Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

11/07/2024 meeting of the Planning Commission and Board of Zoning Adjustments is called to order. Would everyone please stand for the of allegiance? Will the secretary please conduct the roll call?

Yes, chairperson. When I call your name, would you please respond? Chairperson Zuber?

Present.

Miss chairperson Tejada? Present. Commissioner Bolt?

Present. Commissioner

Mendoza? Present. Commissioner Rich?

Present.

Commissioner Solis?

Present.

Commissioner Tavjulu? We have seven commissioners. We have a quorum.

Thank you. The public is is invited to make any comments related to the agenda items that are not listed under public hearings or other items of public interest at this time. If you wish to speak during public comments, please fill out a speaker card and hand it to the administrative assistant, and speakers will be invited to speak. Public comments are limited to three minutes per person. If you wish to comment on an item listed under the public hearings portion of the agenda, you will have the opportunity to do so when the item is heard.

Please fill out the speaker card and hand it to the administrative assistant. We are now taking public comments. This is the time when any person may address the board on matters not listed on the agenda. Are there any items? Speakers? Thank you. Draft minutes for the meeting of 10/03/2024 were provided with your agenda. If there are no errors, additions, or corrections, it should be moved that they be approved as submitted. Do I have a motion to approve the minutes of October 20 10/03/2024?

I'd like to make a motion to, accept the minutes as written.

Second.

It has been moved by commissioner Solis and seconded by commissioner Bolt that the minutes of 10/03/2024 be approved. Please vote on your screens. The motion passes unanimously. Mister secretary, are there any items of correspondence?

Yes, chairperson. Staff did receive one written communication after the publication of the the packet. It's related to the public hearing item and was printed and distributed to the commission, prior to the start of the meeting.

Thank you. Are there any items of oral communication?

No items of oral communication.

Tonight's public hearing has one agenda item for consideration by the planning commission. If you wish to speak before the Planning Commission, please submit a speaker card and state your name and address for the record. Meetings of the Planning Commission are recorded and televised, so please speak clearly for the record. Hearing item hearing item is agenda agenda item six a p l n 20 three-thirty one, consideration of a conditional use permit to build an 80 foot high wireless telecommunications facility at 440 Peralta Avenue. May we please have the staff report?

Thank you. Good evening, commissioners. My name is Lourdes Juarez, associate planner for City of San Leandro. Tonight, I will be presenting PLN23Dash0031, a conditional use permit for a new wireless telecommunications facility at 440 Peralta. The applicant is Tower Engineering Professionals, which is representing AT and T.

They are proposing to build the facility as a new cell tower disguised as a pine tree or what's called a monopine. A conditional use permit is required for any new cell towers in this specific district, the DA 2 District. The conditional use permit and the zoning code require that there are specific design features that are implemented in the design of the tower. The zoning code also requires that the city consider certain factors in evaluating the proposal. The applicant is also required to provide several items demonstrating that the, the applicant has complied with all required codes.

So let's take a look at the location. This is a zoning map. As mentioned, the site is located at 440 Peralta. It is an l shaped lot, approximately 57,800 square feet. Is generally at the corner of San Leandro Boulevard and Peralta Avenue.

This is in the north area of the city, and you can see here that it is also within the Downtown TOD area. However, it's at the periphery of that on the north side as well. To the west and east, there are several residential uses. North of the site, there is a tow yard, and south of the site, there are two public storage facilities. The zoning code requires that the facility, including the tower and the equipment shelter, be designed in such a way as to camouflage the facility from both these neighbors and and the general public.

One of the main factors in evaluation of the conditional use permit for the wireless tower is that the applicant document the need for building a new tower versus co locating their antennas an existing tower. To that end, the applicant has submitted an alternative sites analysis. Here's the coverage gap that you can see on the left hand side. The gap is depicted in purple. And then on the right hand side, you can see that depicted in green, that is where the cell signal would be most reliable once the tower is installed.

Per the report, the coverage needed requires, and I quote, a minimum tower height of 80 feet, and there are no surrounding buildings within this search ring that would allow AT and T to co locate at that height, end quote. The applicant also reached out to other properties to try to place the tower there, but ultimately, this is the site that was selected. As mentioned, the new cell tower would be 80 feet high with four antenna levels and the equipment at the base inside of an equipment shelter. Overall, the footprint of the tower would be just under 1,000 square feet. AT and T would install their antennas at the topmost level at approximately seven feet high.

You can see that they made allocations for two future carriers with two different antenna levels, microwave antennas, and of course, the lightning rod at the top. To meet the zoning code requirements for camouflaging the tower, the applicant is proposing to build the tower as a monopine. That would include adding concealment features, that are built by the company Larson, which specializes in this stealthing equipment. The applicant would install what are called antenna socks, basically, items that would sort of a grid, plastic grid with small little branches to cover the antennas and also branches coming off of the tree and bark cladding on the pole itself to make it look like it's the trunk of a tree. A materials board has been submitted and is available for available for viewing.

We basically have two panels. They are slightly different. One of them has the bark, the other one has the those socks. Right? To camouflage or screen the equipment shelter, the applicant would build the required equipment shelter with CMU block wall.

And conditions of approval would require that the enclosure be compatible with the existing building and to provide live plants, basically vines that would grow to cover the block wall. The applicant has submitted photo simulations showing that the monopine and equipment shelter would be efficiently screened from view from the public. Two key views are shown here. One of them is from Peralta Avenue and San Leandro Boulevard. Is actually where it meets Park Street as well.

It's the closest that we get from that older area older residential area from San Leandro, those residences over to the east side. And then the view on the right hand side is from Park, which is a park that's slightly north of the site. As you can see, the neighborhood already contains a number of trees of varying heights and types such that the mono tree monopine will not look out of place in this area. The monopine facility the wireless tower facility would be accessible by an existing driveway on San Leandro Boulevard. As is standard, an access easement would be required to be secured and recorded in order for the companies to service the site.

Please note that although the power the tower would be placed effectively in two parking spaces, Parking here is not required because the site is within one half mile of major transit stop. That would be the San Leandro BART Station. Per state law and the zoning code, no parking is required within that half mile radius. Utilities for the tower basically include fiber cable and electrical, and they would be obtained from nearby locations from the public right of way going through going through the site through two public easements, A 200 amp panel transformer and a backup generator would all be enclosed within the equipment shelter and shielded from public view. The project is consistent with several of the policies of the general plan, specifically policies of the community services and facilities element.

The subject was also identified in a housing element sites inventory as a suitable location for housing. The installation of the proposed cell tower would not interfere with the ability to construct housing on the site in the future. Staff has prepared recommended conditions of approval for this project, including requiring the required camouflage and screening methods, requiring undergrounding utilities, installing all cable and conduits inside the trunk of the monopine, complying with the noise ordinance, and removing the tower should it ever be abandoned. This project is categorically exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act, CEQA, pursuant to CEQA guidelines section one five three zero three, new construction or conversion of small structures. Staff completed the required noticing for this project.

New comments were received in opposition to the project, citing concerns about RF emissions and their potential health effects. The applicant submitted an EME report, which concludes that there would be no publicly accessible areas that would exceed the maximum permissible exposure limits established by the FCC. Under federal law, the city cannot condition or deny an application on the basis of RF emissions when they meet federal standards. Legal counsel will speak to this after my presentation. We also received an inquiry from commissioner Rich regarding a requirement for an EME report after installation of the tower.

Indeed, it is a code requirement that within thirty calendar days of activation of the facility, the applicant shall submit an EME report demonstrating that the facility meets FCC standards. With this analysis, staff believes that the findings can be made for approving the conditional use permit. Therefore, staff recommends that the Planning Commission adopt a resolution approving the conditional use permit to build an 80 foot high wireless telecommunications facility at 440 Peralta Avenue, PLN 23 Dash 0031 based on the recommended the findings of fact and subject to the recommended conditions of approval. Staff is available for questions. Likewise, the applicant is here with a statement and also available for questions.

With that, I'm going to hand the floor over to legal counsel.

Thank you. And not much to to add to that. Just to reiterate that under federal law, the city doesn't have the authority to regulate RF radio frequency emissions from wireless sites like this. The Federal Communications Commission, the FCC establishes those, and the city is prohibited from establishing its own standards and is also prohibited from denying an application on the basis of radio frequency. So all the city can do is require them to show that they meet the FCC standards so that city requires a report upfront, you know, showing what they anticipated RF levels will be and then requires, as was mentioned, within thirty days after it, you know, goes live, submitting another report to confirm that, you know, in operation meets those standards.

So with

that, be right back.

Commissioner Rich?

Yes. Thank you, and and thank you for the, response to that question. That's very helpful. Regarding the FCC, testing the radio frequencies, the can you help me understand if the modeling or that was done in the report includes the the EMT portion of it, the top, panels that also have the AT and T. They also remark on the second and the third levels, that, these transmitters, these antennas are gonna be available to secondary tenants to rent out.

So my question is, does the modeling include, just the known primary tenants, or does it also include the full use the full anticipated use of tower, the the second and third and and fourth level of antennas, not just the first level of the antenna?

Hello? Okay. It includes both. So in the EME report, they listed all the antennas that they would anticipate. So they listed the AT and T antennas that they're going to install once they build a tower and also potential, like, possible predictable antennas for the other two levels. So some of the drawings that you'll see there, they might it would basically on the chart say that it's AT and T only, or they might say AT and T, comma, unknown. So it's unknown carrier, but but known antennas that are listed in the chart in the beginning portion of the report.

Thank you. So the testing that is gonna occur within thirty days, will that also include future uses on the tower, will that only be the initial primary use on the tower?

That that would only be the initial basically, what's installed. What would be installed at that time?

Just to clarify, as new people come, new providers come, you know, that's known as a colocation. There's a a application process for that through the city, although the city is is extremely limited in in what it can ask for, but it can require confirmation of, you know, radio frequency at that time. So there would be another study at that time.

Here in San Andrew, in some parts of town, we have view protection for residences so that there's a view corridor, and, it can burden neighboring properties. Neighboring properties are not allowed to build up to block in the the view corridor. Or if not, I use this as my hypothesis. Could this tower prevent multifamily housing on a neighboring site? Because it showed on the Waterford report that the RF was at a cloud, that it was much lower down at ground level.

But when that you when you go up the tower, that's when you were starting to see the levels that were both in excess of general levels and also the occupational level. My question is, if a building is going to go up to that height, could that that, could those levels affect that building, or could this project claim that a building is blocking its transmission, to other areas of the city? Is that I I think I mixed two questions up there and made it kinda confusing.

