Prescott Valley Planning & Zoning Approves Stone Ridge 100-Foot Monopine After Commissioners Reverse Course on Medical and Coverage Necessity

[music] Heat. Heat. Okay. Good evening. My name is Joe Huad. I'm the vice chairperson of the planning and zoning commission. I will be presiding over the commission's deliberations on hearing and action items this evening. The planning and zoning commission sits in an advisory capacity to the town council. As such, the commission reviews planning and zoning issues and forwards recommendations regarding these important issues to the council.

All members are appointed by the town council and volunteer their time. This evening's proceedings will be conducted as follows. First, I will read the hearing item into the record. Staff will then present the case and their recommendations to the commission. The applicant will be invited to address the commission and answer questions from the commission. The floor will then be open to comment from the public regarding the hearing item.

If you wish to speak during the call to the public or on an agenda item on tonight's agenda, please pre-register your name with the clerk's the clerk prior to the commencement of the meeting or any time prior to the meeting on the town of Presca Valley's website. When you are recognized by the clerk, please come to the microphone and state your name and address for the record.

After all pre-registered speakers uh speaker comments, the chair will may that the chair in this case the vice chair may call for additional non-registered speakers uh wishing to speak to the podium. The speaker will state their name for the registration by the clerk and be at the podium and will begin their comment when directed by the chair in this case the vice chair.

Uh, I ask that you direct your pertinent comments to the commission, to the chairperson, and not to staff or individuals within the audience. A threeminut time limit will be imposed. After public comment has been closed, the item will then return to the applicant if needed, then to the commission for comment andor a motion and a vote. So, I uh call I would like to call the What is today? How about that?

Um, I'd like to call the September 14th meeting of the Planning and Zoning Commission to order. Um, we could move to the pledge of allegiance. Commissioner Rossi, if you wouldn't mind leading us in pledge to the stands, indivisible for all. Okay, we got this fancy little roll call. So, I guess uh do we just follow through with the roll on this? Is that just press the button? Is that Yes, just mark yourself present, please. Okay, there we go. So, we have completed our roll call.

Uh do we have We do have a quorum. We have a quorum. Thank you. So, we'll move to the call to the public. At this time, any member of the public is allowed to address the planning and zoning commission on any agenda item or issues within the jurisdiction of the commission except for items scheduled for a public hearing at this meeting as there will be an opportunity to speak during the public hearing item. The speaker may have up to three minutes to speak.

Any person wishing to address the commission must first register to speak. Registration can be completed online or in person with the clerk prior to the start of the meeting. Pursuant to Arizona open meeting laws and at the conclusion of of call to the public, the individual member of the commissions may respond to the criticism by those who have addressed the commission and may ask staff to review the matter or may ask that the matter be placed on a future agenda.

However, members of the commission shall not discuss or take legal action on matters raised during an open call to the public unless the matters are properly noticed for discussion and legal action. Do we have any uh we do not no uh no people to speak for call to the public? Okay, we'll move on to announcement. Are there any announcements? No, vice chair. Okay, thank you. Uh, so we'll move on to the approval of the minutes.

Um, so we're looking to approve the July 13th, 2026 regular meeting minutes uh for consideration, possible action. Uh, do we have a motion or any suggested changes? Oh, there we go. We do have a motion. Yes, if we can get a verbal motion. Oh, it's verbal. It's verbal as well as pushing the button. This is for the benefit of the vice chair who doesn't generally do this very often. So, thank you, [laughter] Mr. Vice Chair.

I'll make a motion to approve the minutes of the July 13th, 2026 regular meeting minutes of the planning and zoning commission meeting. Thank you, Commissioner Griffith. Do we And we have a seconded apparent have a second for Thank you. Uh we have a a motion and a second. Uh we will tender our vote here and um I think we're results. Uh passed majority. Uh there's no nazs and uh so that passes minutes. Thank you. Okay. Public hearing items. So if the commission uh let's see here. Let's see here.

Okay. So I'm going to read first. I'm going to read the uh the application into the record. Then uh we'll open uh the item up for public hearing. So I will now open let's see here. Let's read that to the record. Yeah. So GPA26-00001 Stone Ridge cell tower consideration and possible action. Uh Mr. Norlock, if you're available to give your presentation, certainly happy to hear it. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair Commission.

Um as Vice Chair Huat has said, this is a general plan amendment for Stone Ridge Tower. Um we also have a zone map change, so I'll just kind of uh wrap them all up in one quick presentation. Um but it will have two public hearings and two motions. Uh the location of this is at uh is a portion of APN 103-61-004C approximately 0.3 acres. Um the site is east of Stone Ridge Drive, south of Old Black Canyon Highway and uh north of Lucky Draw by the Stone Ridge Golf Course Maintenance Building.

There are two requests for you today. A minor general plan amendment um and a request to reszone to RL10 pad um for a lot line adjustment. Um and in the conditions is a special use permit for the cell tower being proposed here. Um the requests are required because of a lot line adjustment for proposed cell tower um on the northern property and we need the entire the zoning follows the property line. So we do have to reszone the portion.

Um the general plan designation of the current property is community commercial. Um the request is go to low density um and then reszone to the um RL10 pad. Um this is the site plan provided. Um it shows the lot line moving from the current property which is uh in the red to the proposed which would be with the lot adjustment afterwards to the blue there. Um in order to have the 100 foot setback for the cell tower. Um the proposal is a 100 foot cell tower.

Um and the top of the monopel be up to 105 ft. So be 5t above the actual cell tower. These are the uh elevations proposed um as a monopine design for this area. And then just real quick and then I'll let the the applicant kind of do their presentation as well. Um for me, two additional conditions just that the lot line adjustment as shown in the site plan shall be recorded prior to the building permit issuance.

And then total height of the cell tower and modifying structure must not exceed 105 ft. So, originally we had uh that the cell tower wouldn't exceed 100 ft, but we'll add in thank you to um Commissioner Griffith add the entire structure into that to 105 ft. And that is all for me. So, I will in invite the uh the applicant up uh that will talk about the location choice, the height, and other things that's considered when choosing this site.

So, this is uh Logan Williams with Pinnacle Consulting, and he'll have a presentation as well. Before we go to that question, Yeah. Yeah, Mr. Norlock. Uh, does the commission have any uh comments or questions for Mr. Norlock? I do. Um, the total cell tower is not to exceed 105, but the tower itself is how big? 100 ft. 100 ft. Okay. Once it's in the location, I happen to know this location very well. So, once it's in the location, this tower will actually drop down 20 to 21 feet.

Is that what I understand? below the sidewalk. Yes, the the current site is about 20 feet below the sidewalk on Old Black Canyon. So basically once it's once it would be in the total height would be right around 80 ft approximately to the top of the cell tower. Yeah, about 80 85ish to the top of the monopine itself. Okay, thank you. Any other questions or comments from the commission, Mr. Vice Chair? Yes. Thank you, Mr. Norlock. Based on what my colleague just mentioned, I find that confusing.

The applicants requesting a uh consideration for a 100 ft cell tower. So regardless if it drops down, it's still 100 feet. Yeah. It'll be 100 feet from uh the area that is proposed at. And so it's the the area it's proposed at is about 20-ish feet lower than the road I think is but that 20 feet lower than the road does not come into play with the 100 ft requested for the towel cell tower height. Correct. Correct. Commissioner Griffith. Thank you. Yeah. Mr.

Lor, I had the kind of the same question and looking at the elevation of the existing ground or the ground where they're going to start the the tower. Um, obviously this is going to be 100 ft. Uh, the elevation where it starts, [clears throat] it's still going to be 100t. It's just going to be 20 foot lower than the adjacent sidewalk area or road area. That's correct. Yeah. From the road area. Is there been any talk about terracing this even further?

I know that there was a comment by the public that we received uh to look at potential additional terracing and landscape that could potentially um give more of a buffer. Was that was that u included in any discussion? Yeah, talking with the applicant today, they are going to I mean it's required for landscape plan when they come in with building permits.

So, they are looking at that and what that could look like and what the landscape plan could look like to okay help with that terracing of the trees and things. Um, any other comment or questions for Mr. Norlock before you bring Actually, okay, Mr. Commission. Yeah, I'm sorry, Vice Chair. Thank you. Yeah, for sure. Um, I um I had a good conversation with the head of the HOA of Stone Ridge and uh in May there was a um a survey that was sent out to the the uh community.

