[SARA-Members] Great News -

[P. OLMSTEAD]

Ken TRYON, SAR President and myself met with Marion of the Emergency 
Management Alberta yesterday and we were essentially told that the grant 
for another $150,000.00 has been approved for training for 2006/07 for 
the SAR Alberta volunteer groups.
My submission to them is due in one week regarding the courses the 
groups are asking for.

I am sure this grant is not a secret as I have been asking for your 
course selections for two weeks now.  I have received many responses and 
thank you to all who have replied directly to me.  If you have used any 
chat area/ web site etc. to make your selections known I need your 
direct response please.

Congratulations -  - it was to be passed onto you that overall the 
compliance with the last years grant has been good and Marion has had 
little concern about most of the courses.  Thank you for taking the time 
to fill in your class lists and submit them to your local Mun Gov. rep.
Myself; I am still acting as a buffer or a place to direct a question.

A couple notes...

Last year I started to revise the costs of some of these courses 
including Inst. fees etc.  Can you please advise me if any group has had 
any issues with the allotted funds other than Swift Water.
Q - what are you paying to have a mantracking course - level 1 and 2
If there are any other course costs concerns please let me know.

SAR Instructors...
In general SAR Alberta members who have been instructing courses such as 
Basic SAR, Team Leader and CER are not getting a wage but are having all 
their costs covered including travel, meals and hotel if they travel.  
These SAR members who teach in house typically do not draw a wage to 
teach and you might consider this when you ask an Inst. to come to your 
area.

A person outside of SAR such as Rope Rescue, Wilderness First Aid, Swift 
Water  will in many cases ask for a wage and costs;  that's expected.
A volunteer who teaches in many cases will not ask for a wage, but costs 
only.
This allows others to be on a course or free up money for expenses of 
the participants if they have to travel. 
This was the INTENT of the Grant money, not for US to line our pockets - 
please keep this in mind and pass it on to others who Instruct in your 
groups.

Course Certificates - I am told that this is a problem that is almost 
resolved and catch up is in progress with over 500 past certs being 
completed.  I hope to make sure that we can issue current certs with the 
current proposed future courses.

Inst. data - It is still my intent to collect data on all persons who 
are providing any and all training to our volunteers so we can maintain 
a wed based data base.  After this grant has been completed I will ask 
all of you to supply me with who and what is taught in and around your area.

Lastly - I am back - training and its extreme time consuming and 
exhausting tasks will be my primary focus in life.
We as a mature and experienced SAR Association in Canada have much to 
give and led my example - this cannot be done unless we can show how 
hard we work and in most cases this is proven through our training, 
STATS and a continual flow of information (both ways).
SAR Alberta is there to support your group and be your voice globally.

Thanks and take care and please pass this on within your group so others 
have an idea of what's going on.

Paul OLMSTEAD

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://server.castrov.cuug.ab.ca/pipermail/sara-members/attachments/20050928/ee0faab6/attachment.html