3 Min Points

April Draft ( this document may change). You may copy and paste and adjust this document for your city use.

Document for City Council and Planning Commissioners MEETINGS Regarding “Small” Cell Wireless Telecommunication Facilities

Recommendation to residents: Request a 1 hour study session before the City Council to discuss this following crucial issues which cannot be fully covered in detail in 3 minutes. You can make a presentation with a lawyer, engineer, doctor etc and fully discuss the resident’s perspective in order to support your Commissioners or Council to make the best decision.

Have 10 people say the following 10 points in a city commissioner or city council meeting or study session. Topics with information taking two- three minutes each to say at a meeting with council members, study session or for submission as a letter are provided below for reference.

Further Information for your presentation can be found on EHTrust.org, 5GCrisis.com, MomsAcrossAmerica.org, Children’s Health Defense

Note: In this document a “small” cell wireless telecommunication facility will be referred to as sWTF.

Speaker 1

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city. We, everyone here wants to first thank you for your time, dedication and careful consideration of the information which we are providing to you today to support you in making the best decision for the economic growth, safety, health and reputation of our city. We have consulted with several lawyers, engineering experts and health professionals to provide you with accurate independent information backed by science. Ten of us will each address different issues. 

 We, The Residents of Our City, Request the Following Course of Action be Taken by our City Commissioners and City Council Regarding Any “Small” Cell Wireless Telecommunication Facility Applications or Construction.

We request that you pass a Cease and Desist Resolution until 4/5G technology is proven safe with safety studies by third parties and require Pollution Insurance from the applicant to protect the city from lawsuits due to EMF harm.

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city. We  also ask you to delay any consideration of SWTF approvals now to allow time to update our city ordinance, which does not include current SWTF technology and is therefore invalid.

Please Delay approvals with a moratorium until our ordinance is updated with the following changes:

1. The ordinance shall include a requirement of third party RF harm insurance to protect the city residents from RF harm before construction begins. No company of any kind should be allowed to install any technology, facilities, or devices on city property without sufficient insurance. The permit to install such equipment should require the permitee to carry a policy of Pollution Insurance, naming the City as an additional Insured, which insurance will carry $1million, per occurrence, coverage for EMF exposure caused illnesses.   

General Liability policies of insurance carry a pollution exclusion which defines EMF exposure as a form of pollution and excludes it from coverage. Thus the Telecom Company must produce proof of Pollution coverage which includes EMF induced illnesses, in order to adequately protect the City.

The telecom companies will claim they have�� indemnity. Indemnity is a form of “self insurance” offered by the telecoms, but may only be viable depending on the cash reserves of the permittee and therefore should be additional to the requirement of insurance.

If the city chooses not to require insurance a $1million bond per construction site  should be included in the ordinance.

In addition, we request inclusion in the updated ordinance of the federally recognized Electromagnetic Sensitivity disability by the American Disability Act and handicap by the FHAA. 

1. Potential American Disability Act accommodations- The city ordinance must be updated to require the applicant to mail a letter with return receipt notification to all of the occupants of any building with 1500 feet of the proposed sWTF location. Occupants have the right to request accommodation under the American Disability Act for Electromagnetic Sensitivity. The city must engage in meaningful discussion with the requestor. Accomodation could result in denial of the sWTF application. Failure to inform residents of pending construction violates their 1st amendment right to be heard about said installations in a public hearing.

2 minutes 42 seconds

Speaker 2

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city and I also thank you for your time. 

I am here to present information, for the record, showing that the applicant must show that they have chosen the least obtrusive location and no other alternative location. If they do not do this, the city has the legal responsibility to deny the application. Since the applicant is applying for increased 4G service, and 4G facilities can, according to widely agreed upon engineer expert’s data, transmit sufficient radio frequencies for  between 3 to 45 miles depending on if the terrain is hilly or flat, the proposed locations, in the heart of our city’s restaurant areas and residential areas, are not the least obtrusive and best locations. The best locations for additional 4G wireless facilities would be a minimum of 3 miles away, on hill tops, in green spaces. Or for the most effective increased service, fiber optic cables which do not cause increased fire hazards, are more secure from hacking, are more reliable in inclement weather, and provide faster service- at the speed of light.

