A Penn Valley Couple has filed a lawsuit against Verizon, NID, and the County for approving a Cell Phone Tower to be built 20 feet from their property line.  Peter Lockyer and Juliet Erickson say the county gave approval for the 48 foot cell tower under a variance that should not have been allowed.

“There are a lot of issues around it. The key one is that the county has actually approved a variance. In other words, it’s going to be 20 feet from our property line, this tower and they have approved it and it benefits Verizon without demonstrating a hardship for the property owner who is NID.”

The tower is to be built on property owned by NID for water storage and version will lease a part of it to build the tower.  Lockyer and Erickson claim this is a classic David and Goliath fight. Lockyer says Verizon’s out of town representatives came into Nevada County and pushed through a plan that violates the law.  The final variance and approval for the cell phone tower passed on a 4 to 1 vote by the Board of Supervisors with Supervisor Terry Lamphier Voting no.

  Calls by KNCO to County Council and to Supervisor Hank Weston who represents the district have so far not been returned.