Village of Theresa Contemplates Cell Tower Lease Offer

Village of Theresa President Jody Steger provided information on an offer to build a cellphone tower in the village at its board meeting on Monday, May 19.
“Two weeks ago, [Clerk-Treasurer] Becky [Tellier] was made aware that Vertical Bridge, which put cellphone towers up for Verizon Corporation, is interested in putting a cellphone tower in the area here,” stated President Steger.
President Steger explained that he showed a representative from Vertical Bridge different village-owned properties that the tower could be built on if the board granted approval.
The first place President Steger recommended was the water tower. Currently, only Bertram Wireless has an antenna on the tower, so there is room for more antennas. However, Vertical Bridge was not interested in putting an antenna on an existing structure.
“They prefer to have their own tower to put them up,” said President Steger. “He needs a 100-foot by 100-foot square to put this tower up. The tower takes a 50 by 50-foot square. That gives them 50 feet all the way around their tower to do maintenance.”

The tower would also be 210 to 250 feet high with three footings that go 25 to 40 feet into the ground, depending on the soil type.
There is not enough room on the parcel for both the water tower and a cellphone tower, so President Steger showed the representative another location south of McArthur Road.
“He thought that was a very good location to put an antenna up,” stated President Steger. “We would have to lease them 100 by 100 square feet of property to put this tower on. The tower would have a [gravel] driveway coming in off of McArthur onto the site. There is power right on the right side of McArthur, so they would have to bore underneath the highway to bring power up to this tower.”
“Who owns the parcel directly south of that?” asked Trustee Joe Haak.
“We do,” answered President Steger. “When they put this in, they would put a century fence around it with barbed wire on top of it to keep any vandalism from coming in and wrecking any of their equipment. If we wanted to, we could have them dress it up with shrubs... They take care of all of the maintenance on it as far as mowing.”
The village currently leases the land for farming, and would continue to do so if a tower was built on the land, as only roughly one acre would be obstructed by the tower.
It would take six to eight weeks for the tower to be built, and construction would not begin until the spring or summer of 2026.
“Once the tower is installed, he said they have a 60-year lease on it, which gets renewed every five years,” explained President Steger. “The increases would be 7.5% every five years. That’s about 1.25% every year.”
The village would begin by earning roughly $700 a month from the lease, and could choose to be paid once a year or monthly. Space on the tower for antennas would also be leased to other cell service and internet providers.
“If they rent out space on that for other antennas, I asked, ‘Is it possible the village can get rent on that also?’” stated President Steger. “The representative said, ‘You can try, but it never works out that way.’”
“I just wonder if we are going to get some pushback with the 5G thing,” said Trustee Haak. “There are a lot of health concerns with that.”
The board decided to move forward with researching the tower and have the village attorney review the contract.
Board Matters
• The subdivision of land located in the Town of Theresa was also discussed by the board. Due to an agreement between the Village and the Town of Theresa, the village board has to approve the subdivision because the land is located within a set distance of the village borders. The purpose of the proposed subdivision is to separate the house on the property into a different parcel than the farm. The motion to approve the subdivision was made by Trustee Haak and passed unanimously.
• The board considered approving operator liquor licenses for Kennon Bassett and Philip Frey. Trustee Haak made the motion to grant the licenses, which passed unanimously.
• The board also discussed approving a temporary beer license to American Legion Post 270 for its brat fry on June 7, street dance on June 18, and Pioneer Day pig roast on October 5. The motion to grant the temporary license was made by Trustee Haak and passed unanimously.