News - Local - North Coast

Wednesday, Jun. 11, 2008

Board denies Cambria cell towers after Verizon withdraws its application

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There won’t be any cell phone towers on Cambria’s protected Fiscalini Ranch Preserve.

County supervisors unanimously denied a permit for the controversial plan Tuesday after learning that Verizon Communications had pulled out of the project and that a combination of other sites might provide comparable coverage.

Verizon was the latest in a series of cell service providers seeking to improve Cambria’s often spotty reception by installing two towers and other equipment close to the tree line of the preserve’s rare Monterey pine forest.

The forest and 430-acre oceanfront ranch are environmentally protected and classified as sensitive habitat. However, the cell-tower plan had been in the works long before the most recent regulations were approved. Enactment of planning guidelines forbidding such uses on the preserve was delayed so the project could be considered under less restrictive standards in place when it was initially submitted.

Cell phone users have clamored for years for better service in Cambria, and emergency crews said the lack of reliable signals could make it harder to report emergencies.

Two environmental groups had appealed the county Planning Commission’s September approval of the project. Shortly before the hearing, the California Coastal Commission sent a letter asking the appeal be upheld and the project stopped.

The latest project plans called for 60-and 65-foot towers disguised as pine trees and five 160-square-foot storage sheds, surrounded by federally mandated fencing on the preserve, about 1,000 feet west of Highway 1 and 3,000 feet south of Huntington Road.

Verizon representative Dino Putrino said his firm still wants to provide better cell phone reception for the area and will look for other possible sites in Cambria.

“This was the best location,” he said, but challenges raised over the impact it would have on the preserve “makes the lease on the project (on the preserve) less than feasible for Verizon.”

Alternate sites may be not as well suited, added project opponent Mahala Burton of LandWatch of San Luis Obispo County, “but they’re not on a preserve.”

Most of the six sites recently identified as leading alternatives by the North Coast Advisory Council are near residential neighborhoods, locations that often draw opposition.