Davis Media has asked James City County to allow a monopole tower for The Tide and Bach FM, which the company’s president says is needed to keep the radio stations on the air because the current setup can fail during extreme weather conditions.
Currently, Davis Media — parent company of several radio stations and online newspapers, including WYDaily — uses a Verizon T1 line to transmit data from the radio station building on Longhill Road to a radio tower in Barhamsville. The T1 line runs the distance to Barhamsville on a combination of underground and overhead wires on telephone poles; because part of the line is overhead, it can fail during weather events.
In 2006, Davis Media signed a contract with James City County to broadcast emergency information over The Tide and Bach FM in exchange for a generator the county purchased using grant funding; a similar agreement was made with WMBG 740 AM in 2004. In emergencies, county staff can either call the radio stations to have information broadcast for them, or they can take over the radio broadcasts themselves by calling a certain phone number.
The generator Davis Media uses to keep the Barhamsville radio tower powered during outages does little good if the T1 line fails, said Tom Davis, president and CEO of Davis Media. Davis Media is setting out to fix this issue through the monopole tower it hopes to build.
“The sole purpose of this monopole is so we have a microwave link instead of a T1 so that it won’t fail during a weather emergency,” Davis said.
Part of the contract between the county and Davis Media requires Davis Media to maintain the generator. James City County’s purchasing staff has been unable to find records showing Davis Media has paid for maintenance. A county spokesperson said staff from the county and Davis Media are searching for payment records.
In June, Davis Media applied for a special use permit to construct a 104-foot monopole tower at 5249 Olde Towne Road, which is county-owned land behind the Human Services Center. Special use permits are required for any communication towers taller than 35 feet located on county public lands.
According to a staff memo to the county’s Planning Commission, which reviewed the case at its Nov. 6 meeting, the tower would include a 100-foot pole and a 4-foot lightning rod. The tower will cost roughly $30,000 and be paid for by Davis Media.
A balloon test was publicly advertised and conducted July 10 to determine visual impacts on surrounding areas. The top of the tower would be visible from a few places on New Point Road, where Davis Media offices are located; it would not be visible from any residential area or Community Character Corridor, reads a staff memo to the Planning Commission. Longhill Road, as well as several other roads in the county, is considered a Community Character Corridor because of the view along the road; those corridors are protected by the county using buffers for new development.
The Planning Commission voted 5-0 — with Commissioners Chris Basic (Berkeley) and Mike Maddocks (At Large) absent — to recommend the Board of Supervisors approve the tower. County staff also recommends approval.
The public hearing held before the commission had no speakers other than Davis, who spoke about how the tower would work. The next week, three citizens used the public comment period at the regular meeting of the Board of Supervisors to voice opposition to the tower.
Two citizens commented on the generator the county purchased for Davis Media in 2006. Another citizen said “the WYDaily wants a radio tower” and identified the application for the tower and relationship between Davis Media and the county as “outright crony capitalism.”
“The interesting point about all this is this request for this monopole has nothing to do with WYDaily whatsoever. It doesn’t impact it any way,” Davis said in an interview. “During the last hurricane when we stayed on the air with the hurricane, the WYDaily reporters actually left the area to continue to write from a place where they had electricity, which is something the radio station can’t do.”
Citizens who spoke at the Board of Supervisors meeting also latched onto a comment Davis made during the Planning Commission meeting about his company receiving news from the county first.
“I should have used the word information, not news,” Davis said.
Davis explained the county provides information to all media outlets at the same time. The Tide and Bach FM only have direct communication with the county during times of emergency.
Davis said it is important for The Tide and Bach FM to stay on air during emergencies.
“We’re the only one servicing the entire area of Tidewater around here. … We’re the only source for that information if it’s related to this particular area,” Davis said.
Davis provided maps that show the coverage area of his stations and of WMBG AM. The Tide and Bach FM have a larger coverage area.
Davis is still involved in negotiations with the county over a rental agreement for the county’s land where the tower will be located.
“We have specifically kept our location in the Hornsby Real Estate Park and the actual land on which this monopole is going to be built was donated to the county,” Davis said.
In the county’s parcel viewer, records show the land was sold to the county for $110,000. Bobby Hornsby of Hornsby Real Estate worked on transferring the land to the county with his father, Robert Hornsby, who co-owned the land with his wife Lois. In 1984, Hornsby said the county and the Hornsby family negotiated a deal where the Hornsbys would donate the land to the county in exchange for having a sewer line run to the property, which is located adjacent to the Williamsburg Business Center.
“We felt that was a good use for the property and having that there would be beneficial to the work that we were doing to develop this area, because we were developing Windsor Forest and most all this land out here,” Hornsby said. “The reason for it was the combination of helping the county and helping our county grow out here. … It was successful because the office buildings across the street on Olde Towne Road came along, as did the Williamsburg Business Center. … My dad was a big one for trading land for services.”
The Board of Supervisors will take up consideration of the Davis Media tower at its Dec. 10 meeting. The board will meet at 7 p.m. in Building F at 101 Mounts Bay Road. The agenda materials will be posted on the county’s website the week before the meeting.
