ILLINOIS  REPEATER  ASSOCIATION

 

BOARD of DIRECTORS MINUTES

 

April 15, 2011

 

The Illinois Repeater Association Board of Directors meeting for April 15, 2011 was called to order by IRA President Rich Ranson at  08:45 PM  at the Eastland Suites Bloomington/Normal, Illinois.

 

IRA Officers Present:

President: Richard Ranson, KD9Q

Vice President Tim Childers, KB9FBI

Secretary/Treasurer Larry Schroeder, KA9KDC

Directors- -

Al Wolfe, K9SI.

William Kraus, KA9FER 

Stephen Craig, WD9CIR

Milt Forsberg, K9QZI

Staff Present: Aaron Collins, N9OZB, Frequency Coordinator

         Fred Seibold, W9FWS, Newsletter Editor.

 

Guests Present:

Dave Karr, KA9FUR, Wisconsin Frequency Coordinator

 

___________________________________________________________________________     

Request of additional items to be added to the agenda:

Items identified for discussion during Committee Reports and New Business.

 

 

Minutes of Previous Meetings: KA9FER  moved and  WD9CIR seconded a motion to approve the board minutes as previously published in the 2011  printed newsletter and website.  Motion carried by unanimous voice vote.

 

Treasurer's Report: Treasurer’s report: Secretary/ Treasurer, KA9KDC, read the treasurer's for the period of April 2010 to April15, 2011.  

As of April 15th (before meeting) there were :  121 members (with additional expected for renewal at next days General Meeting).   Some few members have paid for memberships for several years in advance.  Treasury/account details read & reviewed with biard; and available from IRA Treasurer.  “Account balance is stable year over year”.

 

K9SI  moved and KA9FER seconded a motion that the report be accepted. The motion carried by voice vote.

 

 

COMMITEE REPORTS:

v      Frequency Coordinators Report : Aaron Collins, N9OZB, IL Frequency Coordinator gave a review of past years coordination and actions.     

o        Processed 37 repeater applications, prior year (2010) were 59.

o        Grented 33 coordinations, last year there were 8.

o        Decoordinated 29 systems, last year were 12.

o        Processed “countless” NOPC’s from adjacent states.

o        Annual Update Forms 509 pages to 307 addressees  and second notice 88 pages to 59 holders of coordination.

o        Discussion of whether some sort of State PL Plan can be formed (amongst board)

o        Reported on success of the narrower forms of digital systems, such as Dstar and the 2 coordinations within one convential analog slot successes.

o        Wait List :9 VHF pending requests [2 are for D-STAR digital systems].

o        Most repeater bands are completely allocated; especially NE Illinois and ST Louis areas.

 

v      Technical Committe Report :   The board will continue search for potential fill for this slot.

 

A motion to accept the committee reports was made by KA9FER and seconded by KA9KDC. The motion was passed by voice vote.

 

Old Business:

 Change of Illinois registered corporation agent with Illinois Secretary of State - transfer of corporate agent from Dick Isely to Larry Schroeder was completed.

 

New Business :

·      Bylaw update proposal – presented by  K9SI.    Current ByLaws unchanged since ’93; a few of rules could use update to be more inline with present organization operations.  

1.        Update the Membership classification section.  “Regular Members shall be in good standing if dues are paid by the beginning of the Annual Meeting in the year they are due  Also discussed role of  “associate” membership.

2.        Defintion of board of directors; with offices to be filled from board of directors

Following considerable discussion, defintion of board of directors proposal to ammend bylaws was tabled for the present time.  Article III; Section 4 “Dues” covered by proposal #1 above, will be proposed at the next days General Membership meeting (4-16-2011)

·      ARRL SPECTRUM DEFENSE Fund    – donation will be proposed by board at the next days General Membership meeting for acceptance.  Proposed amount would be $1000-- the organization has similar donation in 2008 & 2010 (for $500)

 

Additional Board Inputs and Discussion:

