Protecting Our Rural Communities, Our health, Our Environment, and Our Right to Be Heard
The Bald Hill area and the rural communities surrounding Yelm are places where people have chosen to live because of their peaceful rural character far away from the pollution from highly populated area, away from the radiation of cell towers.
Today, several large wireless communication facility projects are being proposed in and around these communities threatening our way of life.
Residents are currently engaged in three separate community efforts concerning proposed towers at Penn Lane, Hobson Road, and near the Clearwood community.
But protecting our communities requires more than responding to one project at a time.
That is why we created the Bald Hill Pure and Clear Skies Association.
Our association brings residents together to advocate for transparent government, meaningful public participation, careful environmental review, and full compliance with the land-use laws and protections that apply to wireless infrastructure projects. Why ? because the FCC deprived local government to make decision about cell phone tower based on health and environmental risks.
We believe communities should have a meaningful voice when large industrial structures are proposed in rural neighborhoods using people as Guinea pigs for technology that is yet to be determined safe - in Environmental Health Trust v. FCC, a federal appeals court ruled in 2021 that the FCC acted “arbitrarily and capriciously” by failing to adequately address evidence concerning children, long-term exposure, non-cancer health effects, and environmental harm before retaining its 1996 radiofrequency limits).
We are left to use environmental and critical-area protections in order to push back against those towers that are more than 150 feet in heights equipped with radio boosters to go through any obstacles.
We believe residents should have access to the information necessary to understand projects before decisions are made.
And when necessary, we believe communities must be able to obtain qualified legal representation to defend those rights using the tools we are left to use.
Why We Need Your Help
- Reviewing and responding to these projects requires significant time, expertise, and financial resources.
- Developers proposing major telecommunications facilities have access to attorneys, engineers, consultants, environmental specialists, and other professionals.
- Residents need the ability to obtain their own professional assistance as well.
- Your contribution to the Bald Hill Pure and Clear Skies Association will help us continue this work throughout the Bald Hill area and surrounding rural communities.
- Unlike our project-specific fundraisers, this fundraiser supports the broader work of the Association and is not dedicated exclusively to Penn Lane, Hobson Road, Clearwood, or any single tower proposal.
- Funds may be used wherever the Association determines they are most needed to advance its mission and protect the communities we serve.
Your Donation Helps Support
Contributions may be used for:
- Land-use and environmental attorney fees, including retainers, legal research, consultation, hearings, appeals, and litigation when necessary;
- Review of wireless communication facility applications and associated land-use and environmental documents;
- SEPA, wetland, critical-area, wildlife, drainage, geotechnical, visual-impact, access-road, utility, and other environmental review;
- Independent professional experts, including wetland specialists, wildlife specialists, engineers, geotechnical consultants, GIS specialists, and other technical professionals when appropriate;
- Public-record requests, document retrieval, filing fees, service costs, transcripts, and other administrative exenses;
- Community outreach and education so residents know about proposed projects and understand how they can participate;
- Public-hearing preparation and representation;
- Research concerning Thurston County land-use regulations and wireless communication facility requirements;
- Advocacy for transparent, lawful, and accountable permitting procedures;
- Legal challenges or appeals when necessary to preserve community rights; and
- Other reasonable expenses directly related to the mission of the Association.
This Is Bigger Than One Tower
Some people live immediately beside one of the proposed tower sites. Others live several miles away. And many supporters may not live in the Bald Hill area at all.
You do not have to live next to a proposed tower to care about what happens here.
The principles involved affect every rural community:
- Will environmental protections be properly applied?
- Will wetlands, wildlife habitat, steep slopes, water resources, historic resources, and rural landscapes receive meaningful consideration?
- Will residents receive adequate notice and an opportunity to participate?
- Will decisions be made through a transparent process?
- Will communities have the resources necessary to hold both applicants and government agencies accountable to the law?
Our goal is to ensure that major wireless infrastructure projects receive the complete, transparent, independent, and lawful review that our communities deserve.
Once a large tower, access road, equipment compound, utility corridor, or other permanent infrastructure is constructed, its impacts can be difficult or impossible to reverse.
That is why careful review must happen before construction begins.
Three Communities — One Common Effort
We currently have separate fundraisers supporting residents directly affected by three tower projects:
Penn Lane — Bald Hill Area
https://www.givesendgo.com/No5GinTheBaldHillArea
Clearwood / Clear Lake Area
https://www.givesendgo.com/help-protect-clear-lake
Hobson Road / Bald Hill Community
https://www.givesendgo.com/help-protect-the-bald-hill-community
If you want your contribution associated specifically with one of those community efforts, please donate directly through that project's fundraiser.
If instead you want to support the continuing work of the Bald Hill Pure and Clear Skies Association wherever the need is greatest, please contribute through this fundraiser.
Please Stand With Us
You may never have attended a land-use hearing.
You may never have read a SEPA checklist, critical-area report, wetland study, engineering plan, or wireless ordinance.
But ordinary residents should not have to become land-use attorneys or environmental consultants simply to make sure their communities are heard.
That is why we are organizing.
Every contribution — whether $10, $25, $50, $100, or more — helps give residents the resources necessary to participate effectively and responsibly in decisions that can permanently change their communities.
If you cannot contribute financially, you can still help enormously by sharing this fundraiser, following our work, attending public meetings, submitting comments, and helping other residents become informed.
Together, we can protect the rural character of our communities, defend meaningful public participation, and work to preserve the pure and clear skies of Bald Hill for future generations.
Thank you for standing with us.
Bald Hill Pure and Clear Skies Association
Website: https://emfdangers.wixsite.com/stop5ginthebaldhill
Contact: no.5g.in.the.bald.hill.wa@gmail.com
UBI: 606-004-684
