If you weren’t at last night’s SARA meeting, you missed a great presentation by Scott Yonally N8SY about the ARRL. Ohio has the 5th largest ham population by state in the entire US and in terms of ARRL Sections, the Ohio Section (the whole state) is the most-populist section in the whole country. One of the most interesting tidbits Scott shared is that the Division and Section mailing lists are now readable by anyone. The URL to see all the Divisions and Sections can be found at http://www.arrl.org/section-division-email-log/.
Silvercreek is both an ARRL Affiliated Club and an ARRL Special Service Club. While there are many affiliated clubs in the US, there are only a bit over 100 Special Service Clubs and we are very proud to be one. Currently only 62% of SARA’s membership is an ARRL Member as well. While it’s not practical to have 100% membership in the ARRL, we do strongly urge those who can afford it to join the League.
The ARRL provides a variety of services to amateur radio. While the QST magazine is probably the most familiar to everyone, membership in the ARRL gives you digital access to QST, QEX, NCJ, and On the Air. All four a great publications. The other major service the ARRL provides is advocacy to the US FCC and to Congress for amateur radio to retain access to RF spectrum. If you follow the news at all, the FCC is significantly re-organizing the RF spectrum to accommodate technologies such as WiFi, mobile data/5G, an a whole host of other communications. The ARRL works hard to make sure we retain – FOR FREE! – a significant amount of spectrum that could be licensed for billions of dollars to industry.
The ARRL has a list of other reasons to join and every may find a different reason that resonates with them.