Pikes Peak ARES support of the Garden of the Gods 10 mile run on 6/13/2015 will use the 447.350 repeater as primary and the 146.910 as backup. The event coordinator will announce, both before and periodically during the event, their use of these repeaters.

Expect event traffic on these repeaters from 0600 to 1100 that day. Feel free to use these repeaters as you normally would, but please be courteous enough to yield to event traffic.

Senate Bill 15-041, the state PRB-1 bill regarding amateur radio antennas, has passed both houses and has been sent to the Governor. Having now passed both the Senate and the House unanimously, the Governor will almost certainly sign it.

In the following extracts, capital letters indicate new material added to existing statutes; dashes through words indicate deletions from existing statutes and such material not part of act. So, it looks like this bill sailed through without change or amendment.

HOAs and local governing entities must now craft a policy that prescribes that in order to comply with this law, either covenants are to be changed or other rules are to be interpreted as permitting amateur radio antennas complying with the provisions of that FCC preemption. Note that in doing that, all three provisions (a), (b), and (c) carry equal weight. Therefore, no HOA can give more weight to aesthetic considerations than to accommodating amateur communications.

CONCERNING A REQUIREMENT THAT LOCAL GOVERNMENTS REGULATE AMATEUR RADIO COMMUNICATIONS IN ACCORDANCE WITH AN EXISTING FEDERAL PREEMPTION ESTABLISHED BY THE FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION.

29-20-109. Local government regulation of amateur radio antennas.

(1) NO LOCAL GOVERNMENT SHALL ENACT OR ENFORCE AN ORDINANCE OR RESOLUTION REGULATING AMATEUR RADIO ANTENNAS THAT FAILS TO CONFORM TO THE LIMITED PREEMPTION SET FORTH IN THE MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER PRB-1 ENTITLED “FEDERAL PREEMPTION OF STATE AND LOCAL REGULATIONS PERTAINING TO AMATEUR RADIO FACILITIES”, 101 FCC 2d 952 (1985), ISSUED BY THE FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION AND FURTHER CODIFIED IN 47 CFR 97.15 (b). AN ORDINANCE OR RESOLUTION ADOPTED BY A LOCAL GOVERNMENT THAT REGULATES AMATEUR RADIO ANTENNAS SHALL CONFORM TO THE LIMITED FEDERAL PREEMPTION WHICH PROVIDES THAT LOCAL GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS INVOLVING THE PLACEMENT, SCREENING, OR HEIGHT OF ANTENNAS MUST:

(a) BE BASED ON HEALTH, SAFETY, OR AESTHETIC CONSIDERATIONS;
(b) BE CRAFTED TO REASONABLY ACCOMMODATE AMATEUR COMMUNICATIONS; AND
(c) REPRESENT THE MINIMUM PRACTICABLE REGULATION REQUIRED TO ACCOMPLISH THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT’S LEGITIMATE PURPOSE.

This was in the ARRL e-letter of 22 Jan 2015. Thanks to Don WA9WWS for sharing.

The ARRL Board of Directors has tweaked the DX Century Club (DXCC) rules to clarify and expand their recognition of remotely controlled station technology. It has also added a rule that puts greater ethical responsibility on operators with respect to remotely controlled operation. In addition, the Board adopted changes to the ARRL VHF/UHF contest rules that are aimed at encouraging greater participation.

The DXCC Rules changes, which affect Section I, subsections 8 and 9, explain and extend how contacts with remotely controlled stations now may be applied toward the DXCC award. According to ARRL CEO David Sumner, K1ZZ, the changes are subtle but significant. The modified rules make clear that contacts with legally licensed, land-based, remotely controlled stations count for DXCC, but the control point — the operator’s location — of a remotely controlled station no longer has to be land based; the operator can be literally anywhere.

The Board also adopted amendments to the General Rules for ARRL Contests Above 50 MHz to encourage greater participation and band utilization. The changes become effective with the 2015 June ARRL VHF Contest. The changes will permit assistance in arranging contacts, but not in conducting contacts. They will, for example, allow a station to announce its location in a chat room, on a repeater, or even via e-mail.

In other actions, the Board instructed the HF Band Planning Committee — which will soon solicit members’ comments on proposed changes to the ARRL HF Band Plans — to include the possibility of requesting that the FCC add RTTY and data privileges for Novices and Technicians on 15 meters.

… our efforts with H.R. 4969 (“The Amateur Radio Parity Act of 2014”) have had measures of success; we intended to obtain 30 co-sponsors for the Bill and actually ended up with almost 70, and … we were able to amass an exceptional and surprising level of support for the Bill … .

… the Bill did not progress as far as expected. Nevertheless, the support generated will give us a significant head start in the 114th Congress beginning in January … .

We have in mind reassembling at least 60 of the cosponsors that we had for H.R. 4969 as original cosponsors for the new Bill which should give us momentum to obtain a much larger list of cosponsors, more positive visibility, more buy-in, and ultimately more traction in a usually sticky legislative process. We have also received interest from Senators in sponsoring a Senate version of the Bill.

So far, opposition from the one association representing HOAs has been only minimally active in attempts to oppose the Bill and they have been unsuccessful due to their misstatements of fact and mis-characterization of the actual effect of the legislation.

Many thanks to all of you who wrote, called, emailed, and personally visited your Congressional Representatives, …

Please stay tuned for next steps.

73,
Brian Mileshosky N5ZGT, Rocky Mountain Division Director
Dwayne Allen WY7FD, Rocky Mountain Division Vice-Director
Division website: www.RockyMountainDivision.org