Criticizes FCC exposure limits and close residential tower siting. Describes approval of a tower beside f…

First, I want to thank HHS for soliciting information from the public about EMF and wireless radiation-related health and environmental issues. The federal government has failed to adequately protect the public from ever-increasing exposures to EMFs for decades, and the FCC has abdicated its duty to enact truly protective RF exposure limits. The fact that HHS is taking steps to prioritize research into the biological effects of wireless radiation, and EMFs more broadly, is a meaningful step toward addressing long overdue gaps between science and public health policy in this area. Despite thousands of peer-reviewed, published scientific studies indicating biological harm from wireless radiation exposure, even at levels below FCC exposure limits, today’s wireless environment is governed by 30-year-old exposure limits that only address short-term, thermal impacts of exposure. Meanwhile, children are literally sleeping with cell phones under their pillows at night, men are carrying cell phones in their pants pocket all day long, and massive, industrial cell towers with dozens of wireless antennas on them are installed and operational mere feet away from peoples’ homes. And have you seen the wireless antenna arrays installed atop apartment buildings in New York City? Huge antennas mere feet away from peoples’ bedroom windows! That’s insanity! (I have attached some photos of particularly egregious installations to this comment for the agency’s review.) On a more personal note, sadly, two weeks ago, my Planning Commission (the Jefferson County Planning Commission in Jefferson County, FL), approved a 195-foot-tall cell tower adjacent to my beautiful property that has been in the family for decades. The property is also located in a majority minority community near historic Baptist and Methodist rural churches. Meanwhile, a 302-foot-tall cell tower is already installed and operational just 0.82 miles from the installation site! To assert its bogus “needs” case, Verizon provided the Jefferson County Planning Commission with anonymously produced RF coverage maps. Nowhere in Verizon’s submission is there reference to the type of RF propagation model used to generate its maps or the input parameters used to generate its maps. So, we have no idea how the maps were made. Further, the maps were never verified using real-world data like drive test data or dropped-call records, so we have no idea how accurate the maps are. In essence, what Verizon provided to the County was totally useless, scientifically non-probative pieces of paper. To add insult to injury, the FCC National Broadband Map demonstrates that Verizon already provides 100% outdoor and in-vehicle coverage at and around the installation site. We know that the FCC National Broadband Map is accurate because wireless carriers are required to submit their coverage data twice a year to the FCC under penalty of perjury. In other words, Verizon is legally required to tell the federal government the truth about where its network provides coverage. If carriers lie about their coverage to the FCC, the carrier may be subjected to significant penalties, including monetary penalties and potential enforcement action affecting its FCC authorizations. Again, the map shows that Verizon has 100% coverage. And resident experiences confirm this reality. As for the Planning Commission’s decision to approve the tower, those commissioners ignored every meaningful comment submitted by the public and even an independent, expert RF engineering report explaining why the tower was totally unnecessary given the 302-foot-tall tower that is already up and running less than a mile away. As is the case in most municipalities across America, these commissioners just had no idea what they were doing and received bad advice from municipal legal counsel. Checking boxes is not good governance. Asking real questions and standing up for residents’ interests is. After single-handedly caring for my sick parents for over a decade, my dream was to build a house on this beautiful property in retirement and finally rest. Now, because of a speculative cell tower site developer called Southern Towers and Verizon’s fixed wireless business plans, that dream is utterly shattered. I will not live my final years staring at totally unnecessary industrial monstrosity while bathing in high levels of wireless radiation. Thank you for your consideration of my remarks, and please take swift action to hold the big telecom industry accountable.