 

v   (K9QZI): Recommends board meetings more than once a year.   While email distribution helps communicate ongoing tasks of the organization, some forum for discussions either at various points in state, or telephone conference.

v   (K9QZI): presented concerns that of past coordination handlings and bad perceptions that exist from a series of past “emails” related to handlings.    Highlighted that organization needs to pay attention to details, and his interest to join into the organization is to “help” better such handlings in future.

v   SNP pair status/ Coordinator (N9OZB) needs to ensure that repeaters on SNP pair/ specfically Peoria system understands that they are on “Shared  Non-Protected” repeater frequency-pairs. 

v   (KD9Q): Led discussion on “death” of repeater holders of coordination/repeater owners”   Example given of large system that existed and on death of individual holder, left concerns of coordination succession or recoordination proceedings…  SUGGEST by board that at next days Annual Meeting AND next Newsletter membership gets reminded that they should take responsibility to ensure coordinations are properly established; and when appropriate coodinatinated as club or/ organization “Holder of Coordination”.   Aaron, N9OZB will write newsletter article on “good” maintenance of Holder of Coordination status.

v   (KA9FUR):  Status for Wisconsin’s W.A.R. organization.  Personal perspectives on how IL and adjacent states might do well to work together, and potentially investigate “shared” or combined organization structures for health of the coordination community.

v     For 2012:   Work with Conference site to have easier accessible board meeting site.  Physical stairs to “Eastland Room” issue.   Attempt to arrange ground floor room for Friday night meeting in 2012.

 

 

 

 

Adjournment:  KA9KDC moved and KB9FBI  seconded that the IRA Board of Directors' Meeting be recessed until after the annual meeting on April 16, 2011.  Motion passed by unanimous voice vote.  The meeting was recessed at  11:20 PM.

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

Larry Schroeder, KA9KDC

Secretary/Treasurer,

Illinois Repeater Association Inc. 

 

ILLINOIS  REPEATER  ASSOCIATION

 

Annual Meeting Minutes

APRIL 16,2011

 

Call to order: The meeting was called to order by IRA president Rich Ranson, KD9Q at 10:05 am at the Eastland Suites, Bloomington/Normal Illinois. Larry Schroeder KA9KDC, secretary/treasurer, verified that there was a quorum present as required in the constitution to conduct business.  

(74 members present or represented by proxy/ 71 ballots issued)

 

Introduction of Officers and Attendees: KD9Q asked everyone to introduce themselves and identify the repeater(s) they represent. There were 74 persons present

 

Also present was Dave Karr, KA9FUR, Wisconsin Frequency Coordinator

            __________________________________________________________

 

Approval of prior meeting minutes: KB9APW moved and KA9ZXN seconded a motion that the minutes of the 2010 annual meeting be approved as published in the IRA newsletter (and website). Motion carried by unanimous voice vote.

 

Treasurer’s report: Secretary/ Treasurer, KA9KDC, read the treasurer's for the period of April 2010 to April 15, 2011.  

 

As of April 15th (before meeting) there were …. 121 members

    [ 103 members paid through 2011; 12 through ‘2012, 3 thru ’13,  and 3 thru ’15 ]

 ---  During meeting checkin an addtional 50 membership checks were received

 

N9JWI moved and N9ABF    seconded a motion that the report be accepted.  The motion carried by voice vote.

 

Coordinator’s report: President KD9Q  introduced Aaron Collins, N9OZB Frequency Coordinator, and thanked him for his efforts in the past year. Aaron presented his written report that highlighted the activity in the past year.    Aaron noted that the effort taken to have a 2nd notice mailing for annual update had beneficial results for getting a number of repeaters to provide more accurate information, as well as reduce the number of systems that are at risk of decoordination for failing to provide annual updates.

 

Aaron highlighted the value of the "coordinators toolkit" software is in performing coordination work. This is a software package engineered by Dave Karr, WI Freq Coordinator.

