Conditional Use (Regular) – Joan E. Patterson/Anthemnet, Inc./Verizon Wireless – 155-Foot, Above-Ground-Level (AGL) Monopine Wireless Communications Facility (WCF) in an A-R Agricultural-Residential District – Southwest Pasco County – On the East Side of the Terminus of Rowland Drive, Approximately 600 Feet North of Balough Road File Number PDE25-CU09
What the county recorded
Staff recommendation
Approval with Conditions
DispositionDenied
Denied Staff’s recommendation of approval with Chairman Starkey and Commissioner Weightman voting nay.
The source document
The county’s agenda for Board of County Commissioners, Feb 25, 2025
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
The county’s minutes for Board of County Commissioners, Feb 25, 2025
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
What was said
Machine transcription of 58m of recording, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 66% of 292 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.
Yes. We have proof publication of the hearing of this matter in the February fifth, twenty twenty five edition of the Tampa Bay Times.
Mm.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Item P42 is PDE 25CU09. This is a conditional use permit in the name of Joan E. Patterson, Anthemet Incorporated, Verizon Wireless. It's for a 155-foot above-ground level monopine wireless communication facility and an AG. excuse me, in an AR agricultural residential district in South West Pasco County on the east side of the terminus of Rowland Drive, approximately six hundred feet north of Ballow
Road.
Mm-hmm.
Um Before I uh begin the presentation, uh there's just two uh updates to the packet that had been submitted to the agenda. Uh the first is um which both were submitted to the clerk's office. Um the first is a letter from the Federal Aviation Administration um extending The no hazard to air navigation. Uh determination which expired according to uh finding a fact number fifteen
uh B, uh which expired on February 11th, 2025. The the Federal Aviation Administration issued a letter dated February thirteenth, twenty twenty five. And noted that Uh the extension the expiration uh was extended from February eleventh to August thirteenth, twenty twenty-six. So that's the first attachment. Uh the second attachment is updated affidavit attesting to providing public notice, which was also submitted to the clerks.
Give this to you, Matt.
Uh so the proposal is a conditional use uh for a 155-foot above ground level AGL monopine wireless communication facility. Uh as I noted in the AR Agricultural Residential District, it has a future land use classification of res three dwelling uh three residential three dwelling units per gross acre. The applicant proposes a 155-foot Wireless communication facility with a five-foot lightning rod as a monopine wireless communication facility, suitable for the co-location of three additional carriers, so that would
make it four total, within a 2,500 square foot fenced compound area as the ground equipment enclosure at the bottom. Um it's on the east side of the terminus as I mentioned of Rolland Drive, approximately six hundred feet north of Ballow Road. This is the general location in the overall counties in the South Market area, uh south of State Road 54. Um Yeah, here we go again.
So stay row fifty-four is now you can see it in the upper right corner of the exhibit there. And the pink is the subject property. Here it is showing it with the future land use map. Um, right off of Geneva Lake there. Um this is the aerial of the property in question, so it's heavily wooded. uh land. Surrounded by uh ex existing development in terms of neighborhood, residential neighborhoods to the north,
west, and south. Here is an exhibit in illustrating the 1,000-foot buffer around the property and the notice. Um one thing to note in this aerial image, uh at the intersection of State Route 54 and Asturia Boulevard. Or um Black Lake. Road. If I could play use the planer, it will be a little bit more. Hopefully not change on me. Yeah, it's changing.
You'll notice uh the shadow of a wireless communication facility on the aerial. That is not there today. So you there used to be a cell tower right on straight road fifty four, there's not one there today. It was uh removed.
Uh this is the site plan which illustrates the location of the ground equipment enclosure, the 2500 square foot compound. that would basically host the ground equipment plus the tower itself, along with the access route. Uh to the ground equipment enclosure. Here's the ground equipment enclosure uh up close. Uh in terms of uh what kind of equipment is going to be within the compound and the location of the tower itself, and of course the image of the tower, the one hundred fifty five
foot monopine Uh which is essentially a monopole dressed as a as a tree. And the four co-location stations on the on the uh facility.
Uh this is the photo simulations for wireless communication views. So this is the map key as we'll walk through some of the images. So here's uh looking south uh from the north. So as you I suppose peer across State Road 54 without the wireless communication facility on the left, and then with the wireless communication facility on the right. So this essentially is kind of the view from Asturia, looking south. Uh this
is uh looking west on State Row fifty four, um, with without the wireless communication on the left, with on the right.
This is looking from Ballow Road without the wireless communication facility on the left with the wireless communication facility on the right.
And you could barely you can see it just over the the trees there.
