The city of Marthasville says an internet service provider will no longer be allowed to keep equipment on the city’s water tower rent free.
Over the past month, the city has been in …
This item is available in full to subscribers.
We have recently launched a new and improved website. To continue reading, you will need to either log into your subscriber account, or purchase a new subscription.
If you are a digital subscriber with an active subscription, or you are a print subscriber who had access to our previous wesbite, then you already have an account here. Just reset your password if you have not yet logged in to your account on this new site.
If you are a current print subscriber and did not have a user account on our previous website, you can set up a free website account by clicking here.
Otherwise, click here to view your options for subscribing.
Please log in to continue |
The city of Marthasville says an internet service provider will no longer be allowed to keep equipment on the city’s water tower rent free.
Over the past month, the city has been in negotiation with Wisper Internet to either pay its way for broadcast antennas currently mounted on the city hall water tower, or else remove their equipment from the structure.
A number of years ago, the city government had agreed to let internet company YHTI mount the antennas in exchange for free internet at city hall, said Mayor David Lange. Since then, YHTI was bought out by Wisper, and the city office switched internet providers.
During the board of aldermen’s Nov. 18 meeting, Lange said a representative for the company didn’t seem interested in a new deal.
“Probably because I told him, once our new well is drilled north of town and tanked, this tower (at city hall) will be able to be torn down,” Lange commented. “They’re looking to maybe just move (the antennas) right next door to the cell tower.”
That’s just fine, aldermen said, since the city gets a share of the rent if AT&T leases space on the tower to another company.
According to the legal contract that allowed AT&T to build the cell tower on city hall property, AT&T must pay the city 30 percent of any income it receives from third party companies leasing space on the tower. That’s on top of $1,300 per month the phone company is paying Marthasville as a base rate.
For the city, the only current issue with moving the Wisper antennas off the water tower is that it isn’t happening as fast as requested. A letter from City Attorney Mark Piontek originally directed the antennas to be removed from Marthasville’s water tower by Dec. 1 if a deal couldn’t be negotiated.
After a reply from Wisper stating the company was not able to remove its equipment by that date, aldermen agreed to delay the eviction deadline to Jan. 15.
