The CRES Amateur Radio Club held its first quarterly general
meeting of the year at the Donatos Pizza in Pickerington on
Monday, 22 March 2004.  President Jack Kirkpatrick/KC8TM called
the meeting to order at 6:45 PM.  The following members and
guests were present:  KD8WK, N9CX, W8FMN, KC8TM, K8AX, KC8VKS,
KC8HIH, K8ON, WD8EBS, KD8ZG, K8RSP, K8KJ, K8TX, WD8CZG, WA8LBZ,
K9RV, N9QKL (XYL of K9RV), and NV7X and his XYL.

Jack immediately turned the floor over the Dave Woolf/K8RSP, who
gave a presentation on the current state of the repeater, and the
repeater facilities available to club members.  Dave and Mike
Stansbery/WD8EBS had revised the "07/67 User's Manual", a copy
of which was given to each member present.  Dave gave a thorough
explanation of the current repeater setup by going through a block
diagram of the machine in detail.  He covered the current timer
values being used, explained the use the speed dials, and how to
make emergency 911 calls.  He discussed the current status of the
general auto-patch, the use of the LiTZ tone, and explained the
DVR problems we have experienced recently.  He covered all
recent changes that have been made to the repeater, most of which
are related to the new requirement for using CTCSS on input to
bring up the machine.

Dave then engaged the membership in a discussion of how people
liked the new CTCSS operations.  The responses were universally
positive with several comments made to the effect that it was
feasible now to leave a rig tuned to the machine whereas prior
to CTCSS there were simply too many extraneous signals bringing
up the machine to conveniently do so.  The consensus of the
membership is that the current mode of autopatch operation was
OK and that the club should not allow reverse autopatches.

Mike Stansbery then gave a report on the DVR:  From his research
on the CAT-1000 web site, it appears our current DVR board, an
early model, has unfixable problems that can cause lockups.  The
developers' recommendation is to upgrade to the latest version
of the board, which would also give us (1) twice the recording
time, (2) a 30 second watch-dog timer on voice tracks, (3) better
sounding audio, (4) the ability to record DVR messages via the
phone line, and (5) the ability to provide easy audio tests for
our users (record a sample track with immediate playback).  A
new DVR board costs $199.  In addition, Mike felt we would be
best to also upgrade to the latest CAT-1000 firmware release at
the same time for an additional $25.  Gordy Lashley/WD8CZG
motions, and Al Mecozzi/ WA8LBZ seconds spending up to $250 to
upgrade the DVR board and EPROM, and the motion passes.

Jack then engaged the club in a discussion of club growth and
the possibility of incorporating.  Some sampling of comments:
N9CX: We need to consider not only how to bring new people into
the club, but also how to retain them.  WA8LBZ: The club has to
provide some value.  Every meeting should have some presentation
or consist of a field trip to make it interesting.  KD8ZG:
The only way to get youth involved is to help them get licensed.
WA8LBZ: We should advertize our meetings on the WTVN radio Saturday
morning show.  WD8EBS: (Involved with scouts.)  It takes a lot
today to get kids interested.  Suggests teaching ham licensing or
electronics courses.  But doing so might involve background
checks today.  WA8LBZ: Average age of those on PSK-31 is 47 years.
KC8HIH: Class at Universal is what got her into ham radio (along
with prodding from her brother).  K8RSP: We need to get buy-in and
support from a critical mass of individual members before we
should consider offering anything like a class.

At this point, the attendance sheet was passed around again to
allow people to express an interest in being on a team to devise,
prepare, and ultimately teach a class.  The following members
volunteered for this: N9CX, KC8TM, KC8VKS, K8ON, WD8EBS, K8RSP,
K8KJ, K8TX, WA8LBZ, and NV7X.

Jerry Scott/K9RV suggests sending postcards to hams in Franklin
County extending an invitation to our club activities.  Bob
Cartwright/W8FMN suggested limiting the mail initially to those
who used to be affiliated with the club in the past to keep
costs in check.  He also commented that he felt quarterly
meetings were about right to keep the club together, and that
we should hold more frequent meetings as an adjunct if topical
field trips and presentations could be arranged.  K8RSP
suggested we utilize weekly club nets around Columbus to get
word out of our specific activities of general interest to
local hams.

Tricia Kovacs/KC8HIH said she had spoken to Ron Rotino, from
ICOM radio, and he would be happy to give a talk on ICOM
products, but wanted to be sponsored through a dealer.  She
had spoken to Universal and they would be willing to provide
a meeting place there, but it can accommodate only about 25
people per session, so we can't advertise this talk too
heavily outside the club.

Several alternate activities were proposed including a trip to
Fair Radio in Lima, a fox hunt, having the micro-controller
group talk about their projects, and approaching Bill Parker
to give a talk, along with continuing our existing activities
(Field Day, the annual club picnic, etc.).  Tricia is keeping
track of the complete list.

Dan Merrick/K8TX motions, and Al seconds, that we try meeting
monthly for a year.  Dave Jeffords/K8ON questions whether it
is appropriate to pass the motion without first garnering the
support of the membership to assist the VP with putting the
various activities together.  After a discussion, in which
the general consensus was that we should try more frequent
meetings and/or field trips where varying topics of interest
are covered in addition to the quarterly meetings where more
formal club business is handled, and after several people
volunteered to assist, Dan withdrew his motion.

Art Grandle/KD8ZG announced he had a free ticket to the Athens
hamfest for anyone wanted it.  He also indicated the next club-
sponsored VE session will be April 3rd at 9:00 AM at Parkview
Presbyterian Church.  Those VEs who are interested may meet for
breakfast beforehand at 7:30 AM at the Cracker Barrel Restaurant
at SR 204 and SR 256.

The repeater committee, chartered to (among other things) come
up with alternatives sites should it become necessary to relocate
the repeater, indicated it had not yet met and would report at
a later time.

The attendance sheet was at this point again passed around so
that people interested in serving on a growth committee could
sign up.  N9CX, KC8HIH, K8TX, and WA8LBZ did so.  Jack indicated
he would defer to this committee the responsibility to study
and make a recommendation as to whether the club should pursue
incorporating.

Tricia questioned whether the club should purchase a general
liability insurance policy.  Rob Stampfli/KD8WK said his
experience with another organization leads him to believe such
a policy might well be too expensive.  The ARRL affords clubs
the opportunity to purchase such a policy through its carrier,
provided the club is ARRL affiliated, but 51% of a club's
membership must be a member of the ARRL to affiliate.  A quick
show of hands indicated we meet this criteria.  Art Grandle
motioned, seconded by Dan Merrick, that the club seek to become
re-affliated with the ARRL.  Motion passes.  Rob agreed to check
into our becoming an affiliated club with a thought towards
obtaining a liability policy through them.

Mike Rauh/NV7X and his wife indicated they would be happy to
allow the club to use their property for this year's Field Day
activities.  Bob Cartwright volunteered to be the Field Day
chairman.  Mike will also check into whether the club can use
adjacent park land, which would make it easier in the event we
decide to invite the participation of the general public.

The meeting was adjourned at 9:15 PM.

No Treasurer's Report was requested or given at the meeting.
However, for the record, the club has $81.09 in our cash account,
$4,640.04 in our Telhio savings and checking accounts, and
$2,126.76 in Telhio CDs.

Respectfully submitted,
Rob Stampfli
CRES-ARC Secretary/Treasurer