Why some American cities choose to say "NO" to 5G

Jack Tibbetts, a member of the Santa Rosa City Council, knew he had a problem. It was early 2018, and he began receiving calls from constituents on the political extremes. The common thread among them was that cellphone antennas were going to be installed next to their homes, raising concerns about property values ​​and health.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), a large body of evidence suggests that if RF radiation has any effect on humans, it is about the same as other "probably carcinogenic" substances such as coffee and kimchi. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), citing data from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), recently declared that existing limits on RF energy from these antennas make them safer. A senior FCC official said there is nothing unique about 5G networks that poses additional health risks.

None of this has stopped the conspiracy swirl fueled by social media that has allowed health scares to spread across the internet. Towns throughout Northern California are issuing ordinances that exclude new 5G cell towers from residential areas, citing health concerns. Legislators in four states, including New Hampshire, have introduced bills requiring further studies of health effects or urging Congress to do so. Congressman Thomas Suozzi (D-N.Y.) expressed similar concerns in a letter to the FCC.

For Tibbetts, it doesn’t matter whether these new “little box” antennas — used for 4G networks but upgradeable to 5G — going up in Santa Rosa are actually dangerous. Some of them are mounted on utility poles just 20 feet from people’s bedroom windows, and residents have complained that Verizon installed the poles without notifying them. What matters is that his constituents don’t want this unwieldy piece of public infrastructure so close to them. “I don’t want anyone to feel that way about being in their home, which is supposed to be a safe place,” Tibbetts said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if 10 years from now there’s no evidence that these towers are giving people cancer, but my job is not to protect Verizon, my job is to protect the people who live in their houses.”

Whatever residents’ arguments against new cell towers, Tibbetts — and countless mayors, governors and council members across the country — have little or no power under current rules to act on voters’ wishes. They also don’t have the wiggle room they once had to set prices for cell towers, a lucrative source of funding for citizen initiatives. Cities that are taking action are enacting regulations even if it puts them at risk of being sued by telecom companies, as happened this month in Rochester, New York.

5G, considered the key to the future of telecommunications, global competition, innovation, and even the development of municipal infrastructure, has become a focal point of debate. In addition to upgrading existing base stations, an estimated 500,000 new base stations and small cells will need to be built on utility poles, lamp posts, and buildings. Experts also expect the rollout cycle to be long, perhaps up to 10 years or more. Most cities want 5G, but they don't want to be told how, when, or at what price to get it. The FCC has passed rules designed to speed up the 5G rollout, which is likely to spark heated debate.

Game between operators and local governments

"My personal reason for doing this is that I think humanity is threatened," said Sandi Maurer, a member of the EMF Safety Network, an activist group that lobbies to reduce exposure to electromagnetic fields. In part because of that activism, many towns in Marin County, California, have passed ordinances or resolutions restricting 5G cell towers in residential areas. Towns like Mill Valley designate areas where towers are not allowed and may also require them to be a certain distance apart.

In 2018, Verizon withdrew its application to install two small cells in Sebastopol, California, without suing the city or taking the matter to the FCC. But since then, the FCC has rolled out its 5G Fast Track plan, which requires cities and states to approve new 5G antennas within 60 or 90 days. It also limits how much government leaders can charge carriers for land used for new infrastructure — whether it’s utility poles, streetlights or even building facades. The carriers like the plan.

An AT&T spokesperson referred to a statement praising the new FCC rules, saying they "will help ensure that all Americans, no matter where they live, can enjoy the benefits of the jobs, investment, and economic growth that this new technology will foster through tried and true free market incentives."

A Verizon spokesperson said, “We are looking for the right access and the right price so that we can efficiently and quickly deploy 5G to communities and the people who live and work in them.”

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and President Trump have both said widespread deployment of next-generation 5G wireless networks is critical to the U.S. An FCC spokesperson referred to the agency’s previous statement: “In order for broadband providers to enter new markets and deploy high-speed networks, access must be fast, predictable, secure, and affordable.”

City leaders say their power to zone and regulate infrastructure is being curtailed. More than 90 cities and counties have joined together in a lawsuit now before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that the FCC has overstepped its authority. A decision could come as early as spring, but it could also take longer.

Shireen Santosham, chief innovation officer for the city of San Jose, California, said the city has approved 596 cell sites, all of which can be upgraded to 5G. When the plan was implemented, San Jose signed agreements with telecom companies to build new small cells at a price of $750 to $2,500 per pole. If the cities lose the lawsuit against the Federal Communications Commission, the city of San Jose may be forced to lower the minimum fee per pole. The city's mayor, Sam Liccardo, said the city is very eager to launch a 5G network.

But like other cities, San Jose wants to be able to charge higher prices for the use of its infrastructure, not only to expedite permits for new base stations for employees but also to provide the $1 million to $2 million needed to support a project to provide broadband access to poor families. Liccardo said similar things could happen in other cities, despite FCC rules that automatically approve licenses after 60 or 90 days. He added: "Even if the federal government requires local governments to act, local bureaucracies have many ways to make it difficult to implement."

“What the wireless carriers are asking is for cities to treat them completely differently than any other entity that’s applying for a building permit,” said Blair Levin, a fellow at the Brookings Institution and former chief of staff to FCC Chairman Reed Hunter. “I think that’s going to backfire because over time you get an adversarial relationship instead of a collaborative one.”

The most typical example is the city of Rochester, which was sued by Verizon on August 8. Verizon claimed that the city's ordinance violated the Federal Communications Commission's regulations by "imposing non-cost fees on wireless carriers to deploy and maintain small wireless facilities." In other words, Verizon believes that the city's rent for utility poles where 5G antennas will be installed is too high.

"The federal framework requires nondiscriminatory access based on cost, which is what we seek," a Verizon spokesperson said. "That means federal law prohibits special treatment."

Taking a different approach to challenge operators

Health arguments are hard to get to court because the FCC has sole authority to decide whether emissions from electronic devices are safe, a right that is not in question in any current court cases or pending federal legislation.

A different — and so far more successful — strategy is to challenge carriers on the size and shape of 5G base stations.

The United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians in Oklahoma launched a legal challenge to the FCC’s current rules, and the D.C. Circuit recently ruled against the FCC, alleging, among other things, that 5G cell towers are not as small as advertised.

The new antennas are about the size of pizza boxes and are otherwise comparable to home Wi-Fi routers, industry insiders said in briefs. But the court said, especially when they sit on newly installed towers, they are so large and conspicuous that they require an assessment of their environmental impact and are subject to historic preservation regulations.

“Even if only 20 percent of small cells require new construction, as one wireless company and the FCC estimated in their briefs ... this could require as many as 160,000 densely packed 50-foot towers,” the court wrote.

Despite all the conflict, most cities are still eager for telecom companies to bring 5G to their streets, said Craig Moffett, founder and senior analyst at communications research firm MoffettNathanson.

The industry promises a truly futuristic technology that will trickle down from ubiquitous, ultra-fast wireless networks — a smarter city where your self-driving car, your AR headset and your self-emptying trash can are always online. “In retrospect, we’ll probably laugh at how stupid we were to not know what these applications were going to be used for,” Moffitt says.