Um, of the respondents, 71% of the Stone Ridge residents were in favor of the cell tower. Um, one of the comments here from Maryanne Mott was asking for actual trees, full-grown trees to be put near the cell tower to beautify it, make it look nicer, uh, for aesthetics. Um, what I understand from the landscaping committee in Stone Ridge is that, uh, they have master gardeners there. that land is very coarse and they have had many plants go in and then die.

Um, and to the point where they stopped putting plants in once those plants die, they actually just put rocks in, which actually corresponds with Stone Ridge if you think about it. Um, so um, that's a concern right there. if she's concerned about adding trees and stuff like that. Um, that would be an issue with the ground. Any any comments or any any information on the soil? Has anyone taken a look at that? Not that I know of. I don't have any information on the soil out there. Yes, sir.

Um, also referring to Ms. Mott's letter, uh, which I found to be, uh, very refreshing these days. Usually it's uh combat and this was more like consiliation and compromise. And I did direct a question to Chris um about potentially reducing the tower height and what effect that would be on whatever the performance metric is that you use for these kinds of towers.

And I gather that would not be uh a very viable alternative uh partially because once you put these towers up, you also looked at collocation uh opportunities. Um so I greatly appreciate Miss Mott's uh letter. Uh we did do some research and I'm satisfied that you know kind of a net 85 from a perceived elevation and the rest of the research on the on the tower. I'm also uh there was another letter uh uh from an impassioned person who was very concerned about health risks.

So I did a little research and uh very credible organizations like the American Cancer Society uh have done studies and have definitively pretty much proven that there are no ill ill health effects uh from from cell towers. Uh so I just want to address those public response items. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Commissioner Evans. Uh just to Commissioner Coloss Colossa, uh comment on the trees and the request for full grown trees.

You know, a definition of a full-grown tree could be different depending upon the tree. And so, um I'm a I'm a big proponent of of landscape buffers to help kind of soften uh the image. I mean, even though this looks like a tree, it really doesn't look like a tree. I mean, it looks like a thing trying to be a tree. So, um, so we'll probably talk to the applicant a little bit about those comments, but thank you, Mr. Norlock.

If we could have the applicant, if he's here, come up and talk to us a little bit about, uh, some of the concerns that were brought up with the community. Thank you. Good evening. Uh, Logan Williams, 7643 East Indian Bend Road, Scottsdale, Arizona. Uh, Mr. Vice Chair, members of the commission. Uh again, my name is Logan Williams. I'm here on behalf of Pinnacle Consulting. Uh with me today is Mr. Tyler Ross and online we have Josh Leonard.

Uh we have hopefully not too long of a presentation for you. Uh I'm going to go over the presentation itself and the application. Um then we have the technical aspects and the telecommunications act as well. So, if there aren't any preliminary questions, um, I can go through those and we'd be happy to answer questions at the end. Um, at the moment, let's go with your presentation and we'll see if anything comes up after that. Thank you. Okay. Yep. All right. So, as Mr.

Norlock said, this is a 100 ft monopine or faux tree design uh adjacent to the existing Stone Ridge Golf Course maintenance facility. Um, it's going to be the tree freestanding and then with the ground equipment enclosed in a CMU wall that'll be designed to match the design of the existing maintenance facility uh on property as well. So, all the utilities will be routed underground from the tree to that compound um to kind of offset the overhead utilities other than the pole itself.

Um, this will be a 25x40 and 8 foot tall wall that's going to surround all this. And, um, there is already existing access to the site off Old Black Canyon Highway. So, we don't foresee any sort of pedestrian or traffic uh, issues aside from the initial construction. Um, so here is just kind of the overall site plan, which Mr. Norlock kind of already went over. Uh, you'll see to the north that is Old Black Canyon Highway.

So we'll be coming off that existing driveway and then kind of down off the side will be the sorry. So this is the actual tower itself or on the south portion and the compound will be a little higher in elevation um just off of that. And the only reason for that is this is a driveway and right here you can see the topography a little bit. So placing both um typically we put the tower inside of the compound but for this exact case that's not really viable.

Um, here's another just general overview. And then you can see the actual maintenance facility there to the right or to the east. And then just going over the zone map change as well. So again, this is just pushing our setback. So we do meet that 100 foot from the top of steel of the tower. Um, that extra 5T is just the faux branches on top, but the actual steel will be 100 ft tall. Um, in this as well, we're also going to be enclosing the compound. So it is in our parcel as well.

Um just so it's not split between the two zones. Um and then as Mr. Evans was saying this is meant for two additional collocations. So two additional carriers in or on top of Verizon Wireless. Um so the reason for the 100 foot is obviously we need this to be viable for Verizon Wireless but then we're also talking about two additional carriers who are 10 feet below Verizon and then whoever that third carrier is is another 10 feet below that.

So, we also have to keep in mind um you know, is it viable for the very bottom or are there going to be needs for additional towers if that height doesn't meet all three of their needs. Um and then in here as well, you can see the uh split between the tower and the compound itself. Excuse me. Uh here we just have some photo sims. So, we took them from the four nearest intersections. This one is to the northwest about 410 feet from the proposed site.

And then the top left you can kind of see the general views. So this will be view one on the very left. Uh view two is to the southwest and this is about 445 ft. And then you can see the wall in the top left as well as the existing maintenance facility in the bottom right. 895 ft from the southwest or southeast looking west sorry and then this is from the northeast approximately,45 ft.

Um so during our neighborhood outreach um we did receive two letters um kind of questioning the placement of this and the need for it. Um so I just want to present kind of an overview of the area. You will see there's a lot of vacant land. Um majority of this is under the same ownership as our parcel. Um and the main developer in the area is essentially looking to develop um majority of this vacant land to additional residential and commercial.

So not only is there a current need and worry of safety in the area, but if these areas are getting further developed, I mean the need for service in this area grows with that as well. Um there as well is just a zoning overlay of generally the same area. So this just shows that [snorts] there aren't many if any undeveloped areas that have a more favorable zoning aside from that PL zone uh right here which is undeveloped currently.

Uh however, we did want to stay true to the zone code and um you know meet the residential setbacks. that puts us about here. Um much lower than the 300 ft setback that we're currently in. So for those reasons, we picked this location being the least intrusive while still meeting the need for the the gap in coverage in the area.

And then I just have a brief memorandum of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 um restricting governments from regulating placement based on the fact that we comply with all FSC regulations, which we do in this case. So that will conclude my portion of the presentation. Uh again, Mr. Tyler Ross has more of the technical aspects and justifications for the site. Thank you. If you would uh hang out there a minute, I'm sure the commission may have some questions for you.

So bring it back to the commission for some questions. Commissioner Rossi, thanks for coming in. Uh, can you walk this group through your sighting process that ultimately landed you in Stone Ridge versus potentially Arizona State Land to the southeast? So, I might defer that to Mr. Ross. Um, he'll kind of go over the existing coverage in the area and why this location was needed as far as the general Stone Ridge community. Commissioner Griffith. Thank you, Vice Chair Huitt.

Um, welcome Logan, Mr. Ross, and Mr. Leonard online. Thank you for your presentation. Again, to go with my colleague, Mr. Graci. Why was this location chosen over others considered? So, Mr. Ross, I think you can answer that. So, I'm I'm sorry. We have we have additional slides. I'm just going to toss it over to Mr. Ross to continue this. Okay. Okay, I will continue with my other questions and maybe he can grab them all at once. Absolutely. Thank you, Logan.

Um, how do we know that there's a current need for additional coverage in this area? That's one of my other questions. Um, and are you familiar with three very close cell towers right in this general vicinity for you to address? So, um, I'll give you a break for now. [sighs] Well, thank you very much for the questions. Um, again, my name is Tyler Ross. I'm an RF engineer. I'm going to adjust this here. Try to not have to break my back while I'm doing this.

Um, but I'm a professional RF consultant engineer. Um, and those are some great questions. Um, I'm going to do the presentation if that's okay. I I feel like a lot of that will be answered in here and I'd be really happy to go back and go into more detail if if I if I haven't satisfactorily answered those questions. Um, ju just to give a quick overview here. So, when we we build these towers, there's always there's two primary reasons we ever put up a cell phone tower.

There's coverage and capacity. Those are always the two main reasons that we ever put up a tower. Um [snorts] and in this case, we're going to see we have a need for both. And uh just to give a a brief plain English of this, coverage is providing service where it does not exist. And then capac uh capacity would be providing bandwidth um in an area that may have coverage. But we'll see here that um it one of the sectors is going to be overloaded.

