There was significant sentiment on the committee for modifying the existing area rules but none of the suggestions received sufficient consensus to recommend a specific change.

Meeting Attendance Criteria

Submission of Scores to Multiple Clubs

Approximately half of the committee felt that some form of percentage allocation was desirable and the remainder felt that no score splitting or sharing was appropriate.

Due to the nature of this study and the polling process used, there were few proposed rule changes that received an endorsement by a majority of the committee. It is suggested that the MSC review not only the polling results but the summary of the dialog provided by the committee on each of the rule change concepts. Details of the final poll on all of the proposed rule change concepts are provided in Section 5 of this report.

4 Study Background

This study was performed as a task submitted to the CAC on 1 October 2000.

Origins of the Problems

Club competition is available for ARRL--affiliated clubs in the following contests:

ARRL Division Directors have received complaints over the years about several aspects of the club competition that are provided within the rules of these six ARRL-sponsored contests. The complaints are predominantly a result of incongruities between club definition criteria and geography in certain areas of the country. In addition, given the circumstances of amateurs in modern times, the ability to attend club meetings in the traditional sense may require some alternate definition in order to provide the ability for members to participate in club competitions without undue constraints on their current location.

CAC Tasking

At the July 2000 ARRL Board meeting, the MSC asked the Membership Service Department to frame a study of the club competition rules. The MSC asked for a review that would include, as a minimum, the club competition study eligibility criteria and club competition categories. In addition, the topic of the purpose of club competition was to be reviewed while undertaking this study.

The framework of this study was provided by the MSC. The study was to be conducted in two phases. The first phase was to identify important issues and gather information, ideas and suggestions from the general contest community. The results of the first phase of this study was collected and submitted in the interim report submitted on 25 June 2001. In that report, the three main topics for the second phase of the study were documented.

The second phase of this study consisted of MSC review followed by by the CAC of the three primary areas identified by the committee in the first phase. The CAC completed the study by conducting a poll on all identified rule changes.

Using the information in this report and other resources, the MSC is expected to produce a set of possible changes to the club competition for further discussion and vote by the CAC. As in all membership services related to contests, the MSC will use the CAC vote to assist in any decisions to change rules for the ARRL contests providing club competition.

CAC Study Project Organization and Study Approach

Given the breadth of this study project, the CAC initially elected to break this study into three parts. The motivation for breaking the study into the three parts was to provide focus in this study. The three parts are:

1) Study the purposes of including Club Competition in ARRL Contests,

2) Study the Club Eligibility for submitting scores in ARRL Contests, and

3) Study the Club Category definitions.

Three sub-committees were formed to individually address each of the parts of this study. The results of these three committees were collected into this report and used as the basis for subsequent discussion on the rules for the ARRL Club Competition.

4.1 Club Competition Purpose Discussion

4.1.1 Initial Comments Received

Club competition is already a significant part of ARRL contest activity. Club competition promotes the friendly interaction between amateurs on a local and national level. Club competition is an added stimulus to contest participation. It enables a contest participant to enjoy a modest start in contesting. Applied correctly it may boost club meeting attendance and broaden involvement in club functions. Club contesting with a local club is quite often the first step to more serious contest activity and thence to affiliation with a major "contest" club. Local constraints to contesting by individual stations (e.g. antenna/tower restrictions, RFI, etc.) probably increase interest in local club activities.

There is evidence that a large segment of the amateur population is neither interested in club competition nor cognizant of what is involved. Field Day seems the main activity associated with "contesting". Interest in scores is minimal. The answer most frequently given by the general ham population to the question, "Is the club competition something you care about?" is "No!" or "What?".

The purpose of club competition should encompass not only the top tier of contest-specific clubs but also those clubs whose focus is on other aspects such as repeaters, AMSAT, public service, etc. Simply put the "purpose" is to promote and publicize ARRL contests. "The purpose of the Affiliated Club Competition is to encourage activity in ARRL contests by promoting competition between ARRL clubs. This competition between clubs may serve to foster a team spirit between club members, and improve their operating skills through their on-the-air activity. It may also serve to encourage the formation of radio clubs specifically for contest operators."

4.1.2 Additional Comments

A poll of various clubs will give the following results:

a) A "specialty" club with a narrow focus will say there is no merit in an Affiliated Club Competition.

b) A "general interest" club will respond "yeah, its OK" if any of it has any members that are contesters, otherwise the answer will be "what's a contest?".

c) The "contest" clubs will respond mightily and with enthusiasm in the affirmative.

An Affiliated Club Competition exists at the desire of the ARRL, to promote activity in its own contests. This activity serves to benefit the ARRL in two ways: first, the league is providing a service to its members, and second, the participation numbers can be used to justify or refute certain political issues affecting Amateur Radio.

There is little, if any, interest among local club members regarding this issue. Indeed, many, if not most, do not really and truly understand the concept of an "Affiliated Club". The concept or knowledge of "who won?" is also foreign to many/most of them. Since they know or believe "they" will never win or score well, their interest lags or dissipates immediately after that weekend. At one CAC member's local club meeting, no one knew what scores were in December's QST, for instance.

There is one aspect of "purpose" which could affect the overall structure of the discussion. There has been circulated the suggestion of "team" competition rather than "club" competition. The subjects of "teams" rather than "clubs" is offered up using the Sprint and NAQPs as examples. With teams, there are no club size or meeting requirements to be met - simply gather up a full team of ops and operate.

The "Purpose" sub-committee's contribution to this CAC project illuminates the difference between a "team" and a "club". A team is a short-lived entity with no real life span. As such, it provides no benefit to anyone outside of the one event for which it was created. There is little fostering of camaraderie, or sharing of contest experience, other than during the time between when the team is formed and the specific contest. Probably the teams will be formed from the best operators that are available, leaving the less-experienced or lesser-equipped stations out in the cold. The Sprint and NAQP teams tend to illustrate this fact clearly. In addition focusing on "team competition" rather than "club competition" could foster the dissolution of many contest clubs. The CAC's general opinion is that team competition was not judged to encourage or support club activity and was not recommended for consideration in any suggested changes to the club competition rules.

4.2 Club Competition Eligibility Criteria Discussions

This report also considers the topic of "club eligibility", namely what clubs can compete in these categories, what their membership and/or number of entries can comprise of, where members live, etc.

Currently there are three categories of club competition in ARRL contests; "Unlimited", "Medium Club", and "Local Club" category. An entrant may only submit his/her score to benefit one club, and there is no "splitting" of score credit for members of a multi-operator team as is allowed in most CQ Magazine-sponsored competitions. The unlimited and medium are identical in that they both allow for club entries from within a circle whose radius is 175 statute miles of the club's center. In addition, club members in these categories must attend at least two meetings per year to be eligible to submit an entry. The difference is that an "unlimited" entry has no limit to the number of entries for the contest; a "medium" club is limited to 50 entries. It makes no difference the actual size of the club; it only depends on how many entries there are in a contest. Indeed, many times one club may compete in one contest as an "unlimited" entrant and in other contests as a "medium" entrant. The club isn't supposed to limit the number of entries that the membership submits to manipulate it into a medium entrant status, but that rule is basically unenforceable.

