Saratoga News

NEWS BRIEFS

Public hearing set on new city budget

There will be a public hearing on the new city budget during the June 5 City Council meeting at 13777 Fruitvale Ave. The budget was earlier discussed publicly at the Town Hall meeting in April. Hearings on the landscaping and lighting assessment district and weed and brush abatement program are also scheduled for June 5. And the Binkley application, likely to be the first application affected by Measure G, will be considered that night.

Cellular antennas need use permits

The City Council voted 4-1 on May 15 to approve an ordinance to require use-permit review and approval for cellular and wireless communication antennas in all zoning districts of the city. Councilmember Karen Tucker dissented.

This action follows the unanimous April 10 recommendation of the Planning Commission to adopt this policy and ends a moratorium imposed Jan. 3 on all new wireless communication antenna applications.

Tucker said she voted no because she wanted to keep the antennas out of residential areas. Currently, the antennas are not allowed in residential districts but only administrative review, not a public hearing process, is required for antennas in commercial areas.

Mayor Paul Jacobs said he shared Tucker's concerns but felt banning antennas in residential areas limited the city's flexibility in locating them in places like church steeples, where they would be camouflaged. Even so, the council warned antenna providers they would not have an easy time getting permission to set up their facilities in residential districts.

Pacific Bell and Sprint have already approached the city with tentative sites for antenna installation after the ordinance goes into effect in July.

Saratoga Band offers a concert in the park

The Saratoga Community Band will perform an old-fashioned Sunday afternoon concert in Wildwood Park on June 2 at 4 p.m. Admission is free.

The band will perform marches, Broadway musical and movie themes, folk music, jazz and popular tunes. The anual park concert has attracted hundreds of people each year for the past 67 years.

The band is under the direction of Craig Northrup, former Saratoga High School band director and music director of the Vienna International Music Festival in Austria. The band started in 1990 with 35 members and now numbers 83 musicians of all ages.