Roles – District Emergency Coordinator (DEC)

ARRL Field Organization

The ARRL District Emergency Coordinator (DEC) is appointed by the Section Emergency Coordinator (REC) to supervise the efforts of local Emergency Coordinators in the defined district. The DEC’s duties involve the following:

  1. Coordinate the training, organization, and emergency participation of Emergency Coordinators in your district of jurisdiction.
  2. Make local decisions in the absence of the REC or through coordination with the REC, concerning the allotment of available amateurs and equipment during an emergency.
  3. Coordinate the interrelationship between local emergency plans and between communications networks within your area of jurisdiction.
  4. Act as backup for local areas without an Emergency Coordinator and assist in maintaining contact with governmental and other agencies within your area of jurisdiction.
  5. Provide direction in the routing and handling of emergency communications of either a formal or tactical nature, with specific emphasis being placed on Welfare traffic.
  6. Recommend EC appointments to the REC.
  7. Coordinate the reporting and documenting of ARES activities in your district of jurisdiction.
  8. Act as a model emergency communicator as evidenced by dedication to purpose, reliability, and understanding of emergency communications.
  9. Be fully conversant in National Traffic System routing and procedures as well as have a thorough understanding of the locale and role of all vital governmental and volunteer agencies that could be involved in an emergency.
  10. District Emergency Coordinators are encouraged to earn certification from the ARRL “Intro to EmComm, EC-001” Course (See ARRL for details)
  11. All ARES Oklahoma officers are also expected to complete ICS-700.A, ICS-100.B, ICS-200.B, and ICS-800.B FEMA training. All existing ARES members must complete this training before 12/1/2007. All new applicants have one year from the time of application to become part of ARES Oklahoma to complete this training.

Recruitment of new hams and League members is an integral part of the job of every League appointee. Appointees should take advantage of every opportunity to recruit a new ham or member to foster growth of Field Organization programs, and our abilities to serve the public.

Requirements: Full ARRL membership; FCC Technician class amateur radio license or higher.

ARES Oklahoma Additions

In addition to the roles and responsibilities listed above, ARES Oklahoma has outlined the following additional roles associated to all officers.

  • You are responsible for training someone who can fill in for you if you are unable to participate. As an example, if you are a REC, DEC, or EC one of your assistants should be designated as your potential replacement.
  • You must go to aresok.org/join and apply to be a part of the section. This adds your name to the list that local incident commanders use in trying to find ARES members for emergencies. Additionally, if you are joining as an AEC or above, this is the website that has all of the tools you’ll need to participate within the section reporting structure. This associates your call sign with ARES at the local section level.
  • If you are applying to be an officer within ARES Oklahoma, you must fill out our personal information release form and mail it to the current SEC. This gives ARES Oklahoma the legal coverage deemed necessary for liability issues regarding the website.
  • All ARES Oklahoma officers must join the “aresoklahoma” Yahoo! Group atgroups.yahoo.com/group/aresoklahoma (then click on the big blue “Join This Group!” button at the top right). This is how we broadcast all section events, information, etc. that is of a timely or critical nature. All ARES Oklahoma volunteers are encouraged to join this group also.
  • If you are an EC, a DEC, or a REC, you must also download a copy of the ARES Oklahoma Section Plan and, using it as a template, edit the section(s) starting on page 14 that apply to your position within the organization. These should be emailed to the ASEC Chief of Staff for review. Once approved, it should be passed along up the chain of command (ie. EC’s edit their information into the EC section on page 15 and mail it to their DEC; their DEC would collect all of the EC’s sections mailed to them, and insert it into their own approved copy of this plan and after adding their own information and mail that to the ASEC Chief of Staff. Once approved, they would then mail it to their REC; and so on). This gives uniformity to all of the operations of ARES in Oklahoma, as the bulk of data for the rules, etc., will be maintained as STANDARD across the section. The finished document, with all EC, DEC, and REC additions, will be the definitive statement of ARES in Oklahoma. Looking through it, any incident commander working on any disaster within the state will have all the information needed to find the ARES members in the section.
  • Once per quarter, all ARES Oklahoma members should validate all of their contact information on both the ARES Oklahoma website as well as the national ARRL website.