Uh this is looking from Roland Drive. So this is without the facility on the left and then with the facility on the right. There you can see it a bit more clearly in terms of the uh appearance of the of the monopine. And the Planning, Development and Economic Growth Department recommends uh makes a recommendation of approval with conditions. The Planning Commission recommendation Uh at the November 16, 2023 Planning Commission meeting, a motion
to approve staff's recommendation with a modification to the wireless communication facilities design, designed as a monopole instead of a monopine, resulted in a tie vote with two ayes and two nays. And the school board broke the tie voting to deny the motion, resulting in recommendation of denial from the planning commission. Um in the event that the Board of County Commissioners agrees with the Planning Commission recommendation of a denial. The denial order resolution will be prepared by planning development economic growth. And the County Attorney's Office and presented to the Chair
for signature at the next regularly. Uh scheduled meeting of the Board of County Commissioners. Our consultants have reviewed this and upon review of the application um they recommend approval of the conditional use application, thus the planning development and economic growth recommendation.
I can try to answer.
Madam Chairman
Mariano. Yes.
Just a technical question is In the procedures, we have the school board members participate to deal with school board issues in that alone, I thought. Yeah. Why would we ever
vote on that? They break ties. They do break
ties? Okay. That's that's the only reason that's
okay. No
problem. Thank you.
Yes. They break ties, but they have been um voicing their opinions. before the vote. And then voting a lot of times.
They only can vote on on issues that they vote on residential
residential density
issues.
I
used to sit
in
that.
Um, is is their role on that on that board. Yeah, David sits with the planning commission all the way. So
they do vote on any density increases that involve residential. They also vote on anything related to school sites or s or or access to school sites. And then they also break ties. The reason we have them break ties is because when we Reformulated the Planning Commission, we only have six members. So we had to have a mechanism to break ties in the event there was a tie. Yeah. Okay.
Okay. Um Do you want to hear from the applicant if you don't have any
You need to hear from the applicant
on these. I'm just saying if you if you're ready, if you don't have no more questions, return. Okay. Um just so you know. Um we had a Uh Salt Tower hearing What was it last year? If you recall in Starkey Ranch. Um Um Uh David and I were on a
And um that cell tower has not been built. but the applicant or the user on this tower has said that Um that's further than a two mile radius anyway, so it doesn't It doesn't affect the store. This tower is still needed, even though we have approval on that one.
Um, I guess it's good evening now. Mary Solak, 121 South Orange Avenue, suite 1500 Orlando, Florida. I'm legal counsel for AnthemNet. I have with me here today Tracy Moore, who is the project manager for Anthem Net. David Smith, who is the RF engineer with Verizon Wireless, and Curtis Ochovachova is online. He is our project engineer. And I have Richard Dreggers with Calhoun Dreggers Associates. You've had a long afternoon. Your staff has done a very thorough evaluation of this application. We meet all of the code requirements.
I know there are people here to speak. on it. I might suggest that you ask me any questions you have now and then maybe I'll let you I'll come back up and address citizen comments. Does that Does that work for you? Do you have any comments or questions for me or any members of our team first?
Go ahead, Commissioner Oakley. Okay.
Um I noticed there was a Cell tower in this area before did I see
that before? It's gone. It's gone. It
was
up on fifty
four. I know but it was one there, right?
There was one up on fifty four. It was a sprint next cell tower. Verizon was not on it. It's gone. It's been decommissioned.
No, but still the the cell tower is not there anymore. It was taken out. Thinking that just
I understood they took it out, but I was wondering why they didn't because if there's a need here in this area. For a cell tower. Why wouldn't they have put one back there?
It was a Sprint Next Hel Tower and I think the there was probably a combination of the lease expiring and then Sprint Next Hel in a fairly nationwide program of decommissioning towers due to the mergers.
Oh okay. Yeah. And we require when a cell tower's not being used anymore, it has to come
Okay.
Which I want to talk to someone about one that Needs to be topped off. That's too high. Um okay and I did ask the applicant Um it doesn't matter to them if it's a pine or a pole.
Correct. Is that right? Correct. There was some debate about that at the Planning Commission. Yeah. Um and then again the Planning Commission only made one motion and that was to approve it as a monopole and not a monopine. Yeah. They never took up the issue of the monopine itself. So we don't care either way.
Okay. Um let's take public comment because I think we have some people here for this.
We do. Elizabeth Kelly.
Um listen, it's late, so if you want to speak on this and you're signed up, please line up right here and you'll each get your three minutes.
Thank you for letting me speak. My name is Elizabeth Kelly, and I live at [address removed]. I was previously sworn in. Um During the Planning Commission meeting, the applicant put up a map with a big red circle and tried to convince us that it was necessary for them to put a cell phone tower in the circle. Basically, they want it along State Road 54 between Gun Highway and the Sun Coast. I want to point out something that was not really mentioned, is that luckily there's
a major highway running through this area. Most of the properties on both the north and the south side of the highway are undeveloped, which means that they could be available for the right price. And that's what this comes down to. Uh we have two huge companies, a million and a billion dollar company, who are trying to get a good deal. In order to get here, they went into the residential neighborhoods sitting behind the highway and found the one single person
who was willing to allow this on her property. But nobody else in the community wants this. There are no neighbors here in support of the applicant. There was nobody at the planning meeting in support either. Now it's up to you. But there's good news. There is a way to make this work. A compromise to appease the good people of Pasco County and still allow the big companies to build their communications tower in the Red Circle. Very simple. Deny
this project. and advise these huge companies to procure land along the highway. Like where it used to be. They have the ability and the bank accounts to negotiate purchases or leases of land directly on 54. Please do not allow them to disrupt our homes by unnecessarily selling our neighborhoods when there are multiple other places that they can build to achieve their goal. They may claim that nobody else wanted to make a deal with them, but that
just means they weren't offering enough money. If they want to be in this area of Pasco County, they should have to pay the cost to build along the highway. This is the ethically right decision. That being said. If you have already decided that a cell phone tower belongs in this neighborhood, Then at a minimum I request the cell phone tower be built as a decorative bell tower.
