Scotts Valley Residents Ask City for Moratorium on Smart Meters

PRESS ADVISORY Contact: Joshua Hart 831 440 9814
July 7th, 2010 joshuanoahhart[at]gmail[dot]com

SCOTTS VALLEY RESIDENTS ASK CITY FOR MORATORIUM ON SMART METERS
“This is about our health, our safety, and our property rights”

A group of Scotts Valley residents alarmed about PG&E’s installation of wireless ‘smart’ meters that use microwave radiation to report one’s electricity and gas usage to the utility are taking their protest to the Scotts Valley City Council this evening. The new group, Scotts Valley Neighbors Against Smart Meters, is asking the City Council to sign on to moratorium requests to the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) by the City of San Francisco (based on billing accuracy) and the EMF Safety Network (based on the safety of electromagnetic radiation).

Questions continue to be raised about billing accuracy, fire safety, and exposure to electromagnetic radiation. “Just as worrying scientific evidence is beginning to emerge about the health impacts of cell phones and wifi, do we really want to install millions of new sources of this radiation throughout our communities, with very little benefit to the consumer?” asks Joshua Hart, Director of Scotts Valley Neighbors Against Smart Meters.

The new meters will generate greater profits to PG&E shareholders but are ultimately being paid for by the consumer. Furthermore, they will allow PG&E to layoff more than a thousand workers at a time of worsening recession and unemployment in California.

The new meters use a similar technology to that used in cell phones. Scientific studies have shown a link between heavy cell phone use and glioma, a form of brain tumor. This evidence recently led the City of San Francisco to require that radiation levels of cell phones be listed at the point of sale, a move that was ferociously opposed by the telecommunications industry. San Francisco has also formally requested a moratorium on the installation of Smart Meters. Though the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) claims that current limits are perfectly safe, levels of electromagnetic radiation permitted in this country are actually prohibited by law in many other countries like Switzerland, Italy, and Russia.

Heidi Bazzano, a resident of Granite Creek Rd. and a member of the neighbors group, has chosen not to use cell phones or wifi after reading up on cell phone health studies. Now she is dismayed that PG&E is forcing her to have the new meter installed. “PG&E’s treatment of their customers and the public is outrageous. They didn’t ask us whether we wanted these meters, and now we’re being told we can’t opt out. That is a violation of our health, our safety, and our property rights.”

SVNASM is holding a press conference at 5:30pm in front of Scotts Valley City Hall. 1 Civic Center Drive, Scotts Valley. The City Council will be meeting at 6pm and the smart meter hearing is first on the agenda. PG&E will be making a presentation, and citizens will have a chance to address the council.

Visuals: protesters holding signs in front of Scotts Valley City Council against smart meter deployment