I’m a little late in posting this, but there’s still time to comment on the latest draft of the ARES Strategic Plan. To get a flavor of what’s being proposed, here’s the opening paragraph:
The Amateur Radio Emergency Service® (ARES®) has held to the same precepts virtually since its inception in 1935, encouraging participation by any licensed Amateur Radio operator with a sincere interest in Public Service Communications. With the advent of more uniformly functioning public safety organizations across the nation, more requirements imposed upon agencies and organizations assisting them, and the development of the Incident Command System (ICS) and The National Incident Management System (NIMS), ARRL was challenged to align the standards of ARES with current needs of our served partner agencies.
As you can see, the move seems to be towards a more formal organization that will require participants to get more training. This is probably not a bad thing. The more that ARES can align itself with its served agencies, the more accepted ARES will be and the more public service it will be able to provide.
It also notes:
This program introduces many changes that were asked for by our partner agencies. Notably, all have been included in the Strategic Plan, and from the mission statement itself, new ARES Guidelines were created, which appear in this document.
The article on the ARRL website notes that comments are being sought from section managers (SMs) and section emergency coordinators (SECs), not general members, but if you have any input I’d encourage you to contact these section officials. The deadline to submit comments and suggestions is October 31. This will give the Public Service Enhancement Working Group (PSEWG) time to review the comments and suggestions and make any changes to the document before the January 2019 ARRL board meeting.