Residents Raise Health Issues Caused By 5G Wireless Technology
Experts claim that the Wireless Facility Ordinance proposed by the Newtown Area Jointure does not protect the health & safety of residents.
ATTENTION: The Newtown Board of Superivisors is likely to vote on this at it’s May 25, 2022, public meeting, which starts at 7 PM. You can attend live (100 Municipal Drive, Newtown, PA) or via Youtube.
There will be a Zoom Meeting, on May 16, 2022 for people interested in making an impact at this meeting . You can find more information about that meeting and register to attend here.
Township leaders in Wrightstown, Upper Makefield and Newtown townships [Jointure] are considering a Wireless Facility Ordinance. Small wireless facilities consist of a cell tower antenna typically attached to a pole on or near homes, schools, workplaces, and places of worship. The Jointure ordinance focuses on the location, maintenance and appearance of small wireless 5G antennas.
Wrightstown Supervisor Chairman Chester Pogonowski said that a goal of the ordinance is to prevent an “eyesore”. Many residents and experts, however, feel that 5G wireless antennas pose a health risk, which the ordinance fails to adequately address. According to Pennsylvanians for Safe Technology, this risk is something that governmental entities and medical advocacy groups have begun to recognize in public meetings and published reports.
Many local Newtown area residents made public comments regarding safety of 5G antennas before the Newtown Board of Supervisors (BOS) on 27 April 2022 (see video embedded below) and before the Newtown Planning Commission (NTPC) on 3 May 2022. The following is a summary these comments plus information pertaining to the legal issues and related ordinances.
Comments Made at Newtown BOS Meeting
The following are excerpts from the Youtube transcript of 27 April 2022 BOS meeting. See the video inserted below:
Ann Longon – a resident of Newtown – introduced veterinarian Alexia McKnight to present some information on the problems with 5G based on her own experience.
“I am Alexia McKnight and I’m from Chadds Ford Pennsylvania … I’ve been a veterinary radiologist for 18 years, 19 years … and well understand the effects of ionizing radiation as a profession,” said Ms. McKnight. “We take radiation seriously and respect the damage it can do with excessive exposure before my plight that led me to understand the biological effects of non-ionizing radiation from wireless devices. Neither I nor my profession are aware of the significant damage it can do. We are not trained in the effects of wireless radiation. Any of you that are remotely contemplating allowing 5G small cell antennas in your township are clearly not aware either,” said Ms. McKnight.
Ms. McKnight asked the supervisors to “imagine one day all of a sudden you get a bad headache all day every day you are completely unable to sleep tossing and turning for eight hours straight all night every night. You’re wired, yet exhausted, unable to relax. Your abdomen hurts. Your joints and muscles ache. You’re in a foul mood, irritable, agitated snappy and fatigued. This continues every single day.”
“As time progresses your memory fails, your cognition fails and it’s no longer possible to concentrate,” Ms. McKnight continued. “The ability to read is gone your heart stops beating normally as you’ve developed in arrhythmia.”
“I know this all to be true because this is what happened to me,” said Ms. McKnight. “It was disabling. The progression from healthy adulthood to debilitation happened suddenly as soon as and as long as the electric utility placed a wireless device on the outside of my home.”
After the better part of a week of this and barely functioning, Ms. McKnight was forced to sleep in her yard. When the offending wireless device was finally removed, the symptoms she experienced inside her home resolved. But some weeks later the arrhythmia returned, the headaches returned, the insomnia returned, aches and pains returned, and the bad mood returned. “Unbeknownst to me the wireless [device] had returned,” said Ms. McKnight. “Upon removing it a second time the symptoms in the house resolved yet again.”
Chadds Ford PA Ordinance Versus JZC Ordinance
Since Ms. McKnight lives in Chadds Ford, PA, I decided to see how that township’s wireless facilities ordinance within public rights-of-way compares with the Jointure’s version.
The Chadd Ford ordinance requires “Conditional Use approval. “To the extent permitted by federal and state law, all applicants proposing the siting of new wireless communications facilities in the public rights-of-way shall obtain conditional use authorization from the Township Board of Supervisors prior to beginning construction of such wireless communications facilities.”
Jointure 5G Ordinance handles this as a “Special Exception” application. A Special Exception is a permission or approval granted an applicant before the Zoning Hearing Board (ZHB), members of which are not elected officials. The Board of Supervisors is a party in Special Exception cases and can testify against granting the approval, but the final decision is up to the ZHB. This is typically how developers such as Wawa get their way in Newtown with minimal oversight by the BOS. I don’t believe, however, a matter with public health concerns such as wireless 5G should be left up to unelected officials!
