Assembly creates a tall problem

Like most property owners in the Mat-Su Borough, Doug and Brenda Lampton know the value of good neighbors. And while good neighbors are a source of Valley pride, this community value is not — seemingly — shared by the majority seated at the Mat-Su Borough Assembly table.

There is a giant, 100-foot-tall testament to this a mere 90 feet from the Lamptons’ home in the form of a new Verizon Wireless cellphone tower.

We’ve been told these towers aren’t designed to fail. But frankly, neither towers, nor planes nor any of the rest of man’s inventions were designed to fail. Yet planes do fail. And towers do fall.

So we understand Brenda Lampton’s concern that the 100-foot tower could — in a worst-case scenario — fall on top of her house.

That the cellular carrier, which has partnered with Matanuska Telephone Association, wants a tower in the area of Lampton’s home near Mat-Su College isn’t surprising. The Mat-Su Borough grew by 50 percent, according to the 2010 U.S. Census count. We all use cellphones, and wireless technologies are more and more important to our daily lives. We understand that things like communications towers are necessary infrastructure.

But there are dozens — or possibly hundreds or even thousands — of Mat-Su Valley residents who will soon discover themselves in the Lamptons’ shoes. Our research suggests that more than 30 new towers are planned here in the near future.

But we can’t tell you where or when, because there is no permitting process or public notification process to provide that information to the public.

Ten months ago, Verizon and MTA could not have built a 100-foot tower without following the borough’s regulations and a public notification process. But rather than amend the borough’s existing regulations governing towers, assembly members instead voted to eliminate all tower regulations.

At the time, Assemblyman Ron Arvin said the repeal of the tower regulations was intended to send a message to industry that “they have a business-friendly assembly now.”

Now Assemblyman Steve Colligan says he wants to appoint a commission to come up with new ones. Perhaps Colligan is unaware that a commission of residents already did this work; that was the raft of revisions he and his colleagues voted down en route to striking down all tower rules.

Still, Colligan wants a do-over. This time he wants the rules to be rewritten by a five-member commission made up of three industry representatives and two members of the public. Setting up a commission weighted to favor industry and then tasking it to write regulations that would govern that industry is akin to appointing a skulk of foxes to guard the henhouse.

This issue is now in the hands of the Planning Commission. We hope the members of this body will see fit to recommend a new ordinance that reasonably regulates tower placement and restores public confidence in the process.