The local club category has many different facets. For one, entries must be from members who reside AND operate from within a circle whose radius is 35 statute miles of the club's center. (Except for the DX contest, where DX-peditions are allowed, but the member must still reside within that circle normally.) In addition, there may only be ten entries in a given contest, and once again the club is not allowed to tell which members are to submit scores or otherwise manipulate entries to stay within that category. And, oddly enough, there is NO meeting attendance requirement for local clubs; members need never attend a meeting to be eligible to submit scores on behalf of that club.

There has been occasional tinkering of the rules in the past with regard to club competition. Originally there was only a single operator category. Then, after many years, the "unlimited", "medium" and "local" categories were added in a club competition. At first the "local" category was defined with a club radius of 20 miles; this was expanded a couple years ago to its present value of 35 miles. Otherwise little has changed in these definitions.

When the inquiry went out to the contest community about this study, many different opinions were voiced. In general, people seem satisfied with the concept. Some suggested that a club shouldn't have to be affiliated to compete; others felt strongly that affiliation was a "must". There were many suggestions with regard to better defining a "medium" club rather than having it retain its current "little unlimited club" status. And many different clubs and individuals suggested that an entrant should be able to submit their score for both a local club and either an unlimited or a medium club. This document will look at many issues raised by commenters and make recommendations on changes to be considered for implementation by the League.

4.2.1 Club Type

There were a number of suggestions on new types of clubs to add. The main thrust seemed to be to add some sort of club that didn't have boundaries to allow for some sort of "team contesting" entry. But there was no consensus of opinion on this subject. Also, while some suggested that ARRL club affiliation should not be a requirement for club participation, there were no convincing arguments made. It is recognized that the ARRL club competition portion of contests is one of many aspects of the League's affiliated club program. It does not seem like a major burden to require a club to be affiliated to participate. The only possible exception to that was with regard to foreign club competition in contests. Given the nature of the League being a US membership organization, limiting club competition to clubs within the boundaries of the League's field area seems reasonable.

4.2.2 Club Boundaries

Many suggestions were received on how to "tweak" the current club boundary requirements. The only truly convincing argument was related to those areas of the country where a 175-mile radius circle does not allow for the local geographic attributes. The "Local Club" boundaries were recently increased to a 35-mile radius circle, and that seems appropriate. Many innovative suggestions were received on this subject. They included: defining the club's area as EITHER the 175-mile radius circle OR some combination of ARRL Section boundaries, such as:

The boundary issue does have some logic behind it. States like Tennessee and Florida have contest organizations that currently cannot compete due to the shape of the state or the proximity of water. Changing this to a state-boundary, Division-boundary, or flexible shape structure would certainly fix that. HOWEVER, it would also truly change the nature of club competition if, for example, clubs in the entire State of California could band together and potentially dominate a category. Also, divisional boundaries have similar problems.

The notion of a flexible-shaped club area which contains the equivalent area of a 175-mile-inscribed circle is indeed innovative, but may create difficulty in resolving challenges to geographical criteria. Using circles as definitions only requires the calculation of the distance of a station from a point. The use of most other geometrical shapes as the definition of a club area will require the use of spherical geometry to confirm that a station is or is not in a club area.

It was also noted in deliberations that the actual "club center" is never really required to be disclosed, and that it may change at any time. This seems like a loophole that should be closed. Some comments were received which posed the thought that coordinate-determination calculations were an onerous requirement. This seems not the case; many amateurs can learn their latitude/longitude from such online services as QRZ.COM, which calculates them based on the mailing address. In addition, GPS receivers are becoming more and more ubiquitous and easier to use.

4.2.3 Club Submissions

Current rules do not specifically state that a participant may not submit scores for more than one club for the basis of club competition; however, the contest branch has interpreted the rules to only allow for scores to be submitted for one club. Several clubs (NCCC, PVRC, MWA, REDXA, RCC) have requested that a participant be allowed to submit a score for EITHER a "Medium" or an "Unlimited" club AND a "Local Club". The argument here was that many participants are members of both a local amateur club as well as a regional organization, and to require that member to select which club for which they desire to submit their score can create undue hardship and animosity. Only one club (HVCDX) came out opposed to this suggestion.

4.2.4 Score Allocation

Current rules require that, in a multi-operator configuration, 2/3 of the operators be members of a club to allow for that score to be counted for that club. Currently, there is no "splitting" of the score between clubs depending on who is a member of which organization. This issue is discussed further in Section 6.

4.2.5 Station Owner

Current rules require that both the operator AND owner of a station be members of a club (with the exception of DX-peditions) in order for that score to count for the club. It has been argued that this harms some clubs in that many operators without stations are put "off the air" as station owners in the area have no desire to join a contest club. On the other hand, it has been noted that this is a good requirement to have, that it keeps entries legitimate and promotes club membership. With the advent of club calls, this area has become somewhat gray. In addition, some operators have made their mailing address the same as the station owner's to get around this rule. In essence, it seems like this rule is unenforceable and should be deleted.

4.2.6 DXpedition Entries

Current rules allow for a participant in a "DX-pedition" who belongs to any affiliated club (unlimited, medium, local) to submit their score for that club only in the ARRL DX contest. It was suggested by some that this was an unfair rule with regards to local clubs. It was also suggested that DX-peditions be allowed for ANY contest, and not just the DX contest. It was argued that opening DX-peditions to all contests would promote activity and travel, thus enhancing contest participation.

The notion of limiting a local club's membership from participating in a DX-pedition runs counter to the notion of club competition enhancing contest activity. Also, allowing expedition for all contests seems to push towards more activity as well.

4.2.7 Meeting Attendance Requirements

Current rules for "medium" and "unlimited" clubs require a member to attend at least two "meetings" per year; "local" clubs do not have a "meeting" attendance rule. The word meeting is in quotes since it isn't really defined what a "meeting" consists of. Does it have to be a meeting intended for the entire membership, or a "chapter meeting"? How is a "meeting" determined to be a "meeting"? Does it have to be publicized in advance or does the chance encounter of some hams at a hamfest count as a "meeting"?

This is a delicate subject in which to navigate. On the one hand, it is proper to require members to attend meetings of their club to ensure that clubs are in fact bona fide and to weed out "paper clubs". On the other hand, to require the submission of meeting notices, attendance rolls, etc., to the contest branch seems like a workload with questionable payback.

4.2 Club Category Definition Discussions

From discussion on the CAC reflector and comments received from members, concerns about eligibility are primarily focused on the requirements for club membership and the rules for submission of multi-op and guest-op scores. Concerns about definitions centered on the rules for club areas.

4.3.1 Eligibility

Club Membership

Membership at all club meetings - nationwide - is trending downward. The amateur population is not as club-centered as has been the case in the past. While, for the Local club category, the meeting attendance requirements are easily met, the Medium and Unlimited categories, with their much larger areas, have a more difficult time getting the necessary attendance. This either reduces membership, or forces the club to have many small meetings in order to meet the requirement. The latter was not the intent of the original rule.

Any changes we make should be done with the expected effect of encouraging club members to get on the air. We should also always be sure that the little pistol and medium guns are encouraged to participate. Consider that in many general-purpose clubs, a sizable fraction of the members have never even been on HF. The existing rules have grown from the need to regulate behavior. We find ourselves in a climate where we need to encourage activity, not limit it. Any reduction in the necessary paperwork is also to be encouraged.

