The Martha’s Vineyard Commission’s (MVC) regulatory review of a temporary AT&T antenna intended to vastly improve wireless service on Chappaquiddick for the summer months provides another example of the regional planning agency’s appetite for stretching out its review of local matters with dubious regional impact that could and ought to be left to the good judgement of local officials.
It is hard to know where members of the MVC acquire their sense of self-importance. Perhaps it is the mere fact of getting elected, or appointed, to a regional permitting authority that is empowered through the language of its enabling legislation — which gives weight to the ephemeral characteristics of Martha’s Vineyard, and which has never lost in court due to the wide latitude accorded those interpretations — to engage in whimsical decision-making wherever it sees fit to poke its nose.
MVC membership must imbue one with more clarity and judgment than the members of the Edgartown planning board, the Edgartown police chief, Edgartown fire chief, Edgartown board of selectmen, and members of the Chappaquiddick wireless committee, all of whom endorsed an offer by AT&T to erect a temporary 104-foot monopole on Chappy — and asked the MVC to get cracking.
The Edgartown planning board referred the AT&T monopole to the MVC as a development of regional impact (DRI), as it was required to do under the current draconian DRI checklist. This is the same checklist that finds a regional impact from a bowling alley in the middle of Oak Bluffs — which returns to the MVC as a supplicant this month to request permission for some operational changes — and from a hair salon on Upper Main Street in Edgartown, which is scheduled to present its landscaping plan to the MVC on Monday, under the rule that once a DRI, always a DRI — meaning there is no escape from MVC purview.
In a certified letter dated March 16 addressed to the MVC, and marked received on April 5, Edgartown planning board chairman Michael McCourt said, “The applicants [AT&T] presented a detailed plan, answered the board’s questions, and fielded questions from the audience regarding the proposed service and plans. They also emphasized the need to expedite the permitting process to meet their deadline to provide service before the beginning of the 2016 summer season.”
Mr. McCourt said, “The planning board has reviewed the application, conducted a site visit, and determined the necessity for this wireless tower service is vital to the safety of the Chappaquiddick residents and visitors. The board looks forward to the MVC returning this application/project to Edgartown for a final decision before Thursday, April 14.”
On April 7, the MVC held a public hearing to review the AT&T proposal. Edgartown Police Chief David Rossi said police radios have very limited coverage on Chappy, and improved cell coverage would considerably improve the safety of his officers and the general public.
Fire Chief Peter Shemeth said, “A better signal will save time, and save energy, and save lives.”
Selectmen Michael Donaroma said, “We’ve had a lot of meetings and looked at a lot of options, and at the end of the day, AT&T was the only one who stepped up.”
The Chappy Ferry owner and fire chief, Captain Peter Wells, said, “This is a golden opportunity to test this out. Remember, this is a temporary tower.”
Chappy wireless committee chairman Woody Filley said the committee’s campaign to improve communication on Chappy started in 2010, and included several RFPs that went unanswered, and a general lack of interest from communications companies in servicing the secluded island.
Not surprisingly, abutters opposed the tower. But none offered an alternative that had not been examined.
AT&T attorney Brian Grossman said test results determined that the antenna would increase coverage to 78 percent of Chappy, including all of the beaches. He said that the proposed antenna was temporary because it was the only way the permitting and construction could be done to provide a cell phone signal boost by Memorial Day.
“AT&T has moved as fast as I’ve seen them in all my years of doing business with them,” he told the commissioners.
Mr. Grossman said the antenna would take three weeks to build and another week to become fully operational — meaning every week was important.
And what was the MVC’s response? Commission hearing chairman Fred Hancock of Oak Bluffs and commissioner Linda Sibley of West Tisbury moved that the hearing be continued to one week to allow for an MVC site visit. Mr. Hancock described it as due diligence: another site visit, on top of the planning board site visit.
The MVC approved the antenna on April 14, and is expected to issue a written decision Thursday night.
The commissioners would have been just as diligent if they had concluded one week earlier that the parade of Edgartown officials knew what they were talking about, and that there was no need to impose themselves where they were not needed.