Sprint, Cingular sue San Diego county over cell tower rule

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Sprint, Cingular sue county over cell tower rule

By:MARTY GRAHAM - Staff Writer

SAN DIEGO ---- Two of the nation's largest cellular phone service companies are suing San Diego County over its new ordinance that makes it harder to get permits to place cell phone towers. The companies have asked state and federal courts to order the county not to enforce the new rules.

In a lawsuit filed in federal court last week, Cingular Wireless and Sprint Telephony sued the county and all five county supervisors, saying the ordinance oversteps the county's legal authority over where cell phone towers can be located and how complex the approval process can be.

"Cellular carriers have to deal with this 'not-in-my-backyard mentality while the (federal) regulatory bodies are saying the companies aren't providing adequate service to their customers," said Jesse Jauregui, who represents Sprint. "It puts the carriers in a tough spot when county rules don't let them do what federal regulators say they must."


A similar suit was filed in Superior Court on the same day.

County supervisors Thursday declined to comment on the suit until it is resolved. But county lawyers Tom Bunton and Ellen Pilsecker, in a phone interview, said the county ordinance was reviewed to be sure it was in bounds before it was submitted to the supervisors.

"It is the county's position that the county has the authority to regulate (cellular tower siting) to a limited extent and we are within our rights," Pilsecker said.

The county approved its Wireless Zoning Ordinance in May, two years after supervisors asked the Planning Department to write it. Supervisors Ron Roberts and Bill Horn voted against the ordinance, because, they said, the ordinance didn't do what they'd asked for. County supervisors intended to use the zoning permit process to make sure that cellular antennae are unobtrusive and blend in with the environment, and to give companies incentives to cooperate and keep the process simple.

For good examples, supervisors pointed to panels on the sides of commercial buildings, antennas concealed in flagpoles, built inside church steeples and dressed as trees.

Cellular providers said in April that the problem with the ordinance is that it makes it harder and more costly to put towers in residential areas, when that's where the customers want the service.

In the last two years, wireless communications companies have applied for 130 permits to build antennas in unincorporated areas, according to Joan Vokac of the planning department. Just eight of those applications were rejected by the county before the ordinance was passed.

But since then, for example, 11 of Cingular's 32 tower projects that were already in the works will now have to meet more intense scrutiny and pay higher fees, the complaint states. Many Sprint and Cingular towers are facing delays. For that reason, the companies are seeking monetary damages as well as a ruling that the ordinance isn't valid, according to Cingular attorney Craig Hunsaker.

"We know our client is being damaged, but some of the damages may be unknowable because you can't quantify the amount of lost revenue and clients lost because of delays," he said. "Clients who don't sign up or who change service because of holes in the coverage area are hard to count."