The Chadd’s Ford ordinance requires “Evidence that the proposed communications tower must be located where it is proposed in order to serve the applicant’s service area and that no other viable alternative location exists; evidence that the applicant cannot adequately extend or infill its communications system by the use of equipment such as redoes, repeaters, antennas, and other similar equipment installed on existing structures, such as utility poles or their appurtenances and other available tall structures.”
The Jointure 5G Ordinance has similar language, but does not mention alternate means/equipment/locations, only that it is the least intrusive location: “The special exception application shall include evidence that a significant gap in wireless coverage or capacity exists in the applicable area and that the type of WCF being proposed is the least intrusive means by which to fill that gap in wireless coverage. The existence or nonexistence of a gap in wireless coverage shall be a factor in the Zoning Hearing Board’s decision on an application for approval of Tower-Based WCF.”
Comments Made at NTPC Meeting
The following are based on excerpts from comments by Dr. Donna DeSanto Ott, PT, DPT, MS, FMCHC, made before the NTPC on 3 May 2022. Dr. DeSanto Ott is a physical therapist and the founder and current president of Pennsylvanians for Safe Technology.
At the May 5, 2022, Jointure meeting, I brought up the arguments made in a video about how an Ohio town was advised that it can “defeat a bad wireless ordinance in 20 minutes“. Jointure members argued that PA is SPECIAL in that it has ACT 50, which some members said makes it impossible to prevent 5G wireless antennas from being erected in the Jointure and other PA township neighborhoods. However, the Solicitor also said that many other states have passed similar acts. I wondered if Idaho has a similar act and townships in Idaho can fight this, why can’t we?
Dr. DeSanto Ott educated Newtown Planners about the problems of ACT 50 and provided some information about related legal cases.
“When the lawmakers passed ACT 50 you need to know that we were not allowed to submit public subject matter experts and most of our team are doctoral level professionals,” said Dr. DeSanto Ott. “We certainly could have provided valuable input to the legislators but it was not allowed. I believe if those in public office understood the harm, and what can be done to help ensure public safety, that they would do all in their power to prevent the irresponsible use of wireless infrastructure, especially in residential areas,” she said.
Act 50 was passed very quickly in the last few days of June 2021 before the lawmakers left for the summer. Pennsylvanians for Safe Technology repeatedly requested in writing, since 2018, to submit subject matter experts to testify at public hearings on 5G and broadband. “Consumer advocates were not allowed to speak,” said Dr. DeSanto Ott. “However, industry representatives were allowed to speak and participate to the fullest. Our subject matter experts included Penn State researchers (one with expertise in microwaves), physicians, university and medical school professors and researchers and even a pediatrician,” she said.
Several weeks after the passage of Act 50 and about two weeks before its implementation, a federal court ruling confirmed many people’s suspicions that FCC guidelines people rely on are suspect at best. The FCC was unable to provide evidence for their 2018 decision and on August 13, 2021 a US Court of Appeals ruled in Environmental Health Trust v FCC the FCC’s decision to retain their 1996 guidelines was “arbitrary and capricious.” Further, the court ruled the FCC failed to respond to record evidence of harm and questions about extended exposure, harm to children, vulnerable populations including people who reported injuries from wireless. The “record evidence of harm” included over 10,000 pages of mostly single paragraph abstracts of scientific research. This evidence also included four volumes of testimony of people reporting harm from wireless devices and infrastructure.
“Local government leaders need to know that the lawmakers who passed Act 50 were not briefed on this information, as it was not allowed, which is a violation of the Pennsylvania Sunshine Act Open Meetings Law,” said Dr. DeSanto Ott. “Most municipal leaders are also unaware and appear to be commonly passing the ordinances recommended by industry advocates. We strongly recommend consulting with a telecommunications attorney such as Andrew Campanelli or Scott McCollough who have a history of success representing people harmed by wireless infrastructure,” said Dr. DeSanto Ott.
“Newtown has an opportunity as well as an obligation to protect public safety and to prevent the tragic situations of harm, disability and constructive eviction of disabled persons from their homes, as well as other harm,” said Dr. DeSanto Ott.
Dr. DeSanto Ott concluded by thanking the Planning Commission for giving her the opportunity to provide information and video testimony. “This is far more education than we have been able to provide to any other municipality, she said. “We hope that Newtown will use this information to demonstrate leadership and develop a carefully written telecommunications ordinance that will protect public safety as well as shield the municipality itself from liability.”