Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: To House Energy and Digital Infrastructure. It's Thursday, January 15, and we are continuing our discussion of age five twenty seven, an act relating to extending the sunset of 30 BSA section two forty eight a. We are here today with Annette Smith from Vermonters for Clean Environment. I'm representative Kathleen James from Manchester.

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: Richard Bailey, Lamoille two. Chris Morrow, Windham, Windsor, Bennington. Michael Southworth, Caledonia two. Christopher Howland, Rutland four.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: Bram Kleppner, Chittenden 13, Burlington.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Great. And rep Campbell is on his way. I don't know where Victoria is, and rep Sibilia is out of town. In the room, who do we have? Claire Buckley from Leone Public Affairs for CTIA.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: John Bram Kleppner from Monter for Clean Environment. Allison Essex,

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: from Monter for Clean Environment.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: Daniel Lane Perry from New Crassinger.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Great. And

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Scott Campbell from Saint Johnsburg.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Alright. For the record, thank you for joining us.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Thank you for having me. My name is Smith. I'm executive director of the Modern Spirkening Environment. I don't think I've been before this committee before. Brief introduction, the Modern Spurfing Environment was formed in 1999 to address a natural gas public funding pipeline project proposed for Bram and Bennington Counties. I never expected to continue doing this work. Twenty six years later, my first time in this building was before the House Commerce Committee on section two forty eight in January 2000 when there was a proposal to eliminate the need clause from Section two forty eight in order to enable the gas power movers. So I have a long history. What we do at the Monitors for a Clean Environment is to help our communities have a say in what goes on in our communities, hold corporations accountable for their actions in our communities. And overall, we prefer collaboration to litigation. And I've tried to bring people together for the sake of the Bruce. I will also add, I am not a lawyer. So I wanna make that very clear because I was brought under criminal investigation by the attorney general's office in 2016 alleging that by assisting people with the Public Utility Commission, I was practicing law without license. And so just I don't give advice. I don't give legal advice. I'm not here to give you legal advice. And I do not do that when I assist people with the Public Utility Commission. What I'm going to do today is to answer the question what is Section two forty eight from the perspective of the community and the people who live with it. And so I'm going to take you through the process just as I have done in numerous towns. I've presented to the Manchester Select Board, to the Marshfield Select Board. I've done this a number of times. It is a very extensive process. So I hope to get through it all. And what I'd like to do, because I want to make this as understandable as possible, is I would like the three of you to be a select board. Three member select board that meets once a month. The three of you are a quorum of your five member planning commission. And representative James, you are the, staff person for the regional planning commission. And it's your job to deal with the project review committee that meets once a month. You meet meet once a month. And the the project review committee that reviews the advanced notices and the the petitions then makes recommendations that have to be approved by the full commission. And I was gonna have the citizens be those other legislators. So I guess if senator Campbell comes back, he can be one of them. But we've got a couple citizens here. So we will have Allison be the neighbor who is very concerned about the health effects because Tower is proposed 500 feet from her house. And she has small children, one of whom's autistic and had health issues and this is very concerning. And John is very worried. He has a really nice house with gorgeous mountain views and the tower would be between his house and the mountain views. And he's he's really wealthy too. And so he's concerned about his property values. And Representative Howland, you've been chair of this Select Board for fifty years. Representative Kleppner, you're the leasing landowner. You're on the Select Board, but you're leasing the site for the tower. And representative Torre, you're you're relatively new to the select board and you're a one. So okay? And and I'm not asking you to do role play. I just I'm trying to set the table for who the players are in this process. So I've I've given you a set of slides. I'm not gonna this is not a PowerPoint presentation. These are reference slides. You've asked a lot of questions. There are a lot of answers in here. I may refer to them. I also found my testimony from 2023 and from 2020. And I've provided that in one sheet of paper which you can access online and have links in it. It also has links to all of the contested cases in the last few years. So we are here to talk about Section 248A. Section two forty eight a is one of the most prescriptive statutes that we have. And so when I am assisting a community, my answer is when in doubt go to the statute. So your your community has received an advance notice for a 140 foot telecom tower that is in an area that is very close to someone's home and has an aesthetic effect and you have never heard of Section two forty eight AFI. We have no experience with PHC. I have never been to a community that has an experience with PHC. So this is all new to everyone. And so your select board meets once a month. Well, you get the advance notice. Do you put it on the agenda? Sometimes do, sometimes don't. But the citizens who got the advance notice realized maybe they found me. Well, you need to see that because what happens on the town level in advance notice period is really critical to the whole process. It's a process where it is not about the PUC at all. PUC doesn't pay any attention to the advance notices except that they have a portal and an ePUC where comments can be submitted. And those comments are to the developer, not to the PUC. But everybody's like, well, we wouldn't tell the PUC. Do you think it is? No. In the advance notice, you're just telling the developer. So it's the opportunity for the community and the developer to work together. Now if you do nothing, nothing happens because the developer doesn't come to you. You've gotten this paperwork. That's all you've gotten. And so it's entirely on the the responsibility of the municipality to reach out and take action. And so one of the first things that I do is I go to the statute, and I do a search for municipal. The word municipal appears 28 times. Now the standard reaction of a select board is there's nothing we can do. Decided to staple. Well, that's actually not true. As you heard when Ellen took you through the statute, the municipality can, during the advance notice days, ask the developer to attend a meeting. You can ask the developer or ask the Department of Public Service to attend the meeting so that they hear what happens at the meeting and they can use that to assist them in their comments. You can ask the Department of Public Service during the advance notice period to, hire an outside expert to look at, colocation and issues like that. I've seen one town do that. But unless you do that, and nobody knows who to contact or what to do, but you