Florida Repeater Council, Inc. Minutes of Annual Business Meeting February 8, 2003 Orlando, Florida ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The open forum was started at 2:08 PM on February 8, 2003 by President Ray Kassis, N4LEM. The following staff were in attendance: Directors in attendance were: District 1: District 2: Mark Filla, KS4VT District 3: Karen Power, KD4DJX District 4: Mike Fletcher, NI4M District 5: District 6: Dave Armbrust, AE4MR District 7: Ted Wirick, W4YJC District 8: Frank Butler, W4RH Staff Members in attendance were: President: Ray Kassis, N4LEM Vice President: Ira Bickham, K8HRR Secretary/Treasurer: Dana G. Rodakis, K4LK Database Manager: Dana G. Rodakis, K4LK President Kassis introduced himself, welcomed all present and said that he is honored to serve as President although elections will occur later. He explained that we had a meeting the previous week at the Miami hamfest and there was considerable discussion of the choice of meeting places. Miami provided us a good meeting place. The first part of the meeting would be an open format, where anyone could express any thoughts. This portion of meeting would lead into the formal portion of the meeting where no participation by the members would be allowed. No roll call is conducted during the open forum but the districts are well representative. The choice of meeting place was discussed. Last Orlando hamfest, we were placed in the corner of a swap table room, and it was very noisy and nearly impossible to conduct a meeting. Several suggestions were made. The subject will be discussed via email and announced in the newsletter. Mr. and Mrs. Wally Cashwell complained that his name was misspelled in the December 2002 newsletter. Wally explained the technical operation of his repeater. Considerable discussion followed. George Jones W4AQR indicated his 444.000 repeater in Seffner was coordinated but somehow got dropped from the database. Since then, another repeater was coordinated on the same frequency. He reminded everyone that not all owners have access to the web site and de-coordination paperwork needs to be mailed. Director Mark mentioned that paperwork mailed typically gets returned and is no longer sent. George stated that he recently sent an application for a new pair. The database manager stated that the 1993 database was the last in which George's repeater was listed. The staff was thanked for all the hard work. A co-owner of the WA4HJM repeater in Dundee mentioned that his repeater will be dropped from the repeater directory. The staff informed him of his responsibilities to report repeater status. Considerable discussion about dealing with paper repeaters followed. President Kassis thanked all who attended and expressed their opinions. The Directors introduced themselves to the group. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The business meeting was called to order at 2:55 PM on February 8, 2003 by President Ray Kassis, N4LEM. The Secretary determined that a quorum of qualified Directors were in attendance: Directors in attendance were: District 1: District 2: Mark Filla, KS4VT District 3: Karen Power, KD4DJX District 4: Mike Fletcher, NI4M District 5: District 6: Dave Armbrust, AE4MR District 7: Ted Wirick, W4YJC District 8: Frank Butler, W4RH Staff Members in attendance were: President: Ray Kassis, N4LEM Vice President: Ira Bickham, K8HRR Secretary/Treasurer: Dana G. Rodakis, K4LK Database Manager: Dana G. Rodakis, K4LK PRESIDENT'S REPORT: The meeting was then turned over to Vice President Ira Bickham Jr., K8HRR who entertained nominations for President. Director Mike nominated Ray Kassis. Nomination was seconded and approved. President Kassis re-appointed Vice President Bickham then entertained a motion to re-appoint Dana Rodakis, K4LK as Secretary, Treasurer, Coordinator, Database Manager, and Webmaster, Matt Bush, KA9RIX as 6-meter coordinator; and to re-elect the Directors of districts 2, 4, 6 and 8. All nominations were seconded and passed. SECRETARY'S REPORT: Secretary Rodakis read the minutes of the business meeting held last week in Miami. The minutes have been posted on the FRC web site. Director Nilo made a motion which was seconded by Director Mark to approve the minutes of the February 1, 2003 meeting as posted. Motion passed unanimously. TREASURER'S REPORT: The FRC Secretary/Treasurer reported the following accounting: Opening balance, 8/6/02 $8,795.99 Income: $1,240.00 Expenses: $2,323.00 Balance: 2/5/03: $7,712.99 Income from the ARRL