Town to bond for highway, police purchases
By Ashley M. Casey
Associate Editor
The Cicero Town Board approved design standards and general guidelines for small cell wireless facilities at its Dec. 11 meeting. Municipalities across the country have been enacting similar regulations since a 2018 Federal Communications Commission ruling that is paving the way for 5G technology.
Last year, the FCC ruled that state and local governments may only charge 5G providers “fees that are no greater than a reasonable approximation of objectively reasonable costs for processing applications and for managing deployments in the rights-of-way” and have a limited amount of time to approve small cell wireless applications. Aesthetic and undergrounding requirements are now under tighter scrutiny, and certain environmental assessments have been lifted for 5G applicants.
Town Attorney Robert Germain explained at a public hearing preceding the vote that “small cell” technology includes the current 4G cellular network technology. Small cell refers to small units that transmit data across high frequencies. Germain said these units must be placed closer together — about every 250 feet.
Communication service providers such as Verizon and T-Mobile will be required to apply for master license agreements. The initial application fee is $500 for up to five small cell wireless facilities, and providers can pay $100 per application for additional poles.
“As a municipality, we’re not in business to make money. We’re prohibited from doing that by the state constitution, but we’re allowed to recoup our costs,” Germain said.
There will also be an annual fee for the small cell installations.
Councilor Judy Boyke asked about the possibility of providers co-locating their utilities on the same pole. Germain said co-location is possible to a point, but 5G units can be heavy and a pole could become unstable if loaded down with too many units.
Boyke also asked what will happen in neighborhoods that require underground utilities.
“That’s a problem. We can’t stop them in the town right-of-ways,” Germain said. “At least with the design guidelines, we don’t want a pole in front of someone’s house, so we’ve taken those extra steps to try to prohibit that.”
Germain added that while decorative utility poles are available, some of them cannot bear the weight of multiple small cell units.
The local law governing small cell wireless facilities is available on the town’s website at ciceronewyork.net/2019/11/18/5g-wireless-review.
Also on the agenda
In addition to dealing with 5G, the Cicero Town Board addressed the following issues at its Dec. 11 meeting:
• The Cicero Citizens Police Academy held the graduation of its fifth class. Chief Steve Rotunno said some of the graduates had already applied to the Volunteers in Police Services (VIPS) program. Sgt. James Snell, who oversaw the program for the first time this year, said about 88 people have graduated from the CCPA.
“It’s extremely important that we are in touch with our community,” Snell said. “I cannot express how proud I am of everybody for sticking with it.”
Supervisor Mark Venesky said the CCPA graduates and VIPS volunteers serve as “extra pairs of eyes and ears to keep our community safe.”
• The town board approved a zone change from agricultural to general commercial for a property on Jerome Street across from the Brewerton Fire Department. The FD plans to build a training facility there.
• The board also voted to authorize the issuance of $678,000 in bonds for police and highway equipment spending. The town plans to spend $428,000 on highway equipment and $250,000 on police vehicles.
