Florida Repeater Council Information

3 Oct 2016

      Greetings and welcome to the Florida Repeater Discussion List,

I am Bryan Fields, W9CR. 

I’m involved in amateur radio in the Tampa Bay area, with membership in four
local clubs and chairman of the Technical Committee for my local group.

Professionally I am a Network Architect with a major telecom company.  I’ve
been a licensed amateur since 1995 (over 2/3 of my life), hold a GROL+Radar
and have a background in cellular/microwave networks.

Fellow Amateurs, the FRC is an organization run amuck.  Incompetent directors
are managing it, flouting the bylaws, violating Florida Law, and ignoring
member needs.  I am asking for your proxy for the upcoming FRC meeting.

It has failed in its ability to coordinate operations of amateur radio
repeaters in the following ways:

  * Publication of the FRC database on a public website
      o This database dump in MySQL format and the associated webpages show
        without a doubt the level of incompetency in the programming behind
        the database.  This is nothing but gross negligence on the part of
        Director Rodakis and Director Lavender.   
      o Per the coordination policy, locations are to be kept secret, however
        a Reddit user was kind enough to post a Google earth KML showing the
        coordinated location of every repeater in the state.
      o  All your personal data, phone, email, home address, repeater site
        address and Repeater Site GPS coordinates are published.

  * Length of the coordination process is unacceptable!
      o As of this writing coordination applications post 1/25/2016 have not
        been processed.  It’s */October/*!
      o If the coordinator cannot process applications in a reasonable time,
        he needs to step down.
      o Renewals have not been processed post 5/7/2016!   As most
        coordinations expire on 9/30/2016, this means no members may vote
        under the bylaws!  This applies to the board as well.

  * Violation of the coordination policy by the directors
  * Willful violation of the bylaws by the directors
  * Willful violations of FS 617 regarding members request for information
      o Acknowledged receipt of this by President Kassis
  * Publicly stating the policy of the FRC is “is unable to search for
    available frequencies”, when this is the FCC definition of a frequency
    coordinator. 
  * When they do suggest frequencies there active repeaters on them, some even
    coordinated well under the radius.
  * Inventing new coordination polices on the fly without approval of the board

The FRC must be reformed if it wishes to keep its legitimacy.  Frequency
coordination is voluntary in amateur radio, and there is little reason for
amateur radio operators in Florida to seek coordination from the FRC under
this current administration.

My goal is to transform this organization into a healthy helping hand for
repeater operators and other amateur spectrum users.  No one should be
answered with contempt for months after putting an application in for
coordination only to be told “fill it out again, we can’t edit it”.  This
should not be an organization which exists as a good-ol’-boy system breading
contempt; rather one which operates in the open, in accordance with its
bylaws, and accountable to its members.

The FRC should ask how to say “Yes” rather than saying “No” in working with
their members and other amateurs.

My plan to get us on the right track is:

  * Remove the current directors for gross incompetency and exposing the
    organization to liability:
      o Ray Kassis, N4LEM
      o Dana Rodakis, K4LK
      o (Glenn) Mike Fletcher, NI4M
      o Chuck Lavender, W4CLL
  * Demand new elections for existing directors in compliance with the bylaws.
  * Establish a bylaw committee to rewrite the bylaws and change the
    organization structure to better serve all amateurs in Florida.
  * Establish a development process for new policies from the membership
  * Encourage input from the membership based on sound technical policies
  * De-centralize coordination by having a web enabled database be accessible
    to the public showing all history of an application through coordination.
  * No one person should be the gatekeeper of the database. 
  * Make all records of the FRC open to the public, as any non-profit serving
    the public interest must be.

I will make a motion to accomplish this at the next meeting at the Melbourne
Hamfest meeting.   To make this happen, I am asking for your proxy, if you’re
a member of the FRC.   You will need to print out this form and sign it, then
send a scan or legible picture of it to me via email or text message. If you
can attend the meeting, please do so.

It’s $10 to become a member on the FRC website and it buys the right to have a
say in the future of amateur radio in Florida.   

http://florida-repeaters.org/donate.htm

I fully expect to be shouted down by the board, but as members we cannot be
ignored.  I wish to resolve this via the membership, but if ignored I do
intend to comply the board, by any legal means, to follow the bylaws and FS 617.

I need your proxy by the Friday, October 7, 2016. 

73’s and see you at Melbourne,

Bryan Fields, W9CR

P.S. Please feel free to discuss this on list.  If you wish to not be a part
of this discussion you can remove yourself using the link at the bottom.  I'm
happy to oblige your wishes via direct email as well if you have any questions.

Bryan Fields

Leon Jurczyszyn

Bryan Fields

Ken Wolfe

mccrpt＠tampabay.rr.com

John Blaisdell

k2hxc＠comcast.net

Pete Rimmel N8PR

MICHAEL WELLS

Nilo Hernandez

MICHAEL WELLS

Livinginavan Downbytheriver

MICHAEL WELLS

MICHAEL WELLS

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