By Lexi MooreResidents of Beaver Creek will not be watching the construction of a cell phone tower anytime soon, and cell phone users in that neighborhood won’t see improved reception soon, either.Midwest Wireless representative Andy Bobrytzke’s building permit was denied during the December Beaver Creek City Council meeting.The building permit was for the construction of a 180-foot cell phone tower and a smaller structure to be placed on the land adjacent to Rauk’s Convenience front lot to the east.Bobrytske first appeared in front of the council in September to inquire about the possibility of placing the tower inside the city limits.Midwest Wireless had been exploring options for building a tower in the area to improve service to Beaver Creek and Highway 6.At that time he indicated that several local farmers had been unwilling to accept a deal from the company but that Phyllis Helgeson, a landowner within the city limits, had given the company an option to buy a portion of her property."The portion of her property we were considering is at the top of a hill. A tower would greatly improve reception to the area."Bobrytske was also in attendance at the November meeting to inquire about the process of getting approval to build within the city.The council informed him that he would need to submit an application for a building permit.The application was submitted and the issue was placed on the agenda for the evening of Dec. 13.At the December meeting a motion was made by Burdell Willers to deny the building permit. Jamie Dysthe seconded the motion, bringing the issue to a vote.The council’s vote ended in a tie with Willers and Caroline DeBoer voting in favor of denying the permit and Dysthe and Arlyn Gehrke voted against the motion.The City’s policy in the case of a tie requires the mayor to cast the deciding vote.Mayor Al Blank voted to deny the permit because the area where Bobrytske wanted to build the tower was residential, not commercial property."Any way you look at it, a 180-foot tower is not residential," Blank said."Outside of added coverage for a few cell users, there is no monetary advantage for the city to accept this permit."Mayor Blank said he didn’t know if the company would submit another application in a different area."I got the impression that we were their last chance," Blank said.Bobrytske said that Midwest Wireless has already allocated the funds for the project and had wanted to finalize the deal before the end of the year."I guess now we will have to reevaluate what we are going to do with the money. We can’t just let it sit there – that wouldn’t be good business."He doesn’t know whether or not the company will be able to secure another piece of land in the town, especially because the elevation drops so dramatically from the south portion of town to the north.