The FCC has denied a Petition for Rule Making to amend Part 97 station identification rules to better accommodate and simplify station identification during emergency nets, drills, or activations. ARRL member Robert A. Dukish, KK8DX, of Canfield, Ohio, had sought a change to Section 97.119(a) of the rules to allow a single point of transmission for station ID on those occasions. He proposed permitting a net control station or other designated participant to announce the call signs of every station taking part in the net or exercise, when tactical call signs often are in use, at 10-minute intervals, using automatic CW identification.

In turning down Dukish’s petition, Scot Stone, the Deputy Chief of the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau’s Mobility Division, said commenters overwhelmingly opposed the proposal.

“They argue that the current rule strikes the appropriate balance between the need to identify the source of transmissions and ease of communication,” Stone wrote. “Commenters state that, in their years of experience with amateur emergency communications, the station identification requirement has not proven to be a burden or obstacle, and that the current procedure actually contributes to efficient operations by providing a clear indication that a communication has ended and the channel is available.”

Stone said some commenters asserted that Dukish’s proposed procedure would be unworkable and cause confusion, while others characterized his proposal as a solution in search of a problem.

“The purpose of the station identification requirement is to make the source of transmissions clearly known to those receiving those transmissions,” Stone wrote. “Separating the call sign from each transmission would defeat this purpose.” Moreover, he said there’s no evidence that the current station ID requirements have hindered Amateur Radio emergency communications.

Dukish had filed his petition in December 2018, and the FCC invited comments on it in February 2019.