The idea for a National System Award first occurred during a meeting of the management committee of the Wellington VHF Group in November 2001.
The committee had been considering remedies for non-approved additions to the National System, which were disrupting the use and enjoyment of users. During the discussion the capital replacement value of the system was established to be just over $1.0 Million. It was considered a travesty of the hard work, effort and capital that had been put into the asset, that it was not being better utilised.
The idea of promoting use of the system lapsed for the next few months. Amongst other duties, the committee dealt with the task of developing and publishing "User Guidelines" for the National System, which were intended to promote improved behavior by users.
After further informal discussion amongst committee members, a proposal to design and run an award was approved by the monthly meeting of the Group in June 2002.
The award has been run several times since, with various themes and styles of certificates, see the individual reports below.