The following options have been suggested:

a) Retain the existing attendance requirement (8.4.1.4)

b) Delete the 2 meetings/year attendance requirement

c) Reduce the requirement to 1 meeting/year

d) Change the requirement to "member in good standing" without an attendance requirement

Score Submission

The multi-op and guest-op rules are discouraging score submission for clubs which has a negative impact on contest participation. The following suggestions were made for specific rule changes:

8.5.1 - Both guest-op and station owner must be members of the same club to submit a score for the club.

Suggestion is to delete the rule.

8.5.2 - At multioperator stations, at least 66% of the operators must be members of the same club for the score to count for that club.

Suggestion is for straight pro-rating to the club scores on the basis of fractional operator representation.

8.6.2 - For multioperator stations, the score counts for only one club and at least 66% of the operators must be members of that club and meet all other criteria.

Suggestion is for straight pro-rating on the basis of fractional operator representation.

4.3.2 Definitions

Club Areas

Currently, there are three categories, with radii of 20 (Local) and 175 (Medium, Unlimited) miles for eligibility. There was little concern about the Local category, but the 175-mile rule for the two larger clubs was acknowledged as insufficient to be suitable nationwide. Unfortunately, there is no simple replacement. After extensive discussion the following suggestions were made:

a) No change to any category

b) Mileage-based, leaving "Local" unchanged

Either a 175-mile radius circle or a rectangle with a minimum length-to-width ratio (aspect ratio) of 4:1. Clubs submit once per year what area they are claiming, including center or corner locations.

c) ARRL Section-based

Small - up to 10 entries from any four contiguous ARRL sections
Med - up to 50 entries from any four contiguous ARRL sections
Large - up to 50 entries from any ten contiguous ARRL sections
Unlimited - no limits on size

d) Redefined purely in terms of number of submissions

Small - up to 10 entries

Medium - up to 50 entries

Unlimited - any number of entries

The recommended option is (b), but (c) and (d) are very interesting and address the issue of population density raised by contesters west of the Mississippi.

4.3.3 General Discussion

There was nearly unanimous agreement that clubs in general felt that the Affiliated Club Competition was a very low priority with most clubs as exhibited by the very low number of comments received by the CAC representatives. To that end, the following commentary from the CAC reflector by the reps is included in the report:

"Recognize [the club scores] and publish the results of their efforts. Given the minuscule notice in the write-ups, club competition gets essentially zero notice, except for the four or five big East Coast clubs. I suggest putting detailed club scoring information on the ARRL web site, particularly stories about club rivalries and challenges, even at the Small or Local level. There are number of long-time traditional challenges between clubs that would be fun to hear about and maybe even spark some interest in challenges by clubs that don't currently participate."

"As to clubs themselves, the perks or payoffs seem more difficult to realize. Simply put, there's little advantage to being an Affiliated Club. I have a rather large (200 members) radio club & an informal Q&A lead me to believe fully 2/3 of its members know nothing of affiliation, to say nothing of its pros/cons, advantages, etc. Indeed, they know nothing beyond the club itself-the officers know little more & pass hardly anything on to the membership."

"Here is my answer to the ARRL. If you drop the Affiliated Club Competition, then I predict there will be a significant drop in the number of ARRL Affiliated Clubs. Without an Affiliated Club competition there is little reason for a club to be Affiliated. I am the current president of [a club] (affiliated since 1971) and being affiliated provides no benefit to us that I can think of."

5 Detailed Final Results

5.1 Club Area Definitions

The committee identified nine potential rule changes related to Club Area Definitions that might have a benefit to the Club Competition. The proposed changes and the committee polling results on these possible changes are provided in Table 5.1-1, below.

Item #	Proposed Rule Change	Tally	Strongly against	Against	Neutral	Favor	Strongly Favor
1-1	Retain the 175-mile circle criteria and require that the center be located at the current definition of the club's center (essentially...do nothing).	Y=4 N=10	X
1-2	Retain the 175-mile circle criteria and permit the club to define a center for the circle to be other the club center.	Y=4 N=10	X
1-3	Revise the 175-mile circle criteria to be the set of counties (or parishes or local geo-political entities or grid squares) that are totally within or touched by a 175-mile circle located at the club's center.	Y=2 N=9	X
1-4	Add a second geometrical shape in addition to the 175-mile radius circle for an area that encompasses the location of eligible members in a club competition. A rectangle is suggested as a second area definition whose surface area is less than 250,000 square miles and has a height (H) to length (L) ratio that is bounded by the formula 0.25 > H/L > 4. Specific points of latitude and longitude define the rectangle corners (allow rectangle to "tilt").	Y=3 N=11	X
1-5	Add a second area definition in addition to the 175-mile radius circle for an area that encompasses the location of eligible members in a club competition. This second area might include: * An entire ARRL Section, or * Up to four contiguous ARRL Sections.	Y=2 N=12	X
1-6	Revise the the club area (for unlimited and medium) to be defined as any "convex" region equal in area to a circle of 175 mile radius. (Convex means you can draw a straight line from any point in the region to any other point in the region without crossing the region boundary)	Y=2 N=12	X
1-7	Revise the club competition rules to use as the center of the 175 mile circle the location specifically defined by the Club in it's affiliation papers with the ARRL (to prevent tweaking it over time).	Y=6 N=8			X
1-8	Revise the the club area to a rectangle with the aspect ratio to 3:5 and including the "any county/parish touched" rule for all areas	Y=0 N=14	X
1-9	Revise the club area to an "area" or other definition of a club territory that is flexible with standards that could be "adjusted" to various geographic areas (e.g. use whole states for less populated areas and circles or boxes for more populated areas).	Y=6 N=8			X

Table 5.1-1 Rule Change Proposals Related to Club Area Definition

Comments provided by CAC members in support of their preference on the leading two proposals for rule changes related to Club Area Definitions:

Proposed rule change 1-7:
Revise the club competition rules to use as the center of the 175 mile circle the location specifically defined by the Club in it's affiliation papers with the ARRL (to prevent tweaking it over time).
Comments in favor	Comments against
"If we allow them to change one time per year." K9IG	"Nothing wrong with tweaking annually as membership changes." W5ASP
"As long as the rules of affiliation allow clubs to move their official center once a year, this works for me." K2UA	"Let them tweak it once a year in the regular affiliation filing. There is no additional burden on HQ beyond the current requirements." N0AX
"Currently, *no one* at HQ keeps track of this information. Asking for it annually in the club's report isn't that much work, no club that wants to compete would 'de-affiliate' because of this rule...unless they were cheating before!" N6IG	"I did get feedback on this. But I see nothing wrong with a club's choosing its own 'geographic center.' Most organizations do not have a clubhouse or station location. Rather, they exist to "serve" a group of people, who all come from 'elsewhere' anyway. So I'm voting against the feedback." K4ZA
	"Too restrictive. Clubs might need to change this information. I would hate for clubs to de-affiliate for any reason related to contesting." AA7A

