Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Bayonne, Nextel to start talks on antenna law

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2003 02:29:19 -0400

Bayonne, Nextel to start talks on antenna law

Mediator will try to forge agreement on appropriate sites
Tuesday, August 12, 2003

By Michaelangelo Conte

Journal staff writer

Bayonne and a wireless communications firm are scheduled to sit down tomorrow with
a mediator to work out their differences over an antenna ordinance aimed at
keeping more cell phone towers from popping up in residential parts of the
Peninsula City.
Nextel Communications, which filed a lawsuit last year challenging the
constitutionality of the ordinance, is trying to build a new cell phone tower on
top of a building at Kennedy Boulevard and 34th Street. Councilman-at-large Tony
Chiappone said Nextel Communications is trying to tell Bayonne what the city
should look like.

"Essentially, this is an ordinance which telecommunication companies fear because,
I believe, they are concerned other municipalities will adopt and enforce similar
ordinances," Chiappone said yesterday.

"We as a municipality feel we have a right to regulate the placement of cellular
antennas as it applies to building codes and municipal ordinances."

Chiappone and former Councilman Nicholas Capodice co-chaired the Bayonne Antenna
Committee that drew up the antenna ordinance, which was approved unanimously by
the City Council in May 2001.

The ordinance was spurred by the stiff opposition residents displayed to a number
of wireless communication company applications to erect antennas in residential
areas of Bayonne.

Last year, Nextel filed a lawsuit in Hudson County Superior Court appealing the
Bayonne Zoning Board of Adjustment's denial of its application to erect wireless
antennas on a building on Kennedy Boulevard near 34th Street.
Nextel then also filed an action challenging the constitutionality of the city's
antenna ordinance itself.

But earlier this year, Superior Court Judges Maurice Gallipolli ordered Nextel and
the city to engage in mediation to resolve the issue, and Nextel agreed to with
draw its appeal, while reserving the right to reinstate it if mediation does not
resolve the matter, Bayonne Board of Adjustment Counsel Richard N. Campisano said.

Nextel is opposed to the antenna ordinance's system of "preferred sites" governing
the placement of antennas in the city. The ordinance lists a number of areas
preferred for antenna placement, ranging from industrial areas, which are most
preferred, down to the residential areas, the least preferred.

Under the ordinance, an applicant must make a case before the Board of Adjustment
showing that it is not feasible or effective to erect its antennas in a preferred
area. Only then would the company be able to install its antennas at a less
preferred site.
Nextel also opposes the fee instituted by the ordinance, and the requirement that
wireless companies register their antenna sites with the city.

A municipality's right to regulate wireless antenna sites is limited because of
federal laws regulating the wireless industry through the federal
Telecommunications Act of 1996.
"Basically, Congress has deemed this kind of communication (wireless) to be in the
best interest of citizens, and said that federal regulations supersede all other
jurisdictions," Campisano said.

But Bayonne officials also say it is necessary to enforce code requirements as
well as regulate the location of cellular antennas for the safety and protection
of the residents, and city officials believe they have a right to do so.

Campisano said that at tomorrow's mediation hearing, representatives of the city
and Nextel will "discuss the ordinance and see if there is any common ground to
work our way though our differences.

"Mediation is designed to allow us to work through the problem in good faith. If
we can't, Nextel will reinstate its lawsuit."

Kearny, Harrison and East Newark have also passed ordinances intended to force
wireless companies to look to industrial zones before residential areas as sites
for new antennas.

Wireless companies have also met public opposition in Jersey City and West New
York.
Nextel's attorney, Gregory J. Czura, referred questions to Nextel spokeswoman
Diane Rainey, who couldn't be reached yesterday.

http://www.nj.com/news/jjournal/index.ssf?/base/news-1/106068307223491.xml

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