As you brought up, there are existing towers and we do have some uh coverage maps that do acknowledge that. So again, the objective of the new site is to provide both coverage and capacity. We want to provide [clears throat] additional bandwidth for customers along Old Black Canyon Highway and North Stone Ridge Drive. We also want to provide additional coverage along uh the highway as well, northern North Stone Ridge Drive.

And then we'll say to the south, east, and west of the proposed tower, um additional coverage is needed. Couple fun facts here. Why are sites like this important? Approximately 96% of Americans in the US own a cellular phone. 57% of American homes rely exclusively on cellular phones. And at minimum, 84% or more of 911 phone calls to emergencies or services are made from a wireless device. This is information about the tower that's been gone over.

Again, we're going to be looking at a 100 foot monopine tower uh with an antenna center line at 95 ft for the anchor tenant horizon. Uh why here? Again, we're going to see that there's overloading in surrounding sectors causing lower throughput. We have a lower coverage rate to the east, south, and west of the proposed tower. Here's a map uh with the green pin in the middle there. If you can see that, that's the proposed site there.

This is a look at the proposed site in the area and then all the existing um Verizon ATN T-Mobile sites around the area. As you mentioned there there are a number of sites existing. For Verizon specifically, we see 1.2 miles to the north is the closest uh existing tower and then the furthest away is about 7 uh 1.2 miles down there to the southwest or I'm sorry, southeast. Okay, so this this is the important part here.

This is going to get into some of hopefully answering those technical questions. This right here is called cellmapper data. This is open crowdsource data gathered from actual Verizon users. Um, and again in plain English here, what we're looking at here is light green would be ideal coverage. Dark green is going to be not good coverage. And then as we get into orange and red, we're getting into really not good.

And as you can see, there's a little arrow there with a proposed site kind of right in the middle there. And there's a lot of that dark green. Um, I'll get into more about what that type of um quality coverage will entail here in a minute. We'll have a I think a little better zoomed in map of this, but for the moment that's coming from crowd source data from CellMapper. This is another website coverage map that provides self uh crowdsource data from a different source.

And again, we can see the proposed site there kind of in the middle. Um, essentially this is going to be red is bad or it's red and orangeish. Um, sorry, I'm looking here to see if it makes a difference for you guys, but uh, essentially red bad, green is good, yellow is kind of in the middle. Um, and you can see we just have a kind of a plethora of all of it here. And I just want to iterate this is only kind of telling part of the story.

And I I'll put all the pieces together because again, we're we're looking at both coverage and capacity here. U, this is going to tell the story of coverage, but it's not going to tell the story of capacity. So, uh, you might look at this and say, well, it looks pretty decent in the proposed area for coverage, but again, it's not calculating or accounting for the capacity to the north that the, uh, current sector, uh, for Verizon's Tower is providing uh, that's pointing south to this area.

Now, I think this is a better uh, map to give you an idea of what's going on. Again, this is going to be looking at coverage. This is an RSRP uh, plot map. That's reference signal receive power. Uh basically what this is going to be saying is this is the expected um signal quality from from uh any given tower that we're looking at here. And as you can see, we're looking at the tower to the north that's a Verizon uh tower. There's one uh to the east and west that are further away.

But in the uh the focus coverage area of the red circle, we can see that there's there is a lot of green. And just to give a a breakdown here of what this means, uh the green is going to mean that for indoor coverage, you're you're going to get a good quality use on your cell phone. So, so there's a lot of green here. It looks good. The coverage appears to be good. Uh but again, it doesn't tell the capacity uh side of the story.

Moving on, the yellow is what you would expect to get a good quality signal within your car or vehicle. And then red is going to be you're only going to get a usable quality from outdoors. And again, I do want to reiterate that in the in the cir the uh circled area, you know, it does look pretty good from a uh coverage standpoint, but it doesn't really really do any justice to the capacity side of this. So, Mr.

Ross, this existing and proposed coverage is this is what we have now or this Okay, sorry. Yes. Uh, so this is your current coverage. This would be current Verizon user coverage in the area. Um, what is your tower going to do then? Where's the map showing what your tower's going to do? Right here. Uh, the next slide is going to be with the proposed right there. So, we run propagations on what's currently actually happening today.

And then we run a propagation of the tower built with the latest and greatest. And this is what that would look like now. So, even looking at your low band coverage, we go uh with existing And then we add, we see that a lot of the yellow fills into green. So a lot of the areas that would be expected to get good quality only in your vehicle or outdoors now turns to good quality use indoors as well. Again, this is only for the low band coverage. Um, this is going to be your lower speeds.

Um, I guess to translate that to something meaningful, this is going to be better for like talking on your phone, but this is not going to be so much. We I have more plots that are going to show your mid-band coverage, which is going to be more of your high-speed internet usage. So, what people are doing typically on their phones, the the in demand stuff for games, watching cat videos, or whatever it might be. Um, but this is your lowband coverage.

It does go further out, but again, this is only showing what it's covering. This isn't telling the story about the need for capacity because that tower up to the north there, there's a sector pointing directly south that is currently covering the proposed tower area. But there is a capacity need from Verizon's then to have another tower to go ahead and offload uh what that what that existing sector is doing.

So does the proposed coverage and capacity with all these colors it's based on your wanting a 100 ft cell tower. If we came back with a cell tower 60 ft or 80 ft, what happens to this proposed coverage and capacity area? That is an excellent question. Um, I can tell you the lower you go on your proposed tower, uh, it's it's going to affect what you'd expect to get in return. Um, I don't like to just shoot things off without having it in front of me.

Usually, we would run a comparison analysis to actually show you the visual. Um, I do not have that in this case. Um, but off the top of my head, if we were to say, hey, okay, drop the the center line 20 feet, I would estimate probably a 20% reduction in coverage inside the the targeted area. I have one more question. I'm sorry. No, no, please.

If we have this amount of coverage and capacity discrepancy in this area, why are you not putting up and wanting to put up and install additional towers left and right? Why are you just doing one? It it's hard to say. Um that comes down to more specifics with each wireless carrier. Um, in this case, Verizon. Um, that would be more of a strategic business decision that would be outside of my it could come down to financing.

Um, a lot of that's going to be like proprietary information that they're not going to divulge in, but it could be financing. It could be um knowing where customer complaints are coming from. There there could be multiple factors like that in there. Um, something I wouldn't necessarily know about from from just a RF standpoint if if that answers your question. Thank you, Mr. Russ. Certainly. Uh moving on. Uh th this now is going to show you um what again this is looking at current coverage.

This is called a best server plot. And again this is looking at your lowband coverage. This is telling you which sector of existing towers is expected to cover a given area uh today. And as expected we see that tower that's uh approximately 1.2 mi north of the proposed tower. That southern sector is covering the entire area here. So it's doing all that work. Now with a proposed tower, it would offload a lot of what that other tower is currently doing. And that's where the capacity need comes in.

And as we can see here, you have three different colors now in the target area. That would be each of the three sectors of the proposed tower uh offloading from the all the work that the existing sector of that tower is doing. Now this is our mid-band coverage. This is where you're going to talk more of your high-speed internet stuff uh that typical phone users are going to be uh doing a lot of the high demand um bandwidth stuff today. And we're going to see a drastic difference here.

So, this is current coverage. And again, green is you would expect to have a good indoor quality. Yellow would be in your vehicle. Red would be you'd have to be outdoors uh to to get a any kind of usable signal. And then the blue, I know it's not on the legend here. Um, this usually doesn't show up always, but blue is just essentially a dead zone, not not usable for for these uh bands of carriers. And this is the proposed and that's the proposed tower right there.

And as you can see, we lost all that dead zone. Um, all that yellow turns to green essentially, and a lot of the red minimizes to to yellow as well. So, while the low band didn't look like it was making much of a difference from a coverage standpoint, the mid-band is making a drastic change with the proposed tower. Mr. Ross. Yes, sir. Um, approximately, what is like the mileage in coverage?

I mean, how in that circumference that we're looking at there approximate here, and I I I want to be transparent. Um, I did not put this specific one together. I'm actually covering for one of my associates that did. But knowing that the tower to the north is 1.2 miles, my guess, and of course it doesn't help that it's like an oval versus a perfect circle, I I would say approximately half a mile would be the the the coverage area that we're looking at targeting this right here.