Thirdly the applicants did not meet visual impact requirements in the application. The application contains an image of the small cell facility on a pole with very limited surrounding area. A true visual impact would include images from the nearby residents bedroom windows, post office window view, restaurant dining area window view etc, the impact on the surrounding building occupants . Without a complete application our city must deny the application.

We thank you for making the best decisions possible for the residents of the city. We thank you for considering to Deny these applications based on

1. Insufficient data proving gap in coverage
2. Failing to identify least obtrusive, no other alternative locations
3. Incomplete visual impact requirements in application

and Require Fact Finding Demonstrations from Applicant. We assert that the  only course of responsible action is to prevent the onslaught of thousands of small cell facilities in our city and to require underground fiber optic cables instead.

2 mins 43 seconds

Speaker 3

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city. We understand that you may have been told that “Your hands are tied,” and that if you do deny an application, the city can be sued.

Let’s look at the facts.

The fact is that impending lawsuits from the residents, which according to lawyers and residents across the country, are coming, are a much graver threat to the coffers of our city, city council members or commissioners personally, than the threat of lawsuits from the telecom company if the city does not approve their application. 

The threats from the telecom companies that any attempt to restrict deployment will result in lawsuits are hollow and specious. 

The Telecommunications Act of 1996, 47 USC 332 7 which establishes federal preemption over small cell deployment, carries no monetary remedy for violations of the act. In other words, if  the City prohibits deployment for the "wrong" reason, the only remedy in court is an injunction requiring the City to issue a permit. 

The telecom companies cannot sue the city for monetary damages, penalties, or even attorney fees if they prevail.  "A public entity is not liable for an injury caused by adopting or failing to adopt an enactment or by failing to enforce any law." - Calif. Government Code Section 818.2 

Therefore the statement “Our hands are tied” is simply what the telecom companies want you to think. Your hands are not tied.  You can choose to deny these applications. The cities of Ross, Mill Valley and Fairfax, in Marin County, have enacted ordinances that have limited or prohibited small cell installation in residential neighborhoods and have not been sued. Los Altos, CA which denied 13 applications, has also not been sued. 

Therefore, I think we can all agree that there is virtually no risk to our city for you, our trusted City Commissioners to deny these applications. If for some unusual reason the applicant chooses to risk reputational damage by bullying our city, which has been repeatedly named the number 1, 2 or 3 safest city in America many times, they may only sue for the permit. The cost is minimal to us, as our city already pays for a city attorney to handle this minor case which takes a few months. If the judge should deem in the favor of the applicant, all that happens is that the applicant is granted the permit, and we are simply at the same position where we are right now should you approve the permit. 

The only difference is that, if you deny it, the residents will know that you made the effort to stand up with us and spoke up to protect our city from constant exposure to RF radiation. The responsibility for harm from RF exposure would then likely be diverted back to the Telecom companies or FCC.  If however, the judge finds in the city’s favor, the city is protected from RF exposure and the bullying of Telecom.

We urge you to deny these applications and stand with the residents of ________.

2 minutes 53 seconds

Speaker 4

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city. If you do not choose to deny this application we understand that you may also be hesitant to delay any approvals of SWTF applications for fear of the telecom companies suing, as it may be perceived that as a city we are preventing service. As was just stated, the threat of lawsuits is simply a Paper Tiger threat and is not a valid reason to avoid denying or delaying any approvals. 

We ask you to, if you choose not to deny, to delay consideration or approvals for SWTFS for the following reason:

1. Lawsuits in District 9 and other cities are expected to meet resolution in 5-6 months. The result of these cases could alter legal options for other cities. Prudent city planning requires the consideration of such changes and the impact on our city. Approvals made and construction allowed before these lawsuits are ruled upon could result in obsolete. unnecessary, harmful, and property devaluing facilities in our city.

There are currently 3 lawsuits filed against the FCC regarding sWTFs , one of which, in District 9, will be concluded within a few months. The other two are against the FCC by Children’s Health Defense and Robert F. Kennedy JR, and the other is by Environment Health Trust. Both require the FCC to update their guidelines to include health and safety of the current 4/5G technology. 

