Author: Eli W7ELI

Our last meeting was the best attended ever! Thank you all. We were in the annex out back at the fire station, so we were crowded. It was pretty chaotic, but we got a lot accomplished. This month will be part two of our push to get members ARRO certified.

With the large membership numbers, printing is getting to be a challenge, so I will be emailing the traffic handling training materials to you. I hope you will become familiar with the contents and bring your questions to the meeting. We will spend the majority of our training time in small groups (in the usual BIG room!) actually practicing passing traffic. See you all on March 27.

Thanks for your enthusiasm and support of this training program.

We have state approval of our training plan! The program is getting its big kick start at the February meeting. We will be working in our teams to check off as many items as possible in our effort to get all members ARRO (ARES/RACES Radio Operator) certified. Bring your hand held radio, manual, cheat sheet if you have one, and your 24-hour go-kit to the Meeting on February 27! The go-kit for this meeting should have the basic items you would need if you were to be deployed for 24 hours. This should include a radio (HT or mobile), power supply (car battery or extra batteries works), food and water, and any personal items you will need to be totally self-sufficient for 24 hours. You do not need to bring bedding.

If you are not on a team, come prepared anyway and we will get you into a work group. If you don’t have a portable radio, you will be working with the orange go-kit supplied to our group by Multnomah County Emergency Management.

The March meeting will be a hands-on traffic handling workshop. Participating in these two meetings will get most members very close to ARRO certification.

Remember to submit your ICS class completion certificates if you haven’t already done so! These are needed for ARRO certifications. You can bring copies to a meeting, or email them to Deb at dprovo [at] yahoo [dot] com. Contact Eli at eliza [dot] pride [at] gmail [dot] com if you need information on how to take these free on-line classes.

The Training Calendar for 2014 has been posted on the website. Thanks to all who attended the December meeting for your input.

Five members of the leadership team have already received their ARRO (ARES/RACES Radio Operator) and NCFO (Net Control and Field Operator) certificates. More certificates will be awarded at the January meeting. Team leaders are or will soon be working with their teams to get their members ARRO certified. Those who wish may also work on their NCFO certificates.

Team leaders have been trained to evaluate their team members and check off tasks. Most of the team leaders have finished their ARRO (ARES/RACES Radio Operator) qualifications. Our training plan has been written in its official incarnation and is under final review. Once the 2014 training schedule has been determined, it will be submitted to Lisa Clarke, the Oregon Section AEC-Training.

Several members have been honing their traffic handling skills on the NTTN (Northwest Traffic and Training Net) and on our weekly net. It’s amazing how quickly they learn! We are trying to assure that at least one piece of traffic gets sent every week on the ARES net. Be ready; the next one might be for you!

Many Thanks to Sonny KF7SUH for a great “Alternate Power Sources” training at the November meeting. It was both entertaining and informative.

The ARRO and Net Control Certification check-off lists have been posted. We are still fine-tuning our teams. All members who have stated on their membership forms that their first service priority in a disaster is ARES are on served agency teams. All members with other first priorities, (NET, workplace or other agency), will be assigned a new team that we are forming. All team leaders will be ARRO certified and trained in helping their team members to get certified.

The ARES Oregon Section developed a training plan in October, 2011 as a way to verify to served agencies and other counties who may need our assistance that all ARES operators have a minimum skill set and consistent knowledge base. We have adapted this state plan to meet the needs of Multnomah County. We have developed a skills and knowledge check-off sheet or qualification card for basic RADO (radio operator) with add-on certification for Net Control. Other add-ons will be developed to include HF, Digital, CW and MAT Team. We hope to have all our members certified by the end of March. This program will be explained in detail at our October general meeting, so please attend!