Municipal Cell Towers and Cell Site Lease Templates
More and more municipal governments, whether in small towns or large counties, are frequently being contacted regarding leasing municipal land or structures for the transmission of wireless services. In some cases, it may be a cell tower owned and operated by the municipal government itself. In other cases, it's the lease of municipal property or structure for the purpose of building a municipal cell tower or attaching antennas. With the telecommunications industry changing rapidly and new technological advances altering the way wireless carriers provide service, it is imperative that municipalities keep informed and up-to-date.
The professionals at Steel in the Air have consulted with a number of municipal entities. While each case differs greatly from the next, there is one universal component in every consultation; a discussion over the "boilerplate" lease that the municipality uses for contract execution with wireless tenants. In our experience, every consultation has shown us that many municipalities don't really understand the technical aspects of the leases, especially considering all the recent changes and mergers in the industry.
Many municipalities are stilling relying on the same lease they modified from a wireless carrier's template lease ten years ago, so while technology and carrier requirements have changed, the leases have not. In some of our recent consultations, this failure to update the municipal cell tower lease from a technical perspective is resulting in the termination of leases and the loss of revenue for the municipalities - losses that could have been prevented.
With the proliferation of new technologies like WI-FI, LTE, and WI-MAX, it's becoming increasingly more important that the lease language accurately reflect the potential threats these new technologies may present. We are here to help review your lease from an objective and technical standpoint and make suggestions to your attorney on how to implement changes or clauses that will prevent the loss of future revenue from a municipal cell tower lease.
We would be happy to provide references from past municipal clients and a no cost, no obligation estimate for our services. Please contact us for more information.
If you are interested in seeing more information on how your municipality can maximize its revenue from developing its own cell towers for lease, please click here.