There are also several other lawsuits.  For example, Simi Valley residents sued city council members directly for failing to protect the residents from radio frequency radiation (RFR) harm. Topanga, CA  is suing because the amount of RFR emitting from the WTF is higher than FCC limits. And residents of Thousand Oaks are suing based on the lack of NEPA review. There are currently two bills HR 530,  S.2012 which move to abolish the nearly 30 year old FCC wireless technology guidelines  and update them, giving local authority back to municipalities for WTF installations.

The outcome of these lawsuits and bills may alter regulations and requirements for our city.  We ask you to consider that to fulfill your commitment to perform prudent city planning it is crucial to delay any approvals or ordinance updates until after these decisions on these lawsuits have been released. It makes no sense for our city to rush to approve these applications now simply because we have been told by a big company to do so. We know that your commitment to our city is bigger than a company’s desire to provide unwanted additional facilities. A six month cease and desist resolution would be a wise, responsible, and prudent city planning decision.

Thank you for your dedication.

3 minutes

Speaker 5

I submit for the public record the documentation to show that it is within your full jurisdiction to Deny applications for the following reasons

They do not meet requirements of:

1. Proving gap in coverage - no fact finding hard data submitted
2. Least obtrusive, no other alternative locations
3. Does not meet visual impact requirements in application

Let’s first look at failing to prove a gap in coverage.

First of all, according to the recently passed Secure 5G and Beyond policy statement by the President, who is working with ATT and Verizon to be global leaders in 5G,  the applicant’s intention is to set up a 5G grid. However, since they are required to show a gap in coverage, and they cannot show a gap in coverage for a technology which does not exist, they are applying under the false pretense that further 4G service is needed. Telecom intends to install 4G small cells and DAS Nodes then later upgrade to 5G. They have presented you with a propagation map - a photograph of supposed gap in coverage with absolutely no hard data. We ask the city to deny this application  because of the failure to include full fact finding determinations that show hard data, no recording of readings of cell phone reception, and dropped calls. 

The applicant claims that the FCC recently removed the requirement to demonstrate a gap in coverage. That statement is misleading and untrue.
FCC 18-133 is a presumptive order and not self-enforcing as admitted by FCC Attorney Scott Noveck himself in front of a three-judge Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel in Pasadena, CA on Feb 10.That means these are merely statements of preferences and are not binding.

In addition, we are also expecting that most or all of FCC Orders 18-111 and 18-133 will be vacated by the same three-judge Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel in a matter of weeks.

An FCC opinion cannot wipe out the relevance of Ninth Circuit case law. Metro PCS v San Francisco (2005) is alive and well and represents the law of CA today.

For the record I submit a document showing:

Map of Sufficient cell phone calling coverage from the applicants own website.

I submit that you, our trusted city commissioners have complete authority and responsibility to deny these applications based on insufficient data of gap in coverage.

2 minutes 52 seconds

Speaker 6

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city. I  also ask you to delay any consideration of SWTF approvals for 6 months and to update our city ordinance with the following additional requirements.

1. Require a Five Year Master Plan- Approving these applications is no small matter - it is like entering into a marriage. This decision must be made with mutual respect and consideration of all of the potential impacts to our current residents and historically beautiful city. Our city planners worked hard to require almost all telecommunication utilities to be underground. Engineering experts report that on average, telecom plans for 3000 small cells per 100,000 residents or every 500 feet, outside of every 2-3 homes  for full 5G deployment. These thousands of small cells will be emitting frequencies 5 billion times higher than is needed for 5 bars on a cell phone. 

WHY is the applicant wanting to install this technology?  This technology is desired by telecom, not to give us better cell phone coverage (the 4G we have is sufficient), or download movie data faster, from 20 to 8 seconds, but instead to upload OUR personal data faster and more frequently. Telecom’s plan is to have 5G  devices in our outside and in our homes, cars and devices which upload data to telecom and big Data companies that they can use for marketing.  Our “smart “ refrigerator will detect its contents and our “smart” cars will remind us if we are out of milk when we pass the “smart” grocery store with our “smart” phone. Our coffee maker, TV, lap tops, security system, lamps, and phones will all send data about our activities to telecom. This information is valuable to major corporations.

