WASHINGTON-Even as the National Capital Planning Commission was voting to further delay the siting of two Bell Atlantic Mobile towers in Rock Creek Park, the Senate was voting to override the NCPC.
Sen. Thomas A. Daschle, the Democratic leader from South Dakota, attached an amendment to a budget bill for the District of Columbia to require the National Park Service to issue rights-of-way permits within seven days of the bill being signed by the president and to set a 90-day time limit on action on future antenna-siting applications on federal property in the District of Columbia.
Additionally, according to the amendment, NCPC’s role in future applications would only be advisory. Federal agencies receiving applications would “not be bound by any decision or recommendation of” the NCPC.
The Senate late Thursday night passed the D.C. appropriations bill by voice vote.
The House has yet to act on the D.C. appropriations bill.
NCPC was warned this might happen by Melissa Wojciak, a staffer who sits on the commission on behalf of Rep. Thomas M. Davis, III (R-Va.). Davis chairs the House’s District of Columbia subcommittee. Attempts to find out what Wojciak knew and when were unsuccessful, but in the meeting she said, “If we vote this down today, [BAM] will go around this commission [to Congress] … I can guarantee you that this will happen.”
The action highlights just how important the siting of the two BAM towers inside Rock Creek Park is to the Senate. Rock Creek Park is the nation’s oldest urban national park and is used by citizens-including members of Congress-for recreational activities. Additionally, thousands of commuters travel through the park. BAM has many dead zones in the park because it says, after five years, it has been unable to site antennas it says are necessary to improve coverage.
It is unclear whether the Senate acted knowing the NCPC was, at the same time, voting to further delay the construction of the towers or whether the Senate would have acted anyway.
However, the commissioner sponsoring the motion to hire an independent consultant to further study the issue would not have proceeded had she been aware of the Senate’s action. “I knew nothing about [the Senate’s action] it … If I had known they were doing that … I would have just suspended [action on the application]. Why would we have gone through what I call a sham if I had known?” said Dr. Patricia Elwood, NCPC vice chairman.
BAM was disappointed with the NCPC action. “After five years and after meeting all of the standards and criteria, certainly we are disappointed by another delay. We believed we were at the end of the tunnel, and the tunnel keeps getting longer,” said BAM spokeswoman Audrey F. Schaefer.
The crime rate-including three murders-inside the park is what prompted the Senate to act, Schaefer said. The Senate’s action “demonstrates the Senate’s sense of importance of safety in the park,” she said.
According to the NCPC motion that passed on a 6-4-1 vote, NCPC will contract with an independent consultant to study alternative technologies and alternative sites.
Eleanor Holmes Norton, the Democratic delegate to Congress for the District of Columbia, was still seeking clarification on the Senate’s action, said her spokesman Sean Gralton.
It is unclear whether NCPC has the money left in its budget as it enters the fourth quarter of the fiscal year to pay for an independent consultant. Sandra H. Shapiro, NCPC general counsel, said she had serious legal concerns about accepting gratis consultant work. Elwood indicated the work could be done either for free or for as little as $1000. Other NCPC members questioned this amount, and audience members laughed. The environmental assessment for the NPS, to be paid for by Bell Atlantic, was originally priced at $289,000.
The NCPC plans to evaluate the motion and poll members about shifting necessary priorities before the August NCPC meeting. The hope is to come to a decision on the consultant and the work completed as soon as possible, said NCPC Chairman Harvey B. Gantt.
Elwood believes an independent consultant is necessary because both sides have experts. “This is the only way we can make a decision. We don’t have this expertise and we need it,” she said.
