The April COOKEN meeting was held at our regular meeting place at the Warner Library on COTC campus.  The meeting was called to order by president Mike Mickelson at 12:00 noon.

Those present were: W5UHQ,WB8YOK ( new member Tom), W8NM, W8ATA, K8EM, N8DFQ, AC8GI, KD8KXK, WD8JLP, WE8V, KD8TNS, KD8TNR, WD8BBE, and K8NQ.

The Treasurer reported 30 active members including our newest member Tom Eckleberry and $482.54 in our treasury as of that date.

A motion was moved,seconded and approved by aclamation to book the Four Church Farm for field day again this year.  Eldon will make the reservations and make out a check for $200 to cover our

club donation for last year ( which we forgot to submit) and for this year.  ( Secretary's note:  The farm is confirmed for June 21, 22, and 23 , 2013  and check has been submitted )

Alan Rothweiler noted that we should have a tax ID for our club in order to keep our bank account audit proof.  Alan will also look into various options the club should take to preserve our tax exempt status including establishing the proper 503 (x) status which is appropriate for a club our size with limited financial activity.  He will report back to club on various options next meeting.

The May meeting will be held as usual and it being the last regular meeting of the fiscal year, will be focused to get a slate of officers for next year and finalize plans for Field Day and the VHF contest operations.

Everyone agreed that the June meeting will likely be pre-empted for Field Day in June except that we may need  to have a vote during a QRX break to hold the yearly election if we can muster a quorum.  If not we can alway do that by email with the change we made to constitution last year.

Bob Ekk reported on recent contest activities.  The Cooken contest group has been very active this year and has racked up some fabulous totals.  See Bob's reports elsewhere on KeepandShare. Cooken does plan to get on 6 and 2 meters during the VHF contest in June.  The location will likely be AC8GX location.  Bob also mentioned that the contesters will likely be going to Dillon State Park this year for OSPOTA in September.  He has checked on cabin reservations but has not committed yet.  This needs to be decided at next meeting to insure we have a plan.

Weldon Mathews, our EC,  thanked several members for their support of the Central Ohio Trauma System (COTS) drill on April 12.  Several ARES and CERT members helped establish back up communication during the drill.  Weldon reported that LMH was the only regional hospital that activated the back up VHF-FM  support into Columbus.  We also were able to communicate better both inside the hospital and outgoing using the newly installed filters which were tried out for the first time with other traffic going on.  Good going teams. 

Weldon Mathews also briefed us on several upcoming ARES events.  Those included The Tour de Cure on  June  8-9 ( same day as ARRL VHF contest) , and ARRL Field Day on June 22-23. He stated that Ohio SEC has requested that the digital nets be activated this year during Field Day if for no other reason than to relay County participation Messages to SEC and SCM.  This means we need to get our 80 meter radio set up for FLDIGI as part of Field Day.   He also reported that the Health Dept representative ( of Licking County Emergency Planning Group ) had inquired about using ARES to provide their teams with back up communications.  Weldon will be looking for volunteers that could be available for that and get trained for their specific mission and communication needs.  One example may be mass distribution of special vacines to local sites in an emergency. He also reminded everyone to keep pecking away at the NIMS on line courses.  Just go to http://www.licking-ares.org/Training.htm    and get started.

There was also some discussion about conducting our yearly free VE session in July.  We have two general upgrades interested as well as at least one new Technician candidate.  More details need to be worked out for that July event including appointing a lead VE.

The business meeting adjourned at  1:00 PM and followed with a Powerpoint Presentation by KD8DZ on Ham Station lighting protection and grounding systems. Mike will be posting his excellent briefing on KeepandShare.