[July 11, 2009] Lee County faces towering problem: Emergency communication could be cut off before county Tweet Jul 11, 2009 (The Hawk Eye - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- FINDS TOWER FIX. FORT MADISON -- Facing the possibility of losing emergency communications for the entire county, Lee County officials held a special meeting Friday to formulate a plan that will allow uninterrupted service throughout the county. Currently, emergency communications in the county are provided via equipment housed on a tower owned by Iowa Public Television. The tower is on land once part of the Faeth family orchard. Last year, Wayland, Mo.-based Quality Investments LLC purchased 32 acres of the orchard property at auction for $121,189, including the land the tower is on. The investment company and IPTV have been unable to reach a long-term agreement to continue renting the tower lot. Officials previously thought they would have a couple of months to figure out a backup plan if an agreement could not be reached, thanks to a 90-day lease between the two entities that would have started June 22. But according to Lee County Attorney Mike Short, the lease was never signed. "The publicity so far has caused the owner (Quality Investments LLC) not to sign the 90-day extension," Short said. That leaves the Lee County Board of Supervisors with an undetermined amount of time to come up with a backup plan, and many of their options have limited feasibility due to the time and money it would take to build a tower elsewhere. "In a way, we're being held hostage," said Supervisor Ernie Schiller. Sheriff Buck Jones and Emergency Management Director Steve Cirinna, who attended the meeting, agreed the most feasible option would be to buy the land directly from Quality Investments LLC. According to Short, the IPTV appraisal of the land with the tower on it is $68,000. Quality Investments offered to sell the land to IPTV for about $130,000, and offered to lease the land for $1,700 a month. IPTV's land lease agreement with the Faeths was a little less than $3,000 a year. "They were a long way apart, and they (IPTV) couldn't justify it," Short said. "I have no reason to think they'll shoot us a better price." Cirinna said the price of constructing a new tower and moving the two radio repeaters and antenna would cost well over $500,000, and such a move might require a change of frequency from the FCC. If that were the case, it probably would be about a year before the tower would be in use. "If we acquired the property, all this would go away," Cirinna said. While there are several cell phone towers in the area that could hold the equipment, none of them are tall enough to provide coverage to the entire county. Additional repeaters could be purchased and attached to several towers, but that also might require a change in frequency. Cirinna said a single tower would have to be 350 feet or higher to provide coverage to the entire county. "There's no feasible way we could do that in 30 days," supervisor Gary Folluo said. Another possibility would be to attach the equipment to the water tower in Pleasant Ridge Township north of West Point. The water tower is owned by the Rathbun Regional Water Association. There is another water tower in Charleston as well. "We might have to start punching holes to get wires through, but it's something we could work through," Cirinna said. If all else fails, Short said an injunction could be filed to get an extension. The board of supervisors could then condemn the property and take it over via eminent domain. Condemnation is a long, drawn-out process that would require the county to first pay $2,000 to have the property appraised and conduct good faith negotiations for its purchase. The process then would cost another $4,500, plus the fair market value of the land. "Personally, I don't like eminent domain, but this is for the protection of our citizens," Schiller said. Cirinna and Buck agreed to start calling radio technicians and cell phone companies in the area so they could obtain a better idea of what kind of coverage could be accomplished with the current towers in the county. The county does use a second tower owned by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, but it is far too short to provide communications to the entire county. Currently, it's configured to simply pick up and repeat communications from the IPTV tower. Officials also will contact the Rathbun Regional Water Association to see if there is interest in using their water tower as a communication tower, and the findings will be presented at the next supervisors meeting Tuesday morning. "We have to have emergency service," Schiller said. To see more of The Hawk Eye or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.thehawkeye.com. 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