Based on the information we received and where the maximum permissible emissions are, there's still room on the site for housing. That would address your first question, I think.

Think Neighboring site.

For a neighboring site? So That would be up to the proponent to show that they can build it.

So this doesn't have you know, this does not interfere with anyone else's property rights to build housing. So if someone else comes in with an application and it's approved, you know, that's something this applicant will have to live with. Like, it doesn't give them the right to stop a project on other things. If a residential project came in on this site, you know, presumably also not infrequently, the tenants get moved to the top of buildings. It it's not unusual for them to be located on the top of buildings including residential buildings.

So that might be something that would happen if, you know, building in question is on the same property.

There are areas on this site where we would want to exclude people from. There's the report talks about areas where the public is will not be accessing those areas. And there are areas above ground that I believe have a similar standard. And above ground on those attachment five on pages thirteen and sixteen showing this cloud, and it's showing in different colors of the cloud, so different areas of exposure in that. And some or all of them exceed the maximum permissible exposure limit for general population uncontrolled exposure, which is lower than the occupational exposure level, significantly lower.

My question is, does that cloud extend over neighboring properties so that if a neighboring property was seeking to build up to their property line or within a whenever setback is required, they'd be building inside this cloud that is exceeding the MPE for general population uncontrolled exposure. And it this is consistent with the questions that we received from the or the concerns that we received from the public about radio frequency. So I'm not seeking to I wanna be clear. I'm not seeking to establish our own levels. I'm trying to understand what those levels mean on this site and particularly on adjacent sites.

Right. So on page 14 of that report, you can see the combined contribution from not just the antennas, but not just AT and T's antennas, but the predictable ones for the other two levels. And you can see that it does overflow onto the neighboring property where the tow yard is located. That property is also zone d a two, so housing could potentially be built there. I'm not gonna make a determination as to the square footage that's left outside of that cloud.

However, this these two properties, being in the same zoning district, are allowed to go up as high as 65 feet to do their any housing projects. They are allowed to do 3.5 floor area ratio, and so that would allow from a lot more flexibility than to push the building right next door to the property line. So there's some flexibility on both these lots to create a taller building or housing.

I'd like to stay on the attachment that you're looking at right there, and and I I think this visually shows what I'm trying to get at. And that on the page 14, it's talking about, I believe, a 100 to 500% of the permissible exposure limit, if that's what that blue on that chart means. And so if we're not trying to establish any special regulations for San Leandro, but trying to understand, is that saying that that blue is is at the maximum permissible exposure limit or up to five times it?

That the blue does indeed say 100 to 500% of the maximum permissible exposure. Right.

So and okay. So that I appreciate that because that's how I'm reading it as well. That's my concern is that it well, that's not a that's a comment. I don't wanna do comments right in the question.

The other thing too I wanted to mention is that these antennas can be adjusted to be aimed differently and similar to what Alex and Alex Malik had mentioned. You know, at the time these antennas go on, there's always testing, right, to to confirm and whatnot. So there's also relocation of these. You know, we saw that with the project at 100 Halcyon where they they moved the tower and moved it into the building, concealed it again. So that does happen when new development comes in.

Thank you.

And, again, the cell tower would not obtain any rights to be allowed to keep this footprint. So it's not like that. If they find that the building is gonna be in their way, they'll look for another way to put up antennas. Commissioner Rich, do you have any further questions?

Thank you. Mister Bolt?

Yes. Thank you. I wanna follow-up on that so I'm clear. We're saying that the municipal levels, it's five times the amount of permissible levels. To me, permissible level is one. That doesn't mean you get to go five times that.

Right. In the report, page 14, the one that we were looking at, the permissible levels are not depicted in any color here. So it's the clear areas. So the blue, that's higher than the maximum permissible levels by a factor of one, two, three, four, five. Right? And then it gets higher when you go to the yellow and to the red. As seen on page 15, now instead of it being clear, you see green, Those rooftops, if anybody were to break in or go to the rooftops to do any servicing for those buildings, they would be outside of the maximum permissible level.

Can I can I recommend that you bring up the slide in question?

These are in the EME report.

I Yes. But for everyone to see.

I may have some Not available. I'm not entirely sure if this backup slide That's good. Is that's page 14. So I think that's the one we were speaking to the most where you can see on the right hand side, there's no green because all of it would be green except for the blue, yellow, or red areas. So everybody that's in the clear is literally in the clear and under maximum permissible emission levels.

And so I just wanna piggyback on what commissioner Rich was saying. If we changed if there was a situation where someone wanted to build housing, high density housing, the blue, if you look at the you know, just looking at it, Count Dracula. Right? That's half that that site next to it. Not saying that anybody has any plans to do that, but to be clear, if they did decide to build, because that is a good spot to build some housing, this would not be able to hold that building back.

We would then tell them, you cannot have your tower here anymore.

Are the excuse me. This would be a preexisting use already in place, so we wouldn't we wouldn't tell them to go down. I'm not a DME or RF engineer. I don't know. Right? This right here is a study, and perhaps the applicant will be able to talk to this. This is a study. There's no obstructions. I don't know how a wall interferes with, you know, a radio frequency pick. It may be such that that lowers it, you know, that mounts that can get through a wall into where it's occupied. So maybe we may wanna hold some of those questions for the applicant to speak to as well.

Okay. Maybe okay. Maybe we're too hard on you right now. We'll wait for that. But my my whole thing is just that because I it sounded like, oh, well, if they wanted to build there, we'd let them. But you're saying, no. This is preexisting. I wanna that's still clear. I'm just asking what we would do as a city. If someone came to build high density housing into that cloud, would we then say, well, you can't do that because not not about range of this, but that it would put the people in that building at danger. It's five times the permissible amount.

You would have to look at what a a study says at

K. Alright.

Mhmm. Okay.

I'll move on.

Is that And I think too, logically speaking and and practicality, the way these things work, if the property owners were to sell the site or want to develop them, there's a lease agreement with the company. And so maybe that's also a question for the applicant, whether there's something in there where it would say, like, they would cooperate to to relocate it. Because, ultimately, the property owner right now, right, is signing an agreement with the carrier. Right? And so when this property gets sold or if somebody decides to develop on it, they're gonna have to encumber whatever that contract says. And so there would be some cooperation to make that work. Typically, that's what happens. But I do wanna make sure just to point it out. And if you wanna ask the applicant a little bit more about that, they're probably more familiar with those agreements.

Okay. I'll move on. We'll ask I'll ask that then. Now when we talk about the tower and you have the top level and we say AT and T is already, you know, planned to do their portion there. There's a it shows what I think I'm seeing is that they did the this graphic based on AT and T and that there's the permissible levels because it would be I'm looking at page 16, the one yeah.

That one right there. The top one, if AT and T was in it, they do it. And so then it gets a lot more you know, the the levels go up. And then it looked like the second level down was the same kind of thing. So if somebody else comes, I don't know who, T Mobile, and says, we wanna do it too, that would also be red. Correct?

So this model takes into consideration the antennas that they posted, which are pretty you know, the professionals who write this, they know what antennas to anticipate at what levels. Maybe that's also a question for the applicant. But, effectively, this model already shows with all those antennas installed.

Oh, okay. Got it. Okay. So we're saying that it's built out. Everybody's working on it. Okay.

Yes. For that's the alt sources on the site. And I apologize. The EME report was a little bit inconsistent in the labeling of the headings, so I understand your confusion. But, yes, this one would be with all the antennas, the predictable ones from AT and T, and then the possible ones from, you know, standard practices that might go on the other two levels.

Okay. Thank you. That's much clear. Now I guess the the next one would be to the city attorney. You know, in a lot of different practicalities, we do testing often.

And so if this is a thing that we're feels like we're a little unsure about as a city, could we put a condition that there's more than just there's a test now. They build it out. There's a test then, right, whenever that's built. But then two years later, we see what the levels are again. And we will we be able to add that as a conditional as a condition of approval?

Yes. K. And just so you know, you know, the thirty days of activation that is in the code that's established, so they they definitely have to do that. It shouldn't change after that until additional things are are added, at which point it will trigger another requirement for testing.

I I heard you say earlier you're not electrical engineer, and I'm looking across none of us are. So I don't wanna just go with, we feel good about it. Right? Okay. I'm I'm done.

Mister Solis?

Yeah. This question is more for, I guess, Alex. You had mentioned before, I guess it was directly after the staff report, that we are prohibited as a public entity to turn this project down or to to not accept it because of the radio frequency. So can you elaborate a little more on who mandates that, who makes that rule, which document that is, and maybe a justification, the reasoning for it?

So I guess I'm I just gone the or you asked. So the FCC makes the guidelines, and they are empowered by Congress to be the sole regulator of wireless communication throughout the country. And so that preempts anyone else from regulating it. It's the same reason we have to allow small cells on our polls in the right of way. Right?

There the FCC creates a rule, and we have no authority to change it or apply something different within our jurisdiction. You know, you see that in similar things locally. Right? The city can't create regulations for telephone poles. Those are solely within the jurisdiction of the California PUC.

So this is a similar thing but on the the federal level. And when cities have tried to do that and set their own regulations, they've been struck down by by courts. As to why, I would say the the argument I would come up with is they want to make it easy for wireless companies to install. I think that's important for, you know, people in the economy that they can have access to wireless signals and communication.

I understand that. I just when it comes where it's a possible detriment to people's health, that's kinda

Well well, I think that what congress and the FCC would say is they are they are the experts. They are establishing the standards for what is safe or

or not, and and they're ensuring safety by establishing these standards. There's no, like, real justification, like, older case law that proves that most of these, like, lawsuits prohibiting this are frivolous, or or it just sounds like it's more the an influential lobbyist in that industry.

I imagine that they're they had some justification in the record when they adopted it. I'm sure that when the FCC adopted these standards, they had you know, it would have gone through a rule making process, which is open to public comment and and all of that. And so I think there were probably lots of studies establishing what was a safe limit, you know, in their eyes.

So to overturn that, I'm just thinking, that would take a congressperson to write a bill that would kinda supersede that? Correct.

And and I don't know about this these particular rules. I do know, you know, when it was probably five or six years ago when the FCC came out with these new rules about small cell facilities that allow them to, you know, go in right away and go on the city polls and not be stopped. You know, local jurisdictions were were very upset, and there were some congresspeople who, you know, introduced bills. And at least in that case, you know, they never went anywhere.

