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“Can you hear me now?” Last week Oakland residents got one step closer to being able to say yes.
After years of complaints about poor cell phone reception, the Oakland Town Commission voted April 28 to amend its telecommunications ordinance, lifting key restrictions on cell towers in an effort to expand wireless coverage and improve emergency communications.
“There is zero signal. For people who work from home or who are making calls, I’ll tell you from experience that from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m., there is zero signal because people are taking bandwidth driving down the turnpike,” Mayor Shane Taylor said during the commission meeting. “It’s a win for me and for everyone here.”
The changes stem from Ordinance 2026-01. The amendments will update the telecommunications section of the town’s land development code to allow limited tower construction on certain town-owned residential properties and revise technical standards that officials say have long restricted service improvements.
The ordinance passed unanimously on its first read; it will have its second, final, read on May 12.
Under the previous code, towers required a special exemption process and were limited to industrial zones, capped at 100 feet in height, and required large separation distances — conditions staff said made it difficult to expand coverage in the town center or support public safety radio needs.
The new ordinance will allow towers on select town-owned parcels; increase the height standard to roughly 150 feet; reduce the required separation distance from two miles to 1.5 miles; and require monopole designs to help towers blend into the landscape. The changes also prioritize co-location, allowing multiple providers and public safety equipment to use a single tower.
Even with the new ordinance, cell towers will not be sprouting up immediately. The ordinance sets the rules for future proposals, which must still go through a special exemption approval process. With that process, any tower would be considered a secondary use on a property, and nearby residents would be notified and given the opportunity to weigh in at a public hearing.
Town Manager Elise Hui said the town is considering a site on the southeast corner of Oakland Avenue Charter School on Catherine Ross Road (old Motamassek Road) directly behind a lift station. She noted that “with the 1.5-mile separation requirement, there is no other parcel in town that could accommodate a tower.”
Hui said resident complaints about poor cell phone service have remained consistent, particularly among those working from home or taking online classes. Oakland’s population growth and higher mobile data usage have also created more demand, she added. Even so, prior commission discussions on upgrading service over the past five-plus years had largely fizzled out.
Hui told VoxPopuli in an email that “earlier conversations were largely informal and focused on known coverage gaps rather than specific regulatory changes.”
Until now.
Hui said the push for the ordinance was driven by a “need for more reliable wireless service to support public safety operations.” Taylor noted the "revenue stream potential for the town" from additional cell towers was also a key consideration.
And there is interest from telecommunications providers to work with Oakland.
“Several telecommunications companies contacted my predecessor expressing interest in locating facilities within the town,” Hui said. “Following internal discussions, the town determined that the most appropriate next step was to update the land development code and issue a competitive RFP [request for proposal] to identify a provider that best meets the town’s needs.”
