The Springs Fire District reiterated its offer to East Hampton Town this week to install a 100-foot temporary communications tower at the Fort Pond Boulevard firehouse to improve wireless coverage in the hamlet.
The fire district would bear all costs of the installation of a "cellular on wheels," also known as a COW, except those relating to installing cellular carriers' equipment, Carl Irace, an attorney for the district, wrote in a letter to the town attorney, John Jilnicki. The district would absorb the cost of installation of any equipment and materials provided by the town, including for the Police Department, Mr. Irace wrote.
The district would also "handle everything related to the engineering of, application(s) needed for, and installation of the temporary structure," he wrote, outlining a plan to complete structural design and engineering within a week of the receipt of information from personal wireless carriers and the Police Department, and to deploy the temporary tower a week after that.
Monday's letter was the latest salvo in the tangled issues of completing an upgrade of the town's emergency communications infrastructure and improving personal wireless coverage, which has outraged and galvanized residents in one neighborhood of the densely populated hamlet, where town officials proposed a 100-foot temporary tower on a 6.9-acre wooded area bordered by Crandall Street, Lincoln Avenue, Norfolk Street, and Fort Pond Boulevard, that would be replaced with a 185-foot permanent tower once it is designed and constructed. Both would house emergency and cellular equipment.
Town officials have said that that site may be the only one in the hamlet on which to place an emergency communications tower. While it remains an active proposal, the town board is revisiting another potential site, the Girl Scouts of Nassau County's Camp Blue Bay on Flaggy Hole Road.
During one of several recent town board meetings at which opponents of the Crandall Street proposal clashed with the board, Laura Bissett-Carr, Camp Blue Bay's director of camping services, suggested that a portion of the 170-acre site could house a tower tall enough to serve the hamlet's emergency and personal wireless communications needs. In 2019, the Girl Scouts executed a lease agreement with American Tower, which operates wireless and broadcast communications infrastructure, allowing it to apply to the town for a permit to replace an existing 60-foot tower at the site with a taller one that would house emergency communications equipment. Those negotiations proved fruitless, but Ms. Bissett-Carr's remarks to the board revived the site as a potential alternative to the Crandall Street location.
Cassie Colgan, a spokeswoman for Girl Scouts of Nassau County, said in an email yesterday that "American Tower is currently negotiating with the Town of East Hampton to increase the size of the tower to provide space for emergency services equipment. Girl Scouts of Nassau County supports the efforts to increase emergency services capabilities for the community surrounding Camp Blue Bay."
No board members have "weighed in on favoring the site," Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said. "It's much more likely that the politicization of this topic has inflamed people as much as anything."
He was to discuss use of that site with the chief executive of the Girl Scouts yesterday, he said on Tuesday. "I don't think anything is off the table," he said in reference to a site for the emergency communications tower. "We're looking at all possible alternatives, which is the sensible thing to do." A temporary tower could potentially be sited at Camp Blue Bay as well, he said. "We'll look at all of the options there."
Meanwhile, Councilman Jeff Bragman, who is challenging Mr. Van Scoyoc in the Nov. 2 election, issued a statement last week opposing a tower at the Crandall Street location. "The more appropriate location is Camp Blue Bay, and we now know the truth: The Girl Scouts are open to a permanent 185-foot tower, and the town should be fully capable of negotiating a reasonable agreement with American Tower, the leaseholder. Their site should provide ample room to adjust the location to avoid neighbor impacts."
"Only recently has there been a sudden rush to get something done," Mr. Bragman charged, referring to "a misleading environmental review" that was "quickly circulated and forcefully promoted" to site the tower on the Crandall Street parcel. "Instead of strong-arming one neighborhood, the town board must change course and devote its time and effort to reaching an agreement for a tower at Camp Blue Bay," he said.
Mr. Van Scoyoc likened Mr. Bragman's statement to "a press release" and "a political statement," noting that it was issued on town letterhead. "I think it's a misuse of town letterhead, politicizing the issue," he said, "which he's done all along."
Some residents around "the pit," the wooded area along Crandall Street, have accused the town board of racism, charging that the neighborhood was selected for the monopole because of its sizable immigrant population. Board members angrily pushed back at the accusation.
A 150-foot-tall tower at the Springs Firehouse, built in 2015 without site plan approval from the planning board or needed variances from the zoning board of appeals, had its building permit revoked by the zoning board, and a State Supreme Court judge dismissed a lawsuit the fire district filed against the Z.B.A. challenging that decision.
While that tower still stands and houses fire district communications equipment, board members have said that it cannot be used to complete the town's emergency communications infrastructure as it was deemed illegal. A timeline issued from Mr. Van Scoyoc's office also states that the tower is "structurally inadequate and too short to permanently house . . . town fire and police emergency communications equipment."
Residents of the Crandall Street neighborhood have also suggested that a resident of Talmage Farm Lane, near the firehouse, who was among those challenging the town's issuance of building permits, is unduly influencing the town board, citing a $5,000 campaign contribution made in 2019. The Talmage Farm Lane resident's brother is a former chairman of the East Hampton Democratic Committee.
That contribution "had no influence on me whatsoever," Mr. Van Scoyoc said, "and I'm sure the other board members would say the same thing. I think that neighborhood has been inflamed," he said of the Crandall Street residents. "They didn't understand that we have to look at any possible alternatives. It is a town-owned site which met much of the criteria."
A spokesman for American Tower did not respond to an email seeking comment.
The siting of an emergency and wireless communications tower in Springs is not on the agenda for today's town board meeting, Mr. Van Scoyoc said.