Proposed rule change 1-9:
Revise the the club area to an "area" or other definition of a club territory that is flexible with standards that would be "adjusted" to varying geographic areas (e.g use whole states for less populated areas and circles or boxes for more populated areas).
Comments in favor	Comments against
"The wording I suggest here would be to allow the inclusion of an entire state's area ONLY IF the state has three or fewer ARRL sections. The club area may encompass the 175-mile radius circle, or A single ARRL section, or A state comprising no more than three ARRL sections. That would allow FL, PA, NY, TX, and WA clubs to form state-wide clubs without opening the gate to CA-sized clubs. Politically, I think a No-Cal/So-Cal club is about as likely to be formed as a Libertarian-Socialist Party ticket, but we should consider the possibility. This is a simple wording that will satisfy all known problems, requires no adidtional work at HQ, and can be easily understood by the clubs." N0AX	"Next thing will be be a 3-dimensional spatial concept." W5ASP
"I'm in favor of the amended version of this proposal, as presented in CAC-I:445 by N0AX." K1HT
"I like the flexible idea. Offer the circle as the basic definition of a club area with a few other options that are clearly defined in a set of simple criteria. Let clubs decide how to define their area. No losers in this approach." AA7A
"The concept of this is quite attractive. But I would suggest that it could work only if the choices are simple and equitable across the range of all clubs affected by this competition. I submit that we have struggled with this problem for several months and have not converged on anything like this, so I'm not sure what we'd actually propose to HQ. There seems to be no simple-to-administer, unambiguous, 'straightforward enough' method of handling this that will satisfy those who have asked for a change." K2UA
"I like this, but am concerned; if we figure that clubs and HQ can't figure out the figure proposed in 1-4 and 1-6, how would this 'flexible definition' work either? Seems like HQ would get quite confused over time..." N6IG

5.2 Modification of Meeting Attendance Criteria

The committee identified two potential rule changes related to Meeting Attendance Criteria that might have a benefit to the Club Competition. The proposed changes and the committee polling results on these possible changes are provided in Table 10.2-1, below.

Item #	Proposed Rule Change	Tally	Strongly against	Against	Neutral	Favor	Strongly Favor
2-1	Reduce the minimum requirement for membership eligibility for the club competition to be the attendance of one (reduced from two) meeting per year.	Y=5 N=9		X
2-2	Revise the minimum requirement for membership eligibility for the club competition to be a member in "good standing" ( i.e. pays dues, submits contest scores within the past year, etc).	Y=11 N=3					X

Table 5.2-1 Rule Change Proposals Related to Meeting Attendance Criteria

Comments provided by CAC members in support of their preference on the leading proposal for rule changes related to Meeting Attendance Criteria:

Proposed rule change 2-2:
Revise the minimum requirement for membership eligibility for the club competition to be a member in "good standing" ( i.e. pays dues, submits contest scores within the past year, etc).
Comments in favor	Comments against
"Abandon the charade of being a 'club member.' Accept the fact the purpose is to put together competitive 'teams' to win. Leave it up to the Club to set the 'good standing' criteria. Make it a simple 'Sign Up' process if the Club is willing. Does anyone really care other than the Super Clubs?" W5ASP	"Unless we set criteria for what a 'member in good standing' is, this is no requirement at all. The club competition is going to mirror CQ's by the time we're done." K8CC
"How about 'pays dues, submits contest scores within the past year, or attends 2 meetings per year.' K0RX
Member in good standing' is defined by the club. There is a tremendous amount of variation in club rules - some have dues, some don't, some require specific participation, some don't, etc. If we put a restriction on what 'good standing' means, then it will require that HQ be able to verify it and I don't think that's in scope for them." N0AX
"This definition should be unique to each & every club/organization. Variations rule the day. Only important requirement to me would be that it exists-on paper, if you will-such that each club can follow it or dictate what's relevant to individual members". K4ZA
"I would be willing to leave this up to the individual club. If standards differ greatly, I would expect competitive forces to produce some convergence." K1HT
"Whatever the club's bylaws define as a member in good standing is a member in good standing." K2UA

5 Allocation of scores to more than one club

The committee identified eight potential rule changes related to Submission of Scores to Multiple Clubs that might have a benefit to the Club Competition. The proposed changes and the committee polling results on these possible changes are provided in Table 10.3-1, below.

Item #	Proposed Rule Change	Tally	Strongly against	Against	Neutral	Favor	Strongly Favor
3-1	An individual operator's score can be submitted to an unlimited club's score and a medium club's score.	Y = 4 N = 7		X
3-2	An individual operator's score can be submitted to a local club's score and either a medium or unlimited club's score.	Y = 6 N = 5			X
3-3	An individual operator's score can be submitted to any two clubs that are not in the same category.	Y = 6 N = 6			X
3-4	An individual operator's score can be submitted to any two clubs in which they are a member in good standing.	Y = 4 N = 7		X
3-5	If an individual operator's score can be submitted to more than one club, in what manner should the individual's score be applied to the two club's score? option A - Full individual operator's score submitted to both club's score option B - Score split evenly between the two club's score option C - Individual operator may allocate the percentage of their score between the two clubs	A = 4 B = 5 1/2 C = 1/2
3-6	Require that any local club involved in the dual submission be in existence for 5 years minimum (the idea being that creating a paper local club for the sole purpose of stealing a win from "legitimate" local clubs becomes a very large investment in time & trouble). Note: All existing local clubs would be grand fathered in.	Y = 6 N = 5			X
3-7	Require that a local club provide evidence of some other substantial club activity besides submission of contest scores in club competition (another paper club deterrent).	Y = 3 N = 8	X
3-8	Should the club competition rules be changed to permit a limit of 2 (out of 10) scores from unlimited/medium counted a second time in a local club's submitted score?	Y=2 N=9	X

Table 5.3-1 Rule Change Proposals Related to Submission of Scores to Multiple Clubs

Opinions on this topic area are quite diverse on the CAC. In order to provide some background information, extracts from dialogue held on the CAC reflector related to this topic are provided below.

K2UA:

Club competition in ARRL contests, regardless of many of the details of implementation, must remain fair.

The idea of allowing a club member to submit a score that counts for two clubs appeals to many people, and for a lot of good reasons. It has the chance of allowing people like me, who belong to a local club in Rochester as well as a large club, the North Coast Contesters, to give some value to each club rather than having to choose one and alienate the other. In fact, some clubs have a requirement that you submit scores in specified events just to stay a member. The merit of this idea aside, allowing some kind of shared allocation of scores is an idea that merits our consideration. But if we blow the implementation, the damage will be much worse than if we'd just left things the way they are today.

If we allow an entrant's full score to be allocated to two clubs in the same event, we will blow the implementation. I can see no other valid way of looking at this. Here's why:

1) It would allow those local clubs in densely populated areas to dominate the local club competition (assuming the area requirements for local clubs don't change significantly from the way they are defined today), with zero negative impact on large clubs' aggregate scores.

2) It would force a large gap between the "richest" and the "poorest" local club scores by strongly tilting the local club competition in favor of the areas of the largest clubs, effectively cutting off any chance for a *legitimate* small club to be competitive in the local club competition.

3) Individuals would have to make no conscious strategy decision regarding what club for which to submit their scores. It's a no-brainer. If you belong to a local club and a bigger one, you simply always submit the full score to both clubs.

4) It will drive competitive, legitimate local clubs (and their members) from the ARRL club competition, and possibly League membership because of #1 and #2.

5) It encourages creation of paper clubs that add no value to the ARRL contest program, or increase participation in ARRL contests.

What's the upside? It lets you vote twice. To some people, this feels good. But it is not fair.

Suggested alternative: The only equitable (fair) way I can see to allow individual scores to be submitted to more than one club is to allow "an equal split" between any two clubs, in two different categories, of which a person is a member in good standing.

This would also create an excellent model for other contest sponsors to emulate when creating or revising their team competition rules.

