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12/17/2018 11:00 PMTaking a position on the sticky question of a permanent home for a replacement cellular and emergency communications tower, a decision that will affect aesthetics, signal strength, and the recipient of the anticipated $100,000-plus annual income from the contract, the Westbrook Board of Selectman (BOS) made its recommendation. On Dec. 11 the board voted to recommend that the new tower be built on the former site of the water tank on Boston Post Road, across from Water’s Edge.
The advisory letter from the BOS is just that—advisory—and may or may not affect the decision of the Connecticut Siting Council, a state agency with sole authority on the matter.
“We can recommend, but the choice is obviously not ours,” said First Selectman Noel Bishop.
About 30 people turned up for a public meeting in Westbrook that evening to hear and ask questions about the future location of the tower, which will replace the temporary tower erected when the water tank on which the antennae were previously attached came down this summer.
The residents who spoke at the meeting favored the current location, which is owned by Connecticut Water Company (CWC). The alternative location is immediately to the northwest of the CWC parcel and is owned by the Dattilo Family Trust, which has made known its opposition to the tower remaining in its current location. the rust also owns and operates the Water’s Edge Resort & Spa.
An overview of the situation was presented at the meeting by Christopher B. Fisher, managing partner at Cuddy & Feder, a law firm hired by MCM Communications, which will construct, own, and manage the tower. Fisher provided a brief history, explaining that the water tower previously located at the site became home to both commercial and emergency communications equipment beginning in 1997, and that once the CWC decided to demolish the tower, there was an immediate need to provide a new site for that equipment. For this reason, a temporary tower was erected.
The public safety communications equipment belongs to the Town of Old Saybrook and is crucial not only for efficient emergency operations, but for the safety of police officers and firefighters, said Old Saybrook Chief of Police Michael A. Spera.
“We’ve been on top of the CWC tower for more than a decade,” Spera said. “And before we went there…taxpayers in Old Saybrook spent a considerable amount of money doing coverage area maps to make sure that exact site would work for us. We have spent zero dollars to see if any other site would work and we know that if we were to move to any other site, it would cost us more money.”
Bishop pointed out that the move from the CWC property to that of the Dattilo Family Trust amounted to “at most 1,000, 1,500 feet.”
“How does that affect communications in Old Saybrook?” he asked.
“We don’t know because we haven’t studied it,” Spera said. “When we built the system more than a decade ago, the slightest variance of location…determines what your coverage area is.
“What I can tell you is that where we’ve been for a decade has provided us with solid, safe communications,” Spera said.
Responding to a question from Selectman John Hall, MCM Communications reps said that space on the tower is also available for the Town of Westbrook’s own emergency communications equipment at no cost to the town—but there is a caveat.
An “interference study would have to be done to make sure [any equipment installed by Westbrook] isn’t interfering with anything else,” said MCM National Sales Manager Robert Stanford.
This option is available no matter which site is chosen, as it is included in the contracts with the owners of both parcels of land.
The commercial networks could also be affected by a move to another location, Stanford said.
“When [the carriers] have an established network…the sites are quite interdependent on each other, they talk to each other. So we’re probably not as restricted as perhaps Chief Spera’s radio system is, but we’re pretty confined, especially when we have an anchor site like this one, which is pretty much the center and the other ones have been developed after that.”
MCM considered a number of sites in the area. The Westbrook Hunt Club, for example, “was 2.6 miles away from one of the existing [towers] and the proximity was too close to do us any good,” Stanford said. “If we were to take a site like that, in all likelihood we would need perhaps another [tower] to fill a gap that that would create.
“Part of what the Siting Council wants to do is to minimize the proliferation of towers,” Stanford continued. “You don’t want to see four of these things going up.”
Engineer Al Wolfram represented the Dattilo Family Trust at the meeting and advocated for choice of its parcel.
“We feel it provides the services that MCM needs, it provides adequate maintenance access, also easy access to power. It’s also the furthest site away from Route 1,” he said.
CWC Vice President Craig J. Patla read a statement outlining the CWC’s position, which is in favor of locating the tower on its own parcel of land. The revenue from its deal with MCM will benefit customers and is overseen by the Connecticut Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA), the statement said.
When the equipment resided on the tower—before MCM was involved—the annual revenue was approximately $100,000 a year, Patla said. The CWC’s contract with MCM is an unusual one: whereas the communications company usually contracts to pay the land owner rent, CWC will receive 45 percent of the revenues. That percentage will increase to 50 percent after 10 years.
“We didn’t hear about the financial arrangements for Water’s Edge,” said resident Julie Barrett, whose property abuts one of the parcels. “To me, as a resident…there doesn’t seem like there’s a compelling argument on why [the Dattilo parcel would be chosen as] the location, so I’m wondering if it comes down to dollars.”
Stanford and Fisher would not divulge the rent specified in the contract with the Dattilo Family Trust.
“I don’t have the number,” said Stanford. “We would actually redact the number when we go to the siting council. It’s a monthly rent number, just so you understand the structure.”
“The siting council…[is] not going to look at whether or not CWC or Dattilo is going to financially gain,” Fisher said. “That’s not in their statutory criteria.”
Hall asked about the safety of the tower, pointing out that the water tank had multiple supports. At 130 feet tall and only 89 feet from the street line, Hall expressed concern that the monopole could pose a public safety hazard if a natural disaster caused it to fall.
MCM engineer Matt Bandle explained that the tower would be equipped with a hinge, preventing it from falling into the road.
“I’ve been doing this 30 years and I’ve never seen a tower collapse,” said, but a “hinge point” would ensure that the tower, should it fall, would remain on the property.
Barrett made it clear that she’s in favor of the CWC site.
The water tank was “in that location for about 100 years,” she said. “And it didn’t seem to be too much of a blight on the neighborhood. And as an adjoining neighbor, to me, the location of the monopole closer to Route 1, which is where more of the retail is, and out of the residential neighborhood, which is where I live, makes far better sense.”
Another neighbor, Karen Hyde, agreed.
“I would prefer it to be at the water company site, because it affects property values,” she said. “I’m a realtor, too, so I do know this.”
One dissenting voice was that of resident Sid Holbrook, whose letter Bishop read at the meeting. In it, Holbrook expressed concern about the permanent tower being erected on Standard Hill, which he described as “a historic location in Westbrook.” He called the tower “an eyesore and potentially dangerous structure” and urged the BOS to “propose to the Connecticut Siting Council a location…as far away from the Boston Post Road as possible.”
Several residents at the meeting expressed confusion or disagreement with the notion that Standard Hill is a historic site, or even that Standard Hill is the proper name of the location. Bishop, contacted later, declined to comment.
As for the notion that the monopole is an eyesore, Spera said, “I go to Water’s Edge. I’ve been there for weddings, banquets… Heck, I just like their brunch. I don’t go there to look at Route 1. I go there to look at Long Island Sound.”
MCM plans to file its formal application in the new year with the Siting Council, which will then schedule a second public meeting in Westbrook, most likely in March or April, Fisher said.