 

Highlights for 2010-2011 Coordination Activity:

o        Processed 37 repeater applications, prior year (2010) were 59.

o        Grented 33 coordinations, last year there were 8.

o        Decoordinated 29 systems, last year were 12.

o        Processed “countless” NOPC’s from adjacent states.

o        Annual Update Forms 509 pages to 307 addressees  and second notice 88 pages to 59 holders of coordination.

o        Discussion of whether some sort of State PL Plan can be formed (amongst board)

o        Reported on success of the narrower forms of digital systems, such as Dstar and the 2 coordinations within one convential analog slot successes.

o        Wait List :9 VHF pending requests [2 are for D-STAR digital systems].

o        Most repeater bands are completely allocated; especially NE Illinois and ST Louis areas.

 

 

A motion to accept the coordinators report was made by W9XA and seconded by KA9LFU.

 

The motion was accepted by voice vote.

 

 

Technical Committee report:    Position : VACANCY

 

Interested parties should contact President and board --  in mean time a board member (KA9FER) will be designated to coordinate any technical issues, that the Coordinator can not handle.

 

Wait List policy was stated (requesters must have annual communication and updates with the technical committee to be maintain on the wait list)

 

 

President’s  report:

Rich Ranson, KD9Q, IRA president summarized his view of 2010-2011 activities of the organization.

 

Presentation summary included:

 >   “Electronic Age” and the ability to handle responsibilities of organization electronically.

           Particularly the presidents role, and his interest & engagement from his remote location

           Email communication within board and by coordinator is sent to all board members

                   to ensure the organization is effectively following issues, concrens and actions.

 >  Thanking the board and committee chairs for their work.

             In particular for Aaron Collins work doing repeater frequency coordination. 

 

 >   Importance of communicating with congress with respect to upcoming legislation that could affect our amateur spectrum and availability of frequencies for repeaters, such as HR607 which has aims to affect 400Mhz band allocation.   It was noted that mailing your comments and support/non-support to the ARRL lobby staff is very essential to getting our input heard,

 

A motion to accept the presidents report was made by KA9SZW and seconded by W9XA.

The motion was accepted by voice vote.

 

 

Election of Officers/Directors:

 

For this year:   President, Vice-Pres, Sec-Treasurer & two bard directors require election.

 

(2 YEAR TERMS):

          Current Board is:

President-                       Rich Ranson-KD9Q

Vice President-                Tim Childers-KB9FBI

Secretary/Treasurer-       Larry Schroeder-KA9KDC

Directors-    

 (2009-2011) Al Wolfe-K9SI                       William Kraus-KA9FER

 (2010-2012) (Stephen Craig-WD9CIR   Milt Forsberg-K9QZI) <= RETAINED

 

                            

NOMINATIONS: Nominations were:   (W9XA presented nomination slate of:)

 

PRESIDENT =                         KA9FER          (Bill Kruas)

VICE-PRESIDENT =              KB9FBI           (Tim Childers)

SECRETARY-TREAS  =          KA9KDC          (Larry Schroeder)

DIRECTOR 2011-2013=       K9SI                (Al Wolfe)

                                                KD9Q              (Rich Ranson)

 

           

 

 

Nominations closed: motion by K9BF; second NT9H

Motion for Acclamation by Voice Vote:   N9JWI;  second N9ABF

          Elected by voice vote.

 

 

 

Old Business:

 

n                   Discussed location for IRA annual meetings.  general consensus that the EASTLAND SUITES facility, Bloomington, IL continues to be a good location.   2012 meeting will be arranged for the same facilities (2012 Meeting will be :    Saturday April   28   2012).

 

New Business:

 

 

Repeater Coordination software: KA9SZW made a motion to donate $200 to Dave Karr, developer for the coordination toolkit.     Motion passed by voice vote.

 

Donation to ARRL Spectrum Defense Fund: Board presented their ecommendation that $1000. be donated to the fund, similar to donation action in 2008 & 2010(which were for $500).  KA9KDC presented motion, Seconded by AB9EE.  Motion passed by voice vote.

