Crown Castle told the FCC it had concerns with part of a draft na...

facilities under Sec. 106 of the act. A similar agreement in 2001 had focused on colocation on existing towers, while the draft would cover new sites. Crown Castle raised concerns over an exclusion in the draft agreement that said that a tower modification that didn’t involve a colocation and didn’t substantially increase the size of the tower was an undertaking that would be excluded from Sec. 106 review. Crown Castle said it agreed with the proposed exclusion but said such actions weren’t properly deemed “undertakings” because they didn’t require a federal permit, license or approval. Such changes, which could involve replacing a fence around a tower site, could otherwise become subject to tribal consultation, Crown Castle said. That would be the case if language proposed by the Navajo Nation were included in the final agreement, the company said. Improperly classifying such activities as undertakings would “be an improper extension of the FCC’s authority and would thus be subject to judicial challenge,” it said. Without changing the language using “undertaking,” Crown Castle said the proposed exclusion could have unintended consequences: “The notion of what ‘is’ and ‘is not’ an undertaking will be blurred. As a result, the overall scope of the FCC’s Section 106 and other environmental obligations may expand as other types of ‘modifications’… that are not related directly to the issuance of an FCC license are considered to be undertakings that are subject to direct FCC authority.”