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Hopeful Digicel awaits approval for controversial cell tower
West Green residents maintain opposition
Mark Cummings
Thursday, November 05, 2009
MONTEGO BAY, St James - Telecommunications provider Digicel is hopeful that its application to erect a 45-metre cellular tower in the middle-class community of West Green will be approved at today's meeting of the St James Parish Council's Physical Planning Committee.
"Digicel has ensured that we are well within the planning guidelines as set by both NEPA (National Environment and Planning Agency) and the Parish Council on this application... (so) we now look forward to the outcome of the Parish Council's meeting," said Anthony Barrows, Digicel's site relations manager yesterday.
However, President of the West Green's Citizens' Association Vilma Clarke told the Observer West that the residents were still firmly against the tower.
"We have not dropped our petition and we do not want it here," she said, in reference to a petition signed by 270 community members urging the Parish Council and NEPA not to approve Digicel's application.
The telecommunications company hopes to construct the tower later this year, but it needs the approval of several state entities including the St James Parish Council and the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) as a prerequisite.
Already, Digicel has received the nod of approval from NEPA, but the St James Parish Council at its physical planning committee meeting last month deferred the application for today, due to the absence of the minutes of a meeting at Cannons Muffler in West Green called by Digicel in September to advise the citizens of its proposal.
No minutes were taken at that meeting but the residents - citing health concerns - made it clear to the Digicel representatives in attendance that they were against the cell tower in their community.
On Sunday when Digicel again met with the residents in an effort to convince them of the importance of the cell tower in their community, approximately 50 residents said they were still not convinced that the tower should be erected in their community.
The residents also bemoaned the fact that there were no representatives of the St James Parish Council and NEPA in attendance at the meeting.
Digicel's corporate affairs manager, Jacqueline Burrell, said yesterday that the telecommunications company delivered the minutes of Sunday's meeting to the St James Parish Council on Tuesday.
And Clarke told the Observer West that she too was in the process of preparing minutes of the meeting to submit to the council.
"We are preparing our minutes which I have to write out, and we will be submitting them as soon as they are ready," she said.
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