Planned wireless facilities cause alarm

Fallbrook residents voiced their concerns about small cell wireless facilities set to be introduced to the unincorporated areas of San Diego at the Fallbrook Community Planning Group meeting, June 17.

These small cell wireless facilities are the direct result of a Federal Communications Commission order, and the issue posed at the meeting wasn’t so much whether or not they would happen, but rather how to make them more aesthetically pleasing and less intrusive for Fallbrook residents.

However, residents had many concerns about these small cell sites, which would help to bring 5G to the county.

Many residents were concerned about the aesthetic aspects of the small cell sites. The new antenna ideally would be co-located, or added to existing poles and sites, and two small cell antenna could share the same location. These facilities could be placed every 500 to 1,000 feet.

Residents voiced concern over these additions and colocation, asking about the support equipment that would inevitably accompany the antenna and where it would go. Residents were concerned about preserving the historical nature and look of Fallbrook’s homes as well.

Tara Lieberman and Eric Lardy, who work in advance planning for the county and came to give a presentation on these small cell sites and the ordinances proposed, explained that all support equipment would be underground, so as not to interfere with aesthetics. Equipment would also be made to match the existing poles. Lieberman also said that they were making a note of historic districts.

However, while aesthetics was one of the major concerns brought up by residents, they were not the only ones.

Some residents questioned why 5G and these facilities needed to be introduced in the first place. Others asked what the community could do to prevent these facilities from being brought in. In short, there was nothing they could do.

An FCC ruling from September 2018, aimed to “remove regulatory barriers that would unlawfully inhibit the deployment of infrastructure necessary to support these new services,” ensured that it wasn’t a matter of if these small cell wireless facilities would go in, it was a matter of when.

Even the most preferred and least preferred areas on the maps that the county is creating are a matter of recommendation. They have to be careful not to put too many restrictions for fear of restricting entire areas and failing to comply with the FCC order.

Bob Gonsett, a Fallbrook resident who was allowed to give a short, prepared statement at the meeting in response to the presentation, was concerned about how small cell wireless would affect existing communication systems.

“The rollout of small cell wireless sites as currently proposed is concerning,” Gonsett said. “Because these sites will potentially be located just about everywhere and stand to compromise or cripple monitoring activities by either overwhelming the receiving equipment with strong, nearby signals or causing interference through a variety of other mechanisms.”

Gonsett was the only resident allowed to give a prepared statement after support from the other residents gathered convinced the planning group to hear what he had to say; however other residents had come with prepared remarks as well and were disappointed that they were not heard.

One of the major concerns voiced was the health effects of these small cell wireless facilities. One resident brought a print off a video from George Washington University’s Dr. Martin Pall in which he presents the possible health effects of the 5G rollout to the National Institutes of Health.

The talk was titled “Diverse Health Effects of Non-Thermal Microwave/Other Frequency EMFs: The Mechanism by Which These Diverse Effects Are Produced: Why 5G Will Be Likely to Be Vastly Worse.”

The presentation listed many ways in which the rollout of the small cell facilities could impact health, ranging from fertility problems to cancer. Pall also said that these facilities are being rolled out without any “biological safety test of genuine 5G radiation.”

However, it was made clear at the planning group meeting that health couldn’t even be a consideration.

“One of the things we have as an underlying law as we’re doing these regulations is we’re prohibited from a federal order from the 90s from considering the health effects of these. So that’s not something we’re considering,” Lardy said when asked if they had considered health effects.

Ron Lebfrom, who prepared a statement but was not allowed to give it, shared his concerns both about protecting the beauty of Fallbrook’s older homes, but also about the health effects. Lebfrom brought up the cellphone guidelines released by the California Department of Public Health in 2017. These guidelines encourage people to reduce their exposure to radio frequency energy from cell phones because of health concerns.

Lebfrom expressed frustration that an order from the 90s, something that he said is now far behind the current technological progress, was being used to stop concerned citizens from getting answers about the long-term health effects these facilities could have.

Lebfrom was also confused about why the facilities were required to be 300 to 2,000 feet from schools, child care centers, hospitals and churches when residential buildings were not given the same privilege.

The ordinances claim that this distance is “allowed based on aesthetics, not health,” given that the aesthetic requirements are “reasonable, not more burdensome than those applied to other types of infrastructure deployments, and objective and published in advance.”

To even further remove the community from the process, the understanding at the meeting was that when companies apply to put in a small cell wireless facility, the planning group will see the application but will not have any say in it because of the fast track timeline that the applications are on.

“I think we’re being steamrolled over,” Bob Gonsett said about the lack of say the community has in these rollouts. “Nothing is as important as this is right now. This is a massive rollout.”