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When I got my ham license, I talked to my ward's Emergency Preparedness Coordinator and told him that I had a ham license. He replied “Oh, that's nice”. I guess my first mistake was making the assumption that he would know or care about emergency communications. I told the Bishop that I had been checking into the local ERC net on behalf of the ward, and that I didn't want to do anything out of order because I had never been called or set apart for this. He said “That's fine. Keep doing what you are doing”.How can I inform the Bishop and EP person about the importance of emergency communications, and that I feel that I need some kind of structure and support from them? I don't want to offend anyone or step on the local leader's toes, but I think that this is an important issue. Anyone have a similar experience who can give me some advice?GarthLogan, UT
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Start by contacting your Stake Emergegency Preparedness Specialist and letting him know about your license and your desire to be a part of an Emergency Communications Network for the Stake and Ward. this will let you know if there is something already implemented in the stake or if something needs to be started. Ir there is not something already started, suggest that the Stake think about starting something and volunteer to help them get it started.
James,Thanks for your reply to my post. The Stake does have some structure in place and they try to include me in their activities, which I appreciate. The other hams in the stake are great, and are very welcoming.I guess my next question is this: If there is a disaster, how will I communicate with the ward leaders so that I can relay information about the status of members, missionaries, and meeting houses to the stake leaders? I would like to have some kind of plan in place in case the worst happens and other forms of communication are not usable.Garth
Hi Garth!Good to see you on here! I would say go back to the Bishop, armed with the information from the church website about emergency coms, and simply volunteer to be the communication specialist who works under/with the Ward E.P. Coordinator. He then simply checks with the Ward E.P.C. to see if he agrees (which he would be nuts not to), and that's it. It's not a traditional calling where you really shouldn't say "I'll take that one!" because it's SUPPOSED to be someone knowledgeable and interested (which is where the descriptions from the providentliving website will come in handy). Then, in that way, you end up deciding how you want to communicate with the Ward leaders to report upwards (like having just some regular handhelds on a predetermined channel or using runners, etc.).Best of luck, buddy!73,Mike
Mike,Nice to see you too! Thanks for the input. I think I feel better now, and can approach the Bishop again. See you on the air some time!Garth
Hello Garth! Welcome to the site!I composed a lengthy and well written response to you the other day, but I when I tried to submit the response, the website had expired my login and my response was lost. Then life happened... 🙂I'll try to remember to copy this response before submitting it this time, just in case. 🙂Within your Bishopric, there is a member responsible for Emergency Preparedness. You need to talk to him. Let him know you are licensed, ready and willing to assist. When the time is right, you will be asked to assist.In the mean time, you need to continue to learn on your own to prepare for service when called upon. There are four primary items I recommend:1) Join your local ARES district and participate in their drills, nets and training. Through ARES, you can become "credentialed" which would potentially allow you to enter cordoned areas during emergencies. http://home.comcast.net/~noutares/2) Join CERT and get certified. They provide valuable training, most of which helps you understand what your limitations are. Remember, during an emergency the last thing you need to be is a burden on the responders in any way.3) Study up on ICS and NIMS. You can't talk apples to apples with organizations that abide by them without knowing them. Here are a few resources: http://www.fema.gov/emergency/nims/NIMSTrainingCourses.shtm#item1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KabG6J6dE84 http://www.arrl.org/emergency-communications-training http://www.barconline.org/4) If you don't have them already, prepare a go-kit with communications gear and a 72 hour kit.Finally, the best you can do with this is prepare yourself, announce yourself and wait for them to accept your help. There is so much to learn in the hobby, don't limit yourself and keep learning. If you haven't started already, start studying for your General exam! You will find HF valuable both in and out of the church.RobWB7SGL
Garth,"I guess my next question is this: If there is a disaster, how will I communicate with the ward leaders so that I can relay information about the status of members, missionaries, and meeting houses to the stake leaders? I would like to have some kind of plan in place in case the worst happens and other forms of communication are not usable."Get with the Stake Emergency Communication Specialist and determine what the stake has set up. If you are close enough, 2m comms will work fine. If you are a distance away, you will probably need HF capabilities. This is why it would be good to get your General license. As far as communicating with your Ward leaders, that is where you have to have a talk with the Bishop or his councilors and determine if anything has been set up in the ward. If nothing has, then volunteer to help and find any other HAMs in the ward to work with, or work with your Stake EmComm personnel to determine what works well for their units and adapt to your situation.Do not re-invent the wheel when something that works can be adapted.Good luck
I suggest one of the following:a) Did you know that an entire unit disappeared when Katrina hit?b) How will you answer the Regional Rep when he calls and asks, "Do you know where all of your members are since the (insert name of disaster here) occurred?"c) How are we going to check on the status of our members when the cell phones/land lines aren't working?d) Would you like to be able to talk to your wife/family if you are away from her/them when a disaster occurs?
I cornered my stake president and suggested he should take a ham radio certification course and so far have had two take the course (from me) and both passed with high marks. They are too busy to participate in nets and that sort of thing but because they have had involvement they have an appreciation for what is required and don't stand in the way. It helps when they are on your side.
Stake leaders will become interested in EMCOMM prep and activity when it becomes an item on their Area Presidency PPI agendas. Likewise, local unit leaders will become interested in EMCOMM prep and activity when it becomes an item on their Stake Presidency PPI agendas.
With as much tact as possible, let me say that our Bishopric and (many of the other local ones) have much of their time tied up in trying to assist with/work through welfare issues. They wish they had more time for so many other pressing things, but the squeaky wheels lining up in front of their doors pretty much get their grease/attention/time. We love our Bishop and are trying to assist, but the economy and jobs situation is running people ragged. As my wife and I get more into Ham radio (we only got our licenses last month), rather than expect other ward/stake people to have too many answers, we are trying to bring information, resources, and suggestions to the table.Hope things go well for you!
No bishop has time to micro-manage his 353 identifiable responsibilities. However, good leadership delegates. Bishops can learn good leadership. If he knows his stake president will ask about EMCOMM, he will find some way to provide the requested information. Contrarily, if he knows he will not be asked, he probably will not give the issue much attention. If EMCOMM is an item on his PPI agenda with the stake president, he will take whatever steps are necessary to make it happen. He can delegate authority…but not responsibility.
Unfortunately, this is a tricky question. Each set of Stake and Ward leaders is different. There is no one answer that can cover all situations. JS wrote of us about the many who are called who cannot understand one lesson. That lesson was all about having power in the priesthood to truly accomplish the purposes. Though a bishop has “353 identifiable responsibilities”, not knowing how to delegate authority and properly minister to those delegated the authority to facilitate the responsibilities being able to be met very little will be accomplished. Approaching such a leader only aggravates them. Often such leaders only call people to such callings expecting that the appearance of doing something is better than nothing, hoping they will not come up with a plan the leader will be expected to support. As at the time of Lehi in Jerusalem, Christ with the leaders of the Jews and Nephi with the leaders of the church before Christ’s visit, such leaders do not like to be exposed for who they really are. As for me, I see it my responsibility to aggravate my leaders if it is something as important as emergency preparedness that requires some pre-communication, preparation to have communication during an emergency, effective emergency communication and good post-communication after the emergency. Now when my leaders hear my name relative to a calling, their reaction can be best described as ‘anybody but that guy’. Each of us is choosing how we want to be seen and, more importantly, why we want to be seen that way.
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