News Release from the National Association of Shortwave Broadcasters

NASB Elects New Vice-President
Shortwave Listener Survey Announced
2011 NASB Annual Meeting will be in Miami and the Bahamas

Glen Tapley of NASB member station WEWN in Birmingham, Alabama was elected the new vice president of the National Association of Shortwave Broadcasters at the 2010 NASB annual meeting in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada May 21.  Shortwave station WEWN is part of the EWTN television network.

Jeff White of member station WRMI in Miami, Florida was re-elected as NASB president.  Dan Elyea of member station WYFR in Okeechobee, Florida was re-elected secretary-treasurer, and Thais White of WRMI was re-elected assistant secretary-treasurer.  Glen Tapley of WEWN and Adrian Peterson of Adventist World Radio were elected to new three-year terms on the NASB board of directors.  The other current board members are Bill Damick of Trans World Radio, Brady Murray of WWCR and Jeff White of WRMI.  Board member and former vice president Mike Adams of the Far East Broadcasting Company (FEBC) resigned his position due to increasing demands on his time due to his involvement in humanitarian relief work and disaster response projects.  The board appointed David Creel of FEBC to fill Mike's NASB board position for the remaining one year of his term.

The sponsor and host of the 2010 NASB annual meeting and the concurrent DRM USA annual meeting was Galcom International, which is based on Hamilton, Ontario.  Galcom has been an associate member of NASB for a number of years.  Galcom founder Allan McGuirl, his son Al Jr. and new Executive Director Tim Whitehead participated in the entire two days of meetings, which were largely organized by Galcom's Jennifer Smith.  Other Galcom personnel including David Casement also took part. 

On May 20, the two days of meetings began with a group tour of Crossroads Communications in Burlington, Ontario, a Christian television network.  The group participated in a live syndicated television show called “100 Huntley Street,” which airs throughout Canada and the United States on a number of stations, networks and cable and satellite channels.  The program included a segment about Galcom International.

The next stop was a tour of Galcom's factory in Hamilton where volunteers assemble hundreds of thousands of small fix-tuned, solar-powered radio receivers set to a variety of AM, FM and shortwave frequencies of stations that broadcast Christian programming in various parts of the world.  Each participant was able to program and assemble his or her own radio to the frequency(ies) of his choice, after which they were able to enjoy a barbecue lunch at the Galcom factory.

On the afternoon of May 20, the group assembled at Mohawk College in Hamilton for a three-hour DRM USA meeting moderated by Charlie Jacobson of HCJB's Global Technology Center in Elkhart, Indiana, which hosted the annual meetings three years ago.  Charlie presented a PowerPoint from Adil Mina of Continental Electronics about the recent DRM Consortium meeting in Amsterdam in March and the current status of DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale) worldwide.  There was a brief update on the Digital Aurora Radio Technologies (DART) DRM project in Alaska, and John Wineman of HCJB talked about the DRM Diversity Receiver project for tropical band STL use.  Charlie Jacobson reviewed some of the DRM receivers that are currently available and in development, and there was a discussion of future activities of the DRM USA group.

Following the DRM USA meeting, the group went on the road again in the late afternoon and evening for a dinner at the Old Stone Inn in Niagara Falls, Ontario, which was founded as a flour mill in 1904.  Dinner featured such items as Angus prime rib, eggplant parmesan, New York style cheesecake and apple blossom.  But the big event of the evening was an opportunity to view world-famous Niagara Falls, which consists of the American Falls and the horseshoe-shaped Canadian Falls which mark the border between the United States and Canada.

Friday, May 21 was the official NASB annual meeting, which took place back at Mohawk College in Hamilton.  Meeting attendance was only about 40 percent of the usual annual attendance of 50-60 persons due to the economic crisis that is affecting member stations and associate member companies and organizations.  Many regular attendees reported that their travel, advertising and promotion budgets had been cut due to the crisis, but most expected the situation to begin improving in the coming months and indicated that they plan to attend next year's NASB annual meeting.

The first talk on Friday morning was by Steve Canney of the Ontario DX Association.  Steve was one of the founders of the ODXA in 1974, and he has been very active in the ODXA's publications and meetings over the years, including some ANARC (Association of North American Radio Clubs) conventions which it sponsored and some local DX camps in Ontario.  The club still exists today, but it has no printed publication, preferring to concentrate material on its website, www.odxa.on.ca, which is freely accessible to all.

