Citizens' views solicited on more cell towers at lake
Park Service seeks input on plan to add as many as six new poles
by Fred Couzens The View News

Boulder City residents and other recreational users of Lake Mead have until Saturday to comment on the environmental assessment of a plan to add as many as six cell towers within or adjacent to intensely used places within the Lake Mead National Recreation Area possibly by the end of the year.

Currently, there are three cell tower sites in use within the park: a 180-foot tower in the River Mountains across Lakeshore Drive from the Alfred Merritt Smith Water Treatment Plant, a 125-foot tower at Overton Beach and a 60-foot tower at Callville Bay.

"The primary purpose of this plan is to enhance communications within high-use areas of the park and to improve emergency response, visitor satisfaction, and employees' and residents' contact with outlying areas," the assessment states. "This plan intends to serve the interests of the public, concessioners (sic), and National Park Service employees by accommodating applications to provide cellular service in developed areas of the park. Lake Mead NRA receives numerous requests from Federal Communications Commission licensees to construct cell towers within the park to enhance communications and fulfill responsibilities associated with the FCC license."

It goes on to say, "In addition, Lake Mead NRA receives letters and comments from the public requesting that cellular service be made available within the park for safety and enjoyment purposes ... This plan would determine locations within the park where cellular service is desirable and appropriate, and ascertain the minimum tower height needed to provide the desired area coverage while minimizing impacts to park resources."

The 58-page document gives an assessment of where, how and why cell towers would be placed in certain locations, a description of the three alternatives -- no action and facilities up to 125 feet and up to 200 feet -- as well as looking at a number of environmental factors, such as soils and vegetation, wildlife, special status species and cultural resources.

Under the No Action option, no new sites would be approved, co-location on existing towers would be considered and approved until the towers reached capacity and, because of the size of the park, some areas would continue to go without coverage.

The preferred alternative in the eyes of many, a 125-foot-maximum tower, initially was determined to have the least impact on natural, cultural and historic resources.

Potentially acceptable sites would be those with previously disturbed land in proximity to existing access roads and utilities -- basically, places that see a lot of visitors -- and would be consistent with the park's plans.

Under this preferred alternative, the document states, "The NPS would consider proposals for new cell tower construction at Boulder Beach, Echo Bay, and Temple Bar on Lake Mead and Willow Beach, Cottonwood Cove and Katherine's Landing on Lake Mohave."

The footprint for each site would be 2,500 square feet -- no larger than 50 feet by 50 feet -- to accommodate not only the tower, but also associated support equipment shelters or trailers.

Each building would hold the equipment for the primary carrier and up to three more carriers, which would all be encouraged to enter into joint ventures for co-location.

"We would try to put them in where visitors congregate," said Mike Boyles, a NPS environmental compliance specialist, who helped write the assessment and noted stealth characteristics would not apply. "Palm trees really aren't indigenous to this area, so they would be somewhat obvious. These would all be in developed areas where there are already power lines and poles. The hope is that even though these would be taller, they won't stand out as much."

The other alternative -- the up to 200-foot tower that would be approved for the same six locations -- was rejected because it didn't offer any appreciably greater coverage than the 125-foot tower.

Two alternatives also were considered but were eliminated for different reasons.

A shorter option of allowing towers up to 100 feet was kicked out because there would not be effective co-location possibilities, resulting in what would be a greater number of sites that would provide a negative visual impact.

Yet another choice, towers more than 200 feet, wasn't considered because it, too, would have a visual impact, but it would also have to have lighting for aircraft purposes "and lighted towers can disrupt the orientation of migrating birds," the assessment states. Also, guide wires would be required, which "increase the risk of bird collisions."

Table 2 in the assessment provides a chart that compares the long-term impacts from the three alternatives and shows the 125-foot and 200-foot alternatives would have the same impacts, except that when it comes to "visual resources," the shorter tower would provide "moderate adverse impacts," where the higher tower would have "moderate to major adverse impacts."