So, um, are have you been to Stone Ridge where this is going to be? Have you seen? I personally have not. No, sir. Okay. Um because I know I know really well the uh the community center that's right there and it's going to be close to the community center right off of Black Canyon. Um above the community center when you start going above it is almost nothing in coverage and there are a lot of residents in phase four and five right there. So I I know that this is a need.

Um but at the same time I just want to make sure that you know we're going to be covering these people too that it it's going to be enough. No certainly I I completely understand that. Um this is going to be again the best server. This is again to no surprise that northern sector is the only sector on that northern tower doing the work essentially right now for the mid-band. And you can see here it gets very splotchy because again it doesn't propagate as far as your low band does.

Um it it requires proximity to get the the most out of the latest carriers like 5G carriers. And then with our proposed we see that the proposed tower is taking over a lot of what the work of that uh northern towers south sector is doing. And again in summary this is showing a need that the sectors are overloaded to the north. Uh showing a need for capacity. We have areas that need service improvement uh especially to the east, south, and west of the proposed tower.

Um, and not only will it improve Verizon service, but having a tower here will also uh make it more attractive for other other carriers to want to put their antennas up there and improve for for your other major wireless carriers as well. Uh, I do have an appendix uh in as famously said uh but wait there's more. Uh I I do have uh some graphics here showing uh again with the hopes that other other tenants would want to join the tower as well and follow suit. Uh very similar to Verizon's layout.

We say AT&T uh from the proposed tower and uh where they're located around. It's very quite similar to Verizon's uh cell map or data for AT&T is uh drastically different from Verizon. It looks like there's a lot of uh significant gaps in coverage here. um there's no orange and red. Essentially, if there's blank spaces, uh there's just no coverage. So, I I would conclude that AT&T has it even worse off than Verizon based on this data.

And this is more crowdsource data now from coverage map for AT&T specifically. And then I just want to briefly uh quickly show you T-Mobile as well. Uh they're they're on a lot of the similar towers, but we see the similar spacing from the proposed tower as well. Uh, T-Mobile also lacks uh a decent quality coverage in the same area. Um, that orange and red and that dark green is is not good. And then we see a complete mix uh and then they even have this this I want to call it almost black color.

It's really dark red, but that's even worse. Um, but it but it just it's hit or miss all around here. And that has to do with the elevation changes um and and the tower distances and and such like that. Um it was brought up uh the health stuff always gets brought up a very valid concern. Um again the FCC is the governing authority about that in the US and um when we designed these towers we we are well within the umbrella of what they've determined are the safe operating levels.

Um but I do like to explain just kind of a basic overview of of why it's why the health concern isn't there. um you have an electromagnetic spectrum of energy, right? And on one far end of that, you have things like X-rays, gamma rays. Um and those are what we call ionizing energy. And that's the stuff that you don't really want to get exposed to.

Uh you know, we all love getting those uh dental x-rays that they have to do and they usually throw that lead uh that lead vest on you and the x-ray tech uh steps around the corner of usually a solid brick wall. Well, that's because getting exposed to that energy, it's ionizing. It is dangerous to be overly exposed to that for human DNA. Um, and it does have adverse health effects.

Now, on the on the other end of the spectrum is RF energy, the radio waves, and those are what we call nonionizing energy. They don't affect human DNA. And we get exposed to this through a lot of different ways. And there's a little list here, things that people might not realize, but your car radio, your television, your Wi-Fi access point, your router in your home, uh, cell phones, light bulbs, wireless baby monitors, and TV remotes.

Um, we're exposed to it in a lot of different ways, but the byproduct of RF energy is it dissipates heat. That's that's it. It dissipates heat. It doesn't affect human DNA. Um, so that's why there there are regulations in place. Um, the FCC has broken it into the general public limit of exposure for a cell phone tower. And then there's occupational limits of exposure for the cell phone tower.

Um, and the general public would be anywhere that they wouldn't even know they're being exposed to these towers. It could be in the park, on the sidewalk, driving down the street. Um, and then the limits that we allow for occasional exposure is different. They're they're allowed to go a little higher, but again, these are going to be professionals that know that they're going to be around the tower.

Um, in this case, um, really it's going to be people that are allowed to go up there to actually work on the tower itself. They're going to be trained. They're going to know everything, but they're going to be exposed to a slightly higher and allowable rate than what the general public would be. Um, but again, the the the byproduct of exposure is heat. Um, so I hope that kind of answers um, some of that as well. But I believe that's and and actually here I had a slide about it.

So there's two isolated groups, general public and occupational. Um but they've determined the the safe value the FCC has. They lowered it by a factor of 10 for occupational and then for general public they took that safe uh exposure value uh lowered it by a factor of 50 and that's what the general public uh is exposed to or what we use in wireless carrier studies. And I'll actually pause right there. I believe that's the end of my part of the presentation.

Did I answer all I know you had quite a few questions to begin with. I I hope I answered them all or are there any I missed? A+ Mr. Ross. Thank you. Mr. Ross, if you wouldn't mind one moment. Commissioner Evans, you had your hand up. You have any questions? He did. Okay, good. Um, any other commissioners? Commissioner Rossy. Mr. Ross, I asked Logan here a question earlier about the sighting process of without understanding the scope of your project.

I'm assuming from what we've read here and seen it's to benefit the customers in the Stone Ridge area and Commissioner Kismo had kind of alluded to there's other areas that this current location may not impact.

Um so kind of understand your sighting process not just for you know inside of the Stone Ridge kind of LLC but that area the coverage map that you're showing there's vacant land there's state trust land immediately to the souththeast where a lot of that that coverage is even more scant to kind of understand And I'll actually have to defer because from an RF standpoint, what we generally do is we we issue a search ring.

We say, "Hey, this is our general area of interest." And uh the real estate experts will go out and and talk with the land owners and and do all that discussion. Um so from an RF standpoint, I can only answer that. I can't really say why not across the road or uh you know what I mean? I don't negotiate with the land owners or or anything like that to know those those pinpointed specifics. Um I just know like from an RS standpoint, we we throw out a ring.

We say, "Hey, this is our general desired area and then real estate will go out and and tell us what kind of magic they can work in finding something that fits within that area." Understood. The reason that I asked this is, you know, working with a private entity or an LLC, that process of obtaining those rights is fairly quick. Um, but dealing with something like a state trust can go into years.

But what what I'm getting at there is you to provide this coverage the best quality, you know, is timing a contributing factor to the site. Uh, from an RF standpoint, absolutely. You know, we want to get the latest and greatest as soon as possible. Um, uh, but again, I I don't know what the, uh, weighing factors were with easier versus waiting longer.

Uh I I I believe you know pricing can could factor into that thing things that are really outside of uh the areas of concern for my profession if that makes sense. I don't want to dodge the question but uh maybe my colleague can can better answer that. No. Uh while I have you up, I did want to ask uh on the topic of collocation. Um is there rack space for local law enforcement, fire departments, things of that nature to utilize that space or is this strictly for a commercial comms?

Sorry, I I'll have to defer that one as well. No worries. Thank you. All right. Um first I'll go over the state land to the south. Um, so as you saw in the propagation maps, most of the surface is going north, east, and west. Um, south is just going to be the residents that are in that area. So as soon as we're crossing over, I don't want to call it a mountain, but it's a pretty sizable hill to the south.

So, uh, even if that were a viable candidate, you're essentially blocking off everything to the north, east, and west. And then typically, these sites are where the users are in the most plain terms. So being in the middle of state land south of a development blocked by a mountain um would typically not be a viable place to go. Right. And I'm not talking about being on the other side of the mountain.

I'm talking about being on the north side of the mountain that could expose you further to the east where currently it could be limited by that said mountain. Um well I mean then we're talking about building on the side of a a mountain and then building roads up. I'm ignorant so that's why I'm asking. So again, yes, it would be a timing issue and then we're getting into that. Um, as far as CAFMA, I actually did have a meeting with them last week.

Um, as far as radio goes, they don't have any, um, issues with this communicating internally. Um, they do understand that there is an issue with, you know, residents getting out to the fire department, though. Um, from my understanding, they're also moving to Starlink, so they wouldn't necessarily need any sort of repeaters. As far as I'm aware, that could change and we'd be more than willing to accommodate them.

