Kent Cell Tower Proposal Meets Opposition

By Rob Sample

While cell phones have become ubiquitous in American life, where the transmission towers get built can become controversial. In Kent, a proposal to build a 130-foot tower has angered residents of mostly rural Hortontown Hill Road.

Heading up the opposition is Chelsea Mulroy, who lives across the street from the tower site, along with her husband and two young daughters. Mulroy has found plenty of support in her opposition among her neighbors, other town residents, and even public officials in Kent, neighboring towns, and Putnam County as a whole.

“Ninety-five percent of the residents who live in this area are now on record as opposing it,” she said. “We had two public hearings in March and we packed the house because people feel so strongly about this. We hired Clifford Davis, an experienced land-use attorney, who said he’s never seen this much opposition to a proposal like this.”

This spring, Kent’s planning and zoning boards both held public hearings on the proposal. The ZBA will reconvene its hearing at 7 p.m. July 19, while the planning board will reconvene at 7:30 p.m. Although both are open to the public, Mulroy notes that the ZBA is the more weighted of the two boards because the plan involves five zoning variances requested by Homeland Towers, the proposed owner/operator of the site.

Homeland Towers is based in Danbury, Conn., but most of its towers are in or near the Hudson Valley. The company did not comment on the proposal.

Mulroy said she is concerned that the tower will lower property values for the entire neighborhood, and is worried about the impact that living so close to a cell tower will have on the family’s physical and mental health.

“My husband, Daniel, is a two-time cancer survivor,” she said. “The Appalachian Trail crosses my road, and we’re surrounded by Fahnestock State Park. We moved here, to this beautiful, wooded area, to heal. But if this tower gets approved, we’ll have to move.”

Kent Highway Superintendent Richard Othmer has gone on record opposing the tower and the proposed access road that would lead to it. He bases that opinion, in part, on the area’s extremely hilly topography. Hortontown Hill Road is subject to flooding and washouts during heavy rainstorms, such as those that occurred in the summer of 2023. The road had to be completely rebuilt using funding through the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“The road is surrounded by highland hills, which generate massive amounts of powerful groundwater,” said Othmer. “Any roadway constructed in this area will only serve as a sluiceway – we might as well build a watermill at the bottom. I discourage development of any type in this area.”

He further noted that the Hortontown Hill Road neighborhood is isolated from the rest of the town – which also needs to be taken into consideration. In addition, the New York State Historic Preservation Office rescinded its original approval of the tower proposal.

Putnam County Legislator Toni Addonizio, R-Kent, expressed similar views.

“My opinion, as well as that of other municipalities, is that there are a lot of drawbacks to the site and it is not a good location for this tower,” said Addonizio, who noted that the area is zoned residential-80. “The purpose of the R-80 zone is to protect the character of the district… and telecommunications is not a permitted use in an R-80 zone.”           

Mulroy’s address is technically Hopewell Junction – a hamlet that lies mainly within the Town of East Fishkill and crosses over into Kent – and East Fishkill Supervisor Nicholas D’Allessandro has also gone on record opposing the project.

“Although the tower is proposed within the Town of Kent, the site lies immediately adjacent to our municipal boundary, and the impacts will be felt disproportionately by East Fishkill residents,” he wrote in a letter to the Kent Planning Board. “We are committed to ensuring that infrastructure improvements do not come at the cost of the health, safety, and quality of life of our residents or yours.”

Both Mulroy and D’Allessandro note the nearby presence of a site atop Shenandoah Mountain – which is on land owned by the state. It is more isolated from residential areas and higher in elevation, thus providing better signal coverage.

Mulroy also questioned the need for the tower.

“In its proposal, Homeland Towers identified what it said were gaps in coverage, but it used an outdated map that did not take into account multiple towers that have gone up since it was created,” she said. “I’m not against connectivity one bit. I am against using a map that is out-of-date to put up a tower where nobody wants or needs it… We’ve consulted local realtors about the proposed tower. Most say that half their clients would not even look at a home in as close proximity as our house to a cell tower.”

Before the application can be approved, several local variances must first be issued. These include a special-use permit, multiple setback variances, a fall-zone variance, a usage variance, and a height variance.

The tower is 30 feet taller than the usual standard for such structures, Mulroy said.

The fall-zone variance would be an especially important consideration, as it calls for a radius of twice the proposed tower’s height, or 260 feet. Within that 260-foot zone there can be no structures on which the tower might fall, should it collapse. Homeland Towers needs its fall-zone variance because a set of Con Edison power lines are within that zone.

“This underscores just one of the safety drawbacks the tower would have,” said Mulroy.

She and other tower opponents took heart in the recent vote by the Yorktown Town Board not to allow Homeland Towers to build a similar tower along Granite Springs Road. But they’re keeping up their fight.

“If this tower is approved despite so many concerns about it, that will set a precedent for other areas,” she said. “So, what comes next?”