The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted Crown Castle’s motion for access to confidential documents in the Pasadena, Texas, appeal to reverse a district court’s granting of summary judgment in Crown Castle’s favor (see 2301050031), said an order signed Wednesday by U.S. Circuit Judge Edith Brown Clement. Crown Castle said it needs the documents to prepare the responding brief that’s due Jan. 23. The district court said Crown Castle was right to assert that Section 253 of the Telecommunications Act preempted Pasadena’s design manual, which the company said impossibly required the small-cell nodes to be buried underground or spaced in a limiting way. Pasadena’s opening brief in the appeal said Crown Castle lacks standing to assert a Section 253 claim because it’s not a telecommunications service provider in the meaning of the statute.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Daniel Stewart for Northern New York in Albany signed an order Wednesday (docket 1:22-cv-00107) granting the Aug. 8 unopposed motion of plaintiffs Verizon and Tarpon Towers II for leave to file their amended wireless infrastructure complaint against the town of Saugerties, New York (see 2301100029). The amended complaint is due Jan. 18, said the order. Verizon and Tarpon sued Saugerties in early February, alleging the town dragged its feet or unlawfully denied their two applications to build and install wireless facilities in the municipality, in violation of the Telecommunications Act. The court delayed acting on the motion to amend as it awaited the results of settlement talks, but those discussions haven't yielded a resolution. Verizon and Tarpon had asked the court to establish a “date certain” for the town to file its record of proceedings, suggesting Jan. 31 as that deadline. Saugerties doesn't oppose the date certain, but thinks the Jan. 31 deadline “is overly optimistic given the volume of the records,” the town’s outside counsel wrote U.S. District Judge Mae D'Agostino in a letter Wednesday, asking for 60 days instead. Stewart's order didn't impose a deadline on the town.

The 17th Judicial Circuit Court for Broward County, Florida, granted Crown Castle’s motion for default against defendant R&Y Underground for failing to answer its Nov. 29 negligence complaint, said a clerk’s entry Tuesday (docket CACE-22-017496). Crown Castle alleged R&Y caused more than $71,000 in “actual damages” when excavating with mechanized equipment at an intersection in Miramar by failing to use “accepted engineering and construction practices” (see 2212070004).

An arbitration proceeding pending before an international tribunal of the American Arbitration Association involves “some of the same entities” that are parties to the breach of contract complaint by Terra Towers, TBS Management and DT Holdings against American Tower International (ATI), said ATI in an amended notice of removal. It was filed Tuesday (docket 1:23-cv-20009) in U.S. District Court for Southern Florida in Miami. ATI removed to the federal court on Jan. 3 the Dec. 12 complaint in the 11th Judicial Circuit in Miami in which the plaintiffs alleged ATI “improperly withdrew” from an $800 million Latin American and Central American telecommunications tower development agreement called Project Codu (see 2301030035). The “facts and circumstances” of the dispute that's in arbitration are “inextricably intertwined” with those in the plaintiffs’ state court action, “and the tribunal’s award and findings will address Project Codu,” said ATI’s amended notice. Its previous notice made no mention of the arbitration proceeding.

Plaintiffs Verizon and Tarpon Towers II want the U.S. District Court for Northern New York in Albany to rule on their Aug. 8 motion to amend their wireless infrastructure complaint against the town of Saugerties, New York, they wrote U.S. Magistrate Judge Mae D'Agostino in a letter Monday (docket 1:22-cv-00107). Verizon and Tarpon sued Saugerties in early February, alleging the town dragged its feet or unlawfully denied their two applications to build and install wireless facilities in the municipality, in violation of the Telecommunications Act. The court delayed acting on the motion to amend as it awaits the results of settlement talks between the parties. But Saugerties hasn't responded to the plaintiffs’ Sept. 28 settlement offer since their Dec. 9 status conference, Verizon and Tarpon told the judge. They asked her to establish a “date certain” for the town to file its record of proceedings, suggesting Jan. 31 as that deadline. The complaint was initially filed nearly a year ago, and the statute “requires expedited review,” the companies said, pressing their case for an urgent deadline. Saugerties officials didn’t respond to queries Tuesday seeking comment.

