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Polk County Amateur Radio Emergency Service, ARES, provides emergency and public service communications to our served agencies. Getting the message through “when all else fails”.

Our served agencies are Polk County Emergency Management, American Red Cross, Polk County CERT Teams, Polk County Hospitals, and the Municipalities located within Polk County.

Special notice regarding WC4PEM repeater system operations on March 24th:  The Orange County ARES group will be providing communications to the American Diabetes Association Tour de Cure on March 24, 2024.  This year’s event will be running from the Lake Nona area (Just south of OIA) all the way down to Kenansville, approximately 25-30 miles south of St. Cloud. During this time they will be using the WC4PEM linked repeater system.  They expect operations to take place from 0600-1600 hours.

Our next meeting will be on Thursday, March 28th at 7:00pm.  Doors open at 6:30pm.  For more information, click hereWe have a special guest speaker for the March 2024 meeting, Bill Fetta, N7CGC, Section Emergency Coordinator for the ARRL West Central Florida Section.

The theme for 2024 ARRL Field Day is “Be Radio Active.” The event will run on June 22 – 23, and it will be one-part contest, one-part emergency communications exercise, and one-part open house — and a great time


News – 01/21/2024 – ARRL Board Meeting – With a goal of recruiting and developing greater participation in the ARRL Amateur Radio Emergency Service® (ARES®), the Board has approved, at the recommendation of the Emergency Communications and Field Services Committee, a commitment to expand messaging and marketing for the program.

One of our served agencies, CERT, as well as other emergency communicators, have a GMRS net on the Polk CERT repeater.  (note: This is NOT an ARES net, but welcome to all FCC licensed GMRS operators interested in emergency communications)

The Polk ARES ICS-205 and Polk County ARES Band Plan have been updated.  You can find them under the Operations menu option at the top of this page.

Our focus is on preparation and training for wireless communications during disasters and public service events.  A  Statewide Florida Emergency website has been opened.  Come check it out.  


Winlink RMS Gateways in Polk County

144.930 WC4PEM-5
144.950 W4PSR-5

The Imperial Polk County ARES Net is held every Wednesday at 7:00pm EST on the following frequencies on the Polk County Emergency Management, WC4PEM, repeater system:

This is a wide area linked repeater system. Pick the repeater located closest to you. You should be able to reach one of our repeaters with a 5 watt HT from anywhere in Polk County. If you are not, please contact Polk ARES through our contact page and we will help you find an antenna solution.

Click here for a coverage map of the WC4PEM repeater system.

The WC4PEM D-Star Gateway repeater located in Bartow is on 444.4875.  You can view the dashboard for this repeater by clicking here.