Okay. Alright.

Yeah. I well, that's it. Thank you.

Commissioner Tabjulu?

Could you give us some numbers or details of, like, I mean, how many similar towers exist within the city limits, and how close in proximity are there to any other residential, like, high rise or something?

Probably more anecdotal in my experience as a planner in five to six years. We have a large number of cell towers. They're not concealed in the industrial properties industrially zoned. Quite a number of them on buildings and commercial areas. You'd see the Manes Fourteenth, shopping centers, the gateway.

What was that other one? Greenhouse. Yeah. I'm not too familiar with any on housing projects. You know, there's one on one of the larger buildings on Callan Avenue or sorry, Callan, close to East Fourteenth, which is quite close to some residential properties, also on a rooftop.

Assuming all those went through the same the conditional use permit process when they were put in?

No. These regulations, I believe, were established in the early twenty teens. And they basically went through and established these concealment requirements, all this camouflaging that's required. And it's been a requirement for the applicant to demonstrate that they tried to co locate. But most of the other towers that were built previously were built before that date. And so not all of them were required to have all these elements on them. You'll see it most specifically on those monopoles that do not look like trees that are all over the industrial areas.

May I add the alternative sites analysis in attachment seven does identify locations of other towers in the vicinity, not not citywide, but in also in the the area around this around the site.

Commissioner Tajada.

Thank you for the information. It's a lot to take in. I think you can see by the questions that are being posed here. You somewhat clarified by way of a response to commissioner, regarding application of, this type of monopine setup or even just the cell tower at large. So just kinda picking up from your description.

You mentioned greenhouse market. I think you mentioned a few other mixed use locations, high density housing as well too. So there's a spectrum of other colocation structures where this type of application could be used, could be implemented. It's not as though the freestanding application or depiction that we're seeing right now is the only path of travel. There are the other opportunities that are out there.

So kind of with that being said, you mentioned that there was an effort by the applicant or some individual to outreach to adjacent structures and to come to terms with what other potential opportunities exist. Do we have any sort of good faith effort documentation of that occurring of the applicant or the city or a combination of the two? Having those concerted discussions and kind of qualifying out what potential locations would be viable candidates for colocation versus what we're looking at right now as a freestanding unit?

Right. So the applicant submitted this analysis. And in even determining where they need a tower, they need to show us where that coverage gap is. So this coverage gap is here roughly bordered by I think it's Davis Street on the South. And then on the North, it goes on to City Of Oakland a bit. So you can kinda see Davis Street here. Downtown on those buildings has some towers, so that might be why they're yellow there. And then Oakland is up here north of the site. So this is where the gap is in that purple area. So any buildings out here might not actually cover that.

And so in the analysis, they did submit this coverage gap, and they submitted a list. There are indeed no buildings that are 80 feet high to cover that gap. And so they would need that height to get to this diagram where it's reliable cell service in the green. And in terms of the locations that they sought to speak to, those locations that are in the table in the analysis attachment, those locations are places that they sought to put a tower once they determined there were no no buildings of the height that they needed where they could colocate or do architectural integrations. But I can also if you wanna ask that question again to the applicant, they can let you know what their search process included beyond that.

K. But it sounds like from your description that there were no structures viable for colocation purposes?

Mhmm.

Okay. Yeah. And, yeah, maybe it's a pointed question to the applicant, but I'd I'd like to better understand I mean, if we're zeroing in on the dot kind of dead center to both images, I would have to imagine there's a tolerance, there's a range, there's a radius skew left, right, north, south where that adjustment could be made. It's not just fixed on that center image where we can only go with the freestanding structure. We can't entertain anything outside of that.

I mean, I look at I look at a mixed use development that's happening right across the street. Granted, it's not dead set center to where that plot location is, but it's within a stone's throw away of being able to serve a viable colocation purpose for cell tower range. So I'd maybe that's a question for the applicant then. That's that. And then I guess in terms of of height, so we were looking at that image that you had up earlier with the cloud and the radius.

Is there I wonder if there is an opportunity for taking somewhat of a of a rightsizing approach. It would seem when you look at the profile layout for the Monopine, there's a lot of future proofing that's kind of built into the plans, future carrier, future microwave, and all of those items kind of stack on top of each other. The true and true areas of the intent for this project are I think they're built towards the top of the monopine. But I wonder if we do away with any sort of future proofing and maybe just focus in on what's really required by AT and T and by the applicant, does that bring the scale down to 65 instead of 80 feet? Because we're not future proofing for these other, you know, carrier limits that may occur or may not occur.

I I think, generally speaking, the applicant and this is this is how most towers are built. But I I'm not entirely sure how much of that we can analyze as that's not the proposal.

They they've presented their report that they need this at 80 feet in order to make it to close the coverage gap. When they do that, the burden is on the city to show that there is an alternative, practical and feasible technically let me another site that technically could close the coverage gap to that that's feasible and available. And so they've you know, we we're not aware of any. You know, they can speak to maybe you you brought up some potentials. They can maybe speak to why those whether it wouldn't work at the, you know, whatever foot level those are at.

Okay. Yeah. I guess just kind of with that with that in mind and, again, I'm not an expert in this, but just looking at that image that was up and kind of the radius that it touches, it does draw to the fact the lower the height, the lower the radius, which decreases the amount of exposure to the adjacent structures and, you know, potentially any anything or anyone within that radius of coverage. So dropping to a 60 foot 65 foot height, rightsizing it just for those services that are immediate right now for the need of AT and T would lessen the impact than just my kind of layman view of this image and what it means. Lowering the height lowers the exposure seems to be a benefit if we can look at rightsizing the overall monopine versus going with kind of the Goliath approach of 80 feet.

Commissioner, can I just ask are you looking at page 16? Is that the

Yes. I'm looking at page 16.

So so my understanding is is that's not the and correct me if I'm wrong. That's not the exposure if you lower the the height of the pole. That is the exposure level for the pole when it's at 80 feet, what the exposure level would be while you're at 65 feet. So it's not that the exposure is narrower if you drop the pole down to 65 feet. It's that for an 80 foot pole, this is the exposure level at 80 feet, this is it at at and this is it down here at 65 feet.

So yeah. And and to add to that, this is at the three antenna levels with the antennas that they listed in the chart at the beginning of that report.

Okay. So that's not a that's not a safe assertion on my end that if you lower the height, that lowers the exposure radius. That's not

I I would direct that to the applicant. I'm not familiar with, the antennas they selected to model. K. But they the preparation of this report is guided by FCC regulations, so they can also speak to, you know, what is good and accurate practice to base these models on.

K. I'll I'll wait for the applicant and ask that question then. Again, not an expert in this field, but just going off what I see and how it how it could be interpreted. The last question I had is specific to attachment three, the development regulations table. So just so I understand how this table is set up and what it's depicting, clearly, you can see the areas that comply. There's a there's a column off to the right that shows yes in compliance. The acronym COA, what does the acronym COA stand for?

Apologies. That's conditions of approval.

Conditions of approval. Okay. So this is what the staff is proposing as part of conditions of approval, building in. Understood.

Right. So some of these regulations are clearly visible on the plans. Some of them don't need to be on the plans, but they will be included in the recommended conditions of approval. And that's what that different marker would be, the COA.

K. And then for noise, there's a paragraph there regarding the city's noise ordinance. So the city's response on that, I guess, the proposed the proposed column there, that's the city's stance as to what should be implemented in order for it to be compliant by way of conditions of approval, or this is the applicant saying we wanna insert this in order to be in compliance?

No. It's just noting that that's part of the proposal, that they would be including a backup generator. So it's a you know, trying to do these tables for clarity of our review process. Sometimes it's not exactly the best way to show this. But, effectively, I we wanted you to see that there is a requirement for construction oh, sorry, for noise during operation and construction and also for the testing of the backup generator. And what is proposed is, you know, obviously, to operate the cell site, and part of that is going to include the backup generator. So we have included the standard noise ordinance and also an a condition of approval that would basically say that they can only test during the daytime without backup generator.

Yeah. Got it. That's it for me. Thank you.

Mister Mendoza?

So the the main objective of the project is to improve or the initial objective to improve communications or coverage for, emergency services that for this particular project?

My understanding is that at the federal level, there was a call for dedicated cell towers for public service usage. I'm not entirely sure how they plan on implementing it, but AT and T is one of the carriers implementing it for the company FirstNet. And so tower engineering professionals is doing the permitting process for them for that. I'm not entirely sure how they would, in effect, then designate those as emergency only, right, public service use only. But maybe the applicant can speak a little bit more to that.

Okay. I I think I read something about it and information.

Yes. But when we say AT and T antennas, it basically it would be also the FirstNet antennas. And I think that's, like I said, also something you can ask the applicant about so they can let us know a little bit more about what that movement is.

Hi. So I have a few questions. And if if it needs to be answered by the applicant, just let me know. So so it it kinda goes along with commissioner Mendoza's question. How how did this come to the attention of AT and T that a cell tower was needed here? Were emergency service calls being dropped? How did how do we know how this came about?

No. Not not in that, or, like, way back origin story, but most cell companies will see coverage gaps and seek to build them and build their network.

Okay. So maybe the applicant knows the answer. Yes. I did not see the term dedicated used in the report. I saw that it would be emergency services. Predominantly, that was the need, but that it would also serve businesses and residences as well.

Right. The the the dedicated is more my qualification when describing what the intent is at the federal level. I do not know specifically that FirstNet will be that the way the AT and T is gonna run these antennas is gonna be dedicated. And so I think the applicant can give us a little bit more information about how that is projected to operate in the future once that FirstNet network is established.

Okay. Thank you. So this is a lease. Correct? Is this a leased property or area?

Right. Most cell towers will lease with the applicant. Yes.

Do we know what the term of the lease is?

We don't ask for that in the application center. The the applicant might know. Mhmm. We don't ask to see the the lease agreement.

So we're being asked to approve a conditional use permit without knowing the terms of the lease?

Generally, are not involved in the private arrangements between parties. So that's in the two of them, what the terms of that lease would be. Plus, it's just whether those use, you know, meets our standards.

So I I ask because I think there's a concern about future housing and the the conflict between the height and the danger. And so, you know, the ability of the city to say, you know, well, maybe that the lease there is only another year. And so that's that's you know, I think a little bit more information is helpful and that maybe then we won't get these questions from citizens and things like that. I'm just gonna make a recommendation that that it would be helpful for these staff reports to have things like a map of all the cell towers in the city of San Leandro so that we can better understand and be better educated about where the other cell towers are. So do we know if there's any data showing that there there have been dropped emergency communications in this area?

