Denver DTV
Tower Approved,
Lawsuit Likely
by Ken
Freed.
.
Broadcasters
wins county nod, but mountain area residents vow to fight
on.
After
eight years of rejected proposals, four Denver TV
stations under the coalition title Lake Cedar Group
finally have won approval from Jefferson County for a
consolidated digital terrestrial broadcasting tower on
Lookout Mountain. A final resolution on the negotiated
agreement was approved in an August 6 vote by the three
county commissioners.
Foothills community
residents, upset by RF interference and fearing antenna
farm radiation, have fought every digital tower proposal.
Objecting to a July 22 zoning change that permitted
county commissioner approval of the plan that day, a
mountain community group likely will file suit against
the county to block the project.
"When we embarked
on this latest application two years ago, said Lake Cedar
Group spokesperson Fred Niehaus of Intermountain
Corporate Affairs, "it was very important to get precise
feedback from the county on their expectations. Our
number one task was to make a credible and significant
submission, which it seems we did. We also talked to the
community, and we did our best to accommodate their
concerns."
"Our decision was
based solely on what was presented in the hearings," said
six-year county commissioner Michelle Lawrence. "In my
opinion, the Lake Cedar Group met every criteria we set
for approval, so the decision was obvious."
"The county
commissioners' approval of the Lake Cedar application was
arbitrary and capricious," said Deb Carney, principle
attorney for C-A-R-E, Canyon Area Residents for the
Environment, which long has lead the charge against
foothills antenna farms. "The commissioners acted
contrary to all the evidence about the health effects of
RF radiation. We plan to challenge their jurisdiction in
changing the site's zoning to fit the desired use, plus
we believe the plan for mediation of disputes is against
Colorado law."
The history of the
tower proposal explains deep conflict.
Lookout Mountain on
the western edge of metro Denver above the town of Golden
became the home of broadcast antennas in the earliest
years of radio and then television. When Jefferson County
first created zoning laws in the Fifties, all the
broadcast towers were grandfathered in as "legal
nonconforming use." The county ever since has suffered
citywide complaints about "visual pollution" of the
foothills skyline, but nothing could be done about the
zoning so long as the use remained unchanged.
After the 1996
Telecom Act mandated digital TV, several Denver
broadcasters formed the Lake Cedar Group as a litigation
buffer for proposing a DTV/HDTV "supertower" for Lookout
Mountain. Joining in the effort was VHF stations KCNC-TV4
(CBS), KRMA-TV6 (PBS), KMGH-TV7 (ABC), KUSA-TV9 (NBC),
and UHF station KDTV-TV20 (UPN), plus several FM
stations.
The tower they
first proposed would have been 850 feet tall, capped by a
three-pronged candelabra akin to the Mt. Sutro tower
serving San Francisco. This one ATSC tower would have
replaced five NTSC towers. The FM gear would have hung on
the new tower, sited about a mile from the grave of
Buffalo Bill.
After loud neighbor
protests, the county determined the proposed nonthermal
RF radiation would stay within the allowable exposure
limits established by the FCC. But the "Jeffco" planning
department in 1999 nevertheless recommended rejection of
the plan, justifying the ruling by saying the tall tower
could collapse on nearby homes.
KRMA then opted out
of the project and chose nearby Mount Morrison to the
south for an innovative horizontal tower, meant to be
invisible from the city.
The four remaining
members of Lake Cedar Group in April 2002 unveiled a
revised proposal. The candelabra was abandoned for a
single stick, which would be about 200 feet shorter than
the existing KCNC tower, now the tallest on the mountain.
The tower also would be lower on the mountain, further
reducing its elevation. To counter health worries, the
previously proposed omnidirectional antennas would be
replaced by directional panel antennas aimed across the
city.
Also, the spacious
colocation building initially proposed to house the
dialectic transmitters was shrunk to about 20,000 square
feet, and half of this would be dug into the mountain
slope to disappear among the evergreen trees.
The collocated
tenants inside the transmitter building likely will be
separated only by interior chain link fences, simplifying
the HVAC and UPC requirements, reducing the overall
project cost, which are not yet publicly
estimated.
After extensive
talks with the county and the community, the Lake Cedar
Group additionally agreed to exclude all FM antennas,
blamed for most of the RF exposure, and to keep the total
TV radiation at 85 percent of the FCC limit.
The county accepted
the broadcasters' offer for one year of RF interference
mitigation at their own expense, with obligatory
third-party mediation, commencing once the FCC grants an
operating license for the digital tower.
Broadcasters then
agreed to tear down and remove the four analog towers
within one year of FCC licensing. To assure the old
towers go, Lake Cedar agreed to post a bond with
Jefferson County equal to 110 percent of the cost for
removal.
For both visual
appeal and security, the transmission lines between the
tower and the new transmitter building will be buried.
Engineers will bore a tunnel through solid granite to
accommodate the lines.
Lake Cedar also
offered to contribute 78 acres of the four tenants' 84
acres for preservation as open space, leaving the tower
complex on six acres. No other tenants will be allowed,
and other existing radio and TV towers will remain on the
mountain.
The strategy for
gaining county approval was revealed at a March 26, 2002,
meeting at KCNC mostly attended by area station
engineers, Speaking was Peter McNally, an affiliate of
Intermountain Corporate Affairs, the political
consultancy hired to spearhead county approval .
If the county
denied this new application , McNally said, the Lake
Cedar Group members would have to build interim digital
towers on "less desirable" Front Range sites like Squaw
Mountain or Eldorado Peak.
The four existing
towers on Lookout Mountain would remain standing until
the FCC enforced an analog shutdown, he said. Then the
stations would replace these with four digital towers,
each with its own building, so the county would have
"zero gain" from refusing the new Lake Cedar
application.
"I heard rumors
about that strategy," said commissioner Lawrence, but I
must ignore rumors and go with the information I'm
presented." 
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