in April will be $883. WEBMASTER'S REPORT: The Council web site receives 30 hits per day. Repeater listings updated. Region names have been expanded so that they sort properly. The FRC district map has been updated as requested. The red and white in the map does not print well and needs a little more work. The Directors praised the website for the wealth of information it contains. DATABASE MANAGER/COORDINATOR'S REPORT: All applications and updates have been processed except those that required a search to be presented to an applicant. Waiting for responses from the applicant. Two are in district 8. Ninety-nine coordinations or transfers were completed last year. Also, three frequency changes were approved. Forty-four repeaters were decoordinated, four approved relocations. There are 1,114 repeaters in database. The repeater listings on the web site are now filtered to include only those that have filed the required updates. The database still contains all known repeaters. Motion was made to accept these reports as read. Motion was seconded and passed unanimously. REPORTS OF DIRECTORS: District 1: No report. District 2: Nothing new since last week. District 3: Director Karen received the returned newsletters and contacted the trustees to send updates. Frank Bryne has passed away and should be de-coordinated. Eric Power was named Vice Director of district 3. District 4: Nothing new since last week. Mike requested the Board of Directors to acknnowledge Tony Stone as Vice Director of district 4. District 5: No report. District 6: Director Dave indicated that the 145.21 in Lake Placid was relinquished by Steve Wilkins and Bill Dibble would be applying. The Coordinator indicated that he has not received anything to date. District 7: Reviewed the returned newsletters and has submitted recommendations to the Database Manager. District 8: Nothing new since last week. OLD BUSINESS: The Coordinator was directed to allocate two pairs in the sub-442 band for state- wide emergency use. A request for four frequencies has been submitted to FADCA (Russ Oder, N4KOX). President Ray asked Bill Sinbine, N4XEO to check into it. A motion was made by Director Dave that no further coordinations be issued on 146.940 MHz until this issue is resolved. It will be discussed via email and decided at the next meeting. Motion seconded and passed unanimously. Grandfathering of existing repeaters needs to be considered when determining co-channel repeater coordination distances. Considerable discussion followed. A motion was made by Director Mike, as follows: All existing coordinations issued prior to March 1, 2003 are grandfathered with the coordinated 85 mile radius of protection until February 28, 2006, provided that no technical changes are made to the repeater (only trustee, callsign, sponsor or feature changes are allowed). At that time, the new separation distances take effect for all coordinations. New coordinations issued as of March 1, 2003 are performed with the new separation distances. Only the highest existing repeater is considered when determining separation. The motion was seconded and approved. NEW BUSINESS: Create a procedure to deal with paper repeaters. This issue will be discussed via email and a decision will be made at the next meeting. The Database Manager has setup a server that allows the FRC staff to search and print database records. This server is limited to 10 different IP addresses in a 12-hour period. An unlimited version of Filemaker Pro costs $1,000. The server could also be the FRC Web server if a fixed IP address is assigned. This issue is tabled until the next meeting. The Directors will try the server to see if the IP limit becomes a problem. Decide on permanent meeting place for the annual meeting. This issue is tabled until the next meeting. Costs of printing and mailing twice-a-year newsletter have reached $1,900. A motion was made, seconded and approved to continue mailing a newsletter to all coordinated trustees by first-class mail. We could use PayPal to accept member dues. We would be assessed a fee by PayPal. The fee could be passed onto the member. Director Mike is in the process of implementing it in his local club. The fees are 2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction (total of 59 cents). A commercial account is required. A motion was made, seconded and approved to implement on-line donations. The meeting was adjourned at 4:00 PM by President Ray Kassis. Respectfully submitted Dana G. Rodakis, K4LK Secretary/Treasurer