The applicant's proposal of building a monopine tower is clear a clear indication that a regular tower would be undesirable for everyone, including them, because of its look. And as we heard ample evidence at the Planning Commission meeting, the plastics in the monopine would lead to pollution of the lakes and the well water that the people in this area drink. A bill tower construction would not be a complete eyesore, and it would eliminate the threat of pollution. This was mentioned at the planning meeting
as well, but the applicant's legal counsel said that they did not want to build a bell tower because, no surprise here, of the cost. Thank you.
Thank you. Next. Heather Criminella.
Okay, Heather Cremella, [address removed], and I'm not sure if there's anyone representing it. Are you
in are you in Pasco County or another county? We're in Pasco County. Yeah.
Um from the Patterson family, but I know that they've suffered a loss, so I'm sorry for that. Uh, commissioners, I'm addressing you as a Pasco resident on behalf of my family, Greyhawk at Lake Polo, which is an established neighborhood of over 20 years to the east of the proposed location, which encompasses nearly 240 homes, and the surrounding community, many of which have been there far longer than 20 years. I'm asking you to not to deny AnthemNets conditional approval and require them to find an appropriately zoned location for the proposed tower. Please
don't encroach on this land. While I understand that it's outside of your scope to determine whether these towers present health risks or side effects, I don't think that should invalidate my concern. But what I can ask you is to consider the financial implications on our property to lose value in such close range to the proposed tower. In 2022, my family began our real estate search in the area. While I understand appraisers, May not tell you that your home will appraise lower during during proximity. I know from experience that you lose out on potential buyers.
While navigating our home search, there were several houses that we never walked into because of location of similar towers. There's a stigma associated, and unfortunately, you can't persuade me to believe that there will not be a monetary sacrifice to our property values. Home buyers don't seek out these. As part of their curb appeal. While I can rationalize with the desire for growth and development in the area, the plan should coincide with current restrictions and require Anthem Net, which is a billion-dollar business, to dig into their pockets and seek out a commercial land lease that's fitting his own criteria and build
things on that land, in my opinion. I did was able to, sorry for my nervous. This energy also, but um I was able to we did a p a post before uh the passing of Ms. Patterson and that petition gained about a hundred and eighty-one signatures. We found out about this meeting last week, so we kinda scrambled to get some uh support, but we were able to gain eighty one signatures from the neighborhood. I think there was a bit of confusion, people that signed last time thinking that maybe that was gonna work. I don't know with um restrictions of Um statute of limitations. I don't know if that exists
with petitions, but so we went ahead and and gained more of those. So thank you for your time. It's been a long day. Did you want
to turn in the petition? Sure, yeah. Okay. Uh take a motion. Move received and file. Second. All in favor? Aye.
Aye.
Oh. next please.
Lindsay D Stepano.
Oh they're coming coming up in order of what they signed. How'd they know that?
Sorry, I'm nervous. My name is Lindsay DeStefno. We live at [address removed] in the Greyhawk community. I have been sworn in. Um I would like to start by saying I'm a licensed physician assistant and a mom to two young boys ages two and four, and my husband and I own a small business in Pasco County. We recently sold our home and we were looking For a new home, and we stumbled across this house in Greyhawk in November, and we fell in love with the layout in the community. So we decided to purchase
this house. Um we had we known that the cell tower was possibly gonna be built on this plot of land that is very close to the house, we would not have purchased the house. Um
Upon further research, it is suggested that these towers be built About a third of a mile from houses and our house, which is in the middle of Greyhawk, is only gonna be 0.4 miles from this tower. The houses that are on the outskirts of Greyhawk are gonna be much closer. Additionally, there's a lot of houses down the side streets that are not part of Greyhawk, but they are going to be right behind the cell tower. Um I don't feel comfortable
living in this house with that cell tower being so closed, especially raising our boys there because children are v vulnerable to EMF exposure due to the more sensitive brain tissue and organs. Um, so that would actually be a deal breaker for us and we would consider selling our house and moving to the point where uh my husband and I actually have EMF blockers on our cell phones and all of our Wi-Fi routers at home because we take it very seriously. Um I'm also worried about what the cell tower will do with our property values because we feel like we did purchase
this house at a high price and we feel like it'll decrease the value. Additionally, RFK Jr. is now secretary of HHS, and part of his plan is to look into EMF exposure and radiation exposure. And the current FCC guidelines were completed in 1996, and we do know that technology is now different than it was in 1996, and all of those guidelines need to be updated. But with that update, it's gonna open up everyone's eyes. is um especially people who aren't aware of EMF exposure and what they could do to you. So that
will further drive down the price of our house. My question is why there's a need for a tower in this specific location? especially on a piece of land that's zoned for residential and agriculture use. Um, I went I did go for a walk in the community on Sunday and I was listening to Pandora the whole walk and I was able to get reception the entire time. I also took screenshots throughout different points of my walk showing that I have adequate cell activity in this community. And then there's also a big cell tower on 54 and
Gun Highway that's very close. So my question is, why can't antenna be added to that location if there's a need for cell service in our area? Um and I would just love for you guys to Um please take into consideration our home values, our health and well-being of the community, and please consider looking for another location for the salt tower. Thank you.
