The city of Eureka is expected to start the long process of crafting a specific ordinance to control the proliferation of wireless telecommunication facilities, namely cell phone towers, at its meeting Tuesday.
The topics has been thrust before the council due to a group of neighborhood residents who have vocally protested plans to erect a 60-foot Verizon cell tower at the Apostolic Faith Church in the 200 block of Harris Street.
The neighbors have complained of feeling they weren't properly notified of the project in time to appeal its conditional use permit and have said they have concerns over health and safety risks, as well as negative neighborhood impacts associated with the tower.
After hearing from a string of upset area residents at a recent meeting and unable to do anything about the Harris Street project because the window for appeals had long since passed, Councilman Chris Kerrigan asked that the matter of creating a long-term plan to deal with the placement, consideration and notification of wireless telecommunication facilities be brought before the council.
Meanwhile, neighborhood residents continue to protest the Harris Street project, with one saying last week that the group was considering contacting an attorney to see if the group has any legal recourse to stop the project.
In other matters, the council is also expected to consider approving a resolution agreeing to fund the city's $180,000 parking meter replacement project through a Municipal Lease, essentially a loan financed through Municipal Services Group Inc.
Under the proposed resolution, the city would pay 4.81 percent interest on the five-year loan, making its estimated cost for borrowing the funds just less than $27,000. Over the next five years, city staff is estimating the new meter program will provide the city with more than $500,000 in additional revenue, but some have voiced concerns that those numbers are overly optimistic and that not as many people will park in the newly metered spaces and lots in Old Town.
The council is also expected to welcome some good news Tuesday by officially accepting a pair of grants awarded to the city, one for the Eureka Skate Park and another for the cleanup of the city's Halvorsen property.
The Humboldt Area Foundation has awarded the city an $8,000 grant to go toward construction of the Eureka Skate Park in Cooper Gulch, a project spearheaded by Councilman Jeff Leonard.
The city also has been awarded a $200,000 Brownfields Cleanup Grant from the United States Environmental Protection Agency to excavate known contaminated soil from the old Carson Mill Site, now known as the Halvorsen property. In order to take advantage of the grant, the City Council will have to vote to appropriate $40,000 from the city's Redevelopment Agency fund reserves.
”The site's past industrial operations have caused varying levels of groundwater contamination at the site primarily from petroleum hydrocarbons,” the staff report states. “The city's primary concerns are to prevent the migration of these contaminants into groundwater and into Humboldt Bay. The objective in seeking EPA Brownfields funding is to eliminate these potential health hazards and to implement long-term monitoring programs.”
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Council to consider cell tower ordinance
Source: Times-Standards.com
