St. Louis County ARES® Minutes of the October 9, 2006 meeting

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Minutes of the October 9, 2006 Meeting

Steve Wooten, KC0QMU, the Emergency Coordinator, presided at the monthly meeting of the St. Louis County ARES^® group on October 9, 2006.

Steve said that the group currently has 62 members, 34 of whom stay active at least on a monthly basis.

Steve mentioned that St. Louis County ARES^® would have a table at the Halloween Hamfest on October 28, 2006.

Steve invited anyone interested in joining the group's Planning Committee to do so.

Steve recommended that all ARES^® members regularly check the group's "Team Members" Web page, as it is frequently updated.

Craig Hirsh, K0CMH, is the Assistant Emergency Coordintor for Planning and Development. He gave final instructions for the Simulated Emergency Test, which will take place on Saturday October 14, 2006. He said that he could use a few more volunteers.

Gary Hoffman, KB0H, is the Assistant Emergency Coordinator - Operations. He passed out Amateur Radio and ARES^® promotional material to those attendees going to the S.E.T. sites.

Mark Biernacki, KB5YZY, said that the 146.850 repeater is functioning as an IRLP node, but that there is a problem activating and deactivating the feature.

Steve noted that the 146.850 repeater will begin making automated announcements about the ARES^® nets.

The guest speaker was Roger Volk, K0GOB. Roger's talk was about station grounding.

Roger also gave an update on the Missouri Emergency Packet Network (MEPN). He said that there are problems with the link between St. Louis and Centralia, but that he believes the problems have been identified and are solvable.

In addition, Roger said that four new repeaters would be installed in the St. Louis area. One will be on 2 meters, one on 70 centimeters, one on 23 centimeters, and the final one, a data repeater, will also be set up on 23 centimeters. All four repeaters will be digital, using the Icom D-Star standard.

And finally, Roger gave a short briefing on the Veterans Administration Medical Centers in the St. Louis area and their desire to have Amateur Radio emergency communications backup.

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