(Children's Health Defense) Residents of Santa Cruz County, California, are suing the county for allegedly illegally approving the placement of a 140-foot AT&T cell tower in a rural residential neighborhood.
The residents want the court to order the county to withdraw the tower’s approval.
Tim Richards, with Santa Cruz County for Safe Tech, the group opposing the tower, told The Defender he and his family will be forced to relocate if the tower is built.
“My wife and I are sensitive to radiofrequency radiation, which triggers migraine headaches and fatigue for us,” he said. “We specifically moved to this mountaintop to escape towers in town.”
He and his wife have two kids, ages 1 and 5. Children are more susceptible to negative health impacts from wireless radiation, Richards said.
“At 900 feet away, we would have to sell our land and move if this tower is built, so we’re fighting to defend our health, our property, our biggest investment, and our dreams,” he added.
Santa Cruz County for Safe Tech alleges the county’s board of supervisors violated the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and local code when it greenlit the project on June 10.
“At a minimum, the project needs to be sent back for a new CEQA report and full Environmental Impact Report,” said Richards, the group’s leader.
On July 16, lawyers, including W. Scott McCollough, lead litigator for Children’s Health Defense’s (CHD) Electromagnetic Radiation (EMR) & Wireless cases, filed the complaint in the Superior Court of the State of California for the County of Santa Cruz.
Parties of interest in the suit include AT&T, CTI Towers and Delta Group Engineering.
CHD’s Stop 5G initiative is supporting the residents in their fight.
‘Telecom industry doesn’t give up easily’
Miriam Eckenfels, director of CHD’s EMR & Wireless Program, said the Santa Cruz community exemplifies how communities “can and should fight back against unwanted cell towers — and how the Stop 5G initiative can support them.”
“However, their story is also an example of how challenging and long-lasting these fights can be and how important it is to get legal and professional support,” she said.
Santa Cruz County for Safe Tech first voiced concern about the project in October 2023 and has been fighting it ever since, according to the complaint.
The county’s board of supervisors “ignored all the substantial evidence we presented to them that should have compelled them to deny the tower,” Richards said.
“The telecom industry doesn’t give up easily,” Eckenfels said.
For instance, when coverage maps on AT&T’s website showed no service gaps, a lawyer representing CTI Towers told the supervisors at a May 7 meeting that the AT&T website maps were simply “inaccurate marketing” maps.
The supervisors were then given new maps that showed gaps, Lookout Santa Cruz reported.
According to Richards, the area has no gap in coverage. This was “proven not only by data AT&T submitted to the federal government under penalty of perjury, but also by our own drive testing” in which residents successfully placed in-vehicle calls “throughout the region,” he said.
“Sometimes it is necessary to take the telecom industry and local decision makers to court to get another shot at political advocacy,” Eckenfels said. “We are proud to fight alongside community advocates and are doing everything we can to deliver them a win.”
County made errors in approving tower, lawsuit says
The lawsuit provides the court with information so it can call out the many “administrative, procedural, and legal errors made by the Board in approving the tower,” Richards said.
For instance, both the federal Telecommunications Act of 1996 and Santa Cruz County’s local ordinance require wireless companies to install new cell equipment on existing towers whenever possible, rather than erecting a new tower.
There is an existing 150-foot tower 1,000 feet away from the new approved tower, with a landowner willing to put cellular equipment there, Richards said. “This is a technically feasible, visually superior alternative.”
That fact should have stopped the county from approving the tower, he said.
Also, erecting the tower puts the forested neighborhood at greater fire risk. The residents know firsthand about the devastation a fire can cause. In 2020, a wildfire burned 40% of the neighborhood’s structures, Richards said.
“We can’t afford more wildfire risk from a tall tower not engineered to withstand 100 mph winds on our mountain summit, nor the generators and backup batteries used to support it in power outages,” he said.
Ann, a resident and member of the plaintiff’s funder group who preferred not to disclose her last name, told The Defender the tower has “no place in our community.”
“There are long-time residents residing here and young families with small children and babies. … The public needs to be aware of and understand the devastating effects of cell towers,” she said.
Those effects include health concerns for residents, the destruction of native habitat and the “unsightly” visual impact of a 16-story metal and plastic tower.
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