No. The applicant did not present that.

Do we have any data showing whether or not cell phone cell phone tower installations in residential neighborhoods affects the, let's say, the value of home properties?

We don't keep that. No. Not on not on here. And and that's generally, like, an appraiser who might evaluate for that kind of thing.

There is I think on sheet and I just wanna make sure I understand what I'm saying. On page eighteen and nineteen, there's a proposed building, one at 55 no. Both it says 65 feet. So is that is that intended to depict a future multi housing development?

Yes. So we asked the engineer to model that so that we may have a greater visual. So it it's labeled proposed, but it's more like potential

Right.

In the future possible.

But that same that same volume is not shown with the cloud or, you know, the antenna.

Partially on this right side? Oh, that's it. This was in the report, but in order to clarify that same question, staff also had that question, and we received this as a supplement. And we confirmed that it's the same dimensions. It's a 130 by a 100. So it's although it's not in green, that would be the same mass.

Okay. Thank you. That's very helpful. Understand. What is Alex, what is the city's requirement as far as posting this? It says it was posted on city hall on October 25, and now we're just fourteen calendar days from that date.

The the requirement is generally ten days notice.

Ten days notice. K. Thank you. There was a a reference to this being 33 feet by 33 feet a 33 by 33 foot compound lease area. The drawing says 35 feet. So is it 33 by 33 or 35 by 35? So

when we required that there be landscaping, I believe that that area grew.

Okay. And

so you might see it at the Okay. Right at the edge of that where the

Can you landscape. Okay. So when we look at this, what what we're seeing is that, when it says future carrier future carrier, we're talking about two more cell towers in this 35 by 35 footprint? No. What does that mean?

So the the tower would have space for two more antenna levels. Each of those would be different carriers, and they would need some equipment on the ground similar to what AT and T would have here. They they would then install their equipment in those areas. Okay. Ground equipment. Mhmm.

Okay. Yes. Thank you. Okay. Those are all my questions for now. Commissioner Solis?

Yeah. First, I wanna thank chairwoman Zuber for asking the question about the justification for the re the reasoning for the tower there. Citi has says that we don't have the data. The applicant may have done a study, but we don't know whether they did or didn't. Correct?

Well, I mean, they're they're claiming a coverage gap or they're

So they have

a signal.

Of some sort. We just don't know what the what the data they're just applying.

So I think there there are two different things. I think commissioner or chair was mentioning that he would like to see where the other cell towers are. It doesn't mean that this company has antennas on those towers. So there might be say, there's a tower a block away, then that come then AT and T would have to ask to colocate on those locations on that tower. But there isn't one such thing, And there isn't one such 50 foot high or 80 foot high building to conceal this without having to create a new tower. And that's sort of the conclusions of that alternative sites analysis.

Thank you. So the applicant is claiming that there's a necessity for this tower in this area for better coverage.

Yes.

So but as far as that data, we don't have. It's we're just going on their word.

Would direct commission to look at attachment seven, which is the alternative sites analysis, which has their backup documentation in support of that assessment.

Justified. Okay. So can somebody from staff explain to me kind of the tax structure is this? Is it like a one time fee that the applicant is gonna pay to erect this tower and do business, or is it something they pay monthly or annually? Or can someone explain how that works? Is the city gonna make tax dollars off of this?

So the they pay a fee for the application and that, you know, that covers staff time, and then whoever is operating this, you know, potentially has a business license. They may already have a business license for their locations, you know, in Citi. And I I don't know what the business license tax structure is off the top of my head, so I'm not sure if this would generate more taxes. Okay. And that's what

I thought. So I was wondering if if this may be a may or may not be a detriment to the health of the residents that live nearby. If maybe this isn't and and we really haven't heard an outcry from the residents that calls are getting dropped or that there is a need for this, maybe since it's a detriment possibly to future development, that maybe we should possibly deny this on those grounds and possibly leave the ground open for some future housing or something of that sort that actually would benefit the community?

So once they have put into the the record that there is a gap in coverage from that study, Once they do that, our only basis to deny any cell tower anywhere in the city once they do that is if we show that there are alternative locations available. You know, once they show that they made a good faith effort to identify and evaluate less intrusive alternatives, that we are extremely limited in what we can do under under federal law.

Yeah. I was just wondering to myself the statement that you made when we started that we are prohibited from prohibiting the project. So but I thought if there were other ways that we could deny it that were justifiable, but, basically, the they want they have the or the desire to build this this tower. So even if we reject it on some other grounds, they have the absolute right to just figure out somewhere new to put it and just kinda we have to just accept it.

Yeah. We would have to show that there are potentially available and technologically feasible alternatives. And to complicate matters a little more, this there's what's known for wireless applications as a shot clock, which means that the city is obligated to act on the application within a certain amount of time or it is deemed approved. And and so it limits the amount of time there is for alternative. That is

So as I feared, we're our our hands are tied. Well, if our hands are tied then, I mean, do we need to continue this and just make the motion?

We yes. We certainly need to take public comment. And I'll I'll be frank, you know, this is a conversation that staff has had before about given we have these with some housing projects too. Given the limitations on discretion, you know, is this something that we should just get rid of, you know, being a hearing item whatsoever? Just have a staff.

Thank you. I just think it's would be a better better idea, would be more beneficial to the city and its residents to wait out more viable applicant to put something that's that's more useful to the community, especially since there hasn't been a public outcry on that there's a problem with dropped calls or whatever. But okay. Thank you.

Mister Tahana.

Yeah. I just wanted to say, if possible, the window there for the applicant to have the floor, I'd be, keen on. That's still occurring. That's still be on the table. Okay.

Okay. Thank you. I is the applicant present?

Evening, chair Zuber and commissioners. My name is Mike McLaughlin. I I represent the Western Fire Chiefs Association. I'm retired fire chief from Consuminous Fire in Elk Grove, California, and had the pleasure of working in Alameda County for the first fifteen years of my career. I'm here tonight to talk about and present this project with the work that we're doing, to try to advance the build out of FirstNet to make sure there's consistent coverage, throughout, well, throughout the entire United States.

And and to start, let me just talk a little bit about what FirstNet is just so there's clarification. So dating back to 09/11, as our world came to a screeching halt, communication systems were so saturated that first responders didn't have the ability to do any communication. And so as part of the nine eleven after action report, they identified that we needed to do have some dedicated spectrum, specifically first re for first responders so they would not be competing with commercial carrier traffic. So they had the ability to do, to continue to do the work that needs to be done. In, 2012, congress enacted, the middle class tax relief and job creation act, which did two things.

It created the first net authority within US Department of Commerce, and it also, dedicated band 14 within the cellular spectrum. So dedicated channels, dedicated frequencies that are specifically for public safety use. It requires a special SIM card in your phone or your wireless device, and it's not something that we would would have access to. For this, first responders are, you know, obviously, the obvious fire law, emergency medical services, hospitals, schools, emergency operations functions within cities and counties, and the list goes on. So, really, the goal is to be able to get a solid dedicated communications infrastructure in place.

As the first authority began to do the work, it contemplated two models, one of which was to build a ground up model nationwide. The other was to partner with a communications firm that already had a national footprint to be able to build this. Ideally, they they ultimately, ultimately found it would be far simpler to put out a request for proposal and partner with a company that already has a national footprint in providing wireless communications. And, ultimately, AT and T was awarded the contract to build out FirstNet. It's a twenty five twenty five year multibillion dollar contract with with great expectations on AT and T to get the system built out for first responders.

AT and T may own the radios, but they don't own the system. Right? The system belongs to, the federal government and the FirstNet authority. And so, ultimately, as they're continuing to work forward and implement and get the system in place, the first work that was done was updating and, you know, converting existing AT and T infrastructure to make it FirstNet capable. The second step was identifying, towers that didn't currently have AT and T on it and be able to hang and colocate as has been talked about tonight.

And now we're in the phase of rollout where we're trying to fill gaps in coverage where there is not any, feasible location to colocate, and the only way, to build this technology to be able to provide the coverage is to build new towers. And I can assure you that, you know, I'd much rather be somewhere else than than being here tonight trying to talk through a cell tech to ask you to approve a cell tower if there was another way to do it. And so, unfortunately, there's not another way to do it in order to provide the coverage. Interesting footing or formatting. Ultimately, wireless coverage is a public safety issue.

Nearly nine 90% of all 911 calls come from wireless devices, and, 78.2% of homes do not have any landlines. And that's a 20 that 78.2 is a, twenty twenty four number from a report that was completed by the Centers for Disease Control. And depending on the demographic, that number can be significantly higher depending on the community that you're working. From a first responder perspective, you know, we've gone basically from using paper map books to relying on data coming across computers to be able to provide information. Without connectivity, these things don't work.

We've been working, extensively with the Alameda County fire department, working with chief Rutherblin and chief Thomas specifically to to help bring this project forward, and we're working at other areas in Alameda County to do address some of these same coverage gaps. Eight, Alameda County uses FirstNet, but without coverage, they it's obviously problematic in in certain areas, which is what we're working to try to address. So maybe this will provide a little clarification on some of the questions that were raised. This is also a coverage map analysis, but from a different provider to give you a better feel. So what this is is an overlayment.

The circle is a one mile radius from the proposed location, and this is all carrier coverage or, so that this is ATT, Verizon, Dish, and T Mobile as the four major carriers and their their coverage. There's one tower on the very northwest corner of the screen that currently does not have any capacity to allow for colocation. Other than that, there's not any towers in the given area, to be able to provide coverage. And and keeping in mind that this is all carrier coverage, that the yellow or the green that you see is good coverage, but it's you know, some of what you see on the BART tracks are probably microcells that are either part of the BART system that themselves, you know, because there's wireless capability on those cars as well. So that's what helps light those up.

But what we're looking to try to address is an area that really doesn't have any coverage. So it it would though the the color scheme ultimately goes from from green to a yellowish orange to orange to red, the black shading, and where there's no shading, there's no coverage. So not even weak coverage, but literally no coverage. And so, if there was coverage, like I said, we wouldn't we wouldn't be here tonight. If there was a place to colocate, I wouldn't be here tonight.

