The taller the tower, the better the reception. But if bigger is better, that is in the eye of the beholder. That is what the county board heard when more than a dozen people spoke at the March 10 meeting about the ARMER towers being erected by the state in Cook County as part of its statewide plan to have emergency radio coverage for the entire state.
Shorter ARMER towers have meant that the Minnesota Department of Transportation has gone from a plan for six 330- foot towers in the county to building 15 190-foot towers.
Because line-of-sight between towers is necessary, shorter means more towers. But the amount of towers needed for good radio reception countywide wasn’t the main concern for the many people who attended the March 10 commissioners’ meeting. Instead, it’s where those towers will be placed that is causing citizen concern.
A plea for no tower at end of the Gunflint
Long time end of the Gunflint Trail resident James Raml said, “I would like to say that those of us concerned with the placement of any tower at the end of the Trail respect the work that these county employees and volunteers do for us and also their desire to have the best radio communications possible.
“I am only speaking today about the proposed placement of the so-called “end of the Trail” tower. We are not talking about keeping a tower under 200 feet in that location but instead asking that you not place any tower in that sensitive location and instead look for some alternative if enhancement of radio reception should be deemed essential in that area.”
Raml said he is familiar with emergency radio use, having worked as a wilderness ranger in the BWCA, as a wildland firefighting crew member and as a manager of a remote helicopter base in Antarctica.
However, Raml said, “This tower would be seen from everywhere up here in this fire-scarred narrow corridor through the BWCA wilderness.”
He said the tower would be the “most prominent visible feature on the landscape,” visible from places like the Palisades, the Kekekabic and Magnetic trails, most of Seagull Lake, Meditation Lake, Larch Lake, the high trails up at Chik-Wauk Nature Center, the portage up to Jap (Paulson) Lake, as well as most of the Gunflint Trail from before the Forest Service guard station to just before the Seagull Public Landing.
Nikki Boostrom asked the board to consider what it means to locals and visitors to the area who see towers everywhere. “I don’t really understand why we need all of these towers. I can say that I don’t like them. Please think about this before you decide to put more of them up.”
Others speak of need for towers
Several community members spoke in favor of the towers, noting that they are necessary for safety reasons.
Beth Schwarz, superintendent of School District 166, said, “The new ARMER system has been an amazing upgrade to our communication system at Cook County Schools. Every day, the district transports approximately 400 children to and from school. Before the ARMER system was implemented we frequently lost communication with our buses,” said Schwarz.
“Today, we only lose communication for very brief periods of time around Cascade, Five Mile Rock, Hovland and in a couple of spots on the Gunflint. Further, the district has the ability to communicate with law enforcement quickly should the need ever arise.”
Schwarz recounted an incident in January 2014 when three new buses had issues on a very cold day.
“One bus stopped completely. Because we had ARMER radios we were able to quickly dispatch rescue buses and keep everyone in contact. In this case, due to the cold temperatures it wasn’t just the children on the bus, but those waiting at bus stops we were concerned about. Everyone worked together to get all children picked up and delivered to school safely with no incidents of frostbite. Without ARMER radios, I do not think we would have been able to this,” said Schwarz.
For Joe Buttweiler, manager of Arrowhead Cooperative, the thought of not having the best way to communicate in place is gut wrenching.
“It’s horrible to sit in an office and not be able to communicate with people in the field.”
Buttweiler was referring to the linemen who go out in storms and repair downed lines, broken lines, etc. in the worst weather imaginable. He said he wanted to “ensure people working in the field go home safely at night,” and he implored the board to take into account all of the emergency workers who need and rely on good communications to perform their work.
John Barton of the Hovland Fire Department said the old VHF system was “very problematic” with frequent outages and provided “extremely poor coverage” for the service area covered by Hovland firefighters. The ARMER system, he said, provides “a night and day difference in the ability to serve our district.”
John Groth—who is also a Cook County Law Enforcement dispatcher— said he appreciates the better communication with ARMER both as dispatcher and firefighter. He said when Lutsen firefighters arrived on the scene of the Ham Lake fire they had no radio coverage and there was fire all around them. “What if we had broken down?
“Now with ARMER I’m not only a Lutsen First Responder, I’m a Grand Marais First Responder/firefighter, a Grand Portage First Responder/firefighter.”
Aaron Mielke, a Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) firefighter, said the DNR’s biggest partners in fighting wildfires are voluntary firefighting crews in the county. The ability to interface radios with those people was invaluable, he said.
Cook County Highway Department Maintenance Director Russell Klegstad said, “I worked with VHF for years and years. It would fade in and fade out…The key to providing better service is through quality communication between groups,” adding that today he can send another plow up the Gunflint Trail (or anywhere in the county) when told one was needed where in the past he never would have known because no one could call in and request one.
Mike Keyport, emergency management director for Grand Portage, said when an ARMER tower was proposed for Mount Josephine there was a lot of public discourse. “Public safety won out,” he said. “To me as an EMS manager it’s a vital piece of equipment we will use forever.”
Keyport noted the tower allowed conservation officers, police, EMS personnel, even the snowmobile trail groomer, all to communicate with each other.
County IT/Radio Support Technician Rowan Watkins and GIS/Mapping Specialist Kyle Oberg gave a presentation to the board about how and why the ARMER system works. Watkins said that in his three years with the county the state has bent over backwards to work with the county on the installation of towers, calling them a great partner.
Sheriff Pat Eliasen spoke in favor of constructing necessary towers because they linked his force with all of the other emergency workers, firefighters from the DNR, the Coast Guard, Homeland Security, Arrowhead Electric, the hospital, the school etc., and said the ability to be able to call and receive calls countywide gave his officers the ability to respond where in the past they might never receive a call for help on the VHF system.
More input needed?
Board Chair Heidi Doo- Kirk said the board has plenty of time to get more public input because, as of now, the state is only in the design phase of plans for any new towers.
Raml suggested an alternative to placing a tower at the end of the Gunflint Trail. “We are not against enhanced radio use for safety reasons, but merely trying to come up with an alternative that would not involve a tower in this most visually sensitive area.
“We already have a new tower on Pine Mountain, with others to be built on Lima Mountain, near Devil Fish Lake and in the Sawbill areas, as well as one in the Cascade River Valley, which is currently planned to be a 330-foot tower with strobe and red lights.
“One alternative to [building] a tower up at the end of the trail would be to connect the existing facility on the Gunflint tower through the new fiber optic to a much smaller tower near the end of the trail. The other would be to look into the feasibility of using an outdoor bidirectional amplifier like what was used in Murray County, Minnesota, and approved by MnDOT’s ARMER program.
“Once again, although we do appreciate what local emergency management employees and volunteers do for us, I know that there are many of us up here that when our time does come, we would be happy to go out while picking blueberries looking up into a blue sky without a tower as our last view of the world.”
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