Chair: Jerry Askew
Committee members: Bonnie Bursk, David Bereznick, Glen Chester
GHSNC Director Leads the Fight Against Verizon FiOS Boxes
Phone boxes called a ‘hazard’ – Many say blind, others are endangered
By Dana Bartholomew, Staff Writer
L.A. Daily News – Sept. 22, 2009
GRANADA HILLS — For the blind, there are enough hazards when walking down the sidewalk — loose dogs, low branches, and couches littering the curb.
Now there’s a bigger obstacle to bop pedestrians — visually impaired or otherwise — in the nose: metal phone boxes.
“If I’m walking by myself, I’ll hit it dead center,” said Racquel Decipeda, secretary of the San Fernando Valley Chapter of the National Federation of the Blind, standing next to an eye-level protuberance from a phone pole in Granada Hills.
“It’s a hazard for the blind community. Just move it up, that’s all we ask, before someone gets hurt.”
A growing number of city officials, neighborhood groups and advocates for the disabled are objecting to the hundreds of high-tech phone-equipment boxes popping onto public rights of way.
. . .
“They’re ugly,” said Jerry Askew, a board member of the Granada Hills South Neighborhood Council, the first of many to oppose the boxes. “They’re blight. They’re a hazard.
“If a kid is riding down the street on a bike, they can smack right into one.”
Click here to go to the Daily News website for the full article, or click here to download a PDF copy of it.
Additional information (September 23, 2009): Our story hit the TV News! (click to watch). Great interview with Robert and Donna from the National Federation for the Blind and the California Council of the Blind.
“The meeting was a resounding success. Verizon has agreed to remediate all of the cabinets. They will do the engineering over the next couple months and they have committed to having every last one done by the end of 2010. It might sound like a long time, but there are a lot of cabinets to raise and a lot of coordination that needs to occur. It is reasonable in my opinion.”
The Daily News ran a follow up story on September 23, highlighting Verizon’s decision to move the boxes higher.
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If you would like to join Jerry Askew and the Granada Hills South Neighborhood Council in the fight against Verizon, click the blue circle to subscribe to the “Pole Mounted Facilities” mailing list. |
UPDATE: From the Public Works Agenda for Friday, August 21, 2009:
(Note: Item continued to the September 11 meeting of the Board of Public Works. Please contact Jerry Askew for updates.)
Recommending Board deny the request by Verizon for permission to install and maintain pole mounted fiber distribution hubs at low height in the public right-of-way; allow Bureau of Street Services to proceed to enforce LAMC Section 56.08(e) to effect removal of approximately 267 non-permitted pole-mounted Verizon fiber distribution hub cabinets already installed at low height in the public right-of-way.
To read more about it, visit this online document at LACity.org. You can also find it here permanently on the GHSNC website.
Inside the above document, there are links to eleven transmittals. For your convenience, those links are listed below:
- Unfiled communication dated April 20, 2009, from Verizon, Julia Cooksey, Director of Government and External Affairs, 1314 7th Street, CAJ04MM, Santa Monica, CA 90404, telephone (310) 260-7725, requesting permission to install and maintain pole-mounted fiber distribution hubs at low height in the public right-of-way.
- Unfiled communication dated April 30, 2009, from Verizon, Julia Cooksey, Director of Government and External Affairs, 1314 7th Street, CAJ04MM, Santa Monica, CA 90404, telephone (310) 260-7725, supplementing information provided in Transmittal No. 1, above.
- Unfiled communication dated February 12, 2009, to Julia Cooksey from Carl Mills, Civil Engineer, Bureau of Engineering, requesting that Verizon relocate installed FDH cabinets, and cease low height installation of additional pole-mounted cabinets.
- Listing of locations where Verizon has already installed fiber distribution hub cabinets at pedestrian height on utility poles.
- Copy of LAMC Section 56.08(e) regarding street obstructions.
- Copy of LAMC Section 62.03.2 (Specifications and Procedures for Above Ground Facilities Installations in the Public Rights-Of-Way).
- Unfiled communication dated December 10, 2008, from the Granada Hills South Neighborhood Council, Jerry Askew, Ad-hoc Committee Chair, transmitting photographs and written complaints from area residents.
- Photographs.
- Fiber Distribution Hub Cabinet Installation Details.
- Copy of Council Motion #08-2440.
- Copy of Council Motion #07-0485-S2.
