public discourse is a valuable thing and PERHAPS others have the same questions as I do about your post.

I'm NOT against dissent.. far from it. Dissent is a good thing and promotes debate.

here are my few questions..

1) How many members were on the board that produced the plan and what was the vote?

<where I'm going with this is as follows.. If you had (for example) 9 members and 7 said 'YES!' and 3 said 'NO', then you have a majority vote and it passes.

NOW.. the 3 'no' votes are dissenting from the majority and CAN produce a 'dissenting view opinion paper' as you have done.

There are 4 hams, specifically ID'd by callsign who obviously voted 'Yes' and 2 hams (you as the author of the item and G3PLX) identified as a 'NO'.

2) How can YOUR opinion, written and authored by you be considered 'ARRL property'? It's yours and therefore they can't sue you for it - assuming its' not libelous. Therefore you are free to write whatever you want when you want.

I can, and do, understand HOW the ARRL document is their property. However, since the ARRL plan we all saw in the public domain WAS published in the public domain, you could have quoted from it freely (as long as you gave the owners of the work the proper credit for it since it IS their property)

How can they possibly REALISTICALLY take any sort of legal action - beyond 'threats' of possible legal action?


While I read your post with interest AND I do concur that automated systems pose a GREAT and GRAVE threat to the rest of us 'non-automated humans' .. I draw the conclusion that your upset has more to do with a couple things.

1) You feel that the universe of amateur radio ops who use the HF band WERE not adequately represented, and their interests not adequately provided for in the final 'draft' proposal.

2) You feel that the automated systems, as you believe they will be installed, will QUICKLY expand their range of activities and choke off any other use due to the expected automated 'come in and take over' nature of their operations.

3) You feel that insufficient input/weight was given to dissenting points of view, both by those on the committee as well as non-digital users of amateur HF bands.

73
Chuck K3FT

 

Beyond the problems I see with Pactor robots across the bands, there is the problem of identity on interfering robots.

How can we self-police the bands, when you need to spend $800 + for an SCS box?

As far as I know, there is no way to decode all modes of Pactor, without buying an SCS box.

So we have interference problems, yet 99% of hams can't identify the station causing interference.

This is an issue that should be addressed at present, before we even consider spreading the problem across more bandwidth.

Winlink and SCS should step up to the plate and address these issues, and become good neighbors first, before this goes any farther.

73,  Bob

 

It does appear to me that there were some things done that reflect questionable ethics on the part of the ARRL.

When these matters are being considered, it hardly seems ethical to put strong proponents of WinLink who have something to gain personally on the committee. In all fairness, it also does not seem ethical to have put Peter Martinez, a strong proponent of PSK-31, on the committee. The committee should be comprised of people with no personal stake in any of the technologies.

73, Russ Eberhart N9IV

 

Chuck,

1) There were six members on the committee (it was actually not a "board", but an advisory capacity to the ARRL Board), and before the final vote, Peter Martinez quit, leaving five members, two of which were Winlink Development Team members, and one of which was appointed chairman.

After complaints about how the committee was being run, the chairman recused himself, but reserved the right to break any tie vote with his own and the other Winlink member then submitted a bandplan for him.

The vote for that bandplan was three in favor and one against (my vote). Unable to sign on to the majority bandplan, which I considered outside the committee charter anyway, I had no choice but to submit the Dissenting Recommendation. I think anyone else would have done the same thing!

2) I was one of the members, all selected by Jim Haynie for the Ad Hoc HF Digital Committee, and the meetings were by a closed email reflector. The recommendations were to be given to Dave Sumner. As such I considered the recommendations to be private unless otherwise instructed.

I do not think any report I submit to the ARRL as an appointed committee member can be considered libelous, since it is expected to be my honest report and recommendation from the committee. However, if I publish to the outside world anything that can be considered libelous or defamatory, then I might be accused of purposely trying to defame someone. So, for this reason, I have never published my Dissenting Recommendation myself outside of the ARRL officials and the Board of Directors.

