Dear Maryland Colleagues concerned about Small Cell Towers and 5G,
Background
The U.S. Government is working hard to force small cell towers and 5G on the state governments, the local governments, and YOU.
Maryland State Senate bill SB937, and its “cross filed” identical bill HB654 in the Maryland House of Delegates, make the Maryland State Government the principal authority forcing small cell towers and 5G on the Maryland local governments and YOU.
Maryland State Senate bill SB713, and its “cross filed” identical bill HB1020 in the Maryland House of Delegates, make the local Maryland governments the principal authorities forcing small cell towers and 5G on YOU.
SB937 and HB654 are supported by the telecommunications industry, among others. SB913 and HB1020 are supported by the Maryland Municipal League, an organization comprised of many local Maryland governments, among others.
Both bills accede to Federal demands that no entity, at any level of government, will be able to stop the forcing of small cell towers and 5G on YOU.
You may access the text of the bills by clicking on the bill numbers shown here: SB713 and SB937.
How to View the Hearing
You can view the hearing held on both SB937 and SB713 before the Finance Committee of the Maryland State Senate on the Maryland General Assembly website.
Your web browser must accept Pop Ups. According to Maryland Legislative Services, which provides the videos of the hearings, you need to load the RealPlayer free software to see its videos; BUT, surprisingly, I did not find it necessary to load RealPlayer with either the current Firefox browser or the current Microsoft Internet Explorer browser. I cannot explain why at this point.
First, try to view the hearing with your computer set up as it already is. If that does not work, unblock (permit) Pop Ups temporarily in your browser, and try again. (Remember to block Pop Ups when you are done viewing the video.)
Click HERE to take you directly to the video.
If that does not work, use the step-by-step approach below to reach the above URL, and to learn how the video of any hearing can be accessed:
(1) Click on the URL at the end of this sentence to open your browser automatically and to move to this URL: http://mgaleg.maryland.gov/. OR open your browser, and type, or copy and paste, the same URL into your Search box. The home page of the Maryland General Assembly will open.
(2) Scroll down the home page until the subtitle “Previous Committee Meetings” appears on the right side of the screen, just under the heading “Committee Meetings”.
(3) Click on the subtitle “Previous Committee Meetings”. A web page entitled “Committee Audio and Video” will open.
(4) Scroll down the web page “Committee Audio and Video” to the “Senate” section.
(5) Look for the line headed “Finance”. You will see a date window displayed there.
(6) If that window already says, “Tuesday, February 26, 2019”, which is the date of the hearing, click on the bold right-facing arrow at the end of that line, in a blue box to start the video. The video should begin to play after a pause of several seconds.
(7) If the date above is NOT displayed in that window, click on the tiny arrow pointing downward at the right end of the line on which the date appears, to cause a menu of dates to drop down.
(8) On the drop-down menu of dates, click on “Thursday, February 26, 2019 Session # 1”, which is the date of the desired hearing. That will cause the drop-down menu to close, and the selected date will appear in the window to right of the “Finance” line.
(9) With that date of “Tuesday, February 26, 2019” displayed on the “Finance” line, click on the bold right-facing arrow at the end of that line, in a blue box, to start the video. The video should begin to play after a pause of several seconds.
If the video fails to begin, you may need to unblock (permit) Pop Ups in your browser just for this purpose, as noted above, and begin again. If that, too, fails, update your browser and try again.
The hearing lasted 3 hours and 57 minutes (3:57), but you do not have to watch all of it. Bills SB937 and SB713 are addressed together. You can pull the blue dot along the time line under the video to reach these locations:
0:00 Hearing begins
2:10:29 The part of the hearing that addresses SB937 and SB713 begins.
Senator Beidle introduces SB713. Three other Senators co-sponsor this bill.
Senator Klausmeier introduces SB937. No other Senator co-sponsors this bill.Many witnesses present testimony in favor and opposed to the bills.
3:57:08 The discussion of both bills ends and the hearing also ends.
Those testifying are in groups up to 6 or so. Usually all of those in a given group are of the same view about the desirability of a given bill, but not always. Some of those testifying oppose both bills.
Who am I?
I am a retired U.S. Government career scientist (Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Harvard University). During my Government career, I worked for the Executive Office of the President, the National Science Foundation, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. I currently interact with other scientists, with doctors, and with aware individuals worldwide about the impact of radiofrequency radiation on human health.
I have been a resident of Montgomery County since 1979.
Respectfully,
Ronald M. Powell, Ph.D.