Planners OK Strict Rules for Satellite Dish Installation

Concerned about a space-age form of blight, the San Diego Planning Commission by a 5-1 vote Thursday approved a new ordinance that places strict regulations on the installation of large television satellite dishes.

The commission acted after city residents complained that a growing number of the bulky metal dishes, some 12 feet in diameter, are ugly and obtrusive--sometimes installed on second-story rooftops, sometimes blocking views.

The lone commissioner who voted against the ordinance, which requires owners of the large dishes to obtain a license before installation and to screen them from view, said she did so because it wasn’t tough enough.

“The best suggestion today was banning it (outright in all residential zones. I vote no,” Commissioner Paula Oquita said.

The commission also decided 6-0 to hold a hearing on whether dishes installed before the new ordinance takes effect should be reviewed and required to meet the standards of the new ordinance, which still must be approved by the City Council. The commissioners made it clear that they would like to do so.

But before the ordinance could be made retroactive, the commission must show “a compelling public need” for removing any non-conforming dishes, Deputy City Atty. Frederick Conrad cautioned.

Commissioner Dan Guevara countered that the proof should be easy. Displaying a newspaper photo of a 12-foot dish protruding from the second story of a house, he said, “I personally . . . find that this one dish is a blight on the community. I wouldn’t want to wait until there were 10 of them to find that this is a problem.”

Local satellite antenna dealers had mixed emotions about the ordinance.

On one hand, “the industry wants to be good neighbors . . . This adds to our ability to market the equipment,” said Larry O’Donnell, executive director of the newly formed San Diego Satellite Dealers Assn., representing 87 county satellite dish retailers and wholesalers.

But some aspects of the ordinance “would constitute a restraint of trade and a violation of our First Amendment protection of freedom of information,” O’Donnell said.

Because the ordinance requires those installing a dish larger than 10 feet in diameter, or those mounting a dish on the roof, to obtain from the city a satellite antenna permit, “many dealers who have 10 1/2-foot dishes, to the extent that they have them in inventory and cannot sell them,” may have a good restraint of trade case, he said.

Also, O’Donnell said, the ordinance may unfairly restrict the satellite antenna industry. “I don’t see any difference between a 10-foot satellite dish on someone’s front lawn and a 10-foot statue with a woman with a jug which turns into a waterfall,” he said.

The San Diego ordinance would allow satellite dishes 10 feet in diameter or less to be installed without a permit.

An attachment to the ordinance requires that all dishes be screened by shrubs and earth berms; if the dish is roof-mounted, it must be recessed into the roof or screened by material similar to the roofing.

San Diego is one of a growing number of cities around the nation to be concerned about satellite dishes.

As the price of the dishes has dropped dramatically (from $10,000 to about $2,500 over the last four years), more than a million Americans have taken advantage of technology that can bring more than 100 channels of news, information and entertainment into their homes.

But as the dishes have popped up like mushrooms in both commercial and residential neighborhoods, cities have sought to regulate them. In San Diego County, the City of La Mesa requires a permit for all dish installations. El Cajon and Poway recently established a moratorium on dish installations until their planners could draft new, more restrictive regulations.

Representatives of San Diego County’s fledgling satellite industry have been watching the issue closely.

O’Donnell told commissioners that his members had not received copies of the proposed ordinance in time to make a formal comment on it.

But one retailer, Martin Altbaum of the Satellite Store, told the commission he had looked at the proposed ordinance and liked it. Altbaum said he had opposed the idea of regulation several weeks ago, but decided that this ordinance is workable and now supports it.