A controversial proposal for a lofty communications tower in Bears Ears National Monument has been withdrawn, days after opponents asked for a fuller review of its potential environmental impacts.
The tower would have stood taller than the Astra Tower in Salt Lake City, which will be 449 feet tall and the state’s tallest building when it’s completed. The Bears Ears tower was slated for a site on land owned by the Utah Trust Lands Administration, a state agency that sells and leases land to generate revenue for Utah public schools.
The tower’s adversaries objected to its potential harms to wildlife and the monument’s natural and cultural landscape, and a lack of consultation with tribes about the plan.
Vertical Bridge Development LLC, a Boca Raton, Fla.-based company and the largest private owner of communications infrastructure nationwide, had proposed the tower. It obtained a conditional use permit from San Juan County, but was still awaiting approval from the Utah Trust Lands Administration and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
The application was withdrawn from the FCC on Wednesday, according to an online list of projects seeking approval from the agency. A spokesperson for the Utah Trust Lands Administration said the company had not yet withdrawn its application with the state.
Vertical Bridge did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In a first environmental assessment, it said it planned to use avian-friendly lighting and place flight diverters — reflective pieces that help birds see structures and avoid collisions — on the tower. It also said it had sent information to interested tribes.
On Monday, the nonprofit Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance and seven other groups had submitted a request to the FCC and Vertical Bridge, asking to review the tower site and arguing for a second and broader environmental assessment.
The first assessment submitted by the company, the groups said, did not adequately analyze the potential for significant environmental impacts to the cultural, natural, aesthetic and other resources and values of two national monuments — Bears Ears and the Natural Bridges National Monument within it.
“The heart of Bears Ears National Monument is no place for a communications tower and SUWA is thrilled that the developer has withdrawn their proposal,” Judi Brawer, the nonprofit’s wildlands attorney said Thursday.
The Bears Ears Commission, a group of tribal representatives that co-manages the national monument with federal agencies, said on Thursday that the Navajo Nation and the Hopi Tribe were not consulted for the tower project.
“Meaningful consultation with all Tribes with cultural and historical ties to Bears Ears is essential,” the commission said in a statement. “The exclusion of these Tribes from the consultation process is a significant oversight that must be corrected.”
Mark Maryboy, a former San Juan County commissioner and delegate to the Navajo Nation Council, had criticized the proposal in a Writers on the Range column in June. “If erected,” he wrote, “this alien-looking tower will be a spear in the heart of the Bears Ears area.”
The San Juan County Planning Commission had approved a permit for the proposed tower on Feb. 8. It was “intended to fill communication gaps in the area as well as support infrastructure already in place to the southern part of the county,” according to a staff report from the commission.
The Federal Communication Commission did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The initial assessment filed with the FCC said Vertical Bridge had sited the tower “away from sensitive locations such as critical habitats, wilderness areas, wildlife refuges, and wetlands, where species of concern are more likely to be present.”
It also said Kade Lazenby, a biologist with the Utah Department of Natural Resources, asked only that the construction be scheduled outside the key season for the pinyon jays in the area. In an email included in the filing, Lazenby told the company: “With that being said, we agree that the proposed undertaking is not likely to adversely affect state listed species or their potential habitats.”
