Fox Meadow residents plead for cell tower

Residents of the Fox Meadow neighborhood asked the Clay County Planning Commission to approve a zoning change that would allow the construction of the cell phone tower near their neighborhood.

Fox Meadow is located directly east of Jennings State Forest, and although development is increasing to its east and south, those areas are still thinly populated.

One resident said the neighborhood of around 550 homes has little to no cell phone coverage and that the situation will worsen as carriers convert from 4G to 5G.

“As wireless networks have transitioned from 3G to 4G to 5g, the cell radius of each tower has narrowed,” the resident said. “This means that a cell tower, which was previously capable of serving customers at a distance of five miles, can now effectively serve at a distance of only 2.5 or less. As we get closer to 5g, we’re not hardly going to have any signal out there with 550 homes.”

“We do need a cell phone tower somewhere out there,” said another resident. “There are places in Fox Meadow that you actually lose your signal regardless of what it is. If you had to call 911, you’d be out of luck. We’ve had to put in a cell phone booster in our house just to get any sort of acceptable reception.”

Some residents said they were concerned that the zoning change might open up the property for additional houses, but the landowner said that because the land is primarily wetlands, more homes on the parcel is economically prohibitive.

The planning commission recommended approval for the zoning change to the county commission.