Boyles said there currently are four carriers -- Verizon, Nextel, T-Mobile, and AT&T, which was formerly Cingular Wireless -- with AT&T the only carrier actively seeking additional sites at this time.

He said there would be more, which is why it's important to have a plan in place to address the potentially increasing need.

"This will go into effect after the comment period ends; we look at the comments and see if we need to address any of them," Boyles said. "Once that's done, the regional director can sign off on the document in a couple of weeks," which would implement the plan.

Those interested in viewing the environmental assessment can go to the NPS Web site at http://www.nps.gov/lame/parkmgmt/docs.htm and on the NPS park planning Web site at http://parkplanning.nps.gov/.

Comments, which must be made by Saturday, can be made directly to the park planning Web site or delivered to Lake Mead NRA, Attention: Compliance Office, 601 Nevada Way, Boulder City, NV 89005.

Boulder City’s trash is one man’s treasure

Entrepreneur seeking council’s blessing to turn garbage into energy, money

Entrepreneur Mike Little has been trying to get his hands on Boulder City’s trash for eight months.

He hopes he’s now close to getting 50 tons of it, which he’s confident he can convert into cash.

On Tuesday, Little will attend the City Council meeting, at the invitation of Councilman Travis Chandler, to pursue the next step: getting city support to apply for a permit from the Southern Nevada Health District that would allow construction of a small trash-to-energy plant near the city landfill.

Little, president of Landfill Alternative, told the Boulder City Council in January that trash can be mechanically digested into compost that produces methane gas, which, in turn, can fuel a power generator.

He says rural Boulder City is an ideal place for his pilot project. The city landfill is nearly full and in need of a $5 million expansion — or a new one needs to be built. Little says he would save the city that expense because he would reduce the waste stream that needs to be buried.

Little is not asking the city for any money for the project. Just the garbage.

•••

Greg Danz emerged from Wednesday’s North Las Vegas redevelopment meeting with a blueprint in his hand and a smile on his face.

The owner of the Broadacres Swap Meet will be moving forward with plans to add an amphitheater and other facilities to the property on Las Vegas Boulevard North.

An overflow crowd turned out for the meeting, including hundreds of vendors who saw the fight to expand as a battle to keep their businesses. Danz was asking to be exempted from required 30-foot setbacks, as new codes require, because vendor spaces would be lost.

After the city Planning Commission turned him down, Danz successfully appealed to the City Council last week.

Danz said work will begin soon on improvements to the 31-year-old flea market as he made his way through swarms of well-wishers on his way to a celebratory dinner.

More than 20,000 people and 1,100 vendors attend the meet during busy weekends.

For George Moen, who has sold tools at the meet for 20 years, the decision brought a sigh of relief.

“It feels good,” he said as he strolled out of City Hall. “You’re under a lot of pressure when you’re trying to figure out your future.”

The future for Moen will be keeping his spot just inside the chain-link fence running along Las Vegas Boulevard North.

•••

The saga over allowing Boyd Gaming to build a casino near Interstate 215 and Losee Road in North Las Vegas will continue for about 90 days, at least.

A public hearing for the proposed gaming enterprise district in the undeveloped section of the growing city that began Wednesday has been continued until Nov. 5.

About 200 people wearing bright yellow “No More Casinos” buttons attended the meeting, some waiting outside in the heat for two hours for the chance to be heard. Others said the casino would bring entertainment and dining to the northern section of the city.

Boyd is asking to move previously approved casino plans from Centennial Parkway and Lamb Boulevard to the new site, part of the planned 60,000-resident Park Highlands community. Preliminary construction has begun.

The city’s decision on the 68-acre Boyd site will set the standard for gaming north of Interstate 215 in North Las Vegas. One casino, Aliante Station, is under construction about 3 1/2 miles west of the proposed Boyd casino, and is expected to open this year.

