‘A group of Massachusetts residents who alleged a Verizon tower near their homes is making them sick have appealed a county Superior Court’s ruling that they must seek relief from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), not the court system.

The residents of the “Shacktown” neighborhood of Pittsfield have been fighting for years to relocate or turn down the radiation levels of the Verizon cell tower installed in their neighborhood in March 2020.

“It’s been 1,694 days of being sick and displaced,” said plaintiff Courtney Gilardi, a mother who said her family became ill and had to move because of Verizon’s tower. “The kids just want to go home and be back in their own rooms in their own community without vomiting in their beds.”

Gilardi added:

“The injured neighbors still living in Shacktown want to live safely in their own houses without feeling dizzy, nauseous and without experiencing palpitations, afib, cardiac issues, migraines and other neurological symptoms.

“We have been begging for help for the last four years, seven months and 21 days, and up until our Board of Health became involved, all we’ve had is finger-pointing on whose responsibility it is to deal with a community health problem. It feels like Verizon just wants us to shut up and die.”’