do get in the advance notice packet a piece of paper called rights and opportunities that actually is a very good review of what is in the statute that municipal legislative bodies can do. May of the commencement of sixty day notice process request department of petitioner's expense to retain experts attend a public hearing during the sixty day notice period, have that based on their comments. And so the Planning Commission, what is your role? Well, I don't know. We run a tower there. It you know, people want more cell service. But wait a minute. Does it the neighbors? God, this is really do a number on them. No. Your role is to evaluate your plan. This is not an opinion piece. This is to go through your town plan. Does it comply or doesn't it? What's the role of your telecom bylaw? Representative Bailey, you've been on this planning commission for twenty five years. So you've been around since the beginning of section 248A. Oh, the bylaw doesn't apply. And you asked the other day about zoning. Well, okay, zoning doesn't apply. But as the statute says, your recommendation can be based on the town plan and also on your telecommunications body. Though it's very unclear, I have heard from at least three different long time planners, our bylaw is superseded and we can't talk about it. No, you can't give a you are required to give a permit based on your bylaw. But the standards that a lot of towns have in place for your bylaw do matter. So you could have a planning commission working on reviewing your bylaw. You could have a select board. I'm not sure what your role is at this point. You could hold a public meeting. That's that's really what you wanna do. The town that I've worked with who has done it the best is Worcester. They got an application from an industrial tower and wireless. They found me somehow. And I said, a lot of times what happens is the town invites in the company, and they just kind of take over the meeting. And I call it a dog and pony show. I've been through so many of these things on so many issues. I I really find it hard to sit through them. But what's best to do is hold your public meeting first with and hear what their questions are and hear what the issues are. And and then hold your next meeting and invite the applicant. But don't let them take over the meeting. You run the meeting and ask them the questions that you have and that have been generated at your meeting. And they did that. And it was a much better experience than what I've seen. For instance, when Verizon came to Manchester for a tower. People were very frustrated by what typically happens is that they take a long time in their presentation. They set up through one in ten minutes last summer. It was really, really hard to sit through. They go on and on and on. I said, really I need to set the time limit of thirty minutes because they don't need to chew up that much time. Oh, no. They just take forever to go through the materials. It was 90 degrees. It was a hot humid day. There was no air conditioning. And then people would ask questions. And then they take another long period of time to answer the questions. And so the public's voice doesn't get heard. Sometimes limit that you can only ask questions. You can't make statements. People want the opportunity to share the information they have. Oh, and by the way, Allison, the PUC doesn't care about health issues. You can't talk about health issues. That's preemptive. John, the PUC doesn't look at property values. So even though that you might have evidence that they reduce property values 15 or 20%, sorry, that's not of interest. Okay. And and I'm being a little chaotic here because it's a little chaotic at this point. Allison's freaked out. She's not sleeping. She is like, I'm gonna have to move, and I don't know where I'm gonna move to. It's very stressful for the people who are affected. And I've seen young families, I've seen elderly people with heart issues that lived in the same house for fifty years. It is something that is done without any advance notice to the community. Now you asked a question yesterday about leases and landowner leases. These companies go out prospecting work sites, and they'll get turned down by a lot of landowners. And then they'll find a landowner who will lease the site. Now there's no transparency around that. I have concerns about the the equity of these leases and are people being taken advantage of? Or some people getting, I don't know, $2,000 and some people getting I heard in one case in one town that three land two or three landowners turned down over $200,000. Now I don't know if that's for the whole life of the thing or if it's for a month, but the the case in Worcester was interesting and and unique. That after hearing the community input, the landowner chose not to proceed because the the tower was 350 feet from the home of a man who had a brain damaged daughter. And the community rallied around this neighbor. And so even though you couldn't talk about the health issues, everybody realized this was just too close, including the landowner who had had a a lawyer, his own lawyer, look at the lease. And so he got out of it. That that was industrial tower and wireless. Since then, I'm aware of two situations where the land the leasing landowner has said they wanted to get out of the lease, but there were penalties in it that they would have to pay all the penalties and that there was no way they could get out of the lease. So I don't I've seen leases for solar projects and wind projects, and I look at them and I think nobody should really sign these without a lawyer looking at them because they're they're they're giving away rights. The leases all protect the rights of the company and not the they don't have any protections for the rights of the people. I'm also aware of three situations at least, where the neighbors who have come out in opposition to the tower have been subject to threats and bullying by the leasing landowner. And some of it is pretty scary. There's one instance with a somebody had to take out of a restraining order or something. I mean, it's it it sets up a community dynamic, all of which is done without any collaboration with the community. These companies seem totally unwilling to come in in advance and meet with the community and say, hey, we we recognize that you could use some self-service here. We'd like to do a tower. Could we work together? That is not part of the equation at all. And I want to respond to what Ryan said about how a collaborative AT and T is yesterday. I've set that aside, but I'll come back to it. So now we are at the advanced notice phase. We've had public hearing. We've had the presentation by the developer. The public has said things. And then in best case scenario, the planning commission has got a chance to review your plan. Now you only need once a month, and this is a sixty day notice period. And, well, you didn't even really realize what you were supposed to do at your first meeting. And so now you have another meeting. And as long as there's a process going on in the town level, it does appear that the companies will hold off on filing. The sixty day notice period means that they cannot file a petition up until day 61. But they have for then until a hundred and eighty days to file their petition. And at a hundred and eighty one days the advance notice expires. And then so I've seen some petitions filed in on day one seventy nine. I've seen some filed on day 61. If nothing happens on the town level, you're more likely to get it on day 61. And if something happens on the town level, like in Wallingford right now, there's an advance notice and they're not holding the hearing until January 20. And it's on day 70 something. So I haven't seen a petition yet, but if they file then they then it will probably be after they've had a chance to get comments from the town. Now the state agencies also

