University Heights City Council voted 6-1 on Monday to hire a broker tasked with finding buyers for the future revenue generated by the city's cell tower leases, a move that could eventually hand the city a one-time payout of $1 million to $2 million while leaving the actual decision to sell for another day. The vote authorizes Cellular Solutions LLC to go shopping for offers, but it stops well short of locking the city into anything.
The agreement, as cleveland.com reported, does not commit University Heights to selling the future cell tower revenue. Council also approved amendments to lease agreements with two wireless carriers on the same tower, changes expected to increase the revenue the tower generates going forward, according to the same report.
Right now, the city pulls in about $6,900 a month from its tower leases, or roughly $82,000 a year, per the outlet's reporting. Councilman Mark Wiseman did some quick math during the meeting, noting that the lease has at least 20 years remaining and that 20 years of that income would add up to about $1.6 million — a figure he used to question how a lump-sum sale would stack up against simply collecting the rent for two more decades.
Mayor Says Final Offer Would Come Back to Council
Mayor Michele Weiss acknowledged that the city does not yet know what its tower revenue rights are actually worth, telling council the eventual purchase price could land anywhere from $1 million to $2 million. She said any proceeds from a sale would be funneled toward the city's planned municipal facilities project, and stressed that an actual offer would still have to come back to council for a vote before anything is finalized.
Weiss also laid out the financial mechanics behind hiring Cellular Solutions LLC in the first place: the broker's compensation, set at 3%, only kicks in if a sale actually goes through. If the city doesn't land an acceptable offer, or if council simply says no once an offer is on the table, University Heights keeps the lease revenue stream exactly as it is now.
A prior council recap from the UH Urbanist Project had previously reported that the city administration intends to sell off the tower itself once its lease slate is full, with an estimated sale value around $1 million — a separate figure from the revenue-stream estimate now being floated. That same recap noted the underlying Verizon Wireless lease amendment had passed 5-1 at an earlier meeting, with Councilperson Stokes casting the lone no vote.
Resident Invokes Chicago's Parking Meter Deal as Cautionary Tale
Not everyone at the meeting was sold on the plan. Resident Micah Maliskis urged council not to sell the future lease revenue, arguing that trading a steady, long-term income stream for a quick cash infusion sacrifices financial stability for short-term convenience. Maliskis went further, comparing the proposal to Chicago's controversial parking meter privatization deal, and pushed officials to instead look for other ways to squeeze more revenue out of the tower rather than selling off the income it already produces.
That kind of caution tracks with broader guidance around these deals. According to the Ohio State Farm Office, a lease buyout essentially swaps ongoing monthly payments for one large one-time sum, and any offered payment should land close to the present value of that future income stream. The same source notes that cell leases typically let the wireless carrier terminate at any time, which injects real uncertainty into how reliable those monthly payments actually are over the long haul — and that additional carriers added to a tower down the road can boost its revenue potential, a factor worth weighing before locking in a buyout price.
Other Cities Have Tried Similar Deals
University Heights wouldn't be the first municipality to explore this path. Research from Inside Towers shows that more local governments are considering selling off future cell tower lease payments as smaller wireless infrastructure like small cells and distributed antenna systems reshapes the industry, with some lump-sum sales reportedly running as high as 160 times a tower's monthly payment. By that outlet's math, a city collecting $2,500 a month could potentially receive a lump sum between $400,000 and $475,000 in a comparable deal.
In California, the city of Sierra Madre partnered with TowerPoint to sell two of its three cell towers at their then-current value ahead of anticipated rent reductions, a move that delivered an immediate cash infusion the city put toward other municipal projects and improvements, according to a case study published by TowerPoint. Whether University Heights ends up following a similar path remains an open question that will hinge on what kind of offer, if any, Cellular Solutions LLC manages to bring back to council.
