Athens to host public hearing on cell tower developments

“We have a proposed draft law that is available to the public for them to come in and read it, and comment on their feelings of what the town is proposing. We had a company come in and propose a cell tower, and from that, there were disagreements about the placing and so forth,” Michael Pirrone, town supervisor, said on Thursday. “We are just trying to address the issues that people brought up, and a lot of people put in a lot of work to draft this proposal, and now it's up to the people to let us know if they agree with it or not.”

The 56-page bill, which was provided to the Daily Mail, mainly seeks to regulate where a cell tower can be placed without being an eyesore on the community, and Pirrone wants the community to make their voices heard on the specifics of the bill.

The bill states that any tower placement will need to minimize a negative visual aesthetic.

“Unless adequate coverage and adequate capacity cannot otherwise be achieved, towers shall be sited off ridgelines and where their visual impact is least detrimental to residential areas and scenic areas, such as scenic areas of statewide significance, state-designated scenic roads, public parks, and historic sites, landmarks or districts, and such scenic resources as may be locally-designated by the Town of Athens,” the bill states.

It also considers the coverage areas of a new cell tower proposal by the applicant. The law states that any new cell tower must provide at least 50% coverage to Athens. Access roads to a new tower must also be minimal, according to the law, and must be designed in a way to minimize environmental impacts from erosion.

The law took into consideration recommendations from a committee of citizens who gave their input on new cell tower developments to the town and Pirrone. Those recommendations were then given to Delaware Engineering, the town’s planner, and George McHugh, the town’s attorney, Pirrone said.

“They fine-tuned the proposal to adhere to the coding we have and the situation we have within the town of Athens,” Pirrone said.

Pirrone said that there was no governing law that directly restricted where a cell tower could be built.

“At that time, we didn't have any specific land use [rules] to govern the placement. All we had was cell towers and wireless towers were permitted in the town of Athens, after the concerned citizens responded to the placement of the tower in scenic areas and close to residential homes, we tried to find an amicable meeting so that these are placed in appropriate places,” Pirrone said.

This all comes as the town awaits a development in the lawsuit that was filed by Hailee Dickson, an Athens resident who lives near the intersection the Verizon cell tower would have been built near.

The lawsuit challenges the Town’s Zoning Board of Appeals decision that granted Verizon to build a 155-foot cell tower at the intersection of Farm to Market Road and Briarwood Drive.

ARX Wireless Infrastructure and Verizon Wireless will lead the construction of the tower. The Zoning Board granted them a special-use permit on November 14, 2023, and denied Dickson’s appeal on October 26, 2023.