The 650-foot communication tower behind the Ottawa County Regional Water Treatment Plant at 1405 W. Fremont Rd., Port Clinton has a light that is just too darned bright.

The light is has been blinking very brightly and erratically for the past cpi[;e of months due to controller failure, reported Sanitary Engineer Kelly Frey. The light is also much brighter than required by the Federal Aviation Administration, and Port Clinton neighbors have been complaining.

Once the proposed lighting replacement system has been approved by the FAA and the contractor is on site, county officials expect the project will be completed in about a week. That might take a while. Non-essential FFA employees, such as the 3,000 safety inspectors, have been sidelined by the record-setting federal goverment shutdown.

The entire lighting system will eventually be replaced, said Frey. Funding has been provided by the county to fix the lights and tower, which once served as a broadcast antenna for local country radio station WOSE. The 20-acre piece of land it sits on was acquired by Ottawa County in 1994 as the location for the county’s water plant.

The Ottawa County Regional Water Treatment Plant maintains the tower, using it as an antenna for its communication equipment, and for a number of private and public entities. Revenue from the tower is used to maintain it and to support the water treatment plant.