City must provide written reasons for denying application for cell phone tower contemporaneously with denial notice.
Cite as
2015 DJDAR 522Published
Jan. 15, 2015Filing Date
Jan. 14, 2015Summary
The City of Roswell, Georgia, held a public hearing concerning T-Mobile South LLC’s application to build a cell phone tower on residential property. T-Mobile arranged to have the hearing recorded, during which several council members objected to its proposal. Ultimately, the council unanimously denied T-Mobile’s application and, two days later, informed T-Mobile, by letter, that its application had been denied. Twenty-six days later, the City published the detailed minutes. T-Mobile sued, alleging violation of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. The district court agreed, but the Eleventh Circuit reversed, finding that the denial letter and the hearing transcript sufficed for purposes of the Act.
Reversed and remanded. The Act mandates localities to provide reasons for denying applications to build cell phone towers in writing. The writing must be clear enough and provided promptly enough to enable judicial review. Here, the detailed minutes would have sufficed for purposes of the Act had they been provided contemporaneously with the written denial, but they came 26 days later and just days before the expiration of T-Mobile’s time to seek judicial review. Thus, this court overturned the Eleventh Circuit’s judgment because the City failed to comply with the Act.
Opinion by Justice Sotomayor; Justice Alito, concurring; Chief Justice Roberts, dissenting; Justice Thomas, dissenting.
— Karen Natividad
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#219895
For reprint rights or to order a copy of your photo:
Email
jeremy@reprintpros.com
for prices.
Direct dial: 949-702-5390