Calling Sheriff Laura

An Open Letter To Ham Radio's Crime Buster

from Mike Wingfield, W8MW

(Background: Laura L. Smith was recently appointed Special Counsel for FCC's Spectrum Enforcement Division. With responsibilities that include amateur radio rules enforcement, Laura is the new sheriff in town, replacing retired Riley Hollingsworth.)

Dear Sheriff Laura:

Law abiding amateurs are buzzing with the good news about you riding into town with your new badge. Mighty glad you're here, ma'am. Yes we know your plate is full with matters more important than our routine peeves. But we'll still nag for a large portion of your time and resources. Here in Ham Town, our biggest problem comes from within. We need you to protect us from each other. Old men with poorly engineered stations fear for their on-air safety.

Please Nab Frequency Thieves

We never know when the next bully will put an abrupt end to our contacts with his insurmountable signal strength. These thugs take our frequencies by brute force, claiming they can't hear our weak signals. Another breed, the smooth talkers, use clever techniques like starting up a net to grab the turf right out from underneath us. John Wayne taught us to stand our ground so we refuse to simply change frequency (QSY) to resolve conflicts. Rather than suffer the indignities of compromise we insist on making a Federal Case out of bruised egos. You'll be hearing from us often.

Please Sanitize Potty Mouths

Please punish dirty hams. We feel violated when foul-mouthed operators spew vulgar words we don't want our 45 year-old children to hear. George Carlin revealed the 7 words they can't say on broadcast television. But there is confusion about exactly which indecent, obscene and profane words to avoid on ham radio. Would you please tell us? When you do, I'm sure some enterprising hamfest vendor will print the no-no list on laminated card stock for convenient reference.

And isn't it time FCC stopped those sneaky slow scan television (SSTV) boys from swapping spicy line drawings of Jughead and Veronica from the 1940's? If you can't ban it outright, can you at least demand they get better images?

Please Stop Controversy & High Blood Pressure

Take politics and religion off the ham bands forever. Surely you can do something to shut down these topics and any other subject matter that provokes thought and assaults the sensibilities of gentle radio operators. Tune around and you'll hear way too many inappropriate discussions where polite chit chat ought to be. I know this is true because I spend hours at a time listening to this disturbing material.

Please Deputize Us

With today's tight budgets, you will be relieved to know we have 3,950 volunteers in our version of Neighborhood Crime Watch. We formed the Radio Atrocity Tracking System (RATS) to blow the whistle on ham radio crime. We monitor activities of amateurs we don't like, take notes and make tape recordings day and night. We provide FCC with carefully manipulated evidence for convenient integration into Warning Letters and/or Notices of Apparent Violation. Sheriff Riley relied on RATS and we are pleased to make our services available to you as well.

Please, Sheriff Laura. Please punish all bad hams. Punish them severely. We're counting on you to ride tall in the enforcement saddle and stop the reign of fear in the ionosphere.