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Annette, I'm sorry. We lost

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: your screen. I know. And it just says workplace and it's going on and on. Isn't technology fun?

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: The document that you have up on the screen that's available to show, you know, what you can do, are you gonna did you submit this, Stephanie? I didn't see it in your packet.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: It's all in this everything that I'm showing you in the links is all linked for instance there's a page of links.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: It'd be helpful if you could submit that document separately just for folks who might

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: not have the time to check out all the links. Yeah, it says it says telecom databases and it has the

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Okay. So

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: if you wanna hold on a minute, I'll see if I can get back on the Zoom. So the agency of natural resources is always submits comments, but they do not submit them in the PUC. So if I wanna get them and share them with the citizens, I write to Billy Coster. And Billy will send them to me. I don't know why. I guess I lost the Internet. That's why.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Wait, wait, Percept. Can we

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: get back on if you want? This is no Internet.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Hawks is our room okay?

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: It's the house. Okay. Yeah. I just got I'm on. I got kicked off.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: So Okay.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: I think I'm on now. So I don't know what the other state agencies do, but often, it's important to find out what the agency's position is. I will say that the agency is doing, I would say, a bare minimum on these cases. And so it is not something that you can count on. I've been very disappointed in all the state agencies in these cases. Kicked off the. Alright. Thanks. Could not rejoin. Try moving to the cloud wireless router. The department of historic preservation is if there's artifacts on the ground, you'll get some activity there. It's archaeological. But in terms of protecting our state's historic resources for scenic aspects, it's just not happening. So the advanced notice phase Trying to avoid technical difficulties. Well, not. So oh, well. We'll try again in a minute. At at some point, the advance notice phase will end. You may have sent your comments. I have I have, lined up to show you the comments that Tim was sent. That said, it doesn't comply with our town plan or our bylaw, and so the project should be denied. And they filed anyway. And so then then the petition gets filed. Now what's a petition? Many times in dealing with not only these telecom projects, but also in the solar projects, people will say they speak a different language. Petition is an application. There are many parts of this PUC process that are so foreign to the public. The first very first solar case we were involved in, the the neighbors had intervened on their own. And then they got a call from their attorney from the attorney for the developer and said, well, you missed your deadline for pre filed testimony. And they said, well, the schedule said for non petitioning parties to submit pre filed testimony. And she said, we've always been called interveners. We didn't know that meant us. There are many, many examples. Get on. But I don't have your Probably Laura. Thanks. Okay. So when the petition is filed, that's when the the first thirty day process happens. So we've we've been through the advanced notice process. It is very difficult on the community level to do what is required within that period or to even get people to do anything. You have a a citizen's room who is very concerned and may be going to every meeting and there may be special meetings. Your planning commission may actually be working together to try and come up with something. But on the other hand, to do that in the time frame, because you may be exchanging drafts and things, which is kind of a violation of the open meeting law. But, hey, you know, at least you're trying. And so then let's say you gave your comments to the petitioner, and then the petition gets filed. And you are then waiting for the hearing officer, Greg Faber, who is the hearing officer on every case to determine that it's complete. Once it's complete, then that's when the thirty day clock starts ticking.

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: Another thirty days?