Unfortunately, neither the CBC nor Radio Canada International nor the CBC North shortwave service attended NASB's first annual meeting in Canada.  But Toronto's shortwave station CFRX was represented.  Steve Canney, on behalf of the ODXA, has been acting as the station's QSL verifier for many years now.  The one-kilowatt shortwave transmitter on 6070 kHz relays commercial mediumwave station CFRB 24 hours per day.

Glen Tapley of WEWN offered meeting participants a PowerPoint of his station, which was founded by the charismatic Mother Angelica.  WEWN has become a multi-transmitter 500-kilowatt (currently operating at 250 kilowatts) powerhouse station transmitting Catholic radio programming to shortwave audiences throughout Latin America, Europe, Africa and other parts of the world.  The station relies on Sirius, XM Radio and Internet webcasting to reach North America.  Glenn's presentation included photos of the transmitters, antennas and other technical installations, as well as shots of the beautiful mountain-top location of the transmitter site in Alabama.

The 2010 annual meeting took place as long-time attendee John White of Thomson Broadcast and Multimedia was set to retire.  The NASB presented him with a plaque in honor of his many contributions to the NASB over the years.  Thomson builds shortwave transmitters and other radio and television broadcast equipment at its plant in Switzerland.  Thanks to John White's efforts, Thomson and the NASB will be co-sponsoring the HFCC/ASBU B10 shortwave frequency coordination conference in Zurich, Switzerland this August 2-6. 

The next speaker was Dr, Jerry Plummer of NASB member station WWCR in Nashville, Tennessee.  Jerry presented a very timely slideshow of images of the recent floods in Nashville and how they affected WWCR.  The station's antenna farm, which was one stop on a tour during last year's NASB annual meeting, was up to 18 feet under water.  The power was out and the station's four 100-kilowatt shortwave transmitters, as well as its mediumwave transmitter, were off the air for at least three days.  Jerry showed pictures of WWCR staff members surveying the flood damage in boats in the middle of their antenna field.

Jerry also unveiled the new NASB Shortwave Listener Survey, which is now online.  The purpose of the survey is to gather demographic and other information about shortwave listeners in North America and around the world.  Questions deal with listener preferences regarding shortwave stations, programming, receivers, DRM and much more.  The NASB is requesting and encouraging all shortwave publications and websites to place a link to the survey, which will be online until May of 2011.  The survey results will be announced to the public at the 2011 NASB annual meeting.  The URL for links to the survey is:  http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/6LRVLJ7

Dr. Adrian Peterson, international relations coordinator of Adventist World Radio, rounded up the Friday morning session with a presentation entitled “Canadian Radio Panorama,” featuring photos of QSL and other radio cards of Canadian stations – especially shortwave – since 1901.  Adrian, who produces the weekly DX program “Wavescan,” has an extensive collection of cards from Canadian governmental, commercial and religious stations, as well as amateur and experimental stations over the years.  A review of his Canadian collection is indeed a trip through Canadian radio history from the beginning through present-day.

After lunch was the NASB annual business meeting.  Member stations in attendance with personal representatives or proxies were Adventist World Radio, Far East Broadcasting Company, Radio Miami International, Trans World Radio, World Christian Broadcasting, WEWN, WWCR and WYFR.  Associate members Galcom International, HCJB, Thomson Broadcast and Multimedia, and VT Communications were also present. 

Among the decisions made at the business meeting was the location of next year's annual meeting.  It will be organized by Radio Miami International and will take place May 13-16, 2011 onboard the Royal Caribbean Majesty of the Seas cruise ship which sails from Miami to Nassau and CocoCay in the Bahamas.  Delegates concluded that it would be less expensive to hold the meeting on the ship than at a hotel in Miami.  The cost for the three-night cruise will be $299.00 plus $66.41 in taxes, per person in a double occupancy inside cabin.  This price includes all meals, accommodation, transportation and entertainment.  The ship has a dedicated conference center where the NASB and DRM USA meetings will be held, and Royal Caribbean will provide the meeting rooms and audiovisual equipment free of charge.  More details are available by e-mail from info@wrmi.net, and they will soon appear on the NASB website, www.shortwave.org.

The NASB membership also approved the sponsorship by NASB of the wireless Internet system in the meeting rooms at the HFCC/ASBU B10 Conference in Zurich, Switzerland in August.  Other topics of discussion were possible improvements to the NASB website and publicity for the new NASB shortwave listener survey.


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