Michael is it Dario? Uh Dameo. Dameo. Yep.
Mike DeMeyo, [address removed]. I'm here to discuss the proposal to put a cell tower in the middle of our neighborhood. This motion was previously denied by a three to two vote by the Planning Commission. Um both votes to approve the motion. approved to say yes, however they were not happy in doing so, which they stated during the meeting. Although I'm concerned about the health effects of living under a cell tower, I do understand that you can't consider those factors during this hearing today. A hundred a
115-foot monopine tower has up to ten thousand pounds of fake pine needles and branches made of fiberglass and plastic. This is a 155-foot tower, so let's just say the number is closer to 15,000 pounds. That's almost eight tons of fiberglass and plastic hanging from a pole. Fiberglass dries out, it gets brittle, it breaks into tiny pieces. The blazing hot Florida sun the summer storms, the hurricanes, all those factors are going to accelerate
that deterioration process. The location of this tower, though technically not placed in the wetland, does tower over top of the wetland. It's 155 feet high. The fake pine needles, the branches, they're gonna deteriorate and shed so much debris into the ecosystem in our waterways below. We live in a very delicate lake system in a rural neighborhood. We're all on well water and there's a huge concern about the microplastics that these pieces are going to leach into the soil. We cannot have Microplastics leaching into
the soil and affecting our drinking water. We're on well water, we don't have city water. The drainage in the area is very poor. We have a very high water table due to all the lakes in the area and it does not drain well. There's no county sewer system. Even the steady rain yesterday completely flooded the road. The road that uh accesses where the tower is located is unpaved and frankly it's an atrocious condition. It's not maintained by the county. It's littered with large potholes and huge swales that you have to drive around. I thought I was
gonna break an axle driving over here today. There's no access to this location from State Road 54. The only access to the site is winding back through the neighborhoods. There's no fire hydrants. Even the post office got rid of our individual mailboxes. A couple solutions I hope you'll recommend. Number one, change the location of the tower. It doesn't need to be installed in the middle of a residential neighborhood. There are houses right next to the proposed location. These people are going to be living under a cell tower. Number two, change the type of
a tower from a monopine tower to the galvanized metal tower. uh something that won't shed plastics into the environment below. And third, if you're going to allow this proposal to continue, please require an ironclad maintenance plan to clean up after it. We're fine with innovation and progress in the area, but your job as commissioners to make sure it's done responsibly and to protect its residents. I ask you that you please consider alternatives to this proposal. And I'll leave you with a direct quote from Mr. Charles Gray during the Planning Commission meeting
in November of 23. He said, quote, I don't like it when a company comes and says that, well, we don't want to do that because it's going to cost more money. How it affects the neighbors is more important to me than whether it's gonna cost more money or not. If it's gonna cost more money, then let's find a different location. Thanks.
Well done. Okay, next.
We have two others signed up but they're online and in addition to those standing.
All right, well let's take these three and then we'll go to the ones online. Okay, come on up.
Is there uh one second, is there anyone else wishing to speak here today? No, you guys are okay, you're in line. Okay, we're gonna close the public comment after the gentleman with the hat. And the two that are online. Thank you.
My name is Darlene. I live at [address removed]. Your last name,
Darlene?
Oh. Darlene Moore.
I live at [address removed]. I know you don't want to hear about the help.
Were you sworn in? Yes, I was here when I sworn.
Not that yep, that's fine.
More batches.
I know you don't want to hear about the health effects. Um of the m headaches that can come from it and the memory lapses and the um How it affects cardiovascular patients and things like that. Um But there's a reason why they cell towers should be so many feet away from schools. And I think it's the same, it should be the same for residential areas
because these children that are in schools are spending more time at home sleeping there. and being constantly
exposed to the radiation.
And this tower, cell tower, is going into a residential area. And cell towers should not be built. in residential areas. They should be in commercial or industrial areas where people are only there for a short period of time. not there constantly. Besides the children, there's people That are retired and are in their homes. All day, all night. So um But
I know you don't That's probably not the point since you don't care about the health, but I was not even informed. about this meeting until I went for a walk. And I saw this sign face down on the ground on the corner of Baylo about this meeting. I also didn't know about the partition or the petition. And I'm sure there's a lot of other people who are opposed to this that
di were not informed and did not know about it. I think you should take that into consideration too.
