WASHINGTON-The Personal Communications Industry Association and the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association have advised the Federal Communications Commission to take a more proactive role with individual states to ensure the success of wireless tower siting on state-owned property.
In comments submitted earlier this month, PCIA noted while the commission has been educating individual states regarding new Telecom Act rules, it also should be the main clearinghouse for information and statutes for local jurisdictions grappling with site contracts.
In addition, the FCC should provide information prior to being asked and before problems arise, the association wrote.
PCIA suggested the following information be provided to those regulators who may need it: all applicable federal statutes and regulations relating to the approval, construction, evaluation or notification of antenna structures or facilities, including Federal Aviation Administration guidelines and environmental caveats; General Services Administration guidelines regarding antenna siting on federal property; Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service management policies and regulations as they relate to federal property; and FCC information on transmitters, including the type-acceptance process and radiation standards.
Finally, PCIA would like to have commission staffers available to answer any questions or to provide testimony when needed before local zoning boards.
CTIA, while agreeing with PCIA on what types of siting regulations and guidelines should be made available to state and local governments, went one step further in its comments by asking the commission not to float a proposed rulemaking on the matter that might discourage “wireless carriers from considering state-owned property as a viable arrangement for siting facilities.”
Such a rulemaking would run counter to telecom act rules that require the commission to work with the states on this issue; CTIA also believes a regulation on this could “result in rigid rules or standards which have the ability to freeze technology and innovation.”
A federal agenda or model for cooperative siting efforts should be formulated, CTIA added, to make sure states, carriers and consumers are treated fairly. Such a model would guard against excluding private property use when appropriate, unreasonable fees, discriminatory bidding and collocation problems.
According to CTIA, some states “are adopting boilerplate ordinances that extort excessive franchise fees, occupancy taxes, excavation fees, obstruction fees, etc., for the use of public rights of way.”
What the FCC needs to monitor is how “fair and reasonable rates” are determined on a competitively neutral and non-discriminatory basis so no real or perceived barriers to entry could be formed at the state or local level.
