Mat-Su Mayor vetoes tower vote

PALMER — Borough Mayor Larry DeVilbiss has wielded his veto pen to strike down a measure that would have asked borough voters to weigh in on how far from property lines to locate towers.

The ordinance, which passed 5-2 on July 19, would have asked voters whether a tower should be required to be as far away from a property line or a right-of-way as it is tall.

DeVilbiss vetoed it Thursday.

“This is clearly designed to obfuscate and oversimplify a very technical issue that has been thoroughly vetted by a special citizen/industry committee over a very extended period of time,” DeVilbiss wrote in the memo accompanying his veto.

Assemblyman Warren Keogh sponsored the ordinance, which he said was an attempt to see some motion on an issue that has been the subject of countless committee meetings. The vote would have been advisory. Changes to the rules would have to come from the Mat-Su Borough Assembly.

DeVilbiss said the ordinance oversimplified a complicated issue.

“If we’re just going to take the issue of how tall something is relative to the setbacks we should be doing something about the trees because they’re going to fall over a lot sooner than the towers are,” he said.

Keogh, at the meeting where the ordinance passed, said he thought the issue was actually relatively simple and understandable by the average voter.

“I think they are the best experts on whether or not we should have these kinds of regulations,” Keogh said of voters at last week’s meeting.

But DeVilibiss, noting that assembly members were essentially seeking advice on the matter, said he feared what they’d get is “ill-informed advice.”

“We’ve got a task force that has worked on this for years and come up with a reasonable compromise because we do have wireless communication needs in this Valley that are getting bigger all the time, and I think the more we try to shut down towers the more we’re affecting our ability to grow with the Internet and everything else that’s going that way,” the mayor said.

DeVilbiss has a pretty decent record on vetoes. His axing of assembly legislation commenting on state redistricting plans stood, as did five of his 13 budget vetoes. His veto of an assembly resolution commenting on planned changes to military airspace stood, but the resolution was later replaced with a less strident resolution.

The 5-2 vote by which the ordinance passed would be enough to override his veto, but assemblyman Noel Woods, while he voted for the ordinance, spoke at the meeting against it.

DeVilbiss said that whatever the assembly decides to do about his veto doesn’t matter to him.

“I don’t count votes, I just do what I think is in the best interest (of the borough),” DeVilbiss said. “If my logic prevails it prevails and if it doesn’t then we put up with it.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.