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Yeah. So you've been in a sixty day period. The advance notice is over. Now it's in the thirty day period. And that's where it gets really confusing. And one of the things that has happened in the last few years is we have a lot more contested cases. When I was before the prior committee in 2023, there were very there were maybe one or two, maybe one contested case. Up until that point, there just hadn't been any. There was one in 2017. And it was around that time that AT and T was doing a big build out on the FirstNet. And AT and T seemed to be doing everything possible to avoid having a contested case. And so I was involved in a number of towns where they found that the project was way too close to schools, people's homes, and they didn't comply with the town plan. And AT and T would find another old location. Then Granville came along, and that one that didn't happen. That became hard fought. You were told yesterday by AT and T that that was the first NET project that wasn't done. They got their CPG in 2024. So their project is done. The project that is out there is paneled and that one is a very upsetting project from my perspective of what it's doing to the neighbors. So we have not had a prospect an opportunity to understand the pitfalls of Section 248 A until the last few years when there have been more contested cases. So we've now had Eniesburg, And Enisberg was denied by the PUC based on the recommendation of the Regional Planning Commission. Alright. Does the Regional Planning Commission intervene? Does the town intervene? Because the statute says you submit recommendations. So the original planning commission didn't have a dream. They submitted a recommendation. The statute doesn't say when the recommendations have to be filed. Now on the EPUC, there's a schedule. And the schedule will say at the thirty day date, so you'll know when the date is, comments. Sometimes it'll say, as Greg did yesterday, comments, motions to intervene, notices of intervention. But nowhere does it refer to recommendations, which is what's in the statute. And so what has come out of these recent contested cases, including Westmore and Tinman, is that there is no process set up for what to do with the pound recommendations. EPUC has a a drop down menu where you click on select all, and you can file your motions to intervene. You can file comments. You can file a public comment. But the owners should say recommendations. So some towns will intervene, some towns won't. Regional planning commissions never intervene. But this statutory citation is that these recommendations will be given substantial deference that create a rebuttable presumption unless there is some greater public good that can be found. So what we found in the Westmore case was that the town, which had a select board where the leasing landowner was on the select board, creating a very challenging situation and social dynamics in the town. They did not intervene, but they did the planning commission finally did get it together and filed their what they called testimony. And then the select board read what they had the evaluation of their compliance with the town plan and the telecom bylaw. And then the four members of the Select Board, by then they had expanded the Select Board. Four members often voted to recommend to deny the tower because it didn't comply. The the planning commission tried to intervene after the thirty day period and was denied. The applicant then filed a motion to eliminate a strike, all the public comment because the recommendation had been filed as a public comment because there's no place in the drop down menu to put it. And so we all realize there's no process for filing recommendations. There's nothing in any of the guidance documents of the PUC that say what the deadline is or that the thirty days is a deadline for recommendations. Then in the Timmith case, because they learned from Westinworth, they did it all right. They got their advance notice coming to the town, from the town to the PUC, then they got their recommendation in by day 30, recommended it did not comply with our town plan. It did not comply with our bylaw, recommend denying it. And the applicant got very upset saying that there's no process for responding to this. So both sides and both of these were industrial tower and wireless. Both sides have said there's no process at the PUC for how to deal with these recommendations. Yet they are given substantial deference. Now this is one part of the problem, but I want to highlight it because as you are thinking about extending it or making it permanent, it's really important to understand that this problem has only surfaced in the last few months and even within the last year. And it was not realized before because the the system hadn't been tested. Now Greg said yesterday that because it it sunsets every three years, they haven't even done rulemaking. And that's really the problem is that because the statute doesn't address the process for recommendations. And even though there are guidance documents, if you do a search of them, the word recommendation doesn't even show up. How did how do you know? How does the town know that they must get the recommendation in by day 30? Even if they can because is it enough time if they if they just didn't know to do anything in the advanced grace period, and then they have to get a recommendation in. I mean, it's a it's a system that is not well thought out or well designed to make it possible for a town to participate in the way that that the statute envisioned. I wanna give a lot of credit, I think, the senate finance committee, which has jurisdiction over this in the senate for I think they are the ones that have been responsible for assuring that the towns have a voice in this process. However, I'm here to tell you that that hasn't that that process that's set out in statute is not working, and it has to be fixed. Now that's aside from the larger problem with the rest of the Public Utility Commission process. I I think you may have been given or how it had the document that is the flowchart of what the process is at the PUC. So I'm gonna take you through that now. The petition's filed. What happens next? You get to day 30. It's the deadline for notices of intervention. So let's say everybody's on the hall and you get your notices of intervention. The town gets its recommendation. But there's also a comment that's separate from the recommendation. The comment needs to be needs to show that the project raises substantive issues that require a hearing. That's what I always thought the thirty day period was for. So are there issues? And you can't just say, we want a hearing. And you can't just say, well, this has got problems. You need to be able to present something that shows that you are prepared to put on a case. And they can deny hearing or they can grant a hearing. And so then the other thing that happens is the motions to intervene. The citizens file motions to intervene. The town has a form. They can file a notice of intervention. And the select board and the planning commission are two separate entities. And Rochester, on Monday, we had the deadline of thirty days. The town and the select board each filed their own notice of intervention. Now the town, when you're dealing with boards, who's gonna represent the select board in the planning commission? You have to figure that out. Or should the town hire a lawyer? Okay. Well, who has 20 to $50,000 kicking in? Is that in the budget? Because that's what this process costs. This is a very legalistic process. Motion to intervene has a form too. Motion to intervene form is a little challenging. It has two boxes on the front and two boxes on the back. And the two boxes on the front say for parties of right, and you can name the statute or you can just list things. But this is very rare, and I have no idea what party of right is. So I just tell people to turn on the back. And then the two boxes on the top are you can intervene by statute, if you can figure out the statute, or you can intervene by issue. So you can write a list. I want to intervene on aesthetics. Now neighbors only get standing on aesthetics and compliance with the municipal and regional plan. I I think somebody yesterday mentioned orderly development of the region, but that actually is not part of section two forty eight a. It is part of section two forty eight. Oh, I should add that in section two forty eight, there is an A, but it's in parentheses. So you have section two forty eight in little parentheses, and you also have section two forty eight which is a separate part of the statute. This is very confusing to people. The the form for filing a motion to intervene has a limited amount of space, so you can add a narrative. And so I handled a lot of these on Monday where people write a narrative that talks about their opposition to the project. And I have to explain, no. This is about your property interest. So, you know, people complain about NINBIs. No. You have to be a NINBY in order to intervene. And you can't talk about property values, and you can't talk about health effects. You need to talk about, can you see it from your property? How is your particularized interest affected? And so some people just use the form and state it that way. Some people write a longer narrative, and then you have to file these things. So you go to e p u c, and you click on the select all menu, and then you use the drop down menu, file motion intervene, but you start filling that out. But then, oh, you have to add a person to the system. So you leave that page. And I have had phone calls from people at 03:30 in the afternoon on the day of the deadline, practically in tears. They tried for two hours to try and figure out how to file these things. And there's some people who try and do it themselves and they just get so frustrated. I have excellent secretarial skills. It doesn't matter who files. Or you have to create an account too first. So I just say, send them to me and I'll file them for you because nobody knows who files these things except the cloak. And so I end up on this crunch deadline, the day of the deadline is there people intervening. And but then people want to file public comments too. Well, okay. So they go to the public to to case page, and on the left is something that says public comment. So some people think they should use that, but that doesn't really get so then instead, you use the drop down menu and you click on public comment. And I've had a few people recently say, but I do that, but then it says at the top the case number and all that, and I can't fill it in, but it doesn't say it's there. So how do I know that it's the right case? And I say, if you're starting with the page and you click on public comment, it's okay. It will go to that page. It's one piece of confusion after another after another. So, we've gotten public comment, we've gotten the motions to intervene, we've gotten the notice of intervention. And now that we know, you have to do your recommendation within thirty days or else the PDC will strike it. What happens next? So now we're going to the actual process.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Oh, I know.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: I'm sure. Hearing officer will issue an order setting a date for a scheduled conference. The scheduling conference is preceded by, hopefully, not always, but the applicant sends out a draft schedule. Now you heard some things yesterday about the shot clock. And these companies are claiming that there's a hundred and fifty day shot clock, and Greg explained that very well yesterday. So he's like, well but Industrial Tower Wireless, which is a new company to go on, has sued the PUC three times in the Iowa case, the Ennis Kerr case, and the Westmore case, while the case is going off, which is very disconcerting to the public. Now the PUC is being sued in federal court by this company saying they're not acting fast enough, and so you better you better issue this permit for us because they're not doing it according to the law. The scheduling conference is often a schedule proposed by the applicant that is so ridiculous that nobody could do it. There would be no due process. I've seen a couple of those recently. And then the Department of Public Service will come up with a schedule and that the the citizens don't really know what a schedule looks like or what it should look like. Now there's standards that you see. There's generally two weeks or a week in between the different steps. And so if I get a schedule, I'll look at it, I'll look at other schedules which will suggest something that is reasonable. If the parties all agree on the schedule, which does happen, the scheduling conference is five minutes. If the parties don't agree, which is very common in these telecom cases, because the companies want this aggressive schedule that is unrealistic, And the neighbors want a reasonable schedule or the town. And so then Greg Faber will say, well, if you can't agree on something, submit your separate schedules, and we will decide. I'll decide. He recently accepted a schedule that the neighboring landowner who's the only party affected vehemently opposed. I've never seen such ridiculous schedule in my life. The Department of Public Service agreed with the applicant. It was the applicant's schedule. And it was accepted by by Greg Faber. And it was so absurd that within no time, the applicant filed a motion to change schedule. Motion to change schedule. Well, that has a rule that if you're gonna file a motion to change schedule, it has to be three days in advance of the deadline. I have been involved in so many of these cases where the neighbors are on the edge of their seats saying, the the the motion to change schedule was filed, but we don't and it's often not from the neighbors. It's often from the developer or the applicant or the or even DPS. And and they don't know if the ruling is gonna come through. And often the ruling on the motion to change schedule comes after the deadline. So the citizens go ahead and file. The department often just doesn't. If they file the motion to change schedule, there was one case where where in in Westmore, on the day that the pre filed testimony was due, the attorneys for the Department of Public Service filed a motion to change schedule on the same day it was due. So the citizens don't know, do we con continue or what do we do? And so they went ahead and met the deadline, and then a little while later, Faber gave the extension. So there could have been two more weeks for everybody, but it's a very stressful process. Okay, so now we have a schedule. Great. What's the schedule involved? The first thing is discovery. What's discovery? Anybody been involved in a court case, do know what discovery is?

