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All set up for Field Day 2026!

Our March In-Person membership meeting will be held on March 25 (2026) at 7PM. This month we will be meeting at the Cross Plains Fire Department, 1501 Bourbon Rd, Cross Plains, WI 53528, which has an Amateur Station. Steve, KC9FKV will introduce us to the station at the fire department and in addition to checking out that station, Kyle, KC9SDK our Wisconsin ARES State Emergency Coordinator will be on hand to tell us what is happening at a state level and answer any questions we might have.

We will NOT be meeting at the Dane County EOC this month.

As usual we will be sending out a reminder with virtual connection information for anyone who is unable to join us in person. You can expect that information about a week before the meeting.

To make room for families and celebration Dane/Iowa county ARES/RACES will have NO in-person meetings November or December of 2025. We will however conduct our normal Net Meeting at 8:00 PM on those Wednesdays as usual.

October 29, 2025,  7:00 PM is our next in person meeting of the Dane/Iowa County ARES/RACES team. There will be no Net Meeting on that night. We’ll be meeting at the Dane County Emergency Operations center at 2982 Kapec Rd, Fitchburg, WI 53719. For those who cannot be there in person we will have a virtual connection to the meeting. 

We’ll have a couple agenda items. I have a slide deck that was used for October ARES/RACES Training in the State entitled Volunteerism: What Do Clients Expect from us? I’d like to walk through it and get feedback from the team.  We will also review what 2025 looked like and lessons learned as well as start to get ready for 2026

The virtual connection information for those who can’t be there in person was sent to team members in an email. If you did not receive that information please send an email to kb9orn@gmail.com.

Starting at 1:00 pm on Oct 4, 2025 Dane/Iowa County ARES/RACES will testing a subset of our activations frequencies, including using the stations at the EOC, Hospitals and operators at home or mobile. For an overview of how the net will be conducted, a list of frequencies (ICS205), the Net Script and to view the log see the links below.

• Overview of how the net will be conducted: https://fillian.net/2025setoverview
• Net frequencies (ICS205): https://fillian.net/2025setfreq
• Net Script: https://fillian.net/2025setscript
• Net log: https://fillian.net/2025setlog (this only includes the MARA15 log – I’ll correct this soon)
• Map of Contacts: https://fillian.net/2025setmap

Hey there Communicators!

3 things for June 2025

1. There will be NO in person meeting on June 25. We will hold our regular 8:00 PM net meeting on the MARA “15”
2. Instead of meeting at the Dane County Emergency Operations Center, you are strongly encouraged to at least visit and participate in ARRL Field Day being organized by the Four Lakes Amateur Radio Club. Field day will be held at Badger Prairie County Park in Verona. Every year on the last full weekend of June hams around the country take to the parks and fields and wilderness and set up their equipment disconnected from commercial power and make as many contacts as possible. While doing a bike event in the Driftless also challenges us to set up in unfamiliar places, another opportunity that coming to field day affords is the operating modes that you may not normally be able to. A technician or someone otherwise limited by space can operate on HF and watch and try out digital modes. For more information take a look at the FLARC website: https://w9jz.org/field-day/arrl-field-day-2025/
3. We are planning to have a few different ARES net meetings during field day. This is still in planning. Different frequencies, repeaters and some simplex. You will hear more about scheduling soon.

Jeff, K9UNZ

Well, after a weekend back in the stone age my internet service is back today!

We are meeting in person this week on Wednesday, 9/25 @ 7PM at the Dane County EOC at 2982 Kapec Rd, Fitchburg, WI 53719

In various ways over the last few months I’ve been answering questions about “Getting Started.” I realize I need to update that information on our website for new and old alike. I’d like to start that update at this week’s meeting. There are some new things to take note of and some reminders of things that have been out there for a while. 

For those unable to join us in person you can use the Google Meet virtual space. (Google Meet information went out in an email to Hams in the area, If you did not receive the email please send a request with your Call Sign to KB9ORN@gmail.com

Please also note that due to scheduling conflicts and holidays this will be our last in-person meeting for 2024. However the Net meetings at 8PM every Wednesday will continue as usual.

We are all on Summer Break. We won’t be meeting in person on August 28, 2024. We will hold the Net Meeting at our usual time.