I'm I'm not in the cell industry. I don't work for AT and T. I don't work for FirstNet. I don't work for public safety tower company. I honestly work for the Western Fire Chiefs Association to make sure the first responders on the ground have the communications they need so they can use the modern tools, whether it's telemetry or paramedics or dispatch information, and also so that, you know, citizens can not only call 911 but can receive emergency notification, if the system goes down.

The question was raised as all in terms of alternative sites that were considered. The the Green Pyramid is the, basically, the subject site. We considered the Alameda County Training Facility. Alameda County Fire was significantly interested in doing so. However, that land is leased from the city of San Leandro.

It's unknown how long that lease may continue on. And so rather than trying to, you know, negotiate something for long term, you know, that we ultimately worked and went a different direction. We've, you know, worked with, obviously, San Leandro Electric, which is a property we're we are now. We looked at the the Siempre Siempre Verde Park, and, you know, that's, you know, that's not favorable for the city as well as a couple other private businesses in the same area. The tower, I think we've we've touched on it, quite a bit, and so I don't wanna spend any time on that.

And and this shows AT and T specific coverage. There just is not the coverage, in the area, which is what we're working to to to try to address. And this was it was pointed out that in the, alternate alternate talk. The alternate site analysis, it provided some very detailed information as to where the coverage is and why the 80 foot tower height is needed in order to provide that coverage. And and it all skips off.

And, ultimately, in the end that, you know, we're we you know, as a as the applicant, we agree to all conditions of approval, that have been stipulated by staff, and, and I'm certainly happy to answer any questions you may have. And I know there's some that I can pick up from yeah. I was taking some notes as some of you were asking questions. So, however, the chair would like me to proceed.

Okay. Thank you for that. That gives it a whole different feeling if this is about public safety and, you know, the what I'm thinking in my head is that maybe we had some calls dropped by police, fire, anybody in that area. That's never gonna be okay with me. So you're saying that this is gonna be dedicated fire serve or to first responder services only. This is not gonna be something that the community would even benefit from other than the fact that now first responders would be able to communicate.

The the technology is one in the same. So it's it's like having a radio with multiple different channels, if you will. And only first responders, you know, first responders can only access these channels, but commercial carriers will access this. So there would be AT and T coverage. If you have an AT and T device, you would have coverage. But that comes as a package with with FirstNet built into it based on the contract, that was awarded in 2016 from from the FirstNet authority.

Okay. I think I understand that. Five channels, two of them dedicated, three of them can be commercial.

Yeah. Exactly.

Right. So do you understand the difference then? Are we asking you about penetration through walls when when we're talking about the levels? Do you under are you the expert on that?

To some degree, yes. And what I think something that's important for for context, and I don't know if we wanna pull up other slides. So something that's important for context is the EME report. We do that I know that that that everyone has been spend time talking about. It it it assumes the worst case scenario. It assumes all towers operating at max capacity, blowing their signal in all directions, and that's not the way they work. Right? They're they don't operate that way. So it's built on the worst case scenario in order to ensure there's that additional buffer built in. Right?

And so antennas aren't all operating at the same time. You know, it's in the evening. They they there's very little power coming out. It's really engaging as, you know, as more and more people attach, but seldom do towers ever really hit, you know, peak, put out or output. And so the you know, it's it's important.

One of the things that when you when you talk about, I guess, using the term use of the cloud, right, is a is a signal pushes out that in order for that to be a factor, somebody would need to be at that 80 foot level within, you know, within the I think it said 65 feet from the tower when that thing's operating at max capacity for it to even be in a partially hazardous place. And so the the the maximum permissible permissible exposure limit assumes twenty seven twenty four hours, seven day a week, three hundred and sixty five day exposure, not somebody passing through, not somebody on a BART train, not, you know, not somebody just going up and in. It's it's so when you look at the exposure, if somebody's there or and and I think with these, they use it for thirty minutes. Right? At thirty minutes, right in front of the antenna operating at max capacity, they're gonna take you know, they're gonna they're gonna be warm.

Right? And and so so with with this, those are based on the worst case scenarios. And so another thing that was brought up about buildings and different things, pointing an antenna directly to building doesn't do anybody any good. All the antennas are directable, and so nothing is gonna be pointed at a building current or future. The antennas would be adjusted to work around or go around whatever obstacles may exist. Right? I mean, obviously, you can't go around. That as I was learning to work in this industry, it was identified for me, which is it was really an moment for me that that radio waves and light waves operate the exact same way. Right? And what we put on these towers are not floodlights.

We put spotlights. Right? It's very specific. It's linear. It doesn't generally, you know, burst out in all directions, right, like a floodlight would, in terms of a a comparison. And so so with that, if if this project were dangerous, if this project was going to present and push I spent my career in public safety, I would not be here. I would not be representing this. I wouldn't yeah. I mean, I don't believe in that, and I wouldn't do it. And if I hadn't spent, you know, a fair amount of time really studying and understanding things, you know, I wouldn't be doing some of this work that I do.

But this is important to be able to get that coverage for first responders. Like I said, I'm working with the the the local fire department in particular because with their mobile data computers, they rely on FirstNet to be able to get information from dispatch, be able to transmit information, and that's the only way that the information is transmitted now is wirelessly. And so it's trying to make sure the coverage is there so that, you know, you can communicate, but also have the ability for, you know, citizens to reach 911 and then, you know, responders to reach, citizens with emergency notifications.

Okay. Thank thank you. I I should have led with this. Thank you for your service to the community and the

Yeah. You're welcome. Thank you.

Mister Rich.

I appreciate the clarification. Regarding worst case scenario, my my concern isn't about the levels on the property that it's been located on. Mine would be on the adjacent property. So the tower comes up very close to the property line. There's a commercial property next to it right now.

That commercial property is, if I understand correctly, is located at TOD District. At a building there could be a residential building, be six stories high. So at that 60 foot level, near that property line, in that blue cloud be a bedroom with a child in there. So we could be looking at a level in excess of the maximum permissible exposure limit for general population. Not a concern for employees, for workers, different standard.

So you mentioned that and this makes perfect sense. Nobody wants to aim a transmitter and antenna at a building. So if this if this monopine goes up with the antennas on it that are designed currently to maximize coverage, which is a good thing. That's infrastructure that we need. That's benefit.

In the future, the competing use comes next door on that property and housing goes up on that property and where currently we would be inside that cloud, inside that maximum permissible exposure limit for residential, could we adjust those antennas so that and, maybe Fenway Park in in in Austin so that there's a short porch there, and it doesn't exceed that maximum permissible exposure limit across that boundary line in that location. That's my question.

And so, you know, to answer your question, I know every community has a little bit different process, but something of that, the project, a six story building of that magnitude, more more likely than not, that development would have an environmental impact report that would be part of it. That would be required by CEQUA for building something of that significance. Well, part of that would be identifying, alright. If this happens, how do we now work to mitigate that impact? Right?

If we're putting something up that could be in front, there would be you know, we would be working with the city, working with public safety tower company, working with a developer to resolve that issue and whatever that would would look like. And so there's there's processes in place to to make sure we don't just, you know, stand something up right in, you know, in harm's way just like we wouldn't with any other, you know, part of the community.

I appreciate that. But my question is a little bit different than that because the scenario that you just articulated does have an effect of this property burdening the property next to it or multifamily housing at a light at a height that goes into and I use this term as a layperson in the cloud. And I apologize. I'm I'm not an electrical engineer. Nothing close to that.

So my question is, can the antennas be adjusted so that it doesn't burden that property next door? Or is that once we put up this tower, is it inherent in the process? In the worst case scenario, when everything is buzzing and all it's all going, there is gonna be this area up there in the air, fifty, seventy five feet tall, where the limits for that are established by the FCC, the federal limits are being exceeded for residential housing and for people for that kid with his window open in that area, that and the the solution is gonna have to be to not build there, to not use that part of the site, that this property here is gonna be burdening that site with radio frequencies, making it not possible for the highest and best use of this site for transit oriented development. And I'm hoping that the answer is, yeah, we can adjust those antennas.

The the towers are absolutely adjustable. You know? So part of the EIR piece is we'd work through to address that. You know, in terms of it going over the property line now without development, that's wireless connectivity. Right? I mean, that's what we need to achieve is it going over property lines. Right? And and at this case, the heights of these would be, you know, I think it was 65, 72, and 80 feet, I think, going off the top of my head. And so that that that max would be that high. With the full course of a building going forward, it would be it would be something where the tower company would work with a developer to address those impacts, whether that's moving the antennas or, you know, taking off an array and putting it on the other side of the building that they're building.

I mean, there's a lot of ways of being able to go, about that. But yeah. I mean, it's you know, if there's a building that's approved, this isn't we're, you know, we're not we're not in the business of, you know, trying to prevent that. Right? We're trying to address a need and try to create a win win in the community, not create something that's a detriment. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you.

Thank

you for the presentation, and thank you for your service. Couple of just pointed questions here. The 80 foot height height itself, it looks like all of the the groupings of equipment are kind of stacked towards the top midway through the monopine to three quarters of the way up. There is some future proofing that's happening for future equipment, future microwave. Is the 80 foot height kind of a hard and fast height limit that you need in order to ultimately complete the goals at hand, increasing coverage, increasing bandwidth?

Is 80 foot 80 feet the hard and fast number, or is there flexibility in kind of scaling that down from if it's not just a technology perspective, if anything else, a line of sight and an unobstructed view stance of bringing down from 80 to 65. Is that possible?

What we what we'd end up doing so just for for context, I know the question was asked how many cell towers in town. So, what to call this a macro tower, this is basically what's called considered to be a macro tower as opposed to the micros on the light poles and that type of thing. These have a radius service radius of about one mile. And and so now you can imagine going around the community. So somewhere between every mile to mile and a half in not any solid grid pattern, there's cell towers throughout the community.

Whether you see them, whether they're on a building and they're in different places, they're a flagpole, in order to provide the coverage, you know, they're they're there. And and all the data can ultimately, you know, be be identified. In in this particular case, and one of the things that I've learned is is, yes, going back to the Lightwave piece. Right? That if, you know, we wanna light a a sock you know, you're using something big, you know, the the the part the soccer park.

Right? That if we put a light in that was six feet tall, you know, it doesn't matter how bright it is, the people on the far side of the field aren't gonna have much in the way of light. In order for them to get the light, you need to raise it up. And so what would ultimately happen is if you bring that tower down, the area of coverage goes down, and now you're gonna have a need for more towers to cover the coverage. So, you know, the I guess the philosophy question is, do you want fewer taller towers or more shorter towers?

