June 11, 2009 – Only a handful of people attended Thursday's Planning and Natural Resources Department hearing on proposed telecommunication facilities rules and regulations, but that allowed for extensive input.
Myriad topics were covered at the hearing held at the Legislature building on St. John, but the need to balance aesthetics with practicality received plenty of discussion. Instead of building numerous tall towers, Brian E. Safreed of the Puerto Rico-based Caribbean Tower Sites suggested that smaller installations could sit on roofs to augment the tall "master" towers.
"In the Virgin Islands your roof is like sacred. People don't want you piercing their roof," St. Thomas Attorney Tom Bolt countered.
Safreed also suggested that towers can be disguised as trees or flagpoles, for example.
Carol Beckowitz of Sen. Craig Barshinger's office pointed out that there were rural areas, particularly on St. Croix and St. John, where there were no houses so tall towers would be required.
Bolt subsequently asked if there were incentives built into the proposed rules and regulations to make it worth a tower company's while to use roof top or other aesthetically pleasing towers.
"We want to encourage roof top structures so we will come up with incentives," answered Dawn Henry, Planning's legal programs supervisor in the Environmental Protection Division.
In addition to Safreed, Beckowitz and Bolt, attorneys Daryl Dodson and Steve Hogroian accounted for the rest of the public who attended the hearing. Planning had five people at the hearing.
The rules and regulations are in still in their draft state. However, Henry said that after the last in the round of meetings Friday on St. Croix, the department will begin to develop the final document.
"How do we take these concepts and reduce them to law. That's the trick," she said, adding that that the final draft must get approval by the Legislature.
The job would be easier if the territory had a Comprehensive Land and Water Use Plan in place, Henry said.
After Hogroian, who represents a communication tower company, suggested that the moratorium on erecting new towers be modified to allow construction of towers with approved permits, Henry said she'd take it up with Planning Commissioner Robert Mathes.
The telecommunication towers rules and regulations will come under the territory's building code.
After holding a hearing Wednesday on St. Thomas, (See "Draft Tower Rules Could Stifle Cell Service, Speakers Say,") Planning will hold the last of its hearings at 6 p.m. Friday at the Florence Williams Library on St. Croix.
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