Saturday morning, residents in Lenoir City will raise concerns about a 180-foot cellphone tower that may be built within a mile of their home.

Residents said they received a certified letter last week that Verizon was planning on building two towers in the county. Some worry about the effect they could have on property values and reached out to county and city officials to find a way to stop it.

“We don’t want the pollutant in our neighborhood,” said Kristi Brackfield, Lenoir City resident. “It’s a visual pollutant. You’re going to see it everywhere. It’s 18 stories high which is just six stories short of the tallest building in Knoxville.”

When Kristi Brackfield purchased her Loudon County home in 2011, she never thought she would have to fight to keep a cell tower out of her back yard.

“I certainly wouldn’t have bought this property three and a half years ago had it had a cell tower on it,” she said. “My neighbors have said the same thing.”

Verizon said it plans to install a 180-foot monopole on Virtue Road if it gets approval from the Loudon County Commission.

“The cell tower that we are proposing is a capacity tower which means it would add capacity for continued data growth,” said Karen Schulz, spokeswoman for Verizon.

It will be located right across the county line from Farragut and right behind the Brackfields’ property.

“It will devalue all of our property approximately 20 percent,” Brackfield said.

Verizon said the county needs another cell tower.

“Our analysis has shown the folks in that area of Loudon County love their data and data use is increasing exponentially,” Schulz said.

But Brackfield said she and her neighbors aren’t buying it.

“I am a Verizon customer and we have excellent cell service. It’s not to give us more cell service because we have it,” she said. “If it’s just for data, we don’t need more data users to have a cell tower in our back yard.”

Brackfield said she will do whatever it takes, even if that means going door to door.

“We are banding together. We are locking arms. Our petition will have over 1,000 names. We have 25 volunteers that are going door to door to get this out,” she said.

Brackfield said she and several of her neighbors plan to present the petition to the Loudon County Commission at the public hearing on August 19.