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Yeah, vaguely.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: So you have three different things. You have interrogatories, so you ask questions. You have request to admit. So admit that the neighbors are gonna see this from their house. Something like that. And then you have request to produce. Well, the average person has no idea how to write discovery questions. And so a lot of the things that I see are things where I say, well, those are pretty good questions for cross examination, but they're not really questions for discovery. And in my view, discovery in these cases is really pretty much a waste of time. It also impedes the ability for the people who are affected by it to develop their own case. Because now the applicant said, as we've heard a couple of years, to get it together, to get the leads, to get and they had their boilerplate applications really to make them. And so then the citizens have what they have to put in aesthetics expert witness testimony. Maybe they can find an expert on a town plan. Maybe they have to raise money. Oh, by the way, all these people who got intervention, maybe there are half a dozen of them, they didn't know each other before. But in the scheduling order, they will they will be told that they have to work together and choose one representative. So all of a sudden, they they get to this builds community, they get to meet their neighbors, and they have to work together. There may be meeting after meeting after meeting where they have to come together on how to how to present a unified face. Oh, they want to hire a lawyer, see if they have any 10 or 20,000 or more. Oh, an expert, aesthetics expert. One in one case, Cisco, everybody they could find. They found one person who was available, $18,000, and he generally works only for developers or the Department of Public Schools. The Department of Public Service, they hire their own aesthetics expert. I tell the neighbors you're better off if they don't, because I've only ever seen one case where the department's experts have found an undue adverse aesthetic effect and that expert has died. Several tower cases, they hire a firm from New York, they don't even come over here. Balloon tests, you asked a balloon test. Are they required? No. Balloon tests, usually the company does one, but they don't notify anybody. Or maybe if the town asks for them to come to a meeting, they'll have the balloon test first. Then the company will come and present simulations. But if you're not sharp to know that you better get out there and look at all the vantage points and get your pictures, we've had a couple of cases where nobody saw the balloon. And once the application's filed, the neighbor said, Well, can we have a balloon test? And Greg Figure won't require it. And the company says, Well, the landowner won't allow it, so we're not gonna make them do it. So there's no balloon test. So now you can't even have your own balloon test to find out where it's gonna be so you can develop your own aesthetics simulations. So back to discovery. So you're generally, it's about a week or two after the scheduling order is out that you have to submit your discovery questions. And then usually the applicant takes a week or so to submit their discovery responses. It doesn't matter what type of case, whether it's telecom or solar or wind, it's very rare to get anything useful from the applicant on the discovery. They just don't answer the questions. They say, Oh, see this in our application. And then you have not a very long time to file your own pre filed testimony. And so then you have to have maybe Allison will file her testimony about it affects her property, and John will file this testimony about it affects his property. But you also can sponsor witnesses. If you can find a witness on the criteria that you are given standing on. Now, goes back to why it's so important for the task to intervene. We have tried, in one case, to allow citizens to have standing on coverage. Because these coverage maps and these claims about coverage appear to be pretty inaccurate coming from the companies. I've heard this over and over. That they overestimate what they claim they're gonna be able to cover, they are making claims in the body, presentation at the beginning about what the coverage will be. But then when you get into the actual data, it doesn't support what they say. So in one case, we were able to find an independent expert, which is very hard to find. And the department can hire an expert, but they're almost all work for industry. But we did find somebody with really good qualifications who said, Look at what the actual data shows. There's not going to be the coverage that they're claiming. So only the towns which get standing on all the issues can bring in testimony about coverage. Also, we have a lot of issues that we hear this is gonna provide public safety. And so in almost every case I've been involved in, the people talk to their fire department and their emergency, and they're like, we have coverage. And for instance, in Timmuth, They can't even use the tower that's proposed there for public safety. A lot of these towns have contracts with, I think something in Burlington. And so this is an area that I've never seen testimony on. I've never seen anybody actually present that. The citizens couldn't present that testimony. Only the town. And, okay, you're doing budgeting. You're, you know, you're really kinda busy. It's the roads are going you know, you've got a lot of issues on your town, but they're the only ones who can present any testimony on these other issues. And if the town is taking a position that doesn't comply with the town plan, then the neighbors are really only left with aesthetics. I'm very concerned about the aesthetics of We are not protecting the aesthetics of Vermont. There are some really badly sited cell towers already. If we don't get a handle on this, Senator Lane was quoted in the 1998 New York Times saying, I don't want Vermont to become a thin cushion state. And it was about telecom towers. And that's exactly where we're headed. I wanna take issue with what Greg Faber said yesterday about the sun setting of Section two forty eight resulting in a rush of towers applications. I see nothing to support that. What I see is we had a flurry of applications for FirstNet. AT and T built out a lot of towers of a lot of applications. They have one application, right, in Powell. And then industrial tower wireless came to their mind a few years ago. Worcester was their first one that I was aware of, but there were one in Fairfax and even before that that nobody complained about. And they have a plan to build out the entire state. And if you go to their website, you can see their map. They have covered New Hampshire, they've covered Maine, they have these ugly lattice towers, and they only go through the process for the lattice tower with antennas on top. But somebody told me the other day that one in Fairfax now has antennas on it, but nobody evaluates that, the whole build out of them during the process.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Yeah. I just wanna sorry. I could just

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: for one moment. This is

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: very helpful. Thank you. I know we started a little bit late, but we had we had you scheduled for an hour. I'm not sure

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: how far you are through the process. We gotta keep going. Well And I'll tell you, this is why it is such a challenge. Have a meeting and it usually takes a few hours. Okay. And it is the sort of thing that I generally only tell people, the advance notice part until that's over, and then the petition part until that's over, and then the next part because it is so extensive. So if you can go to 02:15, let's just keep going. I just wanted to

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: flag it for you because I think we I hope we let you know we had an hour. Don't know. I'm trying to cut you off by