Your name and address for the record, please.
Uh B. Christopher Coutronet, C-O-T-R-O-N-E-I. I live at [address removed] in uh Greyhawk at Lake Polo. You've been sworn. I'm sorry. I was sworn in earlier. And uh Uh many of the remarks I was going to make have already been made by people that spoke prior to uh my arrival here at the podium. Uh I was most impressed by the photos. That were presented.
by the petitioner. Uh-huh. Because it didn't show where this tower is going, because There are two hundred and twenty-six homes in Greyhawk, I'm told. approximately two thirds of them Home so long. Hasra? Drive. Up this drive. Man of war. Uh every time somebody pulls into their driveway. They're gonna see that tower looming
over their homes and over their backyards, You won't be able to go in your pool without seeing that tower. None of that was shown in the presentation made by the petitioner. And I ask you to take that into consideration because they made it look like it was in a rural area. where no one's around and the woman who owned the land is now deceased. And I don't know that the property has been sold or not, and but it should be amended for the record that it's the estate of uh Joan
Patterson. А фермер, і
Uh I'm a recent arrival in Pasco County as a resident. But I've been visiting the area. For forty years. And finally got to retire. But this is not what I want to look at. In my in my front front of my home when I step out the front door And that's what we're facing. Hold it. I'll let you go home. Thank you. Ask you to decline this.
Thank you. And we have our last speaker. In the room and then we will go to online.
The people.
Your name and address for the record, sir.
Walter She Bart, [address removed], I am the one that's gonna live right across the street from this.
Did you take an oath when you earlier in the meeting? Did you swear to that Yeah Okay. That's fine. Please proceed.
I've lived there for fifty five years. I've raised my kids there. I grew up there. Um Why they wanna put a tower back and this we consider this a little slice of heaven what's left. You everybody knows what's going on on fifty four. Put the tower up off fifty four where the other one was. Why do we have to I'm retiring now, now I gotta sit on my porch and look at a Friggin' ugly ass tower? It's
it's crazy. Uh Like the lady said before, there's only access, there's only one way in. It's not like you can come in from fifty four. It's only one way in there. We're on I have th three hundred and ninety feet on a private road that go that they're going down to go to this. I'm not gonna allow It's a private road, it's private property. It shouldn't be allowed. I I don't know what else to
say. I did want to mention too that Joni has passed away a year ago. She is not around anymore. Her kids are there scrambling. They don't know what to do. They're all looking for the easy money, that ten grand a year you get for putting a cell phone. Tower on your property. I have not I grew up with Joni. Joni was a good person. But her kids don't know what's going on. They're all fighting, they're all scrambling,
they don't know what to do. So I'm just here to vote no, I don't want it. I grew up there, I don't want to look at it, and I don't want my kids to look at it, nor my grandkids. Yeah. I've spent my whole life in Pasco County, right there. And now they're gonna do this right in front of my you know, it's crazy. I was I lived in Odessa when Odessa was nothing but dairies and
Metro Ranch and Starkey Ranch. My mom took care of the stargy kids. You know, I've been around this area, and uh it shouldn't be. I just that's all I wanna say.
Thank you. And we have two folks online. Can we go to them?
Uh the first one is Nick Zumas.
Good evening, Commissioner. Nick Jumoff here. I've been sworn.
Okay, there we go. Okay.
Yep, you are now.
[address removed]. I believe the Planning Commission was correct to to recommend denial of this project.
Nick, have you been sworn in?
I have.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you.
I put a message in the chat of WebEx.
Thank you. We can we can't.
No worries. I think the biggest problem here, uh well, not Not the biggest problem, but the sign being down in the road doesn't bode well for the applicant. Uh the first time this project came up, the sign was down in the road as well. Don't want to make any accusations that are false, but I believe that it was the applicant themselves or the property owners that took this sign down. I've had to secure it twice to a stop sign with zip ties. I just I I I don't appreciate the appearance of any impropriety
there. When we're supposed to be having a public open process, you know, for somebody to be messing with sun. Nevertheless, um it shouldn't be a PVC tower, as other people have mentioned, you know, that's going to be a problem with pollution in the lake system. This is a protected wetland. Make them put up a regular tower. If they don't want to put up a regular tower, then too bad. Um you know, I think that this is an issue of carrier prioritization, the need for more towers. ATT prioritizes
their customer service very well across the network. They have multiple different levels of service for their customers. Verizon And you can Google this. Verizon is the worst when it comes to customer prioritization. They don't have enough tiering. Uh They need to do a better job at it. You know, we're we're we're looking down the face of 5G towers and those things are gonna be everywhere, every few hundred feet. Where does it stop? At what point do we say no? You
know, this neighborhood has fiber. Hardwired connections are great. I'm talking to you over fiber right now. Self service in the neighborhood's decent. I understand the need for future expansion, but at some point This technology too will be obsolete. Look at what they're doing with satellites. Um
Uh somebody mentioned the family and I spoke to one of the family members this morning. And
They are in disarray. And a lot of them that have to sign off on this tower don't want this tower. But what I'm told is that the cell phone tower company now is jamming it down their throats because they're in a contractual, they're locked up contractually. So they have to take the tower or risk being sued for performance. So I can tell you that this property is supposed to be sold. I don't know when it's supposed to hit the market. Somebody's living there that's not supposed to be living there. Um but it will be sold and uh uh not only does the neighborhood not want
it A lot of the family members involved don't even want it. Um so I I appreciate y'all's fortitude in this process. It's been a very long day for you. Um these are necessary conversations that we're having. So I I I tip my hat to you and I give all of you on this board credit for doing what you do and having these necessary conversations. And I would recommend denial of this project. Uh thank you very much.
