“The retreat brings people together, builds community in the forest, gets participants outside and off their screens, and uses nature sustainably to heal and inspire minds and souls,” stated Great Mountain Forest Executive Director Michael Zafros. Retreat registration closes on July 30.
We are the stewards of our community, and every decision we make matters. Letting our high school slide into disrepair…letting the character of our Main Street be lost.
In her letter to the editor, Laurily Epstein writes: “I find it doubly painful that it was first necessary to deem the Searles School as historic… then knock the building down.”
A hotel in the middle of town should be an amenity to the town. Rather than wait for events to unfold, I felt we had to seize some initiative, and show them what an alternative [to their design] might be.”
-- Jack Musgrove, member of the Great Barrington Planning Board
Since it was unveiled two weeks ago, the hotel proposal has taken some hits over the design and size, since its historic designation allows it to evade the town’s 45-room hotel limit bylaw.
In his op-ed article, Selectboard member Ed Abrahams writes: "Now is the time to influence the decisions about the hotel. Come to the meetings and give opinions."
The ZBA’s test for expansion of grandfathered property, given the room limit bylaw, was whether a third floor would be “substantially more detrimental” according to a list of criteria, than what already exists.
“It’s not right for Great Barrington, and at least for the immediate future we don’t need to continue the conversation.”
-- Great Barrington Selectboard Chair Sean Stanton
No one has come up with one single reason why it wouldn’t be advantageous to the residents of Housatonic and Great Barrington and the surrounding towns [to have Sunday hours at Ramsdell Library]"
-- Holly Hamer, member of Friends of the Libraries and former library trustee
A residential exemption would tax people progressively more or less based on the assessed value of their home. The more your home is valued, the more you pay, just like the income tax.
"Eighty-three percent of all parcels in Great Barrington would benefit or be neutral [under the residential exemption]. If you include second homes, that changes to 74 percent.”
--- Finance Committee Chairman Michael Wise
Town Manager Jennifer Tabakin will hold a “informational workshop” at Town Hall next Monday (July 27) at 4 p.m. to explain the basics of property taxes and Massachusetts General Law
When asked what to do about a long, straight road with lots of children living along it, a Massachusetts Department of Transportation official responded: “Teach the children not to go into the road.”
“I think we have failed in our responsibility to make sure that we’re doing what is not only in Master Plan but is also the appropriate thing to do for a densely populated neighborhood,”
-- Selectboard Chair Sean Stanton
