Residents Denounce Radio Towers Commissioners Asked To Revoke Permit To Place Towers On Farmland

Residents fighting the relocation of radio towers to farmland south of Spokane have plenty of ammunition: music emanating from furnace ductwork, computer modems going dead and Rush Limbaugh screeching from a toilet.

More than 30 residents who live near U.S. Highway 195 and Stutler Road urged county commissioners late Tuesday to rescind a building permit granted to Citadel Broadcasting Co.

The firm owns KGA-AM and KJRB-AM and wants to move its 400-foot towers from the Moran Prairie to an 80-acre pasture.

The move would improve listeners’ reception in Coeur d’Alene and the Spokane Valley and end complaints from residents who live near Mullan Road Elementary School, according to Citadel chief engineer Bill Gott.

But in a survey of residents who live near the existing towers, complaints have included radio signals in the strangest of places.

“They have no reason to lie,” said Gail Johnson, who lives within a mile and a half of the proposed relocation. “If you want to listen to Rush, that’s one thing. If you don’t, that’s another.

“The idea is we moved to the country and invested everything we had for a lifestyle,” she said.

Gott and his land-use attorney, Stanley Schultz, refused to comment until after the hearing, which didn’t end until late Tuesday.

County commissioners won’t make a decision until next month.

Residents complain the towers also could emit cancer-causing electromagnetic rays, as well as destroy existing wetlands.

Spokane County Health District epidemiologist Paul Stepak, a local expert on electromagnetic fields, said some scientists have connected such rays to childhood cancers.

But, “there are no proven health effects” from exposure to radio frequencies, he said.

Tower opponent George Christensen of Spangle accused Citadel of already clearcutting part of its property without a permit from the Washington Department of Natural Resources. DNR officials could not be reached for comment.

Resident Gary Whitcomb said the company has refused to address neighborhood concerns.

“If that is the kind of neighbors they are now, what about when they move in?” he said. “Once they’re there, they can’t be moved.”

, DataTimes