Steve Henry Herman: A good revenue source for schools

Regarding the Sept. 16 editorial “School cell towers bring dollars”: The proposal to locate cell towers on Wake County school property and thereby capture needed educational revenue brings back memories of our Orange County neighborhood’s multiple efforts over the years to keep cell towers from our midst. We won some fights but ultimately were outlawyered by AT&T and lost.

The alternative proposal back then was to locate the tower on the grounds of nearby East Chapel High. It seemed a win-win solution: The school would have a long-term source of needed revenue and our neighborhood would be spared an eyesore. I can’t recall why the idea was rejected, but it shouldn’t have been.

An analogous situation is the N.C. Education Lottery. For better or worse people want to gamble, so it makes sense to allow it and direct the profits to serve the public good.

You suggest a contest be held to identify ways to “disguise” the inherent ugliness of cell towers. Here’s my entry: place a big neon-lit sign on top of each tower that reads “$ for Schools!”

This story was originally published September 28, 2016 at 3:48 PM with the headline "Steve Henry Herman: A good revenue source for schools."