Transitions
A few months back, I asked people to consider joining our NSRC Board. I said that all positions were available including mine. I have served this club as your President for two terms. First for 8 years when I had to step down to help manage my daughter’s wedding and then right after Don Whiteman stepped down. I am ending my second year. I came back because the club was facing some difficult challenges and we need some leadership continuity. However, I have always felt that leadership is not a lifetime contract. We need to encourage and train new leaders to keep this club vital. Before I became President, I served for 5 years as the Program Director. It was apposition that I loved and allowed me to learn so much more about our hobby. I also assumed the job of Field Day Chair…and eventually built the team we have in place today. All of this is a preamble to say, I am pleased to announce that Burt Krain has agreed to take on the job of President for this organization.
Burt has been a very big contributor to our Board, often doing whatever needed to get done and not looking for recognition or thanks. He has developed a strong bond with the Northbrook Library as we are about to embark on a new chapter with their Collaboratory. Burt has secured an opportunity for us to put a ham radio station in their facility. We are still working out the details, but he has pioneered this relationship. More recently, he has been helping us sell off equipment that has been donated to the Club. In that, Burt has show to have particularly effective skills. He also has been leading some of our outreach event and our Hams in the Park initiative. I think Burt will serve this club well. Please support him.
Cary Willis is also assuming a larger role…he is moving from an appointed Director’s role to tackling the Communications Director, just as we are looking to make some adjustments to that position. Many of the Board positions were designed to fit the personalities of the people who held those offices. For years, Randy Brothers served as out Internal Communications person and did much more than just handle communications. When Derick came along to hold that office, he moved us deeper into the digital age, but we also split many of the responsibilities up into smaller functions. We are currently reviewing that department again in hopes to have it better focus on serving our membership and addressing the outside world. The Public Relations Director has been vacant for a while largely because that landscape has changed so dramatically. It is very difficult to send out press releases and attract press attention. That space has moved to more social platforms, much of which our own members don’t use (Twitter, Instragram, Facebook to some larger extent).
Many of the people holding current Board positions will be returning. Don Whiteman is stepping down as Membership Director and Tami Witbrot will be taking on that work. Don will serve the club as our repeater Trustee.
Meanwhile, I am not going away. I have a storage locker with too much shared equipment – I plan to serve as the Public Service Director, another position that has been unfilled for a several years.
I have to say, to serve this Club has been an honor and a privilege. I have learned so much for my fellow Board members, not only about radio but about management and Robert’s Rules of Order! Thank you for your support and confidence in my leadership over these past years. I suspect my Blog will be retired, as we open the door to a new voice. I have appreciated your putting up with my rants and observations. I have enjoyed hearing from many of you about subjects I discussed and somehow I managed to keep politics out of it! Thank you all.
Meanwhile…
Ham radio moves on. 32 of you joined in to help the Evanston Bike Club’s North Shore Century. Rains that week really did a number to our neighbors to the north and many roads and parks were closed. As the organizers examined their options, they realized their only course of action was to shut down the 100 mile course. Rain event morning also didn’t help. The number of last minute riders was down from previous years. Still, they had about 1500 riders who braved the weather and conditions and hit the roads. We assembled a terrific support team and offered help to close to 100 bikers throughout the days – flats, broken frames or equipment. Turns out we were quite busy. We also had big issues with our TicketsCAD program. That same weekend Google decided to change its licensing agreements with users for systems like TicketsCad. We weren’t aware of the problem but suddenly we could not access the most critical functioning part of the program. If you cannot lock in on a map location, the system does not work. We eventually found some work arounds, but it was cumbersome, time consuming and very frustrating. We are going to seek out other ways to track out SAG vehicles. Believe it or not, there are just now other services coming into rather specialized field. Certainly, would like to thank all of the NSRC folks who supported the event. This is a 14 -ear relationship that has grown and into a strong bond between or groups. I am even a card-carrying member of the Bike club…and I even ride occasionally!
We are in the final stages of prepping for the Chicago marathon. We have 135 ham radio operators supporting this event, including several North Shore Radio Club members. This monster event has given ham radio a unique opportunity to demonstrate what we can do best.
73’s
Rob - K9RST