Allowing double-submission is wishy-washy, as well as ignoring the Contest Branch's stated desire to minimize the paperwork burden that would be created by allowing individuals to double their scores.

To summarize:

Allow double submission.

N6IG:

I think an entrant into an ARRL contest with club competition should be allowed to submit his/her score for a Local Club AND EITHER a Medium OR an Unlimited Club.

My rationale for that all along has been that people often belong to a large regional organization as well as a local group. And often both of those organizations mount club entries in contest. I feel it does a disservice to competitors to force them to choose allegiances over and over again. To allow for this multiple submission should ease that animosity.

To allow for a 50/50 split of a score between two clubs does not fix this problem. It still creates an incentive for one club or the other to try and entice the member to submit 100% for them, to the detriment of the other organization. It should be 100% for both clubs.

One of the original proponents for a rule change like this was the Boiled Owls. But their proposal was to allow for submissions for BOTH a Medium AND an Unlimited. I suppose a compromise rule could be to choose to submit a score for clubs in two of the three entry categories. That would satisfy both requests, although I am not sure what the ramifications of that might be.

The potential downside of all this has purported to be the incentive to create many "paper clubs" that might water down the local club competition. To claim that would happen is to say one doesn't have faith in ARRL HQ's club affiliation process. And, if a club meets the requirements of the league and becomes affiliated, what is wrong with the creation of more clubs. That should equate to more interest in the contest and more fun for everyone.

K8CC:

I was prepared to write a dissertation on this subject, but I find myself in complete agreement with all of the facts and observations in Rus Healy's (K2UA) note. The overall consideration must be to keep the competition fair with a level playing field. With all of the talk within the contesting community about cultivating new contesters, I think we need to cultivate small and/or local clubs and our decision on this matter will affect this.

All of the arguments in favor of crediting a single score to two clubs seems self-serving to me. The Boiled Owls want Medium and Unlimited allowed - no surprise that they are a medium club existing in the shadow of Yankee Clipper. Redwood Empire wants Local and Unlimited, splitting with Northern Cal Contest Club. Everybody wants what benefits them, period.

And with apologies to Jim Pratt (N6IG), the statement that a 50/50 split "...still creates an incentive for one club or the other to try and entice the member to submit 100% for them, to the detriment of the other organization" is simply not relevent. This scenario could occur under the circumstances of ANY rule, split or no split, so it offers nothing to our discussion.

As Rus noted in his e-mail, my overwhelming concern with the dual allocation of scores is for artificial "local clubs" to arise and overwhelm the local club competition. It is just not that hard to create and maintain a local "paper" club. With everyone within 35 miles, and only needing five members to generate the maximum of ten scores, all it takes is four pizza parties a year and some paperwork to/from the ARRL to be a club.

I respect those who support this idea, but I see no merit in it. In my opinion, a few organizations will benefit to the detriment of others. I think the ARRL Affiliated Club Competition program is very important, and I believe dual crediting of scores will do it harm rather than good.

K1HT:

We seem to have a wide range of opinion on this issue. I, for example, have no problem with an operator "allocating" 100% of his/her score to a local club and 100% to an unlimited club (say). I have not reviewed all the e-mail related to this issue, but I did look again at the position that Rus K2UA took in CAC-I:340: "I have given this matter a lot of consideration, and in my opinion, there is no possible justification for allowing anyone to count their scores twice in the same contest." As Rus said, this is "where I get emphatic." So we have the poles of the argument represented at least. I have thought about this some (probably not as much as Rus), and I can't come up with a logical argument that would support his position (Rus didn't go into his logic in that message). As long as the two clubs are not in the same category, I don't know a principle that would preclude "double counting." So I hope Rus will dive back into the discussion and explain his reasoning. It may turn out that he has a compelling argument. I just don't see it yet (I don't think it would "squash the local category," nor do I see any special merit in the "soul searching" involved in splitting the score), and so I'm not being persuaded to move from the position that I stated above. I'm eager to see more discussion on this question. It seems to me that the members of the Order of Boiled Owls would be comfortable with giving 100% of each of their scores to their club and 100% to an unlimited club in their neighborhood, but not with the sort of scheme that Rus feels is essential (in which the two portions must add up to 100%).

W5ASP:

I still find it quite difficult to understand the rational behind the concept of allowing an individual to submit his ARRL single operator contest score to more than one club.

Life is choices. If an individual has to consciously decide which club gets his score, so be it. If there's a conflict between going with a "mega" club or the "local bunch" then one has to make the choice, act on it, and accept any negative consequences that may ensue. Being a "joiner" sometimes has it's downside. Isn't there something about "serving more than one master"?

However, having been the contest chairman of a very competitive Medium club, I can see some real advantages to the "SO/2Club" scenario. Under such a scheme I would be able to solicit scores from a rather elite group of operators who are still "members in good standing," but who are now dispersed across the country and who have also become members of other clubs. (If you're curious as to who, contact me direct.) With persistence and guile I can see propelling our club into the winner's circle with only a minimum contribution from the locals. I hardly think that is in the best interests of contesting.

Having said this, I sense what's going to happen. If so, let's allow an individual to give his FULL score to any two clubs he choses with the assumption that he is a member in good standing with both. This opens the doors wide to give everyone a chance to do what ever "floats his boat."

I'm not sure how to number this but let's call it W5ASP 3.01 - An individual operator's full score may be given to each of any two ARRL affiliated clubs in which he is a member in good standing as defined by the club.

Medium class clubs will just have to live with the consequences.

K2WR:

It's interesting how this is being characterized as a proposal to benefit certain areas; the benefits are not really geography-bound and could be brought to bear nearly anywhere.

Although the particular letter on file is from OBO (The Order of Boiled Owls), interest in this multi-category club score submission concept goes back a lot further than that letter. In the mid-1980's, K5NA, who lived at the time in the Hudson Valley (between New York City and Albany), and who was a well established YCCC member and score contributer, began to submit some scores to a club called OMARC (Overlook Mountain Amateur Radio Club). The reasons made sense to Richard at the time, and I don't fault him in any way since it was clearly his decision to make. However, a couple of the more competitively-minded individuals in YCCC said unkind things to Richard and a fair amount of ill-feeling circulated around the Club for several years. Eventually Richard had enough and moved back to Texas. No, that wasn't the reason, but I couldn't resist a little hyperbole. And yes, I know that everyone in Contesting is competitive... just that a few are hypercompetitive.

Anyway, the purpose behind this multiple-submission idea is to avoid the real problems that arise from divided loyalties, as expressed by N6IG. I'm afraid I can't subscribe to the unfairness concept since the Clubs in the different categories aren't competing with each other. I don't see how a local club is hurt by allowing one of their score submitters to submit also to a Medium or Unlimited club.

The remaining issue is the "paper club" possibility brought up by K2UA and others. I'm a little troubled by this possibility myself. I agree that, if this happens, it will render any benefit to the program gained by allowing multiple-category submissions moot. But we have an advantage here in that we've anticipated the malicious, pathological hack to the system before it is done. We simply have to conjure up a rule that will deter or prohibit paper clubs in the local category being carved out of large clubs' territories.

Here are some possible ways to craft such a rule:

1. Require that any local club involved in the dual submission be in existence for 5 years minimum (the idea being that creating a paper local club for the sole purpose of stealing a win from "legitimate" local clubs becomes a very large investment in time & trouble.)