Um but based on my meeting last week, that was not um a concern as far as their repeaters or equipment. Understood. Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. Yes, Commissioner Logan. Thank you, Commissioner Colossimo. Based on what you heard Logan say and Mr. Ross and your concern about lack of coverage for the growth area in Stone Ridge, what are your comments and concerns? I'd like to hear that, please. Full disclosure, this is going to be a quarter mile from my house, and I am in favor of this. Okay.

Um, where it's going to be, where Old Black Canyon is, that part of Old Black Canyon turns into a dirt road. So, there's there's virtually nothing there. There are homes up on the hill. They were custom homes that were built, and they will probably get a look at this thing. Um, but other than that, there aren't a lot of residences nearby where that location's going to be until you get past the community center. And then you start going north, then there's a lot.

But I'm telling you, those are dead zones. I have been on the phone talking to neighbors up in that area, and if they're out walking their dog, it's dead. They have to call me back when they get home and use their Wi-Fi. Um, so for on a personal basis, I see this as a serious need for the area. Thank you, Logan. Again, let's um if the cell tower height were reduced, what would that do to your coverage, your gap in coverage? What would that do?

Um I don't have an exact percentage but again um you know the further you go down not only are you decreasing the anchor tenants efficiency in the area but then you're also opening up that collocation might not be viable and to your point um then more towers might be needed in the area. Whereas if you have one taller tower collocation is highly encouraged under your code.

Um, so then you're inviting those carriers to go on that one singular tower versus having a need for several in the same area. So this is a personal opinion only. I would much prefer to see a cell tower pole only and not dressed in a mono pine outfit. It's fair. Um, yeah, I mean, we can certainly look thoughts on that. We can certainly look at alternative designs.

Um, I mean, typically we in wooded areas, I mean, we're doing a lot of work in New Mexico and, um, kind of the high desert up east, so trees typically don't work. Um, this seemed like a situation where it might. Um, so we kind of just put that on the drawings, presented it, but we're certainly open to alternative designs. Um the only thing that I will say is again going back to the actual footing of the area. Um something with multiple support legs is not going to be viable.

So it's going to have to be a sort of mono pole. So a singular support and then having a shroud on top of that. So you're not necessarily seeing the antennas. Um but then it would just be a pole rather than a a disguised tree. Thank you. We could probably surround it with tinsel Christmas trees from the 60s. And um with that, I will have Mr. Leonard present and then I'm going to be his uh designated cliff.

If you don't mind, Logan, I got a couple of questions to to add on to what uh Commissioner Krius had added. Uh so I just curious uh the foundation uh specifically where this comes from u uh need in the community. I understand that. Was that prompted by complaints or calls or was it just you guys recognizing the gap and then I believe it's um one of the maps that they use is again pulling users from Verizon.

So I believe that's one of the the things they they use um as far as on the actual carrier side. I'm not exactly sure how the RF engineers um you mind if I add to that? Yeah. Okay. Um thank you. There was a a meeting for the Stone Ridge residents. They have their monthly board meeting just like all the other HOAs do and this topic came up. There were actually a lot of complaints that came in.

And that's why I I mentioned that when they finally sent a survey out, Tom Low, the developer, um asked that the HOA send out a survey to everybody. Um I think like 33 or 35% of the people responded but that's very normal in an HOA. Um but of those 71% said they want this thing. So if that helps. Thank you Commissioner Claus. So if if uh you know let's assuming that this you know the people in the area pitchforks and torches you know they want they want to get their cell phone coverage.

Um, did they was there any input in the community with regard to what's there? Uh, to Commissioner Griff's point about, you know, do we want to see a tree? Do we want to see a monopole that maybe has colors that that reflect more of a natural, you know, blendin environment kind of situation? Sure. So, part of the zoning process, we did have a neighborhood outreach. Um, it's a 300 ft buffer from the entire parcel.

So, not only just the tower location, but it's essentially that entire I I'm not sure what hole that it's actually on, but it's a buffer from that entire hole. So, it's much larger than a 300 ft radius. Um I believe it was 102 unique um property owners. Um of those 102, there were two responses. Um both were more so about the placement. Um, I mean, I'm sure they didn't like the look of it either way, but it wasn't an alternative uh offered up.

Um, on that same notice, there was also an invite to a neighborhood meeting where we could discuss things like this um if anyone had questions about it. Um, no one attended that meeting. So, it was me and a RF consultant as well sitting on there waiting for questions, but um Okay. Do do you I mean obviously this probably isn't your first application that you've had to to go through. Do you have a sense for what people are are going for? I mean do they really like these trees?

Is this something that you have a sense that in most places people do want some sort of a camouflage to these towers? Um certainly camouflage. I mean again uh the trees in my experience I don't typically have a lot of sites where a tree would make sense. Um, we have had one that was in the middle of a um, mining pit that was a tree was suggested, but in that case I don't think it would work.

Um, typically I mean just something that covers the antenna shroud is what I deem to be the most or the least intrusive, but again I could be biased. But again, it's just a utility pole with a lampshade on top of it or sure something that looks like a and I'm assuming that the support structures around going to be are going to be, you know, camouflaged in the way of either ground I mean paint or something to to reflect the natural Yeah, we could we could do glow-in-the-dark if you want.

Whatever whatever type of color, you know, it probably would go. So, I have a a question that might be better answered by Mr. Ross. um with regard to um so we're talking a little bit about height, you know, and um is this a line of sight thing? You look, I'm a novice here when it comes to these things.

Is it a line of sight thing or is, you know, is it, you know, if a 100 foot pole is down in elevation by 40 feet, so now only 60 foots exposed, is it is it going to get the same um uh results than a 100T pole that's 20 ft and you're you're only seeing 80 ft. Yeah. No. Uh absolutely, you're correct. It's a it's a line of sight thing.

Um, you know, I like to use the analogy of like the human, you know, our eyes are up here and if they were built down in our ankles, we would be very limited on what we could see at any given time, right? Um, and the same things with these towers, you know, the further down you put the antennas on the pole or sink the entire pole down, it reduces the line of sight. Um, if that answers your question, basically anything down is is not ideal from an RF standpoint.

So this being even at 100 foot, this being lower on the slope or lower on the area where there's only maybe 80 foot or 85 ft exposed, you're you're losing a little bit by by the installation at that possibly. Uh I would say something that small might be negligible. Um because the antennas themselves, they do have what we call a horizontal and a vertical beam width. So they they don't just see a single line, but they they see a a spread that we measure in degrees.

Um so you know, if you you move it just a couple feet difference, it's not going to be the end of the world. But when you're talking, as was brought up earlier, like a 20ft drop, you're you're going to we're going to want to run an analysis to give a cuz it's going to be a percentage drop that's probably upwards of 20% to a quarter of a percent of efficiency. I mean drop in when you mean drop in in elev elevation, not height of pole. Correct. Yeah.

When you put anytime you put the antennas lower down on on any pole, it's it's going to have a negative effect for what we're, you know, essentially looking for. Okay. All right. Well, thank you. That answers my question. And I know that there may be some continued presentation. Um certainly unless there's any other questions. Commissioner Graci, sorry. Just a small chair. Thanks, Vice Chair. Uh on the topic of monopol or mono stealth pine or whatever it was called versus uh traditional steel.

Is this something that is just a a plain steel? Is it like self-weathering that eventually turns like a rust colored that would match the better aesthetic of the area? Uh it should be like galvanized steel. Yeah. Non-reflective non-reflective paint or Do you guys have the ability to produce a self-weathering steel that can eventually rust into a natural color? Uh yeah, I believe we actually have one that essentially would Yeah, it would be non-reflective and then would look weathered.

Yes, understood. Thank you. Y Mr. Vice Chair, I have one more question and uh before I go into this, I want Logan and Mr. Ross and Mr. Leonard to know that I failed trigonometry. Okay? So, so get that the fall zone because you have a 100 foot tall pole. You now are requesting a different property setback line to allow for the 100 ft radius for a fall zone. But the pole is not really 100 ft tall. 20 ft of it is below ground level. It's below grade from Old Black Canyon. It's not below ground.

Oh, I guess it is. Yeah. So, is the fall zone still affected? And do we need that entire radius? That's my math question. It's solid. It would be 100 foot from grade. I'm sorry. It would be 100 foot from grade. So, it would be 100 feet if it were to fall in a completely straight line. Um, however, um, if we're Sorry. Go ahead. Okay. So, we have a 100 foot tall pole. Mhm. 20 ft of it is below grade below below the adjacent grade. Yeah.

