The Boundary Amateur Radio Club applied for and was awarded a grant of $9,394 from the Amateur Radio Digital Communications organization, which will improve emergency preparedness in Boundary County. 

Much of the amount received will be used to purchase and install new ham radios and power supplies at all seven fire stations in Boundary County. Funds from the grant will also go to replacing an inefficient antenna on Black Mountain that is part of the North Idaho repeater group. 

According to Dan Parrent, a current member and future treasurer of BARC, the radios were in need of an upgrade. 

“BNSF (the railway), they gave us radios about 15 years ago and at the time those radios were already about 15 years old,” Parrent said. “So today, those radios are obsolete. They can’t be programmed. One of them doesn’t work, but those radios were deployed at each of the seven main fire stations.” 

Parrent said the previous radios did not have their own power source, which would pose problems during an emergency.  

“It would have been up to anyone responding to an emergency to make sure that they brought their own power supply with them or that the fire station would have to provide supply,” Parrent said. 

According to Parrent, future aims for the club include putting up a more efficient antenna at Boundary County Hospital that can enable communication between them and Bonner Hospital during an emergency. 

The grant was one of several given out to radio-based groups around the United States and one group in Finland.  

For anyone interested in attending a meeting, the Boundary Amateur Radio Club meets on the first Tuesday of each month at Mugsy's Tavern and Grill in Bonners Ferry at 6:30 p.m.