Thank you. Curtis Archova.
He's with them.
Oh, he is with the applicant. Okay. Okay, to the applicant and then to the board.
Okay. I need to have some of the documents. Can I have the um photo sim first, please?
Okay, well he's loading that up. Your code allows towers as either permitted or conditional uses in every single zoning category in your county. There is no per se incompatibility of cell towers with residential properties in the county that i under your code. We're allowed to do that. We have performance criteria that we have to meet and we've met every single one of them. But We can't just put them in in industrial and
commercial areas because that's not where the people are and that's not where the demand is and that's not where the need is for them. So now I'm gonna show you we added a few um shots to our photo sim. You have one in your package that has four views. This is the same the first four views on this one are the same four in your package, but we added four more views. You had a number of people come talk to you from the neighborhood to the southeast, the Greyhawk neighborhood. And
let me get
Some of my fellow commissioners may not know where Greyhawk is.
Is this a pointer or is this a
right point?
Yeah,
yeah.
The top button is the pointer? Okay. So um let me go back.
That's Greyhawk. That's Greyhawk. This is Ballow Road. So we add we added a couple photosim locations, and I'm gonna point out this one was the photo four. We added the one to the east, which is location number six.
Well that I think uh okay, 'cause that's State Road 54, so here we go. Which one
no I'm talking about the one on Ballow Road, number six, view number six.
So we we added this location down on Ballow Road, directly north of Azra Drive. The tower is not visible. None of those neighbors in that neighborhood to the south will have any visibility of this tower. And we specifically added that view. Now it's a gated community. We couldn't get in there to get something more internal, but we're just north of. Let me go back to the map and show you again where that view is. is taken.
It's uh Right.
That are you saying that is the view from
That's the view from Ballon Road that's just north of this neighborhood. And there that this is Azra that Tracy, maybe you need to come help me with this. I'm very bad. Yeah. So now the pointer. So that view is the one I just showed you. There's n the tower's back here. There's no view from here. If there's no view from here, there's no view from here. And we couldn't get in there, but we took this shot right on the on we went further east on Ballow
Road. And Mr. Um Zumas that just spoke lives pretty close to that neighborhood too. He lives on Denison. And he's he's about where we he that photo was taken about where Dennison intersects with uh Ballow wrote, he won't have any visibility of this tower either. And really the only impact of a tower is its is its view. The aesthetic impact is the only impact it has. I've we've sat here all afternoon and listened to roads and traffic. We don't generate any of that. The only
impact is visibility. So um I'm gonna go back we added a few more shots. In the photo, Sam, they're all locations. Yes.
Go back to the picture go back to the picture you had you had that you were just sh referencing.
The the this one?
The one you had right in the middle of a tree.
Yeah, you can't see it.
When you put a big block of wood right in front of something, yeah, you're not gonna see it. That's a terrible picture.
Well I can have Curtis O'Chow that's a big thing.
You you will not see this tower given the wetlands that are on the Patterson track and the wetland track that is directly to the east. They will not see it. Um the rest of the uh photo sim, there are three added three more shots that we just went in a greater um uh ring around
the original locations. I'm gonna go back and point them out. And there was no visibility from any of these additional locations. So we added um five, six, seven, and eight. So we added from here, we added here, we added it went blank. This one. And I can go through them. Um
Did you show us five?
Yeah, I'll I'll I'll go to five.
Five is from State Road fifty four looking.
No. No it's it's
five five is from Oh yeah.
Looking southeast, you can't see it.
Go back one slide.
This is the only slide we have that you can see it. And this is taken from Roland.
And on the other side of Rillands about eight residents that are probably here today or that have spoken That complained to you before.
Uh there's not eight.
Six.
Five or six from that side. Most of them are up on um uh Keystone Blue Key Blue Stone Road. Mr. Schubert, let's let's put this one up. Can you have you have an overhead?
Mr. Schubert is the closest speaker.
He lives on Rol
Roland or Ballon?
He lives on the corner of Bluestone and Roland.
Okay.
And let's get this map up. Um Mr Zumas lives on Denison. I I have the distance to his house too. As soon as we get this map up I can show you.
Okay.
Right. Sorry.
There it is.
Okay. Oh, it's upside
down.
There there we go. Okay, here's our tower site right here. This is Mr. Zumas over on the on Dennison.