So that 20 ft is not part of the fall zone because it can't fall. No. I mean I think what we're talking about is the difference from the street above. That is 20 ft. That has nothing to do with the height of the tower. Oh. They're comparing it to where if you were standing on the road it essenti I guess what you're saying is the 20 foot difference would make it 80 ft but it's still 100 foot. So we still need that fall zone radius for 100 ft. Correct. Yes.

And I would suggest Commissioner Griffith that we we want it a little further [laughter] you know than than closer probably. It's a little bit safer obviously. Okay. Perfect. Yeah. Trigonometry class over. Um that's all I'll pass it over to Mr. Leonard. But anything else? I know. Go right ahead. Thank you. Uh yeah, Josh, if you just want to screen, that'd be great. Logan, uh like as Logan mentioned, I'm I'm remote, so I don't have the ability to control the slides in my presentation.

I'll just say next slide uh as we move um move from slide to slide. Uh before jumping into my presentation that I have planned for tonight, I wanted to make a couple of just uh off-the cuff comments. The first is uh I wanted to commend the commissioners for the excellent questions uh that you've had tonight. It's um it's clearly a very very thoughtful uh and prepared group of commissioners uh that we've come before and appreciate that very much.

I'd also like to uh to put a bow on a couple of questions that were asked by a couple of the commissioners. Uh first in response to to uh Miss Commissioner Griffith, uh I failed trigonometry 2. Uh it's why I went to law school. Um I I I also want to note uh in response to her question about why we don't put cell towers everywhere throughout the area. Uh there are two primary reasons for that. The first is a costbenefit analysis.

Um cell companies, cell cell carriers don't make money uh uh by building cell towers. Cell towers are on the expense side of their ledger um and don't make them any money. So what they look to do is maximize cell coverage uh and be able to adequately serve their customers and provide the kind of service that their customers have become accustomed to which is pretty flawless uh cell coverage uh without um flooding an area with with towers that can be costly.

Uh the more important consideration actually is that that too many towers uh with antennas u would be as not not harmful but would would degrade signal because there's interference between the antennas of these several towers.

So, uh, instead of putting cell towers throughout and having a lot of shorter ones, what they do is they try to find a height that's the that's a compromise between the tallest that they need or the tallest that they would like, uh, called a boomer tower and a short little neighborhood tower and be able to colllocate, uh, sites on on there.

Um, again, there's a a a [clears throat] perfect distance uh or a perfect um a perfect ratio that they that they try to reach, and that's what they've come to here with the the 100t height. Um, Commissioner Colossimo, um, you asked about ideal tower distances from each other.

Uh, ideally shorter towers, I call this a shorter tower because we deal with some significantly taller towers, but shorter towers like the proposed tower at 100 ft, um, should be spaced out in a honeycomb pattern, uh, at about one or about 0.5 miles apart. Um, that isn't always the case. That doesn't always happen. And part of the reason that doesn't happen is because not everybody wants to lease land for a cell tower.

Uh and and so there there's some u geography and and some some private property rights issues at play there.

uh Commissioner uh I believe it was Commissioner Graci um you asked uh about serving uh the the neighbors the the adjacent neighborhood that that needs coverage and and what I would say is that although uh perhaps the mid-band uh spectrum won't serve won't won't directly serve them, one of the benefits of of this cell tower is that it uh it offloads other users around the periphery of the coverage area of this site.

U by pushing them to other towers, which then makes it possible for uh for greater coverage from existing towers and and it that honeycomb pattern uh creates a network of cell towers that work together to provide coverage uh where there isn't coverage. Um I'm going to butcher this last name and I apologize. I should have paid more attention to how it was pronounced when it was first said, but Commissioner Huat Hwat. That's that's close enough. That's good. Yeah, it's fine. Thank you.

And I apologize. Um but that's right you asked how did how this uh location and height were determined. Uh and I wanted to go into that just a little bit. Carriers determine their needs in in a particular coverage area um based on metrics that their radio frequency engineering team is constantly monitoring. Um that includes the location of failed calls, the locations of of dropped calls, locations of poor call quality, uh and locations of poor capacity or low bandwidth.

There's also they also have tools that these modeling tools that take into effect or or into account terrain, natural obstructions, man-made obstructions and and uh several other factors including uh typical climate uh is is even an input into that modeling. And they using that modeling they can they can show what a proposed tower would do in terms of signal and where it would where it would uh where it would improve coverage area.

And that's what you saw on the plot maps that that were showed a short time ago. Um, that's u I'm I'm not an RF engineer. I play one on TV. That's my my spiel about the the responses to questions that were asked that I wanted to put a vote on. What I'm really here tonight to talk about is the Federal Communications Act of 1996, which is applicable uh to our application and to our proposed wireless telecommunications facility. Next slide, please.

The Federal Communications uh act preserves loc zoning authority and I put kind of here. I'm going to come back to that in just a second and explain what I mean. U it also prohibits the consideration of alleged and unproven health effects of radio frequency emissions. Uh it said it states that any denial uh or or any decision for that matter must be supported by substantial evidence in a written record.

uh it states that you cannot deny an application if denial would quote have the effect of prohibiting the provision of personal wireless services. And I'm going to come back to that one too. And then the last one is it can't discriminate between wireless carriers.

And by that it just means that if you approve a cell tower for one wireless carrier, you can't because that wireless carrier has coverage can't let's say AT&T has coverage in an area, you can't deny Verizon the opportunity to provide coverage in that area as well. Next slide please. This is is where the federal communications act preserves local zoning authority. U ex it starts out with except as provided in this paragraph.

Nothing in this chapter shall limit or affect the authority of a state or local government or instrumentality thereof over decisions regarding the placement construction and modification of personal wireless service facilities. I've highlighted and or I've underlined and bolded the start of this which says accept as provided in this paragraph. Next slide please. And here is the accept is provided in this paragraph.

It says that the regulation and place of the placement, construction and modification of personal wireless services facilities by any state or local government or instrumentality thereof and I'm going to skip to sub two shall not prohibit or have the effect of prohibiting the provision of personal wireless services. Next slide please.

Federal courts have applied one of two standards in determining uh in determining whether or not the denial of an application for a cell tower uh would have the effect of prohibiting the provision of personal wireless services. Uh this that's on the screen right now is what's considered the older federal standard. Uh it's got two prongs. The first prong is that a cell company is able to establish and prove that a significant gap in wireless service and coverage exists.

And second, uh, the second prong that the proposed site is the least intrusive means of filling that gap. And again, that's the older federal standard to show that a a denial of a of a tower application um prohibits service. Next slide, please. The newer federal standard is a little bit more nuanced. It's also much more differential to wireless companies.

Uh it's simply whether denial of an application for a wireless telecommunication facility, a cell tower, would quote materially inhibit a carrier's ability to provide wireless service to its subscribers and customers. Our application meets both of these federal court standards and as a as a result is entitled to approval even if it doesn't meet all of the standards contained in Prescat Valley's ordinance.

Uh, as we've discussed though and as we've shown, our our application does meet all of Prescott Valley's standards. Uh, and we're we're happy to present it to you today. Next slide, please. This was mentioned a little bit earlier in in one of the prior presentations. U, but another one of the provisions of the Federal Communications Act states that radio frequency emissions, RF emissions, can't be considered and can't be a reason for denial so long as they comply with FCC standards.

And that's important because uh opponents of cell towers almost always try to say that that unproven health effects allegedly attributed to RF emissions will create a health hazard.

Uh I appreciate the commissioner and I I apologize I didn't catch your name when you said it that had done a little bit of research uh outside the record and and had looked at uh the American Cancer Society's website to show that those uh to show that those health effects are are actually uh not attributable to RF uh emissions.

Um, but in addition to being an incorrect statement of of of medical policy, uh, the argument that they that that RF emissions affect health can't even be considered so long as the antennas on our facility comply with the Federal Communications Commission's uh, standards, which they will.

Um, I'd also note that uh this is also covered in Prescuit Valley's own ordinance at uh 13-08-070 U.J, which states that quote, "No decision shall attempt to regulate radio frequency emissions except to require that applicants meet FCC standards." Um, that's a really well-ritten ordinance uh because it doesn't cross over into into being opposed to uh to federal law. Uh, next slide, please. And and I'll tell you just in advance, this is my last slide.

