The Stinson Beach County Water District is formulating a lease agreement with AT&T to allow the cellular company to build a 65-foot-tall 5G cell tower disguised as a pine tree at a tank site in the highlands. District general manager Kent Nelson said the tower—which would be visible across town—would boost reception, save the district tens of thousands of dollars a year on meter inspections and provide needed funds.
Mr. Nelson said the lease could bring in $70,000 in the first year alone.
The proposal was met with much disapproval at a community meeting that drew over 50 residents late last month. While Mr. Nelson and a representative for AT&T underlined the need for better cell coverage for locals and emergency services, over a dozen residents expressed concern over health hazards posed by electromagnetic fields.
“This is our version of the gas station in Point Reyes,” resident Harriet Moss said. “We’re concerned about health hazards, and we will be petitioning at the post office very soon.”
An AT&T cell tower behind the fire station in Bolinas that was installed in 1997 provides unreliable coverage along Highway 1, throughout much of Seadrift and in patches of downtown Stinson Beach.
“During winter months, most people have one to two bars downtown, and slightly greater service as they go northbound,” Adam Schermerhorn, a spokesman for the Marin County Sheriff’s Office, said of Stinson Beach. “In summer, due to the influx of people, service is essentially non-existent.”
The new tower would be located east of two water tanks at the end of Avenida Farralone. It would boost coverage across town, enhance emergency communications through a band that serves as a VIP line for emergency services, and make measuring water usage frictionless for about 13 percent of town, Mr. Nelson said. Water use in town is measured using electronic meters that transmit data using cellular technology, but about 100 meters lay outside cell reception, so district staff manually collects the data.
“Significantly reducing or even potentially eliminating this monthly task would not only save the district money, but also free up our very limited staff to perform more proactive and preventative maintenance on the system,” Mr. Nelson said.
But many protested this idea, including board member Sandra Cross, who is recusing herself from voting on the item due to her personal objections to the project. Though no one debates the poor cell reception in the highlands, she and many other residents are not willing to risk a health hazard in exchange for more bars. “There is no proof that the tower would solve the problem of malfunctioning meters,” she wrote to the Light. “The topography of Stinson is full of gullies and dips that would likely not be affected even if we had 25G.”
Tom Hendrickson lives a quarter-mile from the proposed site, and although he and his wife have poor reception at their home, they are opposed to the project. In 2009, Mr. Hendrickson helped to defeat an antenna proposed by T-Mobile atop an office space he shared in the East Bay, and he said he’s not done fighting.
“My wife and I are extremely health conscious and we’re absolutely trying to put a stop to this tower,” he said. “There are a lot of studies that show living in a neighborhood within a cell tower has cumulative effects over time. One of the great things about Stinson Beach is that the air is clean and the environment is pure. We should work to keep it that way.”
Seadrift resident Terry Houlihan was the lone vocal supporter at the meeting. He said the need for better coverage for residents and emergency services outweighs any potential health hazards. “Seems to me that the important and undisputed fact that we need better service should override any other concerns,” he said. “These electromagnetic signals are already everywhere from many different sources. So the question is not ‘Are we being exposed to dangerous radiation?’ The question is ‘Will this one cell tower make a material difference in the threat?’”