Questions CVTC Motives

In the Nov. 15 article about the Crescenta Valley Town Council general meeting, Councilmember Mike Claessans attempted to discourage residents from speaking about the Briggs Avenue AT&T small cell appeal by reportedly saying such speeches would be “inappropriate, confusing and will not help,” based on the prior approval of the project in August (actually April 30, 2018) by the Land Use Committee.

But questions remain over how AT&T and CVTC notified residents about the important Land Use meeting of April 30. Both AT&T and CVTC efforts fell short, unintentionally or intentionally:

1.  AT&T ran an ad in the CV Weekly on April 19, 2018 announcing that on “Monday, April 30, 2018 at 6:30 p.m.” AT&T would hold a “community meeting” at the “La Crescenta Library Community Room” where AT&T would “give a preview of the new local coverage maps for AT&T as well as answer any questions about the proposed project’s benefits, design and location.” (AT&T mailed a similar letter to residents [near] the proposed small cell location on Briggs Avenue.) The AT&T ad makes no mention of CVTC or Land Use Committee.

Sounds like AT&T is just hosting an information-only meeting at the La Crescenta Library to inform residents about the proposed Briggs small cell, a meeting that residents could choose to skip without consequence, right? Wrong! AT&T failed to mention the following crucial fact: April 30 at 6:30 p.m. was actually the official meeting of the Land Use Committee, normally held on the first Thursday of the month (May 3) but pushed forward to Monday, April 30 when an important vote would be taken to recommend approval/disapproval on the Briggs small cell project.  Why did AT&T neglect to mention this crucial fact? Why did AT&T completely neglect to mention CVTC/Land Use Committee?

2. The decision between AT&T and CVTC/Land Use Committee to move the Land Use meeting to Monday, April 30 must have been made prior to April 19 because AT&T was able to run its ad in the April 19 issue of CV Weekly. So why didn’t CVTC/Land Use Committee notify residents by email at the same time, around April 19? Why did CVTC/Land Use Committee wait until Sunday, April 29 to email residents about the April 30 Land Use Meeting?

3. During this period, the CVTC website was down and CVTC made no effort to give residents an alternate way to find out about upcoming meetings or to view meeting agendas in a timely manner; for example, by posting information on the La Crescenta Library bulletin board. Why didn’t CVTC make an effort to keep residents informed, one way or another?

4. Why was the Land Use Committee meeting pushed forward from its regular first Thursday (May 3) to the prior Monday (April 30)? Residents who expected the Land Use meeting to occur on the first Thursday of the month would have shown up on Thursday to discover the meeting had already occurred.

Based on the above, did AT&T and CVTC make a good-faith effort to notify residents in a timely manner about the April 30 Land Use meeting? Or not?

Marilyn Tyler

La Crescenta

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