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: just Yeah. I can't do it any faster. I'm sorry about the technical issues. But okay. So now you're you're preparing your pre filed testimony. Let's say you get it in. It's a real struggle. You've got, I don't know, six or so different witnesses. They're putting in their fact witness or lay witness testimony. You've got some experts, you've got all these exhibits. And then you're subject to discovery. Oh, that's not fun. Because then these lawyers are not easy on citizens. And in fact, this week is the first time I've ever seen depositions done in the tower case, and it's AT and T deposing these neighbors in town, and then they were deposed. The discovery process is one that is used to intimidate the neighbors, and the PUC doesn't care about discovery. So this is all between the parties. And so all of a sudden, these citizens who didn't ask for this are getting emails from lawyers, they're getting these discovery questions. The first case I dealt with, I had two ninety questions on a solar project served on the neighbors. So why is this process like it is? A few years ago, I followed the Green Mountain Power rate case. And a light bulb went off and said, oh, this makes sense. It's about financials. You're exchanging documents back and forth. You're getting all of these. You're asking them to produce documents and admit things. And that's what this process was set up for. It was never ever set up for citing and land use issues. And nobody ever came in when all these other types of projects came in that affect land use and said, hey. Well, you know, we should look at how we're doing this because this is not a far as I know, and this was said by the former public advocate, Jeff Commons, in the Act 174 public meeting. Vermont's the only state that has a PUC that does land use. So lawyers I I got a call from one guy who said that he called 20 or 30 lawyers in the state to try and find a lawyer or representative at the PUC Law. And he said, Nobody would take the case. And I said, Why? He said, Well, they say that it's such a legalistic process and sides are gonna lose. And they they treat the lawyers just as badly as they treat the citizens. So there's no point. I mean, I didn't go looking for that. But it's true. There are hardly any lawyers who will do this. There are hardly any aesthetics experts to find. The department has the same problem. They're It's just not a viable way to do grant use. So you're served with these discovery questions, you have a deadline, you get your discovery responses in, then that leads to, oh wait, motion practice. And so they'll file a motion to strike their testimony a week before the hearing. They'll file in the rest of our case a motion to eliminate to strike all the public comment, which included the recommendation from the town. And that was all struck. At one point, one of the neighbors said to me, when do we get to be heard? And I thought about it. I said, you don't. There's no public hearing. There's no site visit, which I think is outrageous. There's nothing like a site visit. Former environmental court judge said the absolute best part and most important part of this job is a site visit. Until you get out of the site and see it, you cannot imagine what it's like. So, okay, you go to the evidentiary hearing. What's an evidentiary hearing? It's all cross examination. So, let's say you're representing the planning commission and you submitted your testimony. So, okay, on page this and this of your testimony, you say this, and could you please tell us this? The whole purpose of the public evidentiary hearing is to elicit statements by the other side that support your position that you can use in your brief. So if you will admit, if you're the developer, and you will admit that this can be seen from a neighbor's house, then when I'm putting together or you're putting together your own brief, then you're gonna say, in your findings of fact, this can be seen from so and so's house. Then you have to cite to the transcript. So, you go through this very strange hearing that nobody ever has done anything like before. You have this cross examination. And then at the end of the hearing, you set the schedule for briefs. And generally, it's two weeks after the transcript. What's a brief? Anybody ever written a brief? Try and teach somebody how to write a brief? Probably not short. I think the one in Westmore was 40 pages. I had it all here to show you. But, anyways, it's it's long. And it involves going through all of the testimony, everything that's in the record. So at the evidentiary hearing, everything gets entered into the record. Up until then, nothing is in the evidentiary record. The public comment is never considered as part of the evidentiary record. Anyway, it gets into the evidentiary record and then the transcript, anything that came out in there, you pull out everything you can to make your case. So the applicant's doing the same thing, you're doing the same thing. And, oh, by the way, the Department of Public Service is doing the same thing. And since their experts never find an undue adverse aesthetic effect, you're actually, as a neighbor, not only having to do a brief that is challenging the developer, but you're also having to challenge the Department of Public Service. You make your case, and then there's a reply brief. And that's about a week later. And with the reply brief, it's generally short, except that if you're the neighbor, you're responding to two briefs from the department and the the applicant. And so yours is gonna be a bit longer because there's more to respond to. And then the hearing officer issues a proposal for decision. And then you get to comment on the proposal for decision. So if it says to deny it, which has happened once, we're like, great. If it says to approve it, then you have a lot of work to do to make your case why you shouldn't be approving. You can ask for oral argument. Okay, citizens have to go before the full PUC, and they get thirty minutes, the other side gets thirty minutes, you make the case, and then the PUC decides. And nobody has ever done a site visit, and there's no no opportunity for the PUC to ever hear from the public. At which point, you're pretty much guaranteed that the project will be approved. And when you look at the final order, it will say, it says that we weren't even there. And that is the PUC process. And it's this way for telecom with the added problem of the recommendations, but it's also this way for solar projects. And it's it's really growing. When I talk to people afterwards to even get them to respond to requests from the PUC to say, well, what what's it like? It's hardly anybody wants to even think about it again. They've used the words like brutal. Now I wanna speak to what Ryan from AT and T said yesterday because he made statements about how they really consider the community and how they won't ever do something against a single abutter. I'd like to recommend that you hear from the abutters and panel and what they've been put through for the last year by AT and T because there was they've even offered a site on their property so they wouldn't have to look right out at it 700 feet from their house. And they were deposed the other day. There's absolutely nothing community minded about it. I did a visit the week before Thanksgiving. And I came back about as upset as I have been in years over what a corporation can do to a family with young children who have lost a whole year of peace of mind and quality of life with no end in sight with this company that will not quit litigating. Sure. Now the Ennisburg case, that was appealed the decision was appealed in federal court. The federal district court judge, and I've sent these these things that will be on the website. I've sent these court decisions to to your page. He cited that Senator Leahy's quote at the beginning, and he affirmed the PUC's denial, which was based on Regional Planning Commission's recommendation. I only found out in November they appealed that to the Second Circuit Court of Appeal. And that decision came out in November. And about 03:00 on the day before Thanksgiving, Industrial Tower model is filed with new application, new advanced notice for a tower in Ennisburg in exactly the same location, but 20 feet shorter. And that community is gonna have to go through it all over again.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Okay. Yeah. First of all, I apologize. Our our our posted agenda says we're going till 02:30, so I just moved my meeting. So I Alright. Yeah. I don't wanna

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: I know you guys have a lot of questions. So

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: No. That's that's okay. So we have until two 02:30 as we said we

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: did. So,

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: I guess I have a question. In what circumstances have you seen citizens or town have an impact or be successful?

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: None. The Ennisburg case is the only one that's been denied.

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: Worcester, sort of.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Well, Worcester was advanced notice. Now, when it goes through the full petition, and there aren't very many of them. Mean, keep that in mind. We don't have much of a record of contested cases. The reason we're seeing contested cases right now is because these companies are coming in with tower applications that are closer to homes, closer to village centers. Now, you weren't on the committee, Representative Sibilia was, back during in 2020 when this came up before. It was during the pandemic. And there was a proposal for a tower in. And I got calls about it. And it was very close to the restorative center. And one of the things that happened, perhaps the only thing that happened was that the chair of the house and technology committee put in place an extension of the notice period, the advanced notice period, to give the town the opportunity to work more with AT and T to find another location. They did find a location on town property. That tower is built. And it's a good example of what can happen when people work together. Instead of just coming in and saying, this is a site, we're sticking to it, and we're not doing anything to change. So there's a good example of one that came about through a collaborative process. And AT and T used to do that, but they they seem to have changed in recent times so that now it's just they're getting their site. And in Granville, what happened was that they applied for a site. The it's on a back road. Do you you're familiar with the Granville Gulf? Mhmm. I think it's one of the most beautiful drives in Vermont. This tower was proposed in very prominent view of the people on North Hollow Road, which is a backdoor road. And I don't know, half a dozen or more homes would look right out on this tower. They're looking at gorgeous mountain views. They're living in the middle of paradise and nowhere. And so they proposed to use the same parcel but move the the tower further away. So it only affected one property. And they and R came in and opposed it. Meanwhile, they were using proposing to use a right of way. And we run into these land use or property issues with right of ways in other cases too. And the landowner sued in superior court to say you can't use this right of way. And a decision came out that would have upended all right of way, in easements in the state. It came to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court remanded said reversed it and remanded it back. The the landowner was actually winning and AT and T was just gonna litigate it. Then the neighborhood and the leader of the group who was the most opposed came down with brain cancer and died in two months. And it was very sad. The landowner who was suing could see that there was no insight to the litigation and he just settled and that they got their CPG shortly afterwards. So it was ANR's opposition that moved it back. And so, at some point, they'll get their tower. But that's the case where actually two different experts came in and looked at the claims that the tower was going to provide coverage in the Granville Delta. The second time we really tried to look at is there any way to meet the coverage with smaller cells? And to do a study that would have cost about $10,000 and nobody was interested. I mean, we are trying to find solutions. I'm very aware that this isn't just about saying no. This is about saying, okay, if there are needs to be met, how can we meet these needs and avoid these types of fights that are going on and protects Vermont's semen natural beauty.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Other questions?

