NEW YORK-The New York Wireless Carriers Coalition is hoping for passage this spring of a bill that some group members believe would be the first in the country to set uniform statewide tower-siting requirements for local governments to follow and implement.
The proposed legislation’s primary thrust is to divide wireless cell sites and towers into two categories. Minor sites would receive expedited review, provided they meet a set of safety and aesthetics requirements. Designed to encourage collocation and minimize unnecessary proliferation of transceiver locations, the bill’s definition of minor covers structures that include: billboards, certain kinds of buildings, existing communications towers or mono-poles, water tanks, steeples, silos and flagpoles.
Locations considered major sites are those where a carrier wants to construct a new monopole or similar structure.
“These would require a more intensive and exhaustive set of standards for the industry to follow than some of the existing ordinances, especially in upstate New York where local governments have less wherewithal,” said John Liantonio, director of external affairs for AT&T Wireless Services Inc., Paramus, N.J.
Although at least one colleague on the coalition disagrees with this assessment, Liantonio said the status quo often results in less affluent or sophisticated towns getting a disproportionate number of cell sites than better organized and financed municipalities near them.
The New York Wireless Carriers Coalition is comprised of representatives of AT&T Wireless Services, Bell Atlantic Mobile, CellularOne/Upper Region, Frontier Cellular Corp., Nextel Communications Inc., Omnipoint Communications Services and Sprint PCS.
There have been some promising recent developments with respect to the proposed Wireless Facilities Siting Act but also some cautionary signs raised. Consequently, coalition members have their work cut out for them if the New York State Senate and Assembly are to approve the measure before both houses of Legislature adjourn in late June.
Liantonio said he gives the bill a 50: 50 chance of passage this year.
Last year, last-minute opposition from some environmental groups scuttled a vote on the bill, which had been introduced in the Assembly by Majority Leader Michael Bragman of Syracuse and in the Senate by Thomas Libous of Binghamton.
The bill, reintroduced earlier this year by both legislators, is a 20th-round draft of a compromise that resulted from negotiations among the Wireless Carriers Coalition, the New York Conference of Mayors and the New York Association of Towns, Liantonio said.
However, the Association of Towns later decided it would not endorse a bill that did not allow to remain in effect all existing local tower-siting ordinances, even those with less-stringent requirements, he said. The Wireless Coalition’s view is that this grandfathering clause would gut the uniformity intended by the legislation, he added.
“One thing that needs to be really clear is that the state legislature didn’t act on its own on this,” said Fran Malnati, executive director of government affairs for Bell Atlantic Mobile, Bedminster, N.J.
“A number of cities, towns and residents asked the state legislature to do something about this because New York is a diverse state and some localities are without zoning or full-time (municipal) staff.”
The Senate seems more promising as an earlier venue for full consideration of the bill, Liantonio said. MaryLou Rath, a Buffalo area legislator, is receptive to it, and she chairs the Committee on Local Government, which must approve the proposed legislation before the full Senate considers it.
In the Assembly, the signs are somewhat less clear. By inserting minor, non-substantive changes into the language of the bill before reintroducing it this year, Majority Leader Bragman maneuvered to preserve the option to revise the bill in a joint Senate-Assembly conference committee, Liantonio said.
The coalition coalesced in early 1997 after Bragman issued a press release calling for a halt to the proliferation of towers and encouraging the use of state and local government properties for tower siting, Liantonio said.
On the plus side, two assemblywomen from Westchester County-Audrey Hochberg and Sandra Galef-have co-sponsored the siting bill, said Jamie Hastings, manager of legal and regulatory affairs for Omnipoint Communications Services, Cedar Knolls, N.J.
“Westchester is one of the more difficult counties to deal with because it is so diverse, with major urban areas close to rural areas,” said Hastings, formerly director of government relations for Westchester County.
Several coalition members met April 19 to discuss the proposed state legislation at the request of the Westchester County Board of Legislators Committee on Legislation, which is considering whether to endorse the effort as an advisory to their state counterparts.
Westchester County, immediately north of New York City, and Nassau County, immediately east of New York City, are populous and politically powerful suburban jurisdictions.
“They have some concerns, and probably the primary one is about pre-emption of local prerogative,” Hastings said of the Westchester County legislators.
“We have assured them that all approvals would occur at the local level, [not by] a statewide commission.”
Counties like Westchester and Nassau are in the bulge of a Bell curve of relative opposition to wireless tower and cell sites, Liantonio said. By comparison, the low ends of the curve are occupied by two opposites in terms of size that are similar in their greater receptiveness to wireless towers and related facilities.
On one side are large areas like New York City, which have plenty of existing structures for siting transceivers and often have adopted expedited review processes. On the other low end of the Bell curve are sparsely populated rural areas in upstate New York.