Let’s be clear- these 4G small cell facilities are a part of a “Smart” City plan which is a dumb idea for aesthetics, health, property value and privacy. Even if you disagree with that assessment, it should be our choice to use this technology. If you approve these applications, you remove that choice. Approving these applications subjects our residents, your families, to constant exposure to radiation and constant data collection or surveillance. Allowing these 2 small cell installations, then 15 more, and then thousands will have a tremendous forced RF exposure impact on our city, even if the applicant makes them look more aesthetically pleasing. The “pollution” as the insurance company defines Radio Frequency, will have an impact on our quality of life, insect population, and human and animal health, despite the applicant’s claims of safety. 

2 mins 31 seconds

Speaker 7 

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city. I  also ask you to pass a cease and desist resolution any consideration of SWTF approvals for 6 months and to update our city ordinance with the following additional requirements.

In addition to the impact of the small cell facilities, we ask the Planning Commissioners to consider and require a 5 Year Plan which address the introduction of the Starlink Satellite antennas, which have been approved by the US Government to the tune of 1 million antennas on the ground. Will the technology of today’s applicants be obsolete in a year once these satellite antennas are installed?

Will the applicant or a competitor come to us three months from now with a plan to install AirGig which are small cell facilities that attach to existing telephone poles or antennae? What other technologies will litter our city with wires and boxes?

Without this information and an extensive plan, our city planners are not fully equipped to do their jobs diligently and therefore must delay any consideration of approval.

The fact is that we don’t need this small cell technology. No one here wants it except the company.

1. We need and have underground telecommunication utilities. Our first choice is that we request that our city ordinance is updated to require all future telecommunications utilities be located underground, in the form of fiber optics cables or similar cable technology that we already have. Fiber optics is a safer technology which does not cause fire hazards, is more secure from hacking, is more reliable in inclement weather, and provides faster service- at the speed of light. All we need is $40 per household for shielded ethernet cables and a few adapters and all our laptops and smartphones can be hardwired with safe, fast, and secure connections if we personally want updated technology. We should not be forced to use a certain technology. 

• We do not need additional fire hazards.

2018 California fires cost our state over 24 billion dollars. At the same time as an increase in temperature, 4/5G small cells have been installed in these areas at a very high density. Plants are weakened by this wireless technology and become more frail and create terpenes which are flammable, increasing fire hazards.  Wireless telecommunication facilities have started fires. NexG,  whose equipment on a top-heavy pole was partly to blame for the 2007 Malibu Canyon fire has agreed to pay $14.5 million for damages and maintenance.  Birds can and have built nests on the top of poles and started fires. SWTFs can also fall over during extreme weather conditions ( unlike cables in the ground) and limit service for emergency response. 

It is the responsibility of our city officials to take actions to prevent fire hazards and lack of emergency response. On this basis alone, we ask you to deny this and any other above ground applications of wireless technology. Update the ordinance and require below ground fiber optic cables are safer, faster, more secure, more reliable during inclement weather, and are not fire hazards.

3 minutes

Speaker 8 

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city.  If the city chooses not to deny the introduction of thousands of small cell facilities against the residents will, we are requesting this addition provision to be included in the updated ordinance:

Regular monitoring of the small cell facility or any wireless facility must record the power output to maintain compliance with FCC regulations.

Like a restaurant business is regularly inspected, each and every small cell facility must be monitored by an independent RF engineer, monthly, at a randomly selected time. The applicant will not be informed previously. The applicant will be required to pay for such testing. The applicant will be given 10 days to regain compliance or the facility will be required to be shut off and removed.

If the residents report health implications from the small cell facility, the applicant will be responsible for supplying funding  for medical monitoring of the residents, in the form of a long term study, and remedies to resolve such health implications.

Our city simply cannot allow a technology into our midst which has been restricted or banned by 42 other municipalities for health concerns, and not require the applicants to be responsible for monitoring and resolution.

The fact is that if the applicant says we cannot consider health issues when approving or denying this technology, then they should not be able to claim it is safe, and ask us to accept that claim. In addition, if safety is not a concern, then the applicant should not mind monitoring the power and consent to health monitoring of any residents who claim health issues due to their technology.  Just like a restaurant business is inspected regularly, we request consistent, random monitoring for compliance of any telecommunications facilities allowed above ground in our city.

Thank you.

2 mins 20 seconds

Speaker 9

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city. Although you are being told you may not make a decision based on the environmental impacts of sWTFs, which Telecom is interpreting to mean health, we assert that you cannot properly do your job without considering the health implications.