Is that to the right? And what does that say? I can't read it. Sixteen. Thirteen sixty. And then this is Mr. Schubert's house. His house is on the corner here. It's it's located on an angle and it orients it orients this way. The tower is back up behind him, and that distance is I can't read it from here.
So they he's the he's the closest objector. None of the people that lives directly south Here. of the Patterson property have complained. They didn't come to the community meeting, they didn't come to the Planning Commission. They they aren't here today. We haven't heard from them. And they they are the people that are are the closest. They're within the notice, they would have gotten mailed notice.
No, those that's people in the neighborhood down here. This this new neighborhood down here. This isn't this is all an older, a very it's very remote. It's a little i i it's a neighborhood that's kind of just tucked back. in there. You wouldn't know it's there from fifty four. Okay. Um
Mr. Schubert said that these are private roads. This is all public Polk County right away. I'm sorry. It's Pasco County right away. There is some of it that is maintained by the county and some of it that's privately maintained. And this is a map I got from your public works department. Mm.
So Mr. Schubert doesn't have the ability. Uh you need think to turn that around. He doesn't have the ability to block access. These i privately maintained is different than privately owned. So um the green right here nope the green right here is where the county maintenance stops and The Patterson property is up here, it doesn't show on this map. And what's outlined in red is privately maintained.
Okay, let's get the RF engineer up here to talk about. Um can you load the The Verizon package, please. And um Mr. Smith's gonna come up and talk about why we need this tower, who gets served by it. and um why w why and address the tower that's up at fifty four and gun. Okay, David, you wanna go through your
Is that a laser or Uh not really.
Okay.
Oh say your name and add.
Uh David Smith from Verizon, seventy seven oh one East Helcom Parkway, Temple Terrace, Florida. Um
that was
the end
of their time, so if the board wants to extend time, you didn't need to do it by motion.
Well. Uh ex Yeah.
Okay. Do you want to give them five m five more minutes, Commissioner? Is that
Second.
All in favor?
I
okay you gotta go quick because Mr. Drager still has to come up here.
Okay, real quick, um we go through Just go to your before and after the before and after. So this is a current map of our our existing sites. We have four existing sites that are around this facility. So you can see uh A in the top left. Um you got uh B uh site over there just east of the uh expressway over there. And we got a couple on the south side there. The yellow dot is what the proposed location that that we're here for today. So what you see here is a current coverage map of AWS for what we have uh right here. So
you can see green is the good reliable coverage for uh in building. And you can see how it's surrounding the four existing sites that we have. And the yellow dot again is the a stereo site that is uh that that that we're uh here for today. So with the propagation with our current design, you can see how the coverage comes in around the yellow dot. That's the proposed site. So if um if we built the site today, this is what would cover and fill in. And so the purpose of this site is twofold is to increase
the uh the uh coverage. Even though we do have coverage there, the quality of service, we increase that for home internet and things of that uh nature. And also the site to the west by Gun and 54, that one right there in front of Lowe's, and the site to the east of the expressway there, that flagpole, both of those have high congestion. So this one's gonna offload both of those sites and fix both of our problems right there with this one, at the same time increasing our coverage and our ability to to improve uh quality of service for our home
internet as well. So I know we're under a time crunch, so any any questions?
Any guys, Jack, any questions? Nope. Okay.
Okay, Rick. Next.
The comment about that Mr. Gray made about cost. Um we made a decision with the landowner. Ms. Patterson to do a monopine. We thought we were doing the respectful thing and using a mitigated style of tower in the it for this community. The the mi the pine tree tower is much more expensive to build than a monopole. We went the expensive route first to be ex to be respectful to the community. Okay, Rick. Qualifications quick and property values.
Good afternoon, Commissioner.
West Smith Street, Orlando, Florida. I am the owner of Calhoun Dreggers and Associates. We're a full service real estate appraisal firm. I'm a federally certified appraiser on the highest level of licenses that the federal government and the state of Florida recognize for federal. certified appraisers in the United States. I was asked to look at the possible impact to the value of any single family homes that might be adjacent to a tower similar to this. There have been some studies over the years. There was one in New Zealand, there was one actually in
Orlando over my part of the world. Where a an appraiser looked at the big lattice towers like you might see on a big high voltage transmission line or a radio tower with all the guy wires coming down. And so there have been a couple of studies that would suggest those types of towers would have a negative impact. But I was focused on in my study, which I have copied here. uh looked at the type of tower, either monopole or one with a flag on it, or one with um the pine monopine that they've been called. So
I have three different types Of studies here, one in Odessa, one in Land O' Lakes, all in this general area. And just real quickly, based on my analysis of looking at the sale prices of homes that were near or had a view of a tower versus a similar home that did not have a view or wasn't as quite as close to a tower, similar to the one proposed here, I wasn't able to see. see uh any impact or reduction in value. I also heard someone mention what was a fair point that sometimes the marketing time might be extended because some people won't
consider a home. I wasn't able to see that even when I talked to local brokers and real estate agents.
Read this again.
Second. All in favor?
Aye. Any questions from Mr. Dragers?