2. Require that any such local club provide evidence of some other substantial activity besides submission of contest scores. I know we don't want to increase any administrative burdens in Newington, but I'm trying to find a way to plug the holes in an idea that I otherwise like.

3. Require actual meeting minutes to be submitted to ARRL once per year. I don't think "legitimate" local clubs would mind.

These are just examples... I'm sure some even better ideas will surface.

Lastly, this is an idea that has not overwhelming, but geographically widely-based support. The CAC & the League, in the past, have from time to time instituted rule changes with built-in sunset or revisitation provisions. I think we should give this a try and see what the real problems are. Maybe there are serious drawbacks nobody here has though of yet. Maybe it will work, in practice, just fine. We can always recommend that the new provision be for a 2-year trial period only, and then we vote on whether to recommend to keep it or dump it

K4ZA:

I, too, have been formulating a long-winded response to this (commute time has to be good for something, right?).

But the bottom line seems to be simple, requiring only a simple response.

If it's good for contesting in general, good for the ARRL in particular, & good for ARRL-sponsored contesting, then we should support it. In this case, allowing dual submissions is a good thing.

As I've mentioned, this issue has generated little response here in the Carolinas. It's not a hot issue. So my vote's more my own personal opinion than prior issues have been. And it's no longer such a hot topic. It's an idea whose time has come.

K0RX:

I have to agree with Don (K4ZA) - my response will be quite simple.

I don't believe in double-counting anything, which is essentially what we are talking about here. If we have to incentivize contesting by permitting participants to double-count their score, then the problems run deeper than just the club competition aspects of our sport.

We should work to eliminate the gamesmanship aspects of how scores are submitted, rather than create a new opportunity for people to take advantage of.

N0AX:

Boiling this way, way down...

Problem - multiple membership in local, medium, and/or unlimited clubs (which is a good thing, right?) causes problems at score submission time because only one club can get the points. Causes unnecessary conflict in loyalties (although some have raised the point that this is another strategic element of the overall game).

Proposed changes -

a) allow multiple submissions of score to...

- one local AND one (medium OR unlim)

- any two clubs in different category

b) in fractions of...

- 100% (multiple submissions)

- 50% to each (fixed)

- variable, allocated by submitter

Expected problems -

i) Paper clubs created, squeezing out legitimate clubs

ii) Multiple submissions would allow strong local clubs to dominate in areas

where multiple membership is common

Administrative impact -

1) Could push medium clubs into unlimited (additional scores would likely

push totals over 50)

2) HQ has to keep track of...

a) multiple club allocations

b) score splits (Simplest implementation is multiple full-score submissions, followed

by 50/50 and variable fractions.

3) More paperwork for clubs and HQ to allow detection of paper clubs

Mitigations -

for (i) - ARRL club process already in place, team competition would be easier than forming a paper club

for (ii) - none

for (1) - medium clubs will need to monitor submissions closely

for (2) - some impact inevitable, use a fixed split to keep submission and

tracking simple

for (3) - forego the additional paperwork in favor of a review period

for (all) - limit implementation to trial period of 2-5 years

What is the simplest set of changes with the minimum impact to both the clubs and to HQ?

N0AX-1:

1.1) Allow 50/50 split between any two clubs in different categories

- doesn't increase total scoring (no double-count)

- medium HQ impact (will require software changes)

1.2) Rely on existing rules for affiliation and membership

1.3) Implement for 5-year trial period in 2002, with decision to keep or

discard after 2007

We simply don't have this problem in the Northwestern Division, nor did I ever experience it in the Midwest. This is not suggesting it doesn't exist, just that it is not a big deal where I have lived.

N0IJ:

#1 Premise: I feel that, by far, the biggest chance for increased contest participation is through club expansion/interest.

Therefore, we can't dismiss this because of a narrow set of reasoning that effects a small group of clubs/operators.

#2 Premise: Being competitive does not necessarily mean being able to "win".

I think those of you in the more populous areas think that serious operators or serious clubs don't enter unless they expect to win. If the MWA could get 3rd place in the Club SS, Unlimited, we would consider it a huge victory, worthy of a special gathering and celebration. If one of us could get in the top 20 in the DX contest, a bronze statue would be considered. And at W0AIH, with 4 stacks for 10-15-20 on 200' towers, 3/3 on 200' for 40, plus 12 other big towers run by 15 good operators manning two well engineered stations on each band, still does not make the top 6 in last years WWCW, does this group quit?? Heck no. Enough said about that, but be careful not to be jaded!

I have had lots of emails from my division (probably 10-15) showing interest in this with some great ideas.

K0AD (pres. of MWA) suggested limiting local clubs with "help" from contest club entrants to 5 (or maybe 2) entries. Seems like a pretty safe and easy to monitor adjustment that would preclude the creation of an elite local club.

One very interesting note from W0ZQ, speaking for the Northern Lights Radio Society (NLRS) indicates concern for the Unlimited NLRS! I don't think anyone thought of concerns by the unlimited group. NLRS is a study in efficient, well run, competitive contest clubs (VHF/UHF only). In a highly uncompetitive area they are able to come up with lots of entries and activity, and compete in the top 5 in the unlimited category. Certainly, without them, the bands (VHF/UHF) out here would be MUCH less active. There are virtually no other VHF/UHF contest clubs around. Their concern is that in the populous areas where there are many local clubs competing with good stations, these scores will be recruited to the unlimited clubs and they (NLRS) will be adversely effected in the unlimited category. Hmmmmm.

If we were to implement a limit of 2 (out of 10) scores counted a second time in local clubs (recruited from unlimited/medium), I still could support the change if the NLRS situation could be addressed. Comments on this from guys in the east--Russ, Rich, Dave, etc., would be appreciated.

Who said this was going to be a slam/dunk?

6 Interim CAC Recommendations (Phase 1 Results)

6.1 Potential Areas for Changes to Club Competition Rules

The following table contains a summary of the potential rule changes to the Club Competition in ARRL-sponsored contests. Full descriptions of the potential changes offered for MSC consideration are provided in Section 8.

Para	Rule coverage	Change ID	Potential Change
8.1	Contest including Club Competition	None	-
8.2	Affiliation requirements	None	-
8.3	Club score submission requirements	None	-
8.4	Club Competition categories	8.4A1	Revise Unlimited club size
		8.4A2	Add "jumbo" club class
		8.4B1	Clubs center as defined by club address
		8.4B2	Club's center defined annually as other than club address
		8.4B3	Club area as all counties in or touching 175 mile circle
		8.4B4	Club area defined by circle or other shape
		8.4B5	Club area defined by circle or ARRL sections
		8.4C1	Club center within city of club location
		8.4C2	Change club center only once per year
		8.4D1	Expedition operation
		8.4D2	Rover "anchoring"
		8.4E1	Reduce meeting attendance criteria
		8.4E2	Remove meeting attendance criteria
		8.4F1	Evenly split scores between 2 non-Local clubs
		8.4F2	Allocate scores between 2 non-Local clubs
		8.4F3	Evenly split scores between any 2 clubs
		8.4F4	Allocate scores between any 2 clubs
8.5	Station and operator eligibility criteria	8.5A1	Reduce multiop station membership %
		8.5B1	Allocate multiop score to more than one club
		8.5C1	Remove requirement for station owner to be a club member
8.6	ARRL International DX Contest unique criteria	None	-
8.7	Club meeting requirements	None	-
8.8	Awards Committee rulings	None	-
8.9	Miscellaneous criteria	None	-
8.10	Gavel awards to winners in each club category	None	-

Table 6.1-1 -- Club competition rule change recommendation summary

6.2 Detailed Discussion of Potential Rule Changes

The rules for the Club Competition (as currently provided on the ARRL web site) are discussed below. Each rule is analyzed in light of the discussion of the CAC on the Club Competition Study during Phase 1 of the study.

