[CW] NCVEC Petition

[John Rippey]

Rumor has it that the FCC is gearing up (finally!) to issue a ruling on the 
2002 proposals by the ARRL and yours truly to broaden Novice/Tech 
Plus/Tech-with-code certificate licensees' HF CW privileges. Readers may 
recall that the ARRL's petition was filed after extensive polling of the 
membership and represented a broad consensus. If the FCC's ruling tracks 
the ARRL's proposal, then it is an easy argument to make that the new 
privileges that will be granted to newer hams should be given time to take 
hold. This will take a number of years.

In this context, the NCVEC's proposal to end code testing appears to be 
highly premature. No decision should be made on the code/no code issue 
until the results of the "refarming" of the Novice subbands are in.

73,
John, W3ULS