Right? And, and so there's you know, it it is really a a balance. And, you know, and in in our in our work, we really try hard to put find locations in industrial, commercial areas as far away from schools, as far away from residential as possible because we know the stigma. We know, you know, the general concern of things that are brought up. And so wherever possible, that's genuinely what we look to try to achieve. And I think we did it in this case, not knowing what may the future may hold with a parcel next door, but there's always there's always a resolve for those types of issues. So, you know, new growth and infill isn't a new thing. You know, wireless has been around now for thirty years? Close? That's crazy. So

K. No. That that answers my question there. So the old adage of less is more doesn't apply here in this case. Okay.

Your diagram where it showed the the plot of the radius, I think there was an existing pole on the outer limits of that radius limit. Yes. Okay. So blue dot in the center is the proposed location, and you're working a half half mile radius all the way across?

It's a one one mile radius.

One mile radius all the way across? Okay. The existing existing tower, that red dot off to the corner, you're saying there was no opportunity for colocation there. Had there been opportunity for colocation colocation there, would that have been a viable option to proceed forward?

We wouldn't be here tonight. I mean, it doesn't that that tower you can see from the coverage doesn't provide the complete coverage. Right? Otherwise, there'd be a lot more green or yellow, whatever shade conqueror seeing at this point. So it wouldn't necessarily provide the coverage in the area we're going, it but would certainly take a big chunk out of it, which would then change the future, you know, gap analysis and the work that we're trying to do. But there's a picture of the tower there on the left, and, I mean, the tower is completely full. There's not any opportunity to to colocate on on that particular facility.

And the reason I asked is because you did show, some locations that were viable options, and you investigated further. I think, Alameda County Fire Department was one location. But if I'm just kind of drawing a drawing a radius from that outer red dot and bringing it clockwise to the future development, the the development there on San Leandro Boulevard that's under construction right across the way, I think it falls within the limits of that radius coverage. So I know you were looking at, you know, existing structures, existing properties. Was thought also given to potential new developments that would be completing within the next year, potentially year and a half, not knowing the exact timing of the schedule, but that project is moving at a rapid pace right now.

And and so for us, yeah, I can speak with with the the staff and tower engine engineering professionals working very closely with the city planning. You I'm certain those conversations are being bad. Right? Or we wouldn't we wouldn't be here. Right? If we found that these were incompatible, you know, side by side, right, we would have had to do something else. Right? In terms of this, this is, you know, currently right in the center of, you know, of the area that we're trying to cover. Right? It'll cover all this black area and turn it all most of it to a a nice yellow green color on this projector.

I I guess my question is just specifically for the project that's under construction across the way from City Hall right now. If I'm going clock clockwise from where that red dot is, it puts me at, call it, what, 02:00, maybe 03:00 out towards the limits there on the radius as to where that project is right now.

I can't break those out.

So, yeah, my my question is just whether or not projects that are currently under construction that definitely meet the 80 foot height limit were considered in the colocation analysis that was undertaken.

Right. So the sites that they reached out to for towers, just going back to your previous question, those are in this sort of island of of sort of a light industrial area. The Alameda County training facility is here. Next to it is the Maximus Alvarado Antonio Street housing project where they relocated the Portuguese musical group. I don't quite remember the details. But that project has stalled. And I believe this is East Fourteenth. There's a creek, and on this side of the Creek, that would be the project that you're speaking about. That's at Central Callan.

Correct. So it's, you know, call that 02:00 02:00 from where the red circle is highlighted right now. So if that red circle was a viable candidate and we wouldn't be here tonight, colocation would work at that height limit. That structure is gonna be at least 80 feet or close to close to that. Was that something that was investigated? Was that a potential location that was studied or colocation?

No. It it would not have been studied because it's on the outer outer edge of of the search ring. Right? So the goal is to be in the middle of an area you're trying to cover so that you can, you know, broadcast uniformly in different directions. Can I borrow that? Sure. So if if we were to do something here, our coverage arc would be, you know, just using the opposite would be right here, and most of this area is already covered. Where now we we still wouldn't have any coverage over here at all, and we wouldn't, you know, really take much bite out of this particular area if we were to put a tower out in this location.

K. So maybe it's just me not understanding, but that red circle then, because it's an existing tower, if you colocate on an existing tower, does that increase substantially? Or

It it wouldn't change anything. Right? I mean, it wouldn't change anything in that regard. What it would do I mean, if there was ability here, it would be, you know, just like that same arc back. Right? It would cover this whole area. I mean, it wouldn't be complete. Right? We wouldn't have coverage here. We wouldn't have coverage out here, and maybe just a little bit out of this. And so, you know, if if colocation were an opportunity, this footprint would be much smaller for what we're we're we're trying to address. And then we go back to, you know, the we could potentially do a a shorter tower because you don't need to transmit as far, but we're still back to more towers. Right? In this case, you know, unfortunately, it's not even an option. If you look at this tower, you know, there's four sets of antennas, you know, currently on it.

There isn't the ability to add anything further. And so it's, you know, it's it's it ultimately you know, I guess if we're playing chess, it'd be check or checkmate on that one.

I I guess I'd yeah. I probably misunderstood misunderstood what what you you had had said when I asked you about that red circle there. If that was a viable option for colocation, would it have been and I think your response was we wouldn't be here tonight. So I kind of interpreted that as that red circle would cover the full radius and then some, but I'm hearing what you're saying now is it would prompt that whole scenario of less is more. So we would need a secondary a secondary location regardless. Even if that red circle was viable for colocation, a second location would still be needed.

Correct. And and I apologize. I did absolutely answer the way you just repeated it back, and so I apologize for chasing you know, leading you down a a squirrel hole. So

k. Got it. Alright. And I don't know if you're able to share this or not, but just in terms of the overall timeline for the project, is there, you know, you know, say, conditions of approval in place, approvals are dealt? What is the observed timeline for the project that you're anticipating?

So for us, it, you know, it it it fluctuates a little bit based on, you know, timing and local processes. But for us, upon approval by the planning commission and having the zoning approval in the CUP, we would then move toward creating construction documents, really getting into the engineering and the footing and doing the the geo and the ground to make sure we you know, everything is where it needs to be for for all purposes, and that's usually about six months, and then it'd be submitting to the city for permits and whatever the process would be. But I'd say, you know, conservatively, you know, or maybe it'd be about a year before we really, you know, broke ground to really start putting it up, hopefully sooner, but but that's about what you can anticipate.

Okay. Got it. Yeah. That's it for me. Thank you.

Appreciate it. You're welcome. Thank you.

Thank you. Lots of detail. So I have a few questions, and it might go between you and and counsel. This is private property. Correct?

Yes.

Okay. And and where we see the proposed building of the future, the TOD, that is the same property owner. Right. The adjacent property, DA 2, that's a different property owner here at 65 San Leandro. Is this also potential TOD?

Yeah. Yes. Waylon, can you it it's also identified in the housing element as potential type.

Okay.

Less probably half of a capacity, but it's

Okay. Okay. And then and then just so that I understand, the tower is owned by your company.

Yep. Public safety towers will own the tower something that I learned coming into this that I mean, there's always exceptions to the rule, but the rule is is that none of the carriers actually own towers. They hire somebody else to build towers for them to then lease space to, for that. So I I personally do not know of, any actual cellular carrier owned, towers, but I'm sure some exist because, you know, like I said, there's always an exception. This would be privately owned by public safety tower company.

Okay. And and the yellow coverage that you were showing belongs only to AT and T. Is that correct?

The the the blue and gold or the one that was purple that we talked about?

So there was the purple gap, and then it was filled in by the green and the yellow.

Yep. So this this one?

Yes.

So, yes, this is, modeling, AT and T's

Coverage.

Coverage. And so and then what we would expect as we as we're looking at the the cloud going back to the that's a new cloud. There's not the cloud with your phone. This is different phones and cloud. But as as you saw, they had a a bit of a taper to it, right, that that AT and T's or the top FirstNet was the widest. The next two are smaller. They, you know, they run at a little lesser power because they're lower and subordinate on the tower. So you could expect their coverage to look similar to this, but just a little bit smaller. And then the next one down would be a little bit smaller than that.

I think what I'm trying to get at is the purple area on the left. Is that area that is not covered by any other carrier?

It is. Let me I can go back to let me go to this slide. So this is bay basically, the same thing just zoomed out a little bit further. Right? Where for me, sometimes the other one is looks like just paint. Right? It's too zoomed in to get a a perspective. And so this is the all carrier coverage

All carrier.

For that for that area. So, you know, coverage is is pretty

Right. So every We see that

Coverage is pretty solid along the BART, the BART tracks, the BART thoroughfare. But as you get away from that, you know, it gets really pretty weak, you know, down to two, maybe one BART in those particular areas.

Mhmm.

Okay. And I think what I'm trying to understand is how this came about. Were were there first responder services that found that there was a gap in service, or is AT and T going around fishing for coverage? That's what I think everybody here wants to understand.

Okay. So there's there's multiple paths. Yes. So if you would bear with me. So so the answer to your question is, yes. AT and T is not phishing. AT and T has a mandate from the Department of Commerce and FirstNet authority to build coverage. Whether they can afford it or not, they have to build coverage, to get FirstNet up and working. And so they have a mandate to go fill the gaps. I mean, in in a lot of ways, a lot of the gaps that exist in our current wireless coverage is because from a commercial perspective, there wasn't sufficient gonna be a sufficient number of new users toward the investment in a new tower, you know, for somebody to build it.

And so that's where a lot of our existing gaps in coverage exist. In this case, as part of the mandate from FirstNet is we need to close the coverage. Now going back and changing my head back to when I was a fire chief, I was on working with FirstNet consistently saying, you know, we don't have coverage in this area. We need your help to get coverage in this area. And and having worked with with both chief Rutherglen and chief Thomas of Alameda County fire, I know they've absolutely had conversations with the AT and T FirstNet for California to help get some of these coverage issues addressed.

So I don't know which was which. It's somewhat of a chicken egg on this, but it but it ultimately comes from that overall push from FirstNet to get FirstNet coverage. And so in this case, AT and T would not be building this tower if it weren't for FirstNet.

Right. And and so, if I have a Verizon phone and I am in one of the darker areas, non covered areas, am am I am I able to call emergency services?

