BOARD CONFIDENTIAL --- BOARD CONFIDENTIAL Good Afternoon, Here is the latest information we have regarding the state of H.R. 1301. As the issue is very sensitive, please do not share with anyone outside of ODV. In our one and a half hour meeting with CAI this past Wednesday, which was mediated by David Redl of Walden's subcommittee staff, we were unable to reach an understanding that would retain the “reasonable accommodation" language in the Bill. CAI's view is that the 30 years of case law interpreting reasonable accommodation in the zoning context would invariably favor Amateur Radio and entitle hams to towers in every instance. We believe that they are wrong and have offered to explain why they are wrong, but they are intransigent on this subject. We left the meeting at an impasse on only this specific issue. It is imperative that we come to terms on this one issue as it has been made clear to us by both the House subcommittee AND full committee staffers that the bill will not move forward to the full House Commerce Committee without a consensus. We have also been told that without this consensus, the bill will also not get past Senator Nelson (to whom this is a personal issue) without agreed upon alternative language. We were left with two options. One is to rewrite our Bill in a way that allows us to come up with a substitute for "reasonable accommodation.” That is difficult as we would run the risk of jeopardizing virtually all of the jurisprudence and case law on PRB-1 that we have developed over the past 30 years in the zoning context. We absolutely cannot risk that. The alternative is to create a separate and distinct policy applicable only to private land use regulations written in such a way as to keep the tenets of PRB-1 while at the same time including the operative principles that CAI asked for which are acceptable to us. We believe that the attached bill accomplishes that task. It should satisfy CAI while at the same time keeps our needs intact. And it would keep the existing PRB-1 (Sec. 97-15b) and the jurisprudence that accompanies PRB-1safe from alteration. The traditional reasonable accommodation test would continue to apply to zoning and municipal land use cases. We have offered a lot to reach a consensus. Should this not be acceptable to CAI, we believe that an intransigent approach on their part would play poorly in the House and work to our benefit. Please read the bill. While it’s substantially longer than the original bill, it does make our case. (It will most likely be made cleaner, but without any loss of substance, when edited for style by the office of legislative counsel.) Feel free to reach out with any questions. 73, Mike - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Mike Lisenco, N2YBB Director, Hudson Division Chairman, ad hoc Legislative Advocacy Committee ARRL - The national association for Amateur Radio™ 917-865-3538 n2ybb@arrl.org