Uh under under both the old federal standard, which requires that significant gap in service uh and the least intrusive means of filling that gap, and also under the newer federal standard, which requires uh only um requires approval if denial would quote materially inhibit the wireless carrier's ability to provide wireless services. This application is entitled to approval.

uh the applicant has has established uh that its application in the proposed cell tower uh complies with the requirements and standards in prescuit valley's ordinance and and again we uh we're pleased to present this application to you and and would stand for questions. Thank you very much for that. U we have a commissioner Colossio has a question for you. Do we know which carrier um our first responders are using? I'm going to ask Logan if if he knows that right off hand.

I'll tell you that that uh it varies greatly by uh by jurisdiction. Uh there there AT&T in particular offers what's called a FirstNet service that provides service to uh to many first responders around the country. Um I I don't know which one is used by um by by by Prescuit Valley's individual, but so I'd leave that to Logan. Um I didn't mean to make a grand entrance here. U I do not know what they currently use. Um they are moving to the Starlink though based on the the CAFMA.

Um so current user I do not know. Thank you. Uh this is uh vice chair Huat. Um I've got a question about you know we talk about the standards and you know as you know the federal uh that are outlined in the federal communication act. as long as these RF standards are uh fall within the the requirements uh of the act. How how is that is that tested regularly? Are there are there mechanisms to say yes that's that's meeting the standard?

Is there some sort of a a watchdog if you will or some sort of a testing mechanism to ensure that there something hasn't gone arry and they fall outside the limits? Commissioner Huat, I I'm going to leave I'm going to ask u our RF engineer to to direct directly answer your question.

I will tell you that the devices that are used um on these towers have it it's uh it's kind of like a circuit breaker for lack of a better term in a uh in an in an energy situ you know circumstance um that they won't produce more than is is authorized under the Federal Communications Commission. Uh, and if it if it looks like they're going to to ramp up, um, they'll actually they'll actually shut down, but but I would defer to our our RF engineer who's there in person, uh, to talk about testing.

Great. Thank you. So, so the short answer is yes. There are very strict limits and guidelines um, both internally for the wireless carriers um, and the FCC can come down and run audits as well. Um, to give you a little bit more meat on this.

Um, so when an RF engineer designs these and to answer the question, like a lot of the antennas aren't even capable of some of these max exposures, you know, um, we don't have to worry about uh, residential or or commercial vehicles going 400 miles an hour down the road because they're just not capable of doing it, right? They're they're built limited. And the same thing with these antennas, a lot of them are built limited. Um, but then as RF, we design them.

And then you have teams that look at that. um they're usually called regulatory analysts, regulatory special specialists. Their job is to look at the design, make sure that we're in compliance with all of that. So, they're like an even higher safety net before these sites even get turned up on air.

Um post on air, they're constantly checked and looked at by what um most of these carriers would call system performance teams that go back and check and double check and they're the ones that look at customer complaints and performance, but they also look at what what powers are we transmitting at, does anything look fishy? Uh that kind of thing. So you have internal checks before it even goes up and then they have constant monitoring. Uh it's taken very seriously.

They they don't want the FCC coming down and uh asking questions, you know. Yeah. Thank you. Uh commissioners, any other questions? Uh Commissioner Evans, I just have a quick comment for Mr. Leonard. And I mean this in the nicest possible way because we were educated on the Federal Communications Act and I greatly appreciate that. And it was probably the most artful iron fist in a velvet glove speech I've ever heard. [laughter] Thank you very much for the information.

Thank you, Commissioner Evan. Uh any other questions from the commissioners? Okay. Any other questions for the applicant? Uh no. Okay. Well, we'll uh certainly open this portion of the hearing up to public comment. Have we received any public comment? Yes, we have one person registered. Okay. If you wouldn't mind coming up and stating your name and address and uh if you wouldn't mind speaking into the mic. Um I think it's me. We don't have a remote mic unfortunately.

So, my name is Elsa Campbell. I live on 1052 North Hobblestrap Street, which is about a quarter of a mile where they want to put the cell phone tower. And I have an urgent need that this cell phone tower goes in. I am in the black zone. I have serious health problems. When we came here, my husband and I came to move here to be near my family and we both have serious health problems. He had to go on hospice care. Hospice used cell phones. We had problems talking with the hospice staff sometimes.

I never knew if I could even call an ambulance. I have to use a um internet cell phone through spark light that goes out sometimes. I'm on my third cell phone. This one works a little bit better, but lately in the last two years, I've developed a problem where I faint and I fall on the floor. So, I keep my cell phone with me. On a good day, maybe I have one bar. There's something about the weather here during monsoon season. Sometimes I have nothing. And if spark light goes out, I have nothing.

I've had people tell me um I had to get my diabetic supplies driven up from um Phoenix and there were drivers here. They would lose their GPS system. They didn't know how to get to my house and so then I didn't have my diabetic supplies. I used this this records my blood sugar. The best app is on a cell phone. It's not reliable. That information would go to my doctor if I was seriously ill. I have to use a reader which cost $300. That does not go to my doctor.

I've had my doctor call me once when I was seriously ill on my spark light phone and fortunately she left a message and the spark light went out for two hours. I had no cell phone to call her. She wanted to make sure that I wasn't because I had lab work that said I was very ill. She wanted to find out if I needed to go to the hospital. There was a 2-hour break there where I had no communication. That is why it is needed. And the hospice people told me they couldn't even use their iPads.

They're supposed to to put when they came in for my husband and document everything. They couldn't even use their iPads to document. They would have to drive somewhere else to put it in. And now I after listening to them, I understand that sometimes you get cell phone in your car. Now I understood what they were telling me. It made no sense to me. And I am visually impaired. I do not drive. I do not have a car.

There is no way for me to get somewhere if I need to go to the hospital and let somebody know. I live with that anxiety every single day of my life. That is why this tower is needed. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Campbell. Appreciate it. I believe we have another uh speaker, Tom Low. Mr. Low, thank you. Um, just by the way, I like your shirt. Just go wild cats. Um, my name is Tom Low and I'm with the company that developed Stone Ridge. Um, I uh this is hard to sit through.

[laughter] Thank you guys for volunteering to do this every month. Um, this is kind of a straightforward thing for me. Uh, we have, uh, had people calling us for 15 years to put cell towers in and, [clears throat] uh, it's handled straight by the office. There's been a flat no for 15 years. U, I just don't like them. And, uh, the hope was that if we waited long enough, they would go somewhere else. surrounding Stone Ridge.

The [cough and clears throat] problem has been that because it's such a large project, there wasn't anywhere else for them to go. And things got so bad over there because the uh coverage was getting worse every year, not better. I don't know if I don't know what the technical reasons are for this. You live there, you understand the problem.

We're the ones that get the calls and it's been it's just finally gotten to the point where it it became such a safety issue as you just heard that I really didn't have any choice. We had to do something and uh so we started working with these guys and with all due respect to them um there was only one site that we're going to allow a cell tower on in Stone Ridge and this is it. and it's got to work because it's the only place we're going to do this.

So, uh I I I can't have something that's going to go in and still be uh [laughter] uh aesthetically not what I'd like. I'm the one that's requiring that it's a tree. I'm sorry. Uh [laughter] and and and you have to understand my position. We've got a 2,000 acre project over there. I can't take the risk of having a cell tower, which we basically lose money on to to destroy the rest of our project. So, I I'm very sensitive to the aesthetics of this thing. But I'm most concerned.

I have a 94 year old father that lives in the project um that got rid of his landline. And uh this has become so prevalent over there that like the the women that spoke before me uh this is the only option they've got. So um we're moving forward on this.

this is the only one that uh this is the only location I'm willing to do and it's the only one we're willing to do and they have told me that with time they will add other carriers to this tower so it won't be just Verizon and hopefully we can take care of everybody's needs particularly the older community in Stone Ridge with this one tower and it's next to something that I consider to be an eyesore already which is our golf course maintenance facility.

Um, so I saw it just I it's it's just not you know what I'm saying. Yes. So um so anyway, I'm happy to answer any questions that you have. Just being Mr. Low, thank you for being here. Thank you, Vice Chair. I will Mr. Low. Yes, I will go on record saying that I acquies to your [laughter] pine tree. Thank you. Are there any other public comments registered? No, vice chair. Thank you.

So, I will close the floor to public comment and uh bring it back to the commission for any further discussion deliberation. Mr. Vice Chair, before we do that, I would like Mr. Norlock to review the stipulations. Very good point. Thank you, Vice Chair Commission. So, yes. So, um what we have is the Would you like me to go through all all of them? Absolutely. Okay. Absolutely. Mr. Vice Chair, if I could just mention Yes. We do have two votes.