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: You you submitted a couple of one pagers with specific recommendations. Correct? I haven't had a chance to read those, like, two or three days ago.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: I sent you a memo. Sent I sent you two memos that are kind of they are they go together. Read the land use one first, then the section two forty eight of a one first. Right. I appreciated the comments you made at the end of the meeting yesterday about what's the solution here. What are your options? I do not see it as an option to simply extend section two forty eight a for however many years. This problem is already fixed. If you're gonna stick with it, is it possible to fix section two forty eight a and make it work with, for instance, directing the PUC to do rulemaking and do something about the recommendations. And Greg said it takes us two years to do rulemaking. Well, okay. It would be in place the next time if you were gonna extend it. But I think the larger issue is and this is one in the twenty five years I've been coming into this building. This is the first time any committee has ever looked at the PUC process for land use site, for siting solar projects, wind projects. Nobody's ever taken testimony on what the process actually is. And so I I said this ten years ago to the act one seventy four committee. I looked at the testimony the other day. We haven't been ranging strongly. Right now, we've got these two different sets of standards. This is in my memo. And it's this is the moment because of what's going on with act one eighty one. Let's and and I appreciate you said that the representative Sheldon could could take a look at this. Is this the time to to move land use out of the PUC and put it where it belongs? Which is in the district commission process. The difference between the two processes? District commission. They will put a notice in the newspaper if an application comes in. Everything comes in as a minor these days, but if you want a hearing, then it can become a major. Minors are not appealable. If you have issues and you want a hearing, you'll hold a site visit. You go to the hearing, you get party status, and you can talk. You can make your case. They can make their case. You don't need lawyers. I can represent people. And then if there are, after the hearing, if there are more information that needs to be gotten from either side, the commission issues a recess memo, a recess order, so there is no discovery. And in I was in the stakeholder group for the appeals stakeholder group for Land Use Review Board. I'm the only person who was in all four of the stakeholder groups except Millie Costner. And it was really valuable. And I heard the lawyers there talking about environmental court. And what's the problem with appeals in environmental court? Motion practice and the abusive discovery. And I realized, well, that's exactly what I'm seeing at the PUC. Motion practice and the abusive discovery. The litigious solar lawyer, he has taught me everything about motion practice. He does tries every motion possible. And we're seeing that the lawyers that are currently doing these cases, except the AT and T lawyer who's been doing he's he's been representing AT and T long time. There was a similar lawyer doing Verizon's cases, but he something happened to him. And so now we're seeing lawyers who've never practiced before the PUC. They're very litigious. They have experience in federal court. We're seeing a level of motion practice that is very disconcerting. And it turns out that this motion practice and discovery is also an issue in environmental court. And one of the recommendations is limit that or minimize it because that is a way that both sides can slow the Senate. So I think that the active 50 process provides the opportunity for the parties to come together to work out the issues. They can actually sit down and talk. It's in statute that they can have informal stakeholder groups. And if people want to fight, they can go to court. But in the first instance, we shouldn't be starting out with a contested case for something that is possible to work together on. If the towns can work with these companies and the community to find good sites or find shorter towers or find a way to meet the needs. And and what we're not talking about here is that that the health issues are very real. What's happened with the FCC is that there was a DC's Court of Appeals decision in '19 in 2021 that directed the FCC to update their emissions guidelines because they're way out of date. They haven't done it in five years. And so right now they are not complying with a court order to actually consider the cumulative effects of all of this technology that we now have that were not in effect in 1996. And the oral argument in that was absolutely fascinating to listen to, to hear that were FCC was given thousands of pages of studies that they never even considered. And so the FCC is known to be a captured agency. And the backdrop of all this is that right now the FCC is taking comment on rule that would eliminate all opportunities for citing, for state and local governments. And there's also been efforts in Congress to pass something that's completely stripped all sighting. But I will tell you that my efforts in the past in this body have been met with, we're preempted on everything. There's nothing we could do. And right now, we do have the authority to look at citing, and I think that there are better ways to do it than what would you like.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Other questions, Lauren? Just to comment. Yeah. Thanks for your detailed on the ground reporting.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: It

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: it does sound like a really difficult process for an average person.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: So, well, Todd did, I met with Chair McNamara in September 2024 and went through this for two hours with him. I took him through the said, I want you to understand what it's like for the public. And he said that he was open to trying to change the PUC's process to be more like the district commission. And I saw him again in June at a site visit and I said, Okay, do you want me to submit a petition? What do you want me to do? And he said, Well, how about another meeting? And I never heard from him. And I'm just I can't keep doing this. I hope I gave you a headache. I mean, is enormously stressful. I've given the same explanation of the process over and over and over again. And then fifteen years ago or ten years ago, I was in this room with Tony Klein sitting in that chair and I said, I feel like I'm needing the lambs to slaughter. Ten years is a long time to do that. And then to be accused of being anti this or anti that because I'm trying to help people have a say in what goes on in their communities. We have been successful in stakeholder processes with Omeon, with Cabot Agrimar, with JP Carre and Sons. Everything changes when you sit down and talk. And that we start these cases with a fight. There are better ways to do things. Yeah.

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: So

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Oh, god.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Oh my god. What is wrong with you today? Go ahead. But Bram was right. It's like twice. My head is I'm

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: going this way today. I don't know why. Jeez. Representative Kleppner.

