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If tower stays put, city will sue
By JENNIFER FARRELL, Times Staff Writer
CLEARWATER -- The battle over a wayward radio tower, built inadvertently on city property, appears headed to court. City officials said Thursday they will sue WTAN-AM 1340 unless the radio station moves the 183-foot steel tower it erected last year, straddling city land. One leg of the "Tan-Talk" tower encroaches 5 feet onto city property, a problem planning and engineering officials say complicates construction on the new Clearwater Memorial Causeway bridge. The city is waiting for an estimate from bridge contractors, but officials insist the tower stands in the way and and will add to the project's $69-million cost. "The contractor can't work around it," said Paul Hull, assistant city attorney. "It's just come to the point where something has to be done." Radio station officials blame the city for the tower's location and do not want to move it. "They approved it where it is," said station owner Dave Wagenvoord. "We have a permit." City engineer Mike Quillen acknowledged the city issued a permit for the tower. The problem, he said, is that construction crews missed the mark. "They didn't build the tower where the permit lines showed it," he said. "They built in the wrong spot." Bob Diamond, who owns Quality Tower Erectors and Service, the Largo company that built the tower, said plans were approved by the city. "I laid the tower out, they approved it and we drilled the holes," he said. "When we staked the tower out, they said, "Okay.' " Diamond said the tower cost about $80,000 to build and would cost $65,000 to move. "You can't approve everything and okay it and sign it off and be done with it and come back and say, "Oh well, this is all wrong,' " Diamond said. But city officials dispute the Tan-Talk version. Gary Johnson, the city's public services director, said plans submitted to the city show the tower was supposed to be built about 5 feet farther west. "If he had put it where his plan showed it, we wouldn't be sitting here talking about it," Johnson said. In 2000, the city spent more than a half-million dollars to buy a sliver of land from the station to make way for the new bridge. The price was twice an appraiser's estimate of the land's value, and it included a payment to help the station move to another downtown studio and build the new tower. The city deeded another sliver of land to the station. The new tower was planned for the land. Diamond said problems began when a 5-foot-wide storm drainage pipe was discovered underground before construction. The city did not tell the station about the drain, Diamond said. Wagenvoord said crews had to work around the pipe as they sank the tower's 20-foot-deep concrete foundations. "The tower man put the tower the only place it would work," he said. "It can't go back farther." Diamond suggested the city is overreacting. "What is the big deal?" he said. "If you moved that tower back 53 inches, it isn't going to make a difference either way." But Quillen said public safety is at stake. "Somebody could reach out with a fishing pole and hit the tower," he said, "which might be a problem." City commissioners are expected to discuss the matter during a 1 p.m. workshop Monday at City Hall. -- Jennifer Farrell can be reached at 445-4160 or farrell@sptimes.com.
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