No, and we this is not our first cell tower hearing, so we have heard that from many different real estate professionals Um And you are so we typically we have a cell town ordinance that allows for staff to approve towers without going through these public hearing, but You're having to come to us because of of the height of the tower? Because it's a residential feature land use. Okay, and
what about the height?
No, not because of the height. Because it's a residential feature land use.
Um which which you would allow tower. You can see it right here in this map. But um board members, any questions, any thoughts?
Are we done for the presentation?
Yeah.
Oh did you wanna add anything? I just wanted to real quickly, y you have language in your code about aesthetic impact. And you your code says being able to see it does not necessarily equate to adverse visual impact. You have a whole list of factors that you're supposed to consider on that. And um I guess I'm not gonna have time to go through them all, but That tower is visible from one view. You have to consider all the views. It's not lighted. We've used a mitigated design. Um We there if you go through
all those factors, they're no, no, no, no, no. We don't meet any of the factors for establishing an aesthetic impact on a tower. And I wanna be respectful of your time. But that's if you go through them We don't meet them. I mean this doesn't meet those negative factors.
Okay. Thank you. Any questions for me? No, thank you.
And the um the park tower is further to the left. It's off the screen when that comes in, correct? It's not even in it's not even yeah, it's further west.
Yeah, and I uh based on the discussion we had, I don't think it's gonna help with service in this
no it's bypassing the this really ugly tower at Gun and Fifty Four, which should have come down, but that's a story for another day. Um
I I I'm I'm not I'm not gonna Hide the fact that I wish this was up on the fifty four, not in a residential neighborhood. It is tucked in the woods. Um Uh there's no There's no I don't know, it's a toughie for me. Um
No one's ever happy when the cell tower There's no great location for a cell tower. It's too bad they aren't there before people move in.
Madam Chairman, are you in board deliberation? Yes. You can sit down. Oh
okay I was just gonna answer the question about the commercial property at fifty-four that denied us.
Uh
so you tried on fifty. We tried. We tried. Yes. There's one commercial property owner right at the center of our search area and they said no. It wasn't a matter of money. We found the only piece and we found a twenty acre piece that allows the size of the parcel and the existing tree cover to absorb the impact of the tower on site. We think we found the best piece in our search area.
Well someone's always affected when we put one of these, so they're not they're not my favorite hearings at all. I can tell you that.
I
it's I understand. My least favorite.
Does anyone else have any thoughts?
No Chair I Sell tower votes are always always tough. And Site C at the bottom looks like there's one in a similar Kind of area. Can't zoom in my iPads. Acting funky. Um
Yeah, it's residential.
And it's the way that we communicate in this world. And we might be using these today and ten, fifteen years down the road we might not need cell towers and they come down. And you know, we all have Bluetooth in our trucks. in our houses, in our schools, most cell tower sites are on school sites. Um And there's no no easy easy way around it. Uh it'd be nice if cell tower companies, whatever the rules are, could predestine where
these things go, uh, versus waiting till people and neighbo move in and buy a home and neighborhoods are built and then they say, Oh, we need to Put a cell tower here. There's not not very proactive And um so I would be I've I've supported Every cell tower, location, good, bad or ugly, that's that's come before the board. Um And I'd be very hypocritical if I didn't say that It's an unfortunate need and I'll
be consistent with how I voted since coming on the board and cell towers and It upsets a lot of folks, but People get mad and they call when they can't get internet and phone signal at their house too. It's just tough.
Uh monopine, monopole.
Um hearing
Listening to folks and If there has to be one, I I'm hearing a a monopole. If there has to be one.
I know I would not wanna live in these neighborhoods and look at that cell tower. I I feel like there has to be another piece of property somewhere. that they can put that.
And I'm sure I'd agree with that too.
Mr. Oakley.
Well some ways I'll make a motion.
Yeah, well I can't.
Sure you can't.
A chair chair on make the motion.
Um looking at the one down south that is in a residential area off of Lutz Lake Fern. So I'm looking at it here. It's north of of Lutz Lake Burton in a residential area.
Madam Chair. Yeah. Um just to be clear, if you're gonna approve a monopole design, if you rec if you approve this, I don't think that works with the existing conditions of approval. We we probably would have to continue it because For example, condition two requires them to build in accordance with the elevations that are attached. We don't have any elevations for a monopole design. And I I guess what the applicant Unless the applicant has some monopole. elevations they brought with them. There's no
elevations for you to prove under a monopole design.
But we know what a monopole design is.
I understand that, but We the reason we include these elevations as a standard condition because it's showing the maximum height, it's showing other attributes of this poll that they're restricted to. So we don't have anything to attach to conditions showing a monol Pull design unless the applicant happens to have one. In their back pocket.
Madam Chairman Mariano. Let me make let me make this easier move to deny.
Move to deny.
I'll second that.
I'll second it.
Mm.
I don't I don't I think it's a moot point. Yeah, got two sayings on a motion.
Well, okay, all in favor?
Aye.
Aye. All opposed? Nay. Nay. Nay. Three two. So it dies. Okay. All
right,
we're
done.