One is for the general plan amendment and one is for the resoning. I believe any stipulations will apply to the proposed resoning, not to the general plan amendment. That Thank you, Ivan. We can certainly do that. Okay. So, um then any other discussion uh general plan amendment on the general plan amendment internal here? I I agree with Supervisor Griffith. like to hear the on uh the additional uh requirements under the zoning map.

So uh with that being said, if there's no further discussion, I would entertain a motion for GPA 26-001, the Stone Ridge cell tower. I move that we uh accept GPA 260001 uh as presented and recommended to the town C positively recommended to town council. We have a motion with a second from Commissioner K. Um, if we could take our our vote. Thank you. So, we have five eyes. The motion passes. Thank you, uh, Chris. Uh we will move on to ZMC26-00002 Stone Ridge cell tower.

This is consideration and possible action uh for um for that item. Uh Mr. Norlock, if you wouldn't mind. Yeah. And uh this is a public hearing, so you do need to open that. Yeah. We just if you just outline the uh requirements. Mr. Mr. Vice, sure, if you would go ahead and call the public hearing so that folks can speak to this as well. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I open that up first as a as a public hearing. Yes. Yes. Yes, vice chair. Okay.

Well, I will open the floor public hearing for uh ZMC26-002 Stonewood cell tower. That is open. Mr. Norlock sorry. Thank you, Vice Chair. So, um I'll just go over the conditions for this. Um, so the first one being in accordance with town code section 1313 1110G, the use of a cell tower allowed by a special use permit is expressly authorized at this location as a condition of this reszone um being included in the approved site planning zoning entitlement plan.

And then um we adjusted number two to the total height of the cell tower and monopine structure must not exceed 105 ft in height. So that'll take place there for number two. Um and then the third one is the facility shall comply with all applicable FAA FCC building code, fire code and other federal, state and local requirements. The fourth one, facility shall provide for collocation consistent with the approved application and town requirements.

The fifth one, any maintenance or replacement of equipment including disguise the monopine must mitigate any pollution, degradation, fading or habitat impacts. Um, sixth one is any change or modification to the skies of the cell tower needs to be done so in writing um to the director of development services for approval. And then the seventh one we'll add um is the lot line adjustment as shown in the site plan shall be recorded prior to uh building permit issuance.

So if I could get uh these two that I've put back on the screen um in a in a motion if we accept those. Mr. Vice Chair, I have a question for Mr. Norlock. Yes. Number six, any change or modification to the disguise of the cell tower. Well, we've heard here at our meeting this evening from Mr. Low, it's very adamant that the only tower he will approve is the Mono Pine. So, there isn't going to be any change or modification or should we put in monopine?

Monopine has been approved and any change or modification needs to be in writing. I feel I'd like to have Monopine in there. Yeah, we can absolutely add that in there. Is that okay with Mr. Ller? Mr. Vice Chair and and commission. The challenge of course is that uh the HOA isn't actually making the decision in this case. This is a recommendation you're making to the town council with a condition. Uh, and of course, who knows 20 years from now whether someone will want it to be a monopin or not.

Um, you're free to recommend however you think that ought to read. Uh, but you do need to understand that the recommendation is coming from staff and from the commission to the council ultimately and that's the decider. Totally understand councelor and I would like a thumbs up for my fellow commissioners to put monopine in number six. Commissioner Griffith I I would kind of echo that. I I maybe something more general that uh um a monopine I guess is good.

I I'd like to make sure that as part of the site there be some level of landscape or acceptable um color scheme that blends into the the local landscape and I think uh that would be something that I would I would support for sure. So commission or Mr. Norlock or councelor Ivan maybe you could word smith number six uh to to change it to put monopine in there. Is that is that correct? What is that? The vice chair has some concerns on the landscaping. Yeah.

Just uh just that an appropriate landscape scheme that would blend into the environment. I think there's some concerns from some neighbors that they have something that blends in. So, um I I'll I'll defer to to Mr. Legler, but I think that u it might be easier to maybe just make a new condition for landscaping separately. Mr. Vice Chair, it can be done either way. If you just want to put that language in that or add one, whichever.

Yeah, I think adding one would be, you know um something that the community would support, right? something that uh I think adding a a condition would be acceptable instead of modifying unless Commissioner Griffith has another recommendation. Any change or modification to the disguise of the cell tower changing the pro changing the agreed upon monopine. Mr. Nordlock, are you looking that needs to be submitted in writing? Are you okay with that?

It needs to be sub uh submitted in in writing to the development services director for for approval. If I think is there any way we can we need to read into record what our new stipulation is? Yes. With with with the motion. Correct. That'll be included with it have to be included with the motion. I think I think that's fine. Yeah, that would work for me. I mean, as long as there's no objection, I think that's fine. Well, he's clearly stated that he wants the monopine. Yeah.

So, um I I think just adding the monopine. I'm fine with that as long as we do that. Yep. Thank you. Yes, fellow commissioners. So, Chris, what does that look like? We just uh add a motion with a stipulation that there'd be [clears throat] a minor change to stipulation number six, I believe it was, to uh to add to to define that as a monopine. That what you're looking for, Commissioner Griffith. Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you, Chris. So, um uh now, uh any other questions from the commission?

Mr. Norlock. Will these changes in this stipulation then they will go to the council with our recommended changes? Yes, they will as long as they're in the motion. Absolutely. Okay. Okay. Any other questions from the commissioners? Okay. I'd like to open the floor to any public comment. We do have one Tom Low. Only if you have questions. Only if we have questions. Thank you, Mr. Low. I don't believe we have any questions. Thank you for your input, by the way.

So, with that, if there's not any other public comment, I'll close the floor, bring it back to the commission for deliberation and a motion. If I share just a comment, um I would encourage the applicant for future uh proposals, bring someone from your real estate group. Uh, you know, my vote was very close to being a no tonight based off your off your sighting.

Um, being able to bring that representative to better explain the land acquisition component would go a long way in kind of satiating not just commissioners but members of the public and understanding truly this is the best place for this. Thank you, M. Commissioner uh Crossing, any other comment from the commissioners? Mr. Vice Chair, I do wanted to also go on record that I was considering a no vote on this tonight. Um, but thank you to Mr. Leonard for bringing some great information forward.

I understand better the line of sight. Um, Commissioner Colossimo, thank you for sharing that 71% of the homeowners in Stone Ridge desire, need, and want this. And um, I totally understand that this is the least intrusive um, area where to put this cell tower. It's where it needs to go. So, I will be supporting that. Thank you, Commissioner Griffith. I I echo those same comments.

So, I was a little hesitant with the 100 foot pole and um after really reviewing this, there's certainly no um sense in putting forth something at a lower height that's not going to uh allow for the coverage and it's to solve the problems, right? It's a it's a real need. There are people in the area that need these coverages to as as one of as m Mrs. Campbell spoke about needing needing service for medical reasons.

Um so um but uh after understanding this item a little bit better and all that goes along with it um I'm supportive as well. So thank you. Um [clears throat] with that uh if there's not no no other questions or comments I'd be happy to entertain a motion uh for um yeah go ahead. make a positive recommendation to uh move uh ZMC26-002 Stone Ridge cell tower uh for positive recommendation and then we will obviously need to have some uh clarification on item number six of the um uh requirements.

Will that motion need to carry on? Mr. Vice Chair, we just want to re uh reference the conditions as they've been presented by staff and modified by you. who I think we're fine. Okay. Would you amend your motion? Yes. Uh so I would like to amend my recommendation for ZMC 2602 Stone Ridge cell tower with the stipulation of the modified language for uh stipulation six the disguise uh approval. Anything else you want me to add? As as as stated in the discussions. As stated in the discussions.

Thank you. We have a a motion. We have a second from Commissioner Griffith. Move to the vote. That motion passes. Thank you. Thank you, uh, Mr. Norlock. Appreciate that and for the presentations. Um if there are no other um uh further actions on the agenda, which there are none, I certainly uh would move uh have entertain a motion for adjournment. We need that. We do. Make a motion to I will make a motion to adjurnn.

We have a motion from Commissioner Kissimo and second from Commissioner Griffiths. We're out of here. Yeah. Thank you very much for everybody who's attended. Thank you. Good job.