8.1 Contests including club competition.

The CAC recommends no changes to this rule.

A note is made here that not all pages on the ARRL website list the same contests that provide a club competition. The September VHF QSO party is left off the list on the club competition rules page (http://www.arrl.org/contests/cc.html).

8.2 Club Competition participation limited to ARRL-affiliated clubs .

Some committee members offered dialog suggesting that participation in contests by members of non-ARRL affiliated clubs is not affected by the club's non-affiliation.

a. Would removal of affiliation be a good thing for the League? Including non-affiliated clubs into the club competition would clearly be more work for the League staff with little added benefit to League members. It might increase the number of clubs participating in the competition but will probably not result in any new League members, nor is it likely little to add any significant spice to the existing competition.

b. Would relaxation of affiliation requirements be of interest in clubs are not currently affiliated? It is not difficult to affiliate. Club competition participation in ARRL-sponsored contests most likely will not be the critical stimulation needed for clubs to affiliate.

c. Would the creation of team competition class outside of the club competition be a benefit to the league and its members? Team competition exists in other contest competitions and clearly has value to contest participants. This committee generally agrees that a team competition in ARRL-sponsored contests would detract from many of the principle goals of club competition. It would potentially separate participation of many active contest operators from regional club activity. This is considered by all to generally have a detrimental effect. While this might be a mechanism for providing a more level playing field in a competition, it has no positive benefit in the scope of this study for enhancing the value of club competition.

The CAC recommends no changes to this rule.

8.3 Club score requirements for listing

No dialog was produced by the committee. No hot issues apparently exist in this area. The CAC recommends no changes to this rule

Suggested administrative changes:

a. Rule 8.3.2 requires club names to appear on "summary sheet". Given the migration to Cabrillo format for log submissions, the term "summary sheet" needs to be revised. The rule should identify all current methods for properly identifying the club name in a contest log submission.

b. A suggestion is offered to minimize the uncertainty of the identity of a club name. PVRC, YCCC, SCCC and NCCC are acronyms for clubs with wide recognition. CADXA might be Central Arkansas DX Assn or Central Arizona DX Assn and the use of an acronym might result in a misplaced score. A possible solution might be to have a list compiled and readily available (i.e. a list available on the ARRL website) that will define the correct name for all currently affiliated clubs. All affiliated clubs should also "register" their clubs acronym so that when new clubs form, they can check for potential conflict with other club acronyms.

c. Rule 8.3.3 uses the phrase "club members eligible to compete" without defining its meaning. The definitions for eligibility may differ by club category. This rule might be altered to refer to the "club members eligible to compete as defined by section 8.4".

8.4 Club categories

This is the most hotly debated area in the study. The discussion will be organized into the following areas:

A. Contest tier structure

B. Club area definitions for unlimited and medium class clubs

C. Specification of geographical location for "club center"

D. Including scores from members outside of club areas in club competition

E. Club meeting requirements

F. Submission of individual scores to more than one club's score

Area A -- Contest tier structure

The current rules define three categories of clubs: Unlimited, Medium and Local. The category of a club is defined by both the number of logs submitted in a contest and by the definitions of the club areas (175-mile circle and 35-mile circle). Historically, some clubs compete in the Unlimited category in one contest and Medium in another as a result of the number of logs submitted.

Some discussion has been made that the threshold between the Unlimited and Medium categories might be considered differently. It is suggested that very few clubs can meet the 50 submitted log criteria and that the balance of the clubs fall into a generally large class. Two possible recommendations are offered herein:

8.4A1 -- Revise the definition of Unlimited and Medium class clubs to be a number other than 50 for submitted logs.

The committee has done a quick look at the number of logs submitted in the Unlimited and Medium class. In 2000 ARRL DX three clubs were listed in the Unlimited category. The numbers of entries were 119, 164, and 253. The medium category contained 47 clubs, with numbers of entries ranging from 3 (11 clubs) to 42 and 43 (one club each). So all the "medium" clubs had fewer than 51 entries (presumably without a deliberate effort to stay under 51). For this particular distribution, any threshold between 43 and 118 would have worked. This is a limited sample and more data should probably be studied. Does the data indicate that there is a better breakpoint between the unlimited class and all those below? It is not clear.

Also, it is curious that the rules specify a single threshold for all six contests that include a club competition. ARRL DX and Sweepstakes both comprise two separate contests, so each member of a club could submit two entries. Thus, it is easier to submit the required 51 entries for the Unlimited category, or harder to keep the number of entries under 51 and stay in the Medium category. The CAC has not yet looked at data for Sweepstakes, the 10-Meter Contest, or the 160-Meter Contest, or for either of the VHF contests. It might be appropriate to suggest as many as THREE thresholds: one for two-weekend HF contests, another for single-weekend HF contests, and yet another for VHF contests.

8.4A2 -- Break the Medium Category into two classes.

The previous recommendation focused on high end of the Medium class club size. This issue addresses the lower end of the distribution of the issue here is that there are current Medium class clubs that have Local club-sized log submission numbers that fail to qualify as a local club due to club area definitions.

Area B - Club area definitions for unlimited and medium class clubs

The Unlimited and Medium class clubs are currently required to have all eligible members reside within a 175-mile circle located at the club's center. The focus of most of the committee dialog was on whether this definition required any modification to eliminate any uncertainty as to whether any score-submitting club member met the criteria for eligibility in a club score submission. A second issue, a probably the source of most of the comments from league members that some contest-minded clubs have members or potential members who wish to participate in a area-wide competition but are unable to meet the current criteria that is defined by residing within a circle. The state of Tennessee is a case in point where a contest club's center is not conveniently located to permit a 175 mile circle encompass all potential contest operators who would enjoy participating.

Thus, several optional definitions of club areas are offered for consideration:

8.4B1 -- Retain the 175-mile circle criteria and require that the center be located at the current definition of the club's center (essentially...do nothing).

8.4B2 -- Retain the 175-mile circle criteria and permit the club to define a center for the circle to be other the club center (club center reporting process discussed in 8.4C).

8.4B3 -- Revise the 175-mile circle criteria to be the set of counties (or parishes or local geo-political entities or grid squares) that are totally within or touched by a 175-mile circle located at the club's center.

8.4B4 -- Add a second geometrical shape in addition to the 175-mile radius circle for an area that encompasses the location of eligible members in a club competition. A rectangle is suggested as a second area definition whose surface area is less than 250,000 square miles and has a height (H) to length (L) ratio that is bounded by the formula

0.25 > H/L > 4.

Specific points of latitude and longitude define the rectangle corners (allow rectangle to "tilt").

8.4B5 -- Add a second area definition in addition to the 175-mile radius circle for an area that encompasses the location of eligible members in a club competition. This second area might include:

An entire ARRL Section, or

Up to four contiguous ARRL Sections

Area C - Specification of geographical location for "club center"

The committee raised some options for this issue. The ARRL club annual report uses the location of an affiliated club's secretary (or its president or mailing address) to determine which section the club is located in. This location has never been used for club center definition, to date. The ARRL contest manager, if he has questions about eligibility, may ask a club where their center is. (e.g. YCCC recently redefined their center so it would allow more hams in Maine and Vermont to be eligible, and fewer in NNJ). Changes in club location are not something done often, at a whim, or changed for every contest.

