PRESS RELEASE – January 4, 2019

Tower Lighting System Blinking Too Brightly . . . even for Santa!
The 650 foot communications tower owned by the Board of Ottawa County Commissioners and located behind the Ottawa County Regional Water Treatment Plant @ 1405 West Fremont Road, Port Clinton has been blinking very brightly and erratically for the past two months.
The existing tower lighting system is presently malfunctioning due to a controller failure and, due to its age and condition, the entire lighting system needs to be replaced. The lighting system is blinking much brighter than required by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and in an erratic pattern. Funding for the replacement system has been allocated by the county and a contractor has been selected to replace the lighting system as soon as the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approves the required regulatory application for the project. The application was submitted to the FAA in early December, 2018. A lapse in FAA operations due to the federal shutdown may delay the anticipated approval, which was originally expected before the end of January.
Once the proposed lighting replacement system has been approved by the FAA and the contractor is on site, the county expects that the project will be completed in less than a week. Afterwards, the new lighting system will continue to operate at the brightness and frequency level required by the FAA to protect the aviation community from any collision.
The tower was originally privately constructed and served as a broadcast antenna for a local FM radio station operating throughout the area. The 19.761 acre parcel of land that the tower was constructed upon was acquired by Ottawa County in 1994 to serve as the site of the Ottawa County Regional Water Treatment Plant. The tower has continued to be maintained in service by the Ottawa County Sanitary Engineering Department and presently serves to host communications equipment for a number of different private and public entities. Revenues derived from the operation of the tower are used to maintain the structure and also financially support the operation of the water plant.
We apologize for any inconvenience that the malfunctioning lighting system may be causing and look forward to completing the replacement project as soon as permitted. If anyone has any questions with regard to this project, please feel free to contact the Ottawa County Sanitary Engineering Department at (419) 734-6725 for additional information.