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A towering debate
By TIM GRANT © St. Petersburg Times, published November 26, 2000 LAKE MAGDALENE -- Despite an intense and organized effort, homeowners on Indian Mound Road have lost the first round of their fight to keep a 150-foot cell phone antenna tower out of their neighborhood. As they get ready to appeal a land use hearing officer's Oct. 20 decision, the residents have launched a letter-writing campaign asking local and state government officials to help them block the tower. "It is our contention that this structure . . . will be too imposing in our residential neighborhood," the letter reads. APT/VoiceStream Wireless has asked for a special use permit to build an antenna tower on 39 acres now being used as an orange grove on Indian Mound Road. Earl Stover, a former resident who lived on the property, has reached an agreement to lease a 90-foot-square section of his land to VoiceStream for the tower and related equipment. Neighbors said they have tried to persuade Stover to back out of the deal or at least relocate the tower so that it wouldn't be as visible. But Stover said in an earlier interview that he will not change his plans and that he decided to place the tower closer to his former neighbors in order to avoid a legal fight with wealthy residents in the nearby Avila subdivision. Stover could not be reached for comment this week. For a neighborhood that once required all utility lines be installed underground, residents say, a cellular tower would be a blight on the natural skyline they've taken some pride in preserving. All of the neighbors on Indian Mound Road and Teepee Drive have argued that the tower would hurt their property values and quality of life. But they say none would be affected more than Betty Leonard, a 69-year-old disabled retired school system employee who owns the parcel closest to the proposed tower. The tower would be 50 feet from the 5 acres Leonard has owned for 47 years. She said as a single mother of five, she worked full time as a school secretary and up to five part-time jobs to make the $53 a month mortgage. She is counting on the money she would get from the sale of that land for her retirement nest egg. "I'm upset. I'm practically devastated," Leonard said last week. "I don't even have any burial insurance anymore. I figured whatever would come from the property, which was a good investment, would keep my children from having to take care of me." Leonard's son, Phillip Dossier, is a lawyer for the Holland & Knight firm in Orlando. He spoke on his mother's behalf at the October hearing. "I want you to understand that my mother . . . is a fiercely-independent, self-sufficient person," he said. "She vowed that she would die on this piece of property. She finds now in her old age she cannot live up to that vow. . . . That means she would have to sell. . . . It is all she has in her life." Dossier argued it will sell for less if the tower is next door. According to county records, the land is assessed, for tax purposes, at $51,250 while her two-story frame house, mostly hidden by trees and vines, is assessed at about $27,000. Indian Mound resident Gina Vega has led the community's opposition to the tower. She thinks the hearing master did not consider the abundant evidence presented to support their case. "We gave them case law, engineers' testimony, alternate locations, alternate types of towers," Vega said. "We made factual arguments to show the company does not even need a new tower in this coverage area." - To reach Tim Grant call 226-3471, or e-mail him at grant@sptimes.com.
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From the Times |