The following recommendations in this area are offered:

8.4C1 -- Permit affiliated clubs to define the location of their club area. The club area must include the coordinates of the city defined as the club location (specific enough?).

8.4C2 -- An affiliated club may change the location of the club area no more than once per year. Club area definitions will be included in the annual affiliated club report.

Area D - Including scores from members outside of club areas in club competition

The current rules require that operators must reside within the club boundary. Only in the definition of the Local class club do the rules require that an eligible member must reside and operate within the club boundary. Rule 8.6 identifies exceptions to the operating locations in specifically the International DX Contest. However, there may be benefits in expanding the opportunities for operating outside of traditional club areas to all contests with club competition.

The committee has broadly suggested that the club competition rules permit the use of scores produced by club-eligible members (by club geographical requirements) in club competition scores from a "contest entity" outside of the club area. The contest entity may differ by the actual contest. It might by a grid square in a VHF contest, a state or province in Sweepstakes or DXCC entity in the International DX Contest. Providing a means to include member scores from "contest entity" expeditions will:

The following recommendations are offered in this area:

8.4D1 -- Permit the use of an "expedition operation station" score for club competition. An expedition operation would consist of one or more eligible members of an ARRL-affiliated who operate a station outside of the defined club area specifically for a contest. The eligible members must meet all club meeting requirements (as defined in 8.5) and must meet residence requirements within the defined club areas. Contest entity station scores may be added to either Unlimited or Medium club scores (not Local clubs). Score submissions for multi-operator stations are applied to club scores in the same manner as defined in 8.5.

8.4D2 -- Permit the application of scores from a rover operation in a VHF contest to a Local club score by eligible members if at least one of the grid squares activated is within or intersects the Local club's area definition.

Area E -- Club meeting requirements

Given the high mobility of the ham population and the ability to remain active in club activities remotely through the internet, the definition for minimum meeting requirements might bear a revision.

The following recommendations are offered for consideration:

8.4E1 -- Reduce the minimum requirement for membership eligibility for the club competition to be the attendance of one (reduced from two) meeting per year.

8.4E2 -- Revise the minimum requirement for membership eligibility for the club competition to be a member in "good standing" ( i.e. pays dues, submits contest scores within the past year, ...).

Area F - Submission of individual scores to more than one club's score

The committee has expressed the opinion that there is value in the application of a score in a contest to more than one club score. On the surface, there are numerous considerations:

The following recommendations are offered in this area:

8.4F1 -- Permit an individual operator's score to be split between two clubs in which the operator meets all membership criteria (residence and attendance standards). One of the two clubs must be in the Unlimited Class and one in the Medium. (This process may be difficult to manage since a Medium Class club may not know how many logs have been submitted and may not remain in the Medium Class.) The individual's score will be equally divided between the two clubs.

8.4F2 -- Same as 8.4F1 with the ability to define the allocation of the score between the two clubs. (Same problem as 8.4F1)

8.4F3 -- Permit an individual operator's score to be divided equally between any two clubs in which the operator meets all membership criteria (residence and attendance standards).

8.4.F4 -- Same as 8.4F3 with the ability to define the allocation of the score between the two clubs.

8.5 Station and Operator Criteria

This is the highly debated area in the study. The discussion will be organized into the following areas:

A. 2/3 Criteria for multioperator station

B. Allocating multioperator scores to multiple clubs

C. Station owners must be club members

Area A -- 2/3 Criteria for multioperator stations

The committee expressed a value in considering a relaxation of the requirements of a multioperator station team roster for eligibility in club competition. The current requirement is for at least 66% of the multioperator team roster to be a member of an ARRL affiliated club in order their score to be included in the club score. A reduction in this percentage requirement will naturally increase the number of stations that might apply their score to the club competition. Also, a relaxation of this requirement might open up the option of splitting the score of a multioperator station between two clubs. Both of these outcomes will have a perceived positive benefit to the nurturing of club activities and added avenues for participation in the club competition.

The following recommendations are offered from this area:

8.5A1 -- Reduce the minimum ratio for club participants in a multioperator station from 66% to 50% to permit multioperator scores to be applied to a club score.

Currently, it's an all or nothing scenario. If more than two thirds of the operators are a member of a club, then that club gets the entire score. If no more than two thirds of the roster are members of any one club, then no club get any scores from the effort. This appears to be fairly restrictive. Permitting the ratio to be at least one half will increase the number of stations scores that can be applied to the competition.

Area B - Allocating multioperator scores to multiple clubs

The committee has recognized that in some areas of the US and Canada, there are few multioperator stations. These stations may be staffed with operators bearing allegiances from more then one contest club. The committee offers the following recommendation:

8.5B1 -- Permit the score from a multioperator station to be allocated to more than one club score. The allocation of the score to each club shall be prorated based upon the ratio of the number of operators of each club to the total number of operators on the multioperator team roster. (NOTE: this suggestion conflicts with 8.5A1)

Area C - Station owners must be club members

The requirement for a station owner to be a member of the club receiving the score from an operation at their station seems restrictive to some on the committee. Given the difficulty in building contest-capable stations in light of the issues with deed restrictions and local covenants, the number of operators using a station as a guest will increase with time in the US and Canada. Retaining the requirement for both the operator and the station owner to be members of the same club for the score to be submitted to a club competition might be too restrictive. Elimination of this criterion may result in more operations from some rarely heard state, grid or DXCC entities and may result in more contest entrant satisfaction.

The following recommendation is offered:

8.5C1 -- Remove the requirement for the station licensee of a guest operated single-operator station to be a member of the same club as the operator for the score to be eligible for club score. The station used in a guest operation must meet the geographical constraints of the applicable club area as defined in Section 8.4 (unless entered as a DXpedition score).

8.6 International DX Contest unique rules

If the recommendation for the contest entity concept in 8.4D1 is considered, this section may need to be rewritten to cover operations in contests other than the International DX Contest.

8.7 Club meeting requirements

All recommendations from this committee in this area are covered in Section 8.4 area A.

8.8 Changes to club entry classifications

The committee generated no discussions in this area. The CAC recommends no changes to this rule.

8.9 Miscellaneous criteria

The committee generated no discussions in this area The CAC recommends no changes to this rule.

8.10 Gavel Awards

The committee generated no discussions in this area The CAC recommends no changes to this rule.

5.2 Club Competition Study Focus

The Contest Advisory Committee held its annual meeting at Dayton in May 2001. In addition to the CAC members, MSC Chairman Frank Fallon, N2FF, attended and provided some feedback to the committee on its progress to date on this study project. He recommended that the committee narrow its focus to only a few issues. The suggestion was to review all of our work and select three topics for further investigation and discussion.

The committee was permitted to make its own selection of the topics to continue to discuss in the Club Competition Study. The committee members voted overwhelmingly to study the following three topics:

1) Club area definitions

2) Modification of meeting attendance criteria

3) Allocation of single operator contest scores to more than one club

These topics cover the principle issues that were aired by the vocal contest club community. Much of the debate on the committee into recommended changes during the first phase of the study were in these three areas.