The health impacts are numerous. The applicant and their expert have said that the technology is “safe according to FCC standards,” but the fact is that the FCC guidelines, which are 20 + years old, never considered health or environmental impact. So that statement is not based on science.

What is based on $25 million dollars of our taxpayer funded science however, is the recent Federal government’s National Toxicology Program study which found CLEAR EVIDENCE that this radiation causes cancer and breaks DNA. Thousands more studies proved profound harms from wireless technology radiation.  

In 2018, the CA Dept of Public Health published guidelines admitting that peer reviewed scientific studies show evidence that this radiation may cause DNA damage, reproduction harms, cancer and learning disabilities among other effects. How could we allow more wireless near schools, places of work, worship, hospitals or homes when the evidence is showing it is harming learning, health and reproduction? 

In 2014, the CA Medical Association passed a resolution calling on the FCC to update its health guidelines as the scientific evidence showed profound harms. On February 2, 2020, the Children’s Health Defense submitted a lawsuit in the US Court of Appeals of the Ninth Circuit against the FCC challenging its decades obsolete health guidelines. Among the people speaking here tonight are others who could not attend, who are parents of children from CA who have become sick from cell towers and wi-fi in their schools, and doctors attesting to the epidemic they see in their clinics including among children. 

Government Code Sec. 659641.1(f) gave a special exemption from mandatory approval of wireless sitting applications for wireless telecommunications facilities on fire department facilities. This was passed out of the International Firefighters Association’s concern regarding firefighters’ exposure to harmful radiation. They do not want and do not allow small cell facilities on their premises despite the telecom claims that they increase emergency response calls. If they don’t want them, why should we?  Why is the state of California allowing this exclusion and protecting firefighters but not protecting state residents from the same technology? Why should ____ our city allow it?

2 mins 50 seconds

Speaker 10

My name is _____, I am a ___ (occupation) and a ____year resident of ____ city.

Let’s be honest, none of us would be here if these small cell facilities were not a threat to our health. We are not anti technology. We love our internet. We simply need to be safe as well.  Peer reviewed scientific studies have shown that the radiation emitted by wireless technology adversely affects the immune system. In a time when we are trying to prevent pandemics and need to strengthen our immune system we should encourage the population, and especially our children and elderly who are a vulnerable population, to reduce their exposure to this harmful radiation rather than force more of it. 

We ask you to prevent telecom companies from deploying 5G “small cell” antennas or “Hot-Spots” under the false pretense of improving technology for learning during this CoVid 19 shutdown or for faster emergency response at any time. Any further upgrades should be with wired ethernet cables, which provide faster, safer, more secure and more reliable service. 

Considering the clear evidence of potential harm, especially to our children from this radiation, we especially ask for you to disallow any small cells near our homes, child care facilities, senior facilities, schools or universities. The human brain is not fully developed until 25 years old, so public right of way locations near colleges must also be included. Education Code Sec. 51101(a)(7) grants the right for parents to ensure that the school environment for their child is safe. Exposing children to this radiation, from a small cell on a pole across the street from a school for instance, especially over the objection of the parents and children, directly violates the schools’ duty to provide a safe environment and our right to ensure they do. The radiation batters children and violates their civil rights and our parental rights. This will put the school at odds with the city and again, raise serious risk of lawsuits. 

Scientific studies show that within 1500 feet of a cell tower, the risk of cancer increases 300%, especially for children.  Knowing this, and that the city forced the exposure upon children, against the parents wishes, will not likely have a judge rule in favor of the city.

We ask for you to cease and desist any further installations for six months until further resolution is determined in current lawsuits. Studies show it causes harm to sperm and sterility in men. Bees die at alarming rates when exposed to RF. The reproduction rate of birds, frogs and insects drops dramatically. Residents near newly installed small cells report tinnitus, headaches, nose bleeds, a sensation of burning skin, and loss of hearing. Families are being forced to sleep under aluminum sheeting or flee their homes. Business owners are reporting the loss of their business due to a small cell facility causing headaches in their workers, who then quit. 

We ask you for the sake of our children, our city, our future, to deny, delay decision making, require fact finding determinations and update the ordinance to require underground telecommunication facilities in the future. As a city you have nothing to lose by denying these applications, and everything to win, including the trust, safety, health and gratitude of the residents. 

2 mins 52 seconds

Thank you