A 144-foot cell phone tower will not be erected at the Prince of Peace United Methodist Chruch just outside Dale City.
The tower, denied by the Prince Willaim County Board of Supervisors, would have filled a gap in cell phone and data coverage in the area, serving Verizon customers.
Supervisor Marty Nohe made a motion to the deny the tower. It passed with Chairman At-large Corey Stewart being the only dissenting vote.
“I’ve heard there is a lot of concern and frustration on this. We’ve tried a couple of times to turn that around and try to give the applicant an opportunity to get that community buy-in, but that wasn’t successful…” said Nohe.
A neighboring shopping center and the Catholic church were also considered as alternative locations for the cell phone tower, but both property owners decided they didn’t want the tower on their sites.
While some spoke for the new tower, the majority spoke against the pole, calling outdated technology.
“Think about all of the changes in technology we’ve seen. He ad flip phones 10 years ago, and now we have 4G LTE phones. That’s important because we’re about to go to 5G and that’s important because things will be 1,000 times faster with 5G. Things have changed so fast, and the Prince of Peace church will sign 25 year agreement for this pole,” said resident Tim Singstock.
The Board was originally set to vote to allow or deny the pole in May. Leaders deferred the vote to allow the applicant, Calvert Crossland, to address additional concerns from the community.
