Hey Everyone,
My name is Steve Galbraith my Amateur call sign is KB7ITU. i thought I'd put a bit on here to let you know what we did in the Rexburg, Henry's Fork Stake. I am the Henry's Fork Stake ECS.
in our Stake we actually have at least one ham in each of the 9 wards. the problem we run into was that not all of them are active and short of going door to door and getting on my hands and knees, I could not get the support .
So the way we set up the Stake is as follows. We set up a Stake repeater on a commercial uhf band. We needed to have a way that the Stake President, Bishops and all their Emergency communication specialists could communicate if the conventional forms of communication were down. Plus, some of the called specialist were not ham radio operators so I needed a way to communicate with them. It is suggested in our stake emergency communications plan that all ward ECS's have at least a Technician class license and the Stake ECS at least a General. We now have the Stake Priesthood leadership net each Fast Sunday. We also have the ERC ham radio net for the Stake each Sunday. We have set up a packet radio net for the Stake. For you that don't know what packet radio is. Packet radio is old school email. You don't even need your computer running to receive a mail message. It works over the ham radio air waves.Packet is text only but you are able to pass large lists of need supplies in an emergency in a very short length of time and packet is error free.
Two out of the 9 wards have their own weekly net on the MURS radio band. We use MURS because our wards are so large. In my ward we have set up Block Captains strategically placed throughout the ward in a 8 mile by 4 mile area. Each week we have a net on MURS, which is a license free band like FRS. If there is an emergency each Block overlaps the other so no member of the community is missed. The Block Captains are responsible for checking and reporting on the families in their block. The communicate back to the Ward ECS and if necessary the Ward ECS will contact the Stake ECS for assistance.
For the large are in this part of Idaho, We have 4 Regions in the Idaho Falls Bishop's Storehouse ERC . The ERC is the communication support group for the Church of Jesus Christ of Later day Saints. Each Wednesday night , each Region has their own simplex (non repeater) net, taking a count of the number of members that check in each week. Then at 9pm we go over to the local repeater designated for the ERC. The Net Control operator for the Bishop's Storehouse will ask for a representative from each of the stakes to report on the number of check ins . They will then conduct a training on a pre selected topic.
I know without a doubt that in my Stake, The Lord has lead us by the hand in setting up the communication network . I know this is the Lords work . I feel the Sprite pushing me all the time. It is my hope that the information I have sent out here, will be of use to you. If there is anything I can do to help out please let me know. I would be glad to talk to you.
My contact information:
Phone : 208-417-9843
Email:
kb7itu@gmail.com
Sincerely,
Steve Galbraith KB7ITU
Rexburg, Henry's For Stake ECS