 

Bylaws- “Membership Renewal”: Board presented the recommendation to membership change Bylaws Article III section 4; which currently reads:

 

“Regular Members shall be considered to be not in good standing if dues are not paid by April 1st.”

 

To be:

 

“Regular Members shall be considered to be in good standing if dues are paid by the beginning of the Annual Meeting in the year they are due”.

 

N9JWI motion for change, Seconded by KA9ZXN. 

Motion by W9XA for acclamation by Voice Vote; N9JWI second.  All voted in favor./Passed.

 

Explore Interorganization/arrangements with adjacent state coordination organizations:  Dave Karr, KA9FUR, [WI state rptr coordinator] addressed the meeting with facts and perspective on the need to ensure that our state coordination entities remain healthy and active.  In some cases adjacement states have only a few individuals doing the task, and sometimes are not getting state-wide participation in meetings and actions taken.  NT9H made motion that IL RPTR ASSOCIATION enter into discussions with adjacent state organizations for potential cooperation, support  and/or improvements.   Accepted by voice vote.

 

 

---------------

General discussion topics (no specific motions):

 

Death of Holder of Coordination: KD9Q/president communicated that repeater owners/holders of coordination should ensure that they have their systems as having secondary trustee, or coordination as an oganization to protect against issues should the primary owner/holder of coordination die.    (unfortunately deaths have been occurring leading to loss of coordinations or other issues)

 

Board Meetings/teleconfernce sessions:  In 2012: the board will meet several times via teleconference.

 

Online / Electronic coordination updates: . Online updates and coordination were discussed. Software is extensive and cost prohibitive to formulate this process. Paper forms are still ideal at this time for the ease of the coordinator.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Adjournment: There being no further business before the body a motion to adjourn was made by N9JWI and seconded by KB9APW and approved by a unanimous voice vote. The meeting was adjourned at 11:28 AM

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

Larry Schroeder, KA9KDC

Secretary /Treasurer

Illinois Repeater Association Inc.

 

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ILLINOIS  REPEATER  ASSOCIATION

BOARD of DIRECTORS MINUTES

 

April 16, 2011

 

The meeting of the Board of Directors of the Illinois Repeater Association was called to order by IRA President  KD9Q  at  11:34  AM at the   Eastland Suites Bloomington/Normal, Illinois.

 

IRA Officers Present:  Outgoing President(now board member):  Rich Ranson, KD9Q;  New President (former board member) Bill Kraus, KA9FER - Vice President KB9FBI- Secretary/Treasurer KA9KDC - Directors:

2010-2012 board members: Milt Forsberg K9QZI, and Stephen Craig, WD9CIR   ,

2011-2013 board members: Al Wolfe K9SI, , and Rich Ranson  KD9Q   ,

 

IRA officers absent:  None.

 

Committee and Frequency Coordinator Appointments: President appointed Aaron Collins, N9OZB  to serve as Frequency Coordinator for the next year.

KA9FER moved and KB9FBI seconded that this appointment be confirmed.

 

President Appointed  <no – one>  to serve as IRA Technical Committee Chairman.

- as search for candidate is in progress.   In mean time KA9FER  will aid in technical consultation when needed.

 

President appointed Fred Seibold, W9FWS,  to serve as Newsletter Editor.

 

K9SI  moved and KD9Q  seconded a motion that these appointments be confirmed.

 ** passed by a unanimous voice vote.

 

 

NFCC Delegate: KD9Q moved and K9SI seconded a motion that: “The IRA President shall cast all NFCC ballots on behalf of the IRA, and that the IRA Vice President shall do so in the absence or incapacity of the IRA President, or by the direction of the IRA President.”  Motion passed by unanimous voice vote.

 

Adjournment: KD9Q   moved and K9SI seconded that the IRA Board of Directors meeting be adjourned.  Motion passed by unanimous voice vote. 

 

The meeting adjourned at 12:15 April 16, 2011.

Respectfully submitted,

Larry Schroeder, KA9KDC

Secretary/Treasurer,

Illinois Repeater Association Inc.