The SF Examiner notes yet another screwball delay in San Franciso’s oft delayed municipal wireless network. The San Francisco Neighborhood Antenna Free Union (SNAFU) filed an appeal with the Board of Supervisors decision to exempt from environmental review the installation of an estimated 2,200 Wi-Fi, transmitters throughout The City.
The city’s five-member review panel ranked the EarthLink-Google package as the best deal for San Francisco — what is it — more than a year ago. Now the Board of Supervisors has 45 days to schedule a hearing on SNAFU’s appeal. If upheld, the agreement would have to undergo an environmental review, which generally takes about a year.
“We’re concerned about the potential health and environmental effects from the microwave radiation used by these transmitters,” SNAFU spokesman Doug Loranger said. “At this point, we’re simply saying, ‘You shouldn’t proceed at all without an environmental review.’”
In May, a Board of Supervisors committee postponed consideration of the deal until a July 11 hearing. Board members have said that the terms of the agreement should be better and some are advocating moving forward with a city-owned Internet network instead.
Bruce Wolfe of PublicNet SF Coalition believes San Francisco is selling off public rights-of-way. They would like to see a citywide fiber ring with a WiFi layer on top as they work towards a municipal FTTP as a community effort. The proposals by SFLAN and BARWN would bring ownership and management of the network closer to the people.
Related DailyWireless stories include; WiFi War in San Francisco, SF Cloud: Mute Point?, Meraki Networking in SF, El Paso Unwired + Most of California, NY State, Toledo & SF Wireless Plans, SF Cloud: Done Deal?, SF: Freedom Not Free, Rain on SF Cloud, San Francisco BusFi, Google WiFi SitRep, Wireless Silicon Valley Proposals, GoogleFi: Ads or Not?, Google WiFi Interview, 100th Anniversary of SF Earthquake, Portland Chooses MetroFi for 134 Mile Cloud, SF WiFi: Bad Deal for Poor? and SF Cloud: It’s Google/Earthlink.
.gif)