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: The chair may be giving me a hint that I'm not picking up on it.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Drifting left today.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: 248A, cumbersome process, and going to the district commissions moves all of this citing from February back to two fifty, which we've also heard is a very burdensome and complicated process that nobody likes.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: There is a lot of mythology built up around Act two fifty, and I have been attending, as I did with the Climate Council, I've been attending all these meetings that the Lurb is having. I might as well be their mascot at this point. The chair calls on me, Annette, do have anything you want to say? She's much nicer than they were at the Climate Council. I've attended all the public hearings. I've attended all the meetings they've had with their commissioners and coordinators. And in every one of these meetings, something has been said about we're getting blamed for active 50 permitting. If you look at their data, they're very good at getting decisions out. The district commission process is the best process we have for it was envisioned to be like, you know, people sitting around the wood stove at the the the country store and let's work things out. It could be considered like the advanced notice process, where you actually have a formal way that you can get together and talk. So ACT two fifty is also you know, we have to do all this engineering and all that. Well, these companies are doing everything that they would do for an Act two fifty process. But then you wouldn't put the citizens in a position of having to be involved with the lawyers, and it wouldn't be a whole lawyers game, necessarily.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: And just we we heard from chair and that since two forty eight a has been

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: in

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: effect, the utilities have all chosen to do that. No one has chosen two fifty. And I wonder if it actually is better for everyone, why are

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Oh, I didn't say it was better for them.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: One would one would think sitting around and getting it sorted out would be better for them than that.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: But again It isn't true that they're not still using Act two fifty. Don't Greg's favor said that yesterday, but if you ask it it there's a whole other issue with the lack of a a consistent database. So apparently there's a statute, I found it at one point, that said that I told Act 15 to create a map of all the towers that have been proved that they haven't done the map. So when I need to look at something like I had to look at Manchester, I think, I found that for existing towers where they have already gotten the active 50 permit, if they're adding or swapping out antennas, they will be using active 50. So active 50 is still used. I think when I was on the Rutland Regional Planning Commission, we were redone with a tower proposal then. But why do they choose to section two forty eight a? Because hardly anybody participates. And when you do, you're gonna lose anyway. And so, of course, the industry likes it. It is definitely a biased industry favorite thing. Now what would it mean for the companies? It also would mean municipal permitting. I don't think there's anything wrong with having to go get a municipal permit. Is it gonna add more time than the long time that these cases are taking through the Section two forty eight process when they are contested? I don't know why the developers want section two forty eight for energy cases for solar. It must drive up the cost. There's you could do it so much faster. You know, a lot of these cases are about where to plant the trees. You don't need lawyers for that. And we also haven't talked about small cells. I need to touch on this. And there's a page with some pictures on it. There's a lot of small cell deployment going on in the state that is not regulated at all. They're being put on existing phone calls. They are pretty loaded up with things. I sent some pictures to Hunter Thompson recently. He didn't know about them. We need some regulation around small cells because if they're putting these things up in front of people's homes, it could be next to a baby's bedroom. There's no notifications. The de minimis and the limited size and scope stuff, that's got no public thoughts at all. You asked about decommissioning. These towers, once they're in, they are forever. They don't come down. So that's why it's so important to have them sited well. Because they need to go in a place that minimizes the impacts to the environment and the people. This is not easy. People are asking, well, if we have all these satellites, what do we need this for? Public safety? I think distracted driving is a problem. I don't think we should cover all of our winding back roads where people can be looking at their cell phones. With the fiber optic build out, areas that don't have cell coverage, everybody has cell service in their houses. They just use the Wi Fi off their house or they use real IP. So getting to what is the need? What is it that we're trying to do here? Vermont is negative. One thing is governor someone says that I agree with, Vermont is never going to have universal cell service because of our mountainous terrain on the face. We are never going to have it. And it's unrealistic. David?

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: Yeah. So I was getting back to what the rep's club here was talking about the time frame. So if you have a contested case through February a, if they actually figured it out that they did the advanced notice and going and or going through the 02:50 process. Is there can you give me a time frame one versus the other? The

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: the data that I've seen from Act two fifty is much, much shorter. I would have to There's probably somebody better to answer that question. In fact, there's There are three people I look and then you hear from in addition to the neighbor from panel. Brooke Dinglebeam an attorney was an attorney who did both the Ennisburg and Bramble cases. And she is now on the land use review board. So she has this expertise in both areas. She can get you data on these things. Timmeth, the town clerk, is the one who's dealing with an ITW tower right now. And that has some very interesting nuances to it that have revealed this problem with the recommendations. She was a representative here in this building for six years. So she would be an excellent witness. She's she said that she'd be she would do it. Her name's Gail Fowler. And so she she understands what you're trying to do and probably could come up with some good ideas. And as a lawyer who started to do this work, Andrew Clyburn, and he is currently representing people in Marshfield and in Timmis. And he he would like to testify and he has some ideas. So Okay. I don't know what they are, but those are three people in addition to the citizen in Palmytte who would give you a better understanding of We have someone coming from Westmore. So Oh, good. So And

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: just one other follow-up. Yeah. Are you recommending that you put all the tower process through Act two fifty or just the the medium and and big months?

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: Certainly when it's a land use issue, it belongs in active 15. I've recently thinking what business does the PUC have? What is their interest in telecom? And who where should antenna citing be? Now here's the problem. Every other state of Connecticut does telecom regulations for municipal zoning. So what I'm seeing is that municipal zoning can write standards for small cells. They can do setbacks from people's homes. They can it can establish some aesthetic standards. They can do things in municipal zoning. Because we have this section two forty eight a and this strange way where you can use your telecom bylaw for your recommendations, people aren't there's nothing there's no mechanism for looking at small cells. So we're seeing other states have the rights. California, Massachusetts, their their municipalities are writing bylaws that actually address small cells. The the technology is changing. So I think that the combination of act two fifty and municipal zoning would enable us to I mean, my town doesn't have a telecom bylaw. It relies on Act two fifty. I have no doubt that it would go faster through Act two fifty. Now if it's going to a contested case, if everybody wants to fight, then you're talking court.

[Rep. Richard Bailey (Member)]: Through two forty eight or both?

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: They're both. Both processes. Yeah. So I think the tall selves also belong in a way that communities can have a say. And currently they can't at the PUC. It's rubber stamped for all our lovers.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Right. Thank you so much for being here and for I

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: could give you more of the stuff that I have if you want it. I mean

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: I have a lot of feel like I have a lot of documents for you, but anybody is welcome to reach out My

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: problem is I have too much information.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: I mean, you know, what you send will post.

[Annette Smith (Executive Director, Vermonters for Clean Environment)]: And you should look at what I did in 2020 and what I did in 2023. Because if you just kick the can down the road and I come back two more in three years and nothing happens, I mean, what am I doing? Just give me a brief wall that can bang my head against. I don't know. I really appreciate the three year sunset and the opportunity. But if it's just going to be a let's look at it and then let's just move along or we'll look at it again in three years, Now's the time to fix something. You can go big picture, can go little picture, but something's got to change because this isn't fair to all people, especially with the power and the money that this company, this corporation, these corporations have with all the political money preemption that they have that they are using against our communities. So thank you very much.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Thank you very much, Annette. Appreciate you coming in. Alex? Yes. So we can go offline. Thanks.