Panel Approves Rules on TV Satellite Dishes

A City Council committee Thursday approved a revised ordinance that would require residents to get a permit before installing television satellite dishes more than 15 feet off the ground.

The proposal applies to satellite dishes more than two feet in diameter.

The Transportation and Land Use Committee, responding to complaints that the dishes--some 12 feet in diameter--were causing space-age blight in front yards and on roofs, voted 3-0 in favor of the regulation.

In February, the Planning Commission approved an ordinance that required anyone installing a dish larger than 10 feet in diameter, or those mounting a dish on the roof, to obtain a satellite antenna permit from the city.

But many dealers with 10 1/2-foot dishes in inventory warned that they might bring restraint-of-trade charges if the ordinance prevented them from being sold, and the ordinance was returned for revisions.

Councilman Mike Gotch said that because industry officials and concerned residents liked parts of the revamped proposal, “apparently it is a successful middle-of-the-road compromise.”

Larry O’Donnell, executive director of the San Diego Satellite Dealers Assn., said dish owners “did not get handed carte blanche.”

But O’Donnell said the proposed rule would balance “the rights of those who want the antennas effectively screened and the consumer’s freedom of information rights to receive signals transmitted from the satellites.”

The proposed ordinance does not require a permit if certain guidelines are followed. Among the guidelines:

- Satellites to be placed on the ground in the rear 40% of the owner’s yard.

- The dish to be located on lots where a six-foot wall, fence or hedge is installed between the antenna and the property line.

- The antennas to be screened by trees or shrubbery so that no more than 25% of the antenna is visible.

The property owner must obtain a permit from the city if a satellite dish does not meet the guidelines, and if he or she wants to place the dish on a roof or on a historic property. Antennas placed on roofs should be recessed into the roof, or screened by material similar to the roofing.

The question of whether banning or regulating antennas violates a person’s First Amendment rights has been raised in other parts of the nation.

The Federal Communications Commission is presently considering a regulation to prevent cities from banning satellite dishes, committee consultant Betsy McCullough said.

Although the FCC will not present its ruling on the issue for several months, McCullough said the committee’s ordinance appears to be similar to what the FCC is proposing.

McCullough said the committee should proceed with the proposed ordinance and, “if the final FCC rule conflicts with what we have adopted, amendments would be prepared at that time.”

San Diego is one of a growing number of cities nationwide that are concerned about satellite dishes.

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

The dishes have popped up like weeds in both residential and commercial neighborhoods, and cities have sought to regulate them.

In San Diego County, La Mesa requires a permit for all dish installations, and El Cajon and Poway recently placed moratoriums on dish installations until their planners could draft regulations.