Wednesday 21 January 2015

An Ontario Radio Society?

I have just discovered the following article on the blog site of Rod Hardman, VE3RHF, and it was written last November.......and what a marvellous idea that article is !!  

Now Rod, as you may know, was up to a few months ago, the RAC Director for Ontario South, that is before he resigned after about eight months into his term....you'll have to ask Rod why he resigned.  Before he was elected as the Ontario South Director Rod actually contacted me looking for my thoughts on what I thought was wrong with RAC, and I sent him a long email in return.....which turned into quite the exchange of emails. 

To be honest I had high hopes that finally, somebody with high ethical standards, actual proven leadership skills, and somebody who actually gave a crap about what happened to hams in Canada was going to be on the RAC Executive.  I don't blame Rod for packing it in, I think we can all understand the level of intense frustration he must have been going through.

Anyway, let's have a look at his Blog article:                 

I'm hearing rumbling from Ontario Hams about a desire to form (reform) an Ontario Amateur Radio Society.

Imagine a unified annual membership, initiated at the club level, that would fund the Club, The Ontario Society and RAC.

Each level is funded for services it provides, with clear division of responsibility. Members choose to belong to a Club and elect an executive, Clubs belong to a Provincial Society and elect an executive, and the Provincial Society chooses to belong to RAC and appoint Provincial Directors. It's a bottom up structure and the financial flow ensures a Servant-Leader approach. If RAC fails to serve the provinces they may not get funded!

It is an interesting "inversion" of President Bawden's recent TCA message regarding ARES, pushing responsibility for ARES leadership down to the regions, effectively "outsourcing" the problems associated with lack of national leadership in Field Services.  Instead of outsourcing a problem down, the Clubs and Provinces would hold RAC accountable, or we will find a more responsive National Society to spend out dollars with. 

Imagine that, People that pay the fees being treated as customers instead of a tax base!

I think there may be some sound thinking behind this - at a minimum it is worth looking into. The numbers certainly tell a supporting story. Ontario has a significant percentage of Canada's Amateurs and is underrepresented on the RAC board. 
This might just be the method to shake up the status quo at RAC and force the Executive to be responsive to the needs of Ontario Amateurs. 

I think it's worth a look. 

I agree, it most certainly is worth looking at, especially if it is going to hold RAC totally accountable for it's actions.....................where do I send my membership fee???

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