So 911 can hit any carrier. And so, so there that's that's just something good to know. But in this case, as as we talked about earlier, there's the tower is providing the potential for colocation for future. So Verizon, T Mobile, Dish, whomever, to be able to colocate, on the tower, which would also increase their coverage. So they'd get the benefit of somebody else paying to build the tower, and they just come along and enter into a lease for their 12 feet of tower space.

Right. Okay. Thank you. That's that's very helpful. And and just so I understand, Alex, this is because I wanna go back to what commissioner Soleys said. We are kind of our our hands are tied. I think this is serving a good purpose, but I just wanna understand, this is not imminent domain. Right? This is not this is private property. So unless the property owner says yes, this tower would not be going here.

Absolutely. Okay. Have voluntarily entered into this lease.

Right. Okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. Mister Tahira?

Sorry. I just sorry. I just had one last question here. So can you touch on the testing and commissioning procedures that happen once once the monopine is up and running? Before that, you know, there's a whole series of activation, testing, commissioning channels that need to run its course, then you establish a baseline for the affected cloud area that's anticipated to be impacted.

Knowing that there's gonna be future microwaves and future carriers that are built onto this monopine, Is it safe to say that when those carriers and monopines install their equipment, there's a whole new cloud study that's generated to show effectively what's changed from the initial construction date and commissioning to what that new baseline would be for additional carrier and microwave services being added to the monopine?

So, to answer your question is, I guess I'd be speaking on behalf of the city of San Leandro, but I believe it'd be true because it's true everywhere else, is that they had a new carrier. They're responsible for providing an EME report to show electromagnetic energy report to show that their array they're putting in specifically meets, the standard, the FCC standards. And so, but with this, it is pretty safe to say because, I mean, this is Waterford consultants. This is the work they do. They're third party.

They're not affiliated. They're, you know, electrical engineers that do the study. And, you know, in this case so this gives a pretty good idea. Worst case scenario, all antennas on, all operating at max power at the same time, that's your cloud, right, for all all three sets of antennas operating at the same time. So and we know that's not gonna be the case because that's not the way they work. So that cloud's gonna be, you know, considerably smaller, but we wanna do the worst case scenario, you know, because then anything else after that's good news. Right? Or move in least in the right direction.

Okay. So outside of any new carriers or new microwave equipment being installed, and if it's just the equipment that that your company is gonna be accounting for as part of the commissioning services here, there's the initial data that's provided once turnover occurs and once that monopine is activated. Is there a secondary baseline at another interval that occurs so that it's not kind of just a single snapshot in time when the Monopine was activated? This is what we determine the cloud to be, but, say, a year from there, two years from there, are there interval checks to make sure that nothing's going askew and that the data from the initial commissioning report is still holding true?

I know that there is absolutely routine maintenance on these towers, you know, at least, in most cases, at least quarterly, if not more frequently. So there's always people working on them, making sure they're not you know, making sure they're working within the operational standards and their allotted license for operating. In terms of doing, you know, an EME trifield meter assessment, I I can't speak to that. I know, as as city attorney pointed out, it's something we'll be required to do within thirty days of each set of antennas coming online. And, you know, we'd be, you know, amiable to, you know, to do something if it would you know, you know, something more well, again, even though it may not be required, just to, you know, I guess, put minds at ease.

Perfect. And you kinda you picked up where I was going with it. So, I was reading some of the concerns here from fellow commissioners and having that belt and suspenders approach beyond just the thirty days after commissioning to provide peace of mind for the community. You know, a recommended interval, what the next check would be would be something that I think potentially be could be a discussion point. But it's good to know that you would be open to that. You would be amenable to it.

Yeah. Absolutely.

And I guess in your expertise, is there kind of a sweet spot in terms of when that next interval in your opinion would be warranted?

I don't know of any place requiring them more than the initial, and which means with a regular maintenance, everybody is generally satisfied with the routine maintenance bay based on, you know, the, you know, the radio operation. I mean, these are, you know, radios. Right? So the radio operation and the energy that it's outputting to that it's within, you know, the parameters established. So I don't know of any place else that does it. I can't say there would be something that would be, you know I mean, you know, a year at the most, I would think, would be, you know, one you know, once a year, you know, would be, you know, more than reasonable because I wouldn't expect much in the way of changes.

Perfect. Thank you.

You're welcome. That's great.

Yeah. Thank thank you for your for your service and the presentation. So in in summary, can one say then that what's happening here is that there are certain expectations or mandates from the federal government regarding, you know, first responders and access. And you do, there are certain survey surveys that are being done, with with the technology, and then you, identify certain areas that are lacking, like, you the security you're showing me that that don't have enough coverage. And then then you make it, like, in in case there's an emergency, you mentioned 911, that there might not be enough or there might be an issue with first responders because there is not enough coverage in that area.

Therefore, this project here

that Yes. Yep. Exactly. And in in in in in asking your question, remind me, I know a question that came up about, you know, power and generators, you know, that you know, like, in 2017, I was on the board with the California Fire Chiefs Association involved in our legislative work. And after, like, the Tubbs fire and the other fires that ran through Northern California, as soon as power went down, all communications went down because wired landline hubs require power, and all cell towers require power.

So the following year, the state enacted the requirement for emergency generators on all cellular towers. So if power goes down, they can still operate autonomously, you know, unless they're damaged by whatever event it may be. But they have the ability to still be up and operating autonomously without any outside, input or in involvement on that. And something that we do with, the public safety towers is we put a put in battery backup. And so for something that's a short term outage, the generator won't even kick on.

So we usually have enough power, you know, depending on the amount of use, somewhere between eighteen and twenty four hours of battery backup before the generator would even turn on for that. So it's a little bit of a side note to to what you had asked, but I know the question came up earlier about, power, and I saw it as one of my notes to to touch on.

I remember a little bit about maybe over twenty years ago, used to work in in several technology. And I remember all the thing about the, you field engineers and all the testing. Back then, we're doing analog. Yeah. Working with technology that that that was identifying clone cloning devices, and then we digitize the print for each phone. And, you know, there were servers connected to to, you know, each cell tower, and they would send that signal back to these farms for servers. And so I I remember a little bit. That was over twenty years ago.

Yeah. It changes fast, doesn't it?

One more question for you, Waylon, because I really wanna understand the cell phone tower requirements. And so where are if if you're if if we really have no authority here and there's no pushback, are people allowed to put cell phone towers on their residential property, or is this only for commercial property? Where where are cell towers allowed to go?

The city has a wireless telecommunications ordinance within its zoning ordinance, which designates areas in the city where where wireless facilities can be located by type. So in certain zoning districts, a monopole may be allowed. In certain zoning districts, they may not be. There's also zoning districts. There's also different types of wireless facilities like those mounted on buildings or ground mounted facilities. And so it'll depend on zoning district where those would be allowed.

Mhmm. Okay. I I'm just I just wanna make sure that if next year, a resident comes up and and is, you know, pushing a cell phone tower that they're gonna get paid millions of dollars for in their backyard, that, you know, we understand the rules, the city of San Leandro with their neighbors. You know? I mean, it it I feel like we we need a little bit more information in in general, maybe, the commission, on what the rules with cell phone towers are.

Is that because it it feels like they could go anywhere right now. They can.

I mean, if they can show the gap in coverage. So in most residential neighborhoods, they're not gonna be able to show a gap in coverage. And so then the city's zoning rules would apply.

Right. But if they could show one okay. Okay. I just wanted to make sure I understood.

And and you if you you don't notice them, but they are out there in residential neighborhoods already.

Mhmm.

Okay. Thank you. And and thank you for all of the information. Are there any public anyone from the public who wishes to speak? Emily Kuhn.

The first time for this is my first time ever. I've lived on Peralta for thirty five years, and I am against the irresponsible placement of the tower on Peralta. First I learned about this was today in the San Leander Times.

Just make sure you speak into them. And Okay. You might have to lower it.

Alright.

The

FCC guidelines are out of date and on adequately protecting humans and our children, the environment against harmful effects of the RF radiation exposure. They are lacking. RFEMF is classified as a human carcinogen, increases in DNA damage, impacts fetal growth, children are a great risk and more vulnerable to radiation and exposure. The Environmental Health Trust has filed 11,000 pages of evidence of harm from five g and wireless technology. Property values generally decrease if close to a cell tower, and I believe that local housing is a much greater need than another cell tower.

Thank you.

Michael McGuire?

Hey, Rob. I reported with the San Leandro Times. Wrote the article in question that Emily Emily was just referred to. But I have two factoids and a question rather than, you know, my own opinion. The two factoids are that there was, in fact, one negative comment that's part of the agenda packet against the project.

It's the one listed under public comment last item. Another is that live in the we don't have the slide up, but the I live in one of the black areas by the blue dot, and my cell phone has never dropped a call. I may just have a fabulous cell phone, though it's cheap piece of garbage, my opinion. But, anyway, just just so that's a little counter something theoretical. But the question I had is when this when the system is going at full tilt, communication system, have our emergency people ever complained of a problem in coverage along San Leandro Boulevard and that area?

That would have happened at 09:11, which is I mean, that's at peak time. Would have happened at 09:11 a few months before I moved to San Leandro. But it also would have happened during the George Floyd riots of a couple years ago as the first responders were running all over the place, fire and and police, and they were putting out fires, hypothetically, figuratively speaking, all over town. So I'm just curious if that complaint has ever come up that we lack coverage now. Now maybe we wanna build future coverage, but I'm I'm not sure it's well, anyway, someone perhaps could tell me if it's come up as an issue up till now. I have the local emergency responders. Thank you.

Is there anyone else who wishes to speak?

I

will now close the public hearing and bring the item back for discussion by the commission.

I'm so sorry. I

oh, sorry.

Apologies. Not sure if we had all the speaker card.

Good evening. My name is Don Lee. I'm the property owner of this long discussion that's going on. When I was contacted about three years ago by AT and T subcontractor, they were concerned at that time about the inability to communicate with a lot of people in our area. I've owned the property for over fifty years.

As you all familiar with it, it's very well landscaped. We have the beautiful fence along Sandal Boulevard. I'm really concerned about the appearance of the property. When they came up with the subtower and showed me the looks of it, I have a big pine tree on the property right now, the guy assured me that the tree was gonna look better than what I already had, so I laughed about it. But anyhow, I would think the first concern this council should have, and I think we just had a perfect example when the hurricanes hit the Eastern Seaboard.

The first responders could not communicate with half the people there. Elon Musk brought in his computer satellites and gave us the ability to communicate with the people in that area. The same things happened in Ukraine. If you remember back, they couldn't communicate with the people on the ground. The military could not communicate.

