Emergency Preparedness Meeting
August 29, 2020

The meeting was called to order at 8:30 using the Zoom Video Conferencing tool. Members present induced Doug/K4DGG, John/WA9OXB, Eric/WA4EMN, Kurt/WB3AFB, Keith/KI5US, Dick/W4NWD. Joe/W0QF, Dan/N1MEO, Bill/N1CDO

• Follow up from Special EPC meeting 8/6/20 (Dick/W4NWD, Joe/W0QF)
  • KPARC EMERGENCY OPERATIONS PLAN
  • KPARC Emergency Plan Check List
  • These documents were discussed and no major changes were made. The groups spent a lot of time discussing personal and club liability. Bill/N1CDO feels the club will be covered by the county if the members are ARES members as well and there is an activation. He also says the ARRL offers liability insurance for clubs that is very inexpensive. Bill offered to document his thoughts and present them at the next board meeting.
• The following are items tabled or pending and will not be discussed unless we have additional information or questions.
  • Vulnerable antennas backup plan – Joe/W0QF and Dick/W4NWD – Bill/N1CDO quoted a cost of $1750 for the antennas and $400 for the mounts. Joe and Dick will continue to look for funding sources  (Dick/W4NWD reported that NI4CE is replacing their antennas. They have some good commercial-grade antennas and he will look into acquiring them when they are retired.)
  • PSOC & KPARC agreements documentation – Bill/N1CDO – Joe/W0QF – Bill/N1CDO is currently working on MOUs for the county and expects to have them done soon (Nothing to report, Bill has not responded yet)
  • Logging program that would not require Internet – Eric/WA4EMN – status?  (Nothing to report yet)
  • Club or member liability – Dick/W4NWD Joe/W0QF – status?  (Nothing to report yet)
  • Florida Disaster Net – Eric/WA4EMN (tabled till next meeting) Eric/WA4EMN reports the FDN contact has not been responsive and this should be removed from the agenda. Kieth/KI5US is working with the Keystone club to develop a working relationship. It may be they will be able to provide some support in the event of an emergency.
    
• Continued publicity – Joe/W0QF and Dick/W4NWD – explosive interest in the community due to recent publicity is creating some anxiousness in the membership. Can we effectively support the community if we get too many people signed up? Several members advocated splitting the community into different nets with different frequencies. Several members felt the community is challenged already with the technology. Dick/W4NWD reminded everyone this is for emergency communications not for general communications and things will work very differently in an emergency then they do in a controlled net situation.
• FRS testing/deployment status – Dick/W4NWD, Keith/KI5US
• FRS User sign-up and radio sales – Hud/KM4DDD (several sales have been made, the effort continues) – 20 more radios have been ordered. – we have sold out of radios and our next batch is nearly fully committed. Board members present (Joe, Bill, Dick, Doug, and Dan) voted to buy another 20 Retevis radios. Bill/N1CDO said he would place an order today.
• Conversion of club room to 12v power status? Dick/W4NWD – this will be done one station at a time there is batteries for the Icom station now and Bill/N1CDO has a device that will regulate the power that he will test with it.
• Winlink training at club – Bill/N1CDO – only 6 members showed up for Winlink application training. He will do it again with more advanced notice.
• Message Net
  • Status – Doug/K4DGG Things are going well
  • Message App (Winlink, Fldigi, Flmsg, d-rats) training – Joe/N0QF
  • Keith/KI5US suggested we use the DSTAR net time slot to pass digital messages like DRATS, Winlink, and Fldigi.
• Emergency Profile – status – Eric/WA4EMN – some changes (additions) are going to be made possibly collecting certifications and maybe some other things.
• Documents available off-line in event of an emergency – Doug/K4DGG and Paul/KM4VRH – Eric/WA4EMN says he has an LG 2 TB NAT that he will donate to the club to sync with Google Drive to collect and maintain a backup copy of club documents. This could be networked with club computers making the documents available off line.
• Next meeting – September 26, 2020

Meeting adjourned at approximately 9:50 am.
Respectfully submitted,
Doug Gatchell/K4DGG