Hey, this is a HOBBY, and I was asked by the president of the ARRL to provide input as part of an ARRL committee. There is no reason why I should have to wind up endangering my own financial future with the risk of a lawsuit! So, I felt I was not able to independently publish my Dissenting Recommendation without risking a lawsuit. The ARRL officials were free to disseminate the document to the Board members, as they should have done, and which they finally did, I suppose, but perhaps too late for the proposed petition review, and free to publish it for the members to compare to the committee report, which, as far as I know, has not yet been done.

I agree with your final points, but let me say that I am just a radio amateur like the rest of you, and ham radio has been my life and my love for fifty years. I could not in good conscience sign on to any proposal that I felt could do so much harm to everyone else, so I had no choice but to either quit the committee, or stick it out and submit what I felt was a good recommendation. I have no other agenda, and never have had.

I do think that my point of view, since I was appointed to the committee, is just as valid as the majority point of view, and should receive equal publication and consideration.

I believe both viewpoints should be judged only on their merits, regardless of how they may have come about.

73, Skip KH6TY

 

Bob, as one of the DigiPan team members, I have long wished to include Pactor-II receive (and now Pactor-III receive) so we can identify the interfering Pactor signals as we can already do with Pactor-I.

However, two years ago, our DigiPan coding genius, UT2UZ, asked SCS for additional information to enable us to do that, and so did I, and Hans-Peter Helfert's (SCS) reply was simply, "...not to be disclosed." And, he added, "Nobody has any business reading another's email anyhow".

So, it is my opinion that the requirement to document Pactor-II publicly has not been sufficiently met, but Winlink and SCS surely know that it would take a legal challenge to determine that.

What I think is missing is an ARRL board of true expert technical review to determine if any protocol is sufficiently documented, and that result should be open to peer review and challenge.

In addition, the F6FBB BBS protocol, presumably used only for compression, is often used for a lot of transfers and that protocol is impossible to read as a third party (according to the author), which means that it is impossible to determine if the message content is commercial or any other unallowed content. How can we police the bands ourselves if we are blocked, either technically, or financially (as you point out), from determining if transmissions are within that allowed by the regulations?

All of your points are very well made!

73, Skip KH6TY

 

Russ,

My opinion is that expert representation of ALL interest areas is essential. I.e., balanced representation of all interests such as IARU, CW, QRP, SSB phone, contesting, RTTY, PSK31, Winlink, SSTV, emergency communications, HF packet, experimenters, etc.

If you have a committee composed of those with no specific interest, it will probably be incapable of providing the expert recommendations needed.

The task of coming up with a total rewrite of FCC regulations, that is as fair as possible to everyone, is a daunting one, to be sure, but if it is going to be done, it needs to be done in such a way that is worthy of the far-reaching impact on all interests of our diverse hobby.

73, Skip KH6TY

 

Hi there,

FWIW, my wife and I have spoken in person to two ARRL representatives this past weekend about this issue. They told us that the bandwidth proposal has been withdrawn by President Haynie and that the withdrawal will not be publicly announced. No reasons were given why it would not be announced.

73,
--Alex KR1ST
http://www.kr1st.com

 

DL,

Check out the links on this page: http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2004/08/25/1/?nc=1

The "holes" are hard to find, but basically, they were created like this:

1. Declare "autoforwarding" illegal.

2. If autoforwarding is illegal, then eliminate the FCC-allocated subbands where autoforwarding is now legal, since they are no longer needed for autoforwarding.

3. However, those same subbands also serve to contain unattended digital operations from speading into the phone bands, and unattended operations over 500 Hz in width from being used elsewhere. So, by rewriting the section (97.221), as the proposed petition does, unattended operations under 500 Hz in width can now spread all over the phone bands if so desired, and those over 500 Hz in width can now spread all over the phone bands if desired, since they are of the same width as ssb phone.

Clever, isn't it!

Now, how apparent was that, even with a second reading?

You do not need to figure out whom to believe, because with enough serious study the truth is contained somewhere within the current Part 97 rules and the proposed petition. You just have to discover where it is hiding!

I welcome any corrections to my own analysis.


73, Skip KH6TY

 

That sounds like a John Kerry plan.....

Chris Sokol/KD5ILI
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
http://skywarn.kd5ili.com/forum/