Station Casinos also owns 54 acres adjacent to the Boyd site. That area has not been approved for gaming, although a proposal is moving through city government.

City answers call for more dispatchers

Adding two new police dispatchers might not sound like a big deal, but for the five dispatchers at the Boulder City Police Department now on duty who are doing the job of eight, the extra personnel will be a huge relief.

The Police Department had fallen short of meeting its goal of having two police dispatchers on duty at any one time because of two vacancies and a dispatcher on extended sick leave.

"It's definitely minimum staffing, so we don't want to fall below five," Deputy Police Chief John Chase said. "If we absolutely have to, we have two trained officers, Jen Ford and Tiffany Driscoll, who can dispatch in a pinch. In fact, Ford was a dispatcher before she became an officer."

The department duty roster's loss earlier this year of dispatcher Sandy Anderson, who is waging a battle against cancer, added to the other dispatchers' woes of having enough coverage during the day, swing and graveyard shifts. Anderson is on an indefinite leave of absence.

"With us being short-staffed sometimes, it can be pretty hectic around here," said Rose Sandoval, a graveyard shift dispatcher.

To address the situation, the department currently is in the process of hiring one new dispatcher from Texas, with yet another hiring expected to occur in coming months, according to Chase.

"The applicant from El Paso has had her background check completed and we've offered her the job of dispatcher," Chase said. "She's done dispatching before and wants to relocate to Southern Nevada. We have a couple of other viable applicants who are from California and Alaska and are still in background checks. The applicant from Alaska worked there with the same computer system as we have that was installed last September."

The attempt to increase the number of dispatcher jobs to eight within the Communications Bureau has not been easy despite the increased need for personnel.

According to the 2007 fiscal year budget, there were six full-time dispatchers and one part-time dispatcher in approved positions and a request was put in to hire one more dispatcher. City Manager Vicki Mayes denied that request for the $58,879 position despite the department's justifying remarks that said, "(The dispatcher's) workload has increased over the years. Whenever one is sick, on vacation or in training, we have no one to cover."

Mayes, instead, approved call back and overtime pay for dispatchers that was far less than a full-time dispatcher's pay.

Then, in the fiscal 2008 budget, for the bookkeeping year that ended June 30, 2008, Mayes approved the creation of an eighth dispatcher position after Police Chief Tom Finn said in his budget request, "Vacations and sick days create an overtime issue and the need for meal breaks and bathroom breaks forces an officer to come off the road to cover the desk. Additionally, a recent 21 percent increase in uniformed officers due to the 'More Cops' funding program has proportionately increased the dispatcher's workload. Since the dispatchers provide services for police, fire and EMS calls, it is essential that the bureau be fully staffed by eight dispatchers."

The total of eight includes Anderson's position, which will remain unmanned indefinitely while she remains on sick leave, meaning that seven dispatchers will share the workload after two new employees join the staff.

Not only was a $61,074-a-year (the salary is $42,067 with $19,007 in benefits) position created for the 2008 fiscal year, but Mayes also approved $18,000 in overtime pay and $14,000 in call-back pay for dispatchers in the last fiscal year.

Both years, the request for a new dispatcher's position was the Police Department's No. 1 priority, putting it ahead of cars, computers, Tazers and other items needed to be replaced or acquired for effective law enforcement.

For the current fiscal year, covering the period from July 1, 2008, to June 30, 2009, no additional funds for dispatcher positions were requested; however, Mayes again approved $20,000 for overtime pay and $15,600 in call-back pay.

According to a set of performance indicators for the dispatchers, the budget shows 92,279 calls are expected to be received this year, a 4.7 percent jump over the last fiscal year; 6,264 contacts with citizens are expected, an 18.5 increase from last fiscal year; and calls for service are anticipated to be 29,711, up 4.8 percent from FY 2008.

The dispatcher's position pay starts at $22.19 per hour. All new Police Department employees have to be certified to a 12-month probation period.