CRARC Committee December update email #Committee_update

The CRARC committee meets on-line on the second Wednesday of the month, to discuss the running of CRARC. This email is an outline of items covered and other topics potentially of interest to CRARC members and is promulgated to keep members aware of what is going on.

Can I also take the opportunity to wish a very merry Christmas and a safe and happy new year to all CRARC members and other amateurs in the region. For those on the road over the festive season, please drive safely and have a very enjoyable break.

As usual there will be no December monthly meeting given it is in the middle of the Christmas period. The next CRARC monthly meeting will be on Wednesday 24^th Jan 2024 and will be a trash and treasure sale at the club rooms. Doors opening at 7:30 for an 8pm kickoff.

Club membership is running well, with 192 financial members. As always, if you have any membership queries, contact Graham on membership@crarc.org.au

CRARC maintains a number of Beacons and Repeaters.

We have experienced some issues with the IRLP/echolink, DMR and d-star repeaters over the last month or so that have resulted in some outages or degraded services, but for the most part believe these have been resolved (noting ongoing link issues impacting audio quality on d-star). If you notice any issues with repeater performance, please advise the committee by email.

On the education front, the final Foundation course of the year (and the last one conducted under the AMC system) was conducted with all six participants successfully completing their assessment. Amanda VK1WX advises that due to AMC/ACMA changeover of assessment responsibilities in February, the usual January course will not be conducted. The next course is planned for the weekend of 16/17 March 2024. Out of session examinations can still be conducted by arrangement with Amanda and the other members of the education team.

For WICEN, the biggest event of the year, the Rally of Canberra was successfully completed in late November with support from over 30 amateurs. Our support to this event ably led by Phil VK1PL who as usual put in a huge effort in planning and running it – as always, a huge thanks to Phil for his efforts in making this a really successful activity. An update on anticipated events for 2024 will be provided in the January update email.

Upgrades and work continues on the shack at the clubrooms with more equipment having been acquired. As a result of a generous donation of decommissioned equipment from ACTEWAGL, we have received a significant quantity of equipment. Some of this has been incorporated into the shack including a good quality spectrum analyser and CRO, which is available for use by members during tech nights and when the shack is open. We anticipate the shack will continue to evolve as upgrades and changes are made.

People may have heard some talk about changes to the taxation rules that could have some impact on the clubs’ finances – we have sought advice and have a couple of small amendments to the Objects and Purpose in the existing rules to ensure we meet ATO requirements. These will be put forward at the AGM in February (formal advice on planned changes to be promulgated prior to the AGM).

Matt VK1MA

For the CRARC Committee