By Nick Buglione
At a March 13 hearing before the Town of Hempstead Board of Zoning Appeals, a Sprint representative quickly moved to kill the proposal, before the 10 East Meadow community members in attendance had a chance to petition the board for a vote postponement.
The withdrawal of the application had to do with issues we had with funding at that particular site, said Kathleen Dunleavy, a spokeswoman for Sprint PCS. We're looking forward again to working with the community so we can find an adequate and acceptable location for the antennas.
Some community members present at the meeting had heard reports that Sprint intended to abandon plans to place antennas on the East Meadow Avenue building, but showed up ready to fight regardless.
We had some unofficial communications with Sprint, but none direct, said 30-year East Meadow resident Richard Judge, who has fought the proposal since its inception. We were looking for confirmation, but we didn't get it. That's why we showed up today, and that's why we were ready to propose a postponement.
Members of the Board of Zoning Appeals briefly scolded Sprint for waiting until the day of the hearing to withdraw its application, stating they wasted the time of those who came down to speak out against it.
Nevertheless, community members were ecstatic at the development. We're happy to have it moved, and we hope that they'll keep on moving it, said longtime resident Pat Maher. We just hope that they don't decide to move it three blocks from there.
In January, Sprint proposed placing six cell towers, each about14 feet tall, at 407 East Meadow Ave., in order to fill cellular phone service gaps in the area.
We have customers in the East Meadow area that have signed up for our service who are not getting a signal in their neighborhood, Dunleavy said, explaining additional antennas would solve the problem.
The proposal faced almost unilateral opposition from civic activists, local elected officials and business leaders. We were all prepared to fight based on the fact that Sprint was not forthcoming with the data we needed to assess the situation, said Nassau County Legis. Norma Gonsalves.
Opponents to the plan were primarily concerned with health risks, saying that some studies have shown there might be a link between cellular phones and antennas to cancer and other illnesses.
However, the 1996 Telecommunications Act prohibits local zoning boards from denying applications to build cell towers because of perceived health risks. Instead, East Meadow activists planned to use aesthetics as their main argument against the project, maintaining the towers would be an eyesore in the residential area.
They don't know what medical effects these towers could cause, said Maher. If they are going to put these towers up in the future, I would like to see Sprint make some sort of contract with the community so that they could take responsibility if they do have some medical effects.
Dunleavy said that studies indicate the towers would pose no harm to East Meadow residents. The FCC has done considerable research, and it was determined that the antennas have no effect on people.
She went on to note that there is a still a need to install cell towers somewhere in the East Meadow area, though alternative sites are not yet known.
Erection of cell towers has been a hot issue county-wide in recent years. About a year and a half ago, the Town of Hempstead formed a cell-tower committee to investigate proposed installment sites for cell towers and to present possible alternatives if necessary.
We can't really stop them, so the best we can do is offer other sites, said Viki DeJong, an East Meadow resident on the committee. It's an interesting issue, and it's going to get bigger.
