Monopole Battle Heats Up; Wage Drive Neighbors Unite

Rarely has a neighborhood rallied together so hard to exclude a new neighbor. Of course, on Wage Drive, the new neighbor is not a person, but rather, a 105-foot-high monopole in place of a home on the cul de sac.

Residents have joined in a vocal campaign against Dominion Virginia Power, which purchased the home at 821 Wage Drive for more than $180,000 over its assessed value last summer and plans to use the lot as a site for a monopole tower needed for its transmission line that will stretch from Leesburg to the Hamilton substation. Since last month, residents, with the support of Mayor Kristen Umstattd and members of town council, have reached out to state and local legislators to deliver their message of disapproval to Dominion. A community meeting held Nov. 6 at Loudoun County High School drew around 40 community members, including representation from nearly every home on Wage Drive, Umstattd said Tuesday.

Dominion representatives offered two options for locating the monopole on the property during last Thursday's meeting. One includes placing the tower at the southwestern corner of the 7th Day Adventist Church of Leesburg property on Dry Mill Road, near its southern boundary and the other, Dominion's preferred option, would be to locate the pole at the southern end of 821 Wage Drive. These options could both entail the clear-cutting of existing tall trees.

Umstattd and Del. Joe T. May (R-26), who attended last Thursday's meeting along with state Sen. Mark Herring (D-33) and Judy McCary of Rep. Frank Wolf's (R-VA-10) office, presented another option to Dominion that would instead place the pole down the slope from either of Dominion's proposed options and locate it next to the shoulder of the Rt. 7 Bypass, with the transmission wires hanging on the south side of the pole, so that no trees would have to be cleared, according to the mayor. Another option given by Umstattd and town staff involves placing the pole in the median of the bypass, although that may complicate any road widening projects in the future.

Adding to neighbors' and the town council's frustrations are feelings that again the town has been left in the dark over Dominion's plans. Umstattd said that, in a recent meeting with Dominion representatives and town staff, she relayed these concerns.

"What I said to [Dominion] was that we've now reached the point where the town cannot assume Dominion is being truthful in anything they tell us," Umstattd said. "There have been too many violations of trust by Dominion. I said, 'From now on I can't take your word on anything you say to us.' They've been untruthful too many times. That appears to be the sentiment of the council."

The Leesburg Town Council Wednesday unanimously passed a resolution that said Dominion had disregarded a State Corporation Commission order that requires the company to establish a point of contact for the Wage Drive neighbors and to keep the town informed of its plans for 821 Wage Drive. The resolution also asked that Dominion be held accountable for its disregard of the order.

But Le-Ha Anderson, Dominion media manager, maintains that a list of contacts for the project has been available to the public on the SCC's Web site, and the company has committed to making that information available to residents on Wage Drive and neighboring Anne Street.

Anderson said that Dominion was "disappointed" by the council's action, but added that "the fact remains that Dominion has an obligation to build this transmission line to serve western Loudoun County. The SCC issued an order that we must adhere to. The order is the outcome of a very long and a very thorough public process, a process where the Town of Leesburg was involved as a formal respondent in the town."

Both Anderson and project manager Les O'Donnell say that a second community meeting will be scheduled some time after all resident's suggestions on the pole placement, due to Dominion Friday, have been received. As to the neighbor's concerns about the secrecy of Dominion's plans for the pole placement, Anderson explains that a "balancing act" was necessary in negotiating with the former homeowner of 821 Wage Drive to purchase the residence.

"We entered into an agreement between Dominion and a private resident that was a private negotiation. We would have violated their trust had we made it public," Anderson explains. "There's a lot of balancing acts required. We've got to balance the information we provide to the public and, at the same time, the information we provide to a homeowner. The other balancing act is we've got to try to accommodate is all the wishes, desires, recommendations and ideas of the public, but at the same time we cannot compromise the integrity of the engineering required [for the monopole placement] and safety concerns. We're hoping at the end of the day to do a good job of balancing, to be able to come to decisions that suit as many people as possible."

In the meantime, Wage Drive resident Terry Titus and his neighbors are continuing to log long hours fighting Dominion on the pole placement. Though Titus said he has accepted the fact that the pole will go somewhere on the property at 821 Wage, he hopes that Dominion takes his and others suggestions' seriously as to the exact placement of the pole on the property.

"We're just trying to make the best of a bad situation," Titus said.