TO: Mayor and
City Council
From: Chuck Reed
Date: May 19, 2003
Revise
the Policy for Wireless Communications Facilities so that it includes the
following statements:
1. San Jose residents, businesses and
public safety personnel depend on wireless communications for convenience,
economic activity and security. Wireless communications are a crucial part of
our economic infrastructure, and our residents and businesses want more and
better wireless services. As the
Capital of Silicon Valley, San Jose should have a high level of wireless
service available to its residents and businesses in order to meet increasing
demands for new and better services. San Jose has a strong interest in
achieving and maintaining a high level of service and substantial competition
among service providers.
2. The
wireless industry is encouraged to continue to make major capital investments
in San Jose, and the City will work with the wireless industry to facilitate
continued improvement in wireless services while dealing with and solving
problems associated with development of the wireless infrastructure.
3. Although we anticipate that
technological changes over time will result in the replacement of large
monopoles with smaller and less visible facilities, some of the monopoles will
remain in place for their useful life. Under California law, operators have
some vested rights to continue operating existing monopoles in which they have
made substantial investments and replacement of monopoles will not be feasible
in all situations.
4. Our preference for collocation of
multiple antennas on single monopoles in order to minimize the number of
monopoles will sometimes result in the need to increase the height of
individual monopoles in order to facilitate collocation. Such changes will be
handled administratively without new conditions of approval so that ease of
processing is an incentive for collocation.
Dropped calls,
garbled conversations, crossed calls, dead spots, gaps and black holes in
wireless communications are caused by inadequate infrastructure. We need private industry to continue to make
major capital investments in San Jose to improve the wireless infrastructure so
we have better service. Our Policy should reflect our interest in having high
quality wireless services for our businesses and residents and our willingness
to work with the industry to improve wireless services and to solve problems
associated with development of the wireless infrastructure.
This matter was
on the Economic Development & Environment Committee agenda for December 2,
2002 and I made the above recommendations back in November for the committee to
consider. The item was deferred at
staff’s request and has not been considered by any other Council committee
since then so I am republishing my recommendations for Council consideration.