So there again, they came in with a satellite, were able to communicate with those people. So I would think the first concern of this council and I understand electronic mic my backgrounds and concerns about future buildings. The property is really small, folks. If you go east, if you go north from our property, you're gonna go through the tunnel and come up in Oakland and 90 Eighth Avenue. There that's not what you really would call a residential area.

If you go north, you know, we've got San Juan Boulevard sitting there, and there's a lot of old homes there, of course, across San Juan Boulevard, but it's not what you would call brand new area for new construction. If you head south, you're gonna run into Davis Street, and there's not a whole lot area there or a big fancy high story, six story building. So on if you go south from our property, you've got the BART train tracks sitting there and the unused train tracks right now where we're having a problem trying to keep that area clean. But I think our first concern should be the communication of all people in an emergency situation. And I think AT and T has really addressed that, and this speaker before me, of course, addressed it very detail wise. So that's all I've got to say. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Any any other speakers? None. Okay. Any other discussion items from the count from the commission?

Commissioner Rich.

I agree that this is important and that the the FirstNet is a value for our community. My concern is the potential for this use, the burden, future the ability for future development. And I think the only site that might be affected for future development would be the triangular site to the northwest of this property, the closest property line to the tower. There is a, a slide that we viewed with a potential 65 foot building, to the south of the tower. I'm talking to the north, northwest of the tower.

There's a there's a triangular property, there, and that is in our transit our our TOD district. So my concern is the safety one, and I believe that is within our jurisdiction. Not looking at any new regulations. I'm looking at for compliance with current existing regulations for maximum permissible exposure limit for public. And to the extent that it is possible to adjust the equipment so that the MPE for a general population is not exceeded on any residential areas on adjacent properties, then I don't have a concern there.

Is there is there room to oh, mister Tahada.

I didn't I didn't mean to jump in if you had something that you wanted to

Well, I was just wondering if there was a a motion in there too.

So the the project complies with all EMF requirements. It is not interfering currently with any or creating any exposure requirement. In the city, the you know, that that's what you know? For better or for worse, that that's what's there. I I can't say, you know, what's certainly what would happen if a developer came in in the future and what would occur then, but the application before you complies with all of required EMS standard.

Can I jump in on that? It exceeds the maximum permissible exposure limit. So 500%. It shows 500%, which

Every every antenna will exceed that at some location. Right? But there can't be occupancy within that location, and there is not currently any proposed occupancy within that.

So this goes back to my original question about can this antenna burden neighboring property? And if I understand your your comment now, it is yes. This antenna can burden neighboring property.

As to the city, it it can. Whether or not that adjacent property owner has rights vis a vis this property owner, you know, I I don't know that. I can't speak to that. But as to what the city can consider, that's not something the city is allowed to consider under, you know, federal law.

Maximum exceeding maximum permissible exposure limits is not something that the city can evaluate under federal law.

The the project does not exceed the maximum allowable.

I just agree. I I we've seen charts in this presentation here tonight that show areas in red and in yellow and in blue, and all of those exceed the maximum permissible exposure limit

Those are there. Uses. Sorry. Apologies. I didn't mean to interrupt you. There are no people that occupy those areas. They're in the middle of the sky. And so if there was a building there now, then it wouldn't be they wouldn't be able to build this antenna assuming that, you know, that doesn't impact the cloud. But there's not a building there now, and so there's not that issue. If this was on the ground level, for example, where there is occupancy now, they wouldn't be allowed to to build it in this location.

But currently, it it's in the sky for lack of a, you know, more accurate description, and there's no occupancy there. There's no way for a human to be within that cloud except for potentially workers, you know, working on the facility. Because of that, the city doesn't have any authority at this time to deny the application whether or not a JSON property owner might have their own property rights if and when they decide they wanna pursue building of some you know, a you know, I I don't know that off the top of my head.

So Short of denying, because this is a valuable piece of infrastructure here, could we have a condition that the if the RF maximum permissible exposure limit was exceeded in any adjacent property or residential unit, that the applicant would need to adjust the equipment in order to bring those RFs to within federally established MPE limits for public uses?

I think that would be okay. Yeah.

That's all I got. Well, then I make a motion to that effect. There's a condition. I can restate that if

So so I would just suggest that when, if you're ready to make a motion on the whole thing to add that, but I would just make a motion to approve with an additional condition of in that.

Yeah. I'm sort of bad

at Robert's rules of order here.

And I don't wanna stop the discussion that's happening on on council because I recognize my concern might be a little bit different than some of the other concerns. But I don't have a concern if this property is not burdening neighboring properties in a transit oriented develop district or future multifamily housing, which is something that we want in that that neighborhood. Whether somebody actually is ever gonna build there, whether somebody wants to build next to that, those are different those are different market decisions that people make. I would be concerned if the tower is making it so that it's not so it's so that there's a it's exceeding the mass maximum permissible.

Commissioner Tejada.

Thank you, commissioner Rich. We've we're writing that down.

So, yeah, I think the the concern that that remains, and it's more like peace of mind for the surrounding community and even future developments for that matter to commissioner Rich's point, is putting a condition of approval in place that doesn't just keep it at the point where it's kind of, you know, set it, establish the baseline, and then forget it. And this is just paraphrasing. I know there's maintenance occurrences that happen in between as explained by the representative that was just up here, so there will be periodic maintenance. But I would like to see a supplemental EMF report and data similar to what we received as part of our package tonight being provided on a yearly basis for a five year term. I think that gives us enough coverage where if there is a future development that that happens and comes to light, having this condition of approval in place kind of holds the standard of maintaining the baseline EMF results that were in place at the time of testing and commissioning for the project and final acceptance for that matter on this project.

And then moreover, it would provide additional re reassurance for the community at large within the Radius footprint of this project where they can kinda hang their hat on knowing that yearly tracking of this project from an EMF report and data perspective is being provided. So just talking that out loud through here with the fellow commissioners, that's that's my my take, and I think it's maybe a shared view amongst some of the fellow commissioners here. So

Mister Bolt?

K. Thank you. Yes. Like, both of the ideas, and I would recommend that that be in the motion that, number one, we have a annual test for the five years. And, additionally, if we're if there was someone to come purchase that site just north of it and build into the cloud, we would make sure that it's adjusted.

Now I think all of that is great. I do want to point out that that was mentioned and discussed, and it was said that that could be done. So I don't think we're overreaching. When they explained it, they said they they would have to do that. And I think there's two reasons why they would do it.

Number one, I don't think they wanna, you know, harm anybody in a building. But but, ultimately, more importantly, if they don't do it, they won't have the coverage that they need for the for the services that they're trying to provide. So with all that being said and and I think there was a question too about has have we had our first responders drop calls in that area and the and that was answered, and and the answer is yes. They've had problems in that area, and that's why they're here trying to address that. If they didn't if they hadn't had problems, they wouldn't be saying, hey.

We need to do something about this. So it's clear that our hands are tied as far as whether it's gonna get built or not, but our hands aren't tied when we're trying to protect the city in a way that says, let's put some conditional some additional conditions to this that the city can then look to and feel confident that, you know, we're we're doing the right thing, and we're we're at least trying to do everything we can. With all that being said, I think there is the opportunity here for us to learn, and I guess more for us city staff, like, understanding how this works. You know? Because this is the first time in my tenure.

It's the first time I've dealt with it. They're everywhere. Obviously, our cell phones wouldn't work. So understanding and putting our mind at ease and maybe even the public, like, that's something that we should consider. You know?

Some study session or something around it. Because the first thing you think of when you see this is, you know, health concerns, and that's what we don't want anybody to be afraid of while we do it. So those are my comments, but I concur that one year intervals for five years, understanding that the power's working the way we expect it to, and there's no harmful data coming out of those tests, and that if there is a situation where someone wants to build next to this tower, it's not gonna be a problem for them to build. Thank you.

Mister Mendoza?

Yes. I I just wanted to express my my views so far, which may differ a little bit from from most of the the other members, that I'm satisfied with, the information that the applicant provided and, don't share actually, any of the concerns about, these affecting, any future developments or housing. I from what I've seen and from the presentation that he gave, I think it's it's it's all, you know, well balanced, and they they explained it really well. And, again, don't see any any any issues with any future problems. So just wanted to make that point.

Okay. So I think we have a motion combined.

Yeah. If through the chair, if you'd like. So I believe what what I'm hearing is it would be a motion to adopt the attached resolute resolution approving the conditional use permit to build an 80 foot high wireless telecommunications facility at 440 Peralta Avenue based on the recommended findings of fact and subject to the recommended conditions of approval with the addition of the following two conditions of approval. The first, if a future radio frequency emission study identifies that the project violates the FCC standards within any adjacent or or neighboring residential building, applicant shall adjust the antennas until the missions in the residential building do not exceed FCC standards, and second being that in addition to the EMF study that must be done thirty days after activation, every year thereafter, there would be an additional study for the next five years.

I'll second that. I I'm assuming that motion comes from commissioner

Yeah. No. That's a that's a great summary. I my only concern, and and that's is accurately how I stated it. There may be other adjustments that they can make besides antenna with the equipment or the operations. I'm using antenna as a layperson's shorthand for adjusting the operation so that the exposure is brought within.

So, yeah, so perhaps the motion will change it so that rather than antenna, we'll just say facility.

Yeah. I would make I I make that motion. Second.

Wonderful. I am not sure I can repeat that. So I'm just gonna say, that it has been moved by commissioner Rich and seconded by commissioner Bolt to adopt a resolution to approve a conditional use permit to build an 80 foot high wireless telecommunications facility at 440 Peralta Avenue based on the recommended findings of fact and subject to the recommend recommended conditions of approval with two additional conditions as stated. Thank you. Please cast your vote.

The motion passes unanimously. Thank you very much. Decisions of the planning commission are final unless appealed to the city council by fall filing a form to the city clerk within fifteen days of the the action. The form shall specifically state the reason for the appeal, and an appeal fee is required. As mister secretary, do we have any mill miscellaneous items?

There are no miscellaneous items on tonight's agenda.

Do we have any other comments from the commissioners? No. Thank you. Do we have any staff updates? Nope.

There are no staff updates.

Okay. Well, the time oh, no. The time is now

it's like

10:22 by my watch. Oh, nine oh, it sure feels like 10:20. I didn't fall back. Thank you. Yes. The time is now 09:22, and the meeting is adjourned.