The city of Rochester conferred with plaintiffs Verizon, Crown Castle and Extenet, and the parties agree another attempt to resolve their dispute through mediation “makes sense in advance of trial,” Rochester counsel Patrick Beath wrote U.S. Magistrate Judge Marian Payson for Western New York Friday. They agree Payson should be mediator, given her “familiarity with the issues and the parties,” said Beath’s letter (docket 6:20-cv-07129). All can be available for a joint mediation in February, he said. Each of the three cases was “separately mediated” during discovery, but none was resolved, he said. A bench trial consolidating the three cases is scheduled to begin June 1 (see 2212200065). Common to all three complaints are the allegations that Rochester’s wireless deployment fees significantly exceed a reasonable approximation of the city’s actual costs of maintaining the rights-of-way used or occupied by telecommunications service providers, in violation of Section 253 of the Telecommunications Act.

Decisions loom for the magistrate judge presiding over AT&T’s lawsuit to force Muttontown, New York, to approve construction of a 150-foot-tall cell tower to remedy a service gap. U.S. Magistrate Judge Lee Dunst for the Eastern District of New York in Central Islip, in a text-only entry Tuesday (docket 2:22-cv-5524), ordered the parties to meet and confer on a joint report due Jan. 19. It said the parties should discuss whether Dunst should wait for a decision on the village’s request for a pre-motion conference on its anticipated motion to dismiss AT&T’s complaint before ruling on two motions from about 30 village residents to intervene in the case to block the tower. AT&T and the village oppose the motions to intervene (see 2301030042), but the residents argue their interests in protecting their property values and the aesthetics of their homes aren't represented by the parties in the case (see 2211030048).

American Tower International removed to U.S. District Court for Southern Florida the Dec. 12 complaint in the 11th Judicial Circuit in Miami in which Terra Towers alleges ATI “improperly withdrew” from an $800 million Latin American telecommunications tower project agreement without justification (see 2212160042). ATI “does not waive any rights or defenses to which it is otherwise entitled” in Terra’s breach of contract complaint, and it expressly reserves the right “to assert all such defenses at a later time” and to file counterclaims against Terra, said the notice of removal Tuesday (docket 1:23-cv-20009).

The law is “well-settled” that “neighboring landowners” don't have “sufficient interest in the property or transaction to intervene as of right” in a Telecommunications Act action, said AT&T in a memorandum of law Friday (docket 2:22-cv-05524) in U.S. District Court for Eastern New York in Central Islip. AT&T opposes two motions to intervene from 30 resident property owners in Muttontown, New York, who are seeking to block the carrier from building a 150-foot-tall cell tower in their village. “Whatever interest the neighbors may have” in the fate of the cell tower in Muttontown, “it is adequately represented by the board that considered the application,” said AT&T. Due to the “expedited nature” of TCA actions, “controlling authority also rejects permissive intervention due to the inevitable delay caused by adding parties,” it said. Notwithstanding “the volume of cases affirming that neighboring homeowners have no right to intervene,” the resident property owners “improperly try to argue the merits and openly admit that they will challenge any resolution that allows construction of a facility,” it said. “The effort to avoid the core issue of intervention and to focus instead on the merits is improper, as is the overall strategy of delay, both of which confirm the wisdom of the decisions denying intervention in cases such as this.” The residents contend AT&T is colluding with the village to get the tower built over the objections of the local zoning appeals board, which opposes the project (see 2210200034).

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted Crown Castle’s request for a two-week deadline extension to Jan. 23 to file its appellee brief against the city of Pasadena, Texas, said a text-only entry Wednesday in docket 22-20454. Pasadena seeks reversal of a district court’s Aug. 2 decision granting Crown Castle summary judgment (see 2212090044). Pasadena says the minimum spacing and undergrounding requirements in its design manual for Crown Castle's small-cell installations are “facially valid” and consistent with the city’s authority. In granting summary judgment for Crown Castle, U.S. District Judge David Hittner for Southern Texas in Houston said a “plain reading” of the manual shows the spacing requirement for small-node networks is “clearly more burdensome” than the requirements applicable to other users of the public rights-of-way. Pasadena filed three 30-day deadline extension motions to file its principal brief since its appeal was docketed before the 5th Circuit denied its last request. Crown Castle's request for an extension was its first.