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Lanesborough Town Administrator Paul Sieloff, left, and the Board of Selectmen discuss the warrant for a Dec. 1 Special Town Meeting.

Lanesborough Officials Endorse Amended Mount Greylock Agreement

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
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LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — The Board of Selectmen on Monday voted 3-0 to recommend special town meeting's approval of the amended regional agreement for the Mount Greylock Regional School District.

It also tabled a controversial question on the town's educational future.

The Lanesborough special town meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, Dec. 1, at the elementary school, to approve changes to the document that governs the district.

The only substantive change sought by the School Committee is new language on how the district apportions capital expenses. The proposed new formula was created in response to requests from Lanesborough town officials to make the apportionment more equitable.

Williamstown voters will face the same question at a special town meeting on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at Williamstown Elementary School. Both towns must approve the new language in order for the amendments to go into effect in the two-town junior-senior high school district.

The Lanesborough Selectmen on Monday also voted to drop a proposed warrant article seeking the town's guidance on whether the board should pursue other educational options for the town's seventh- through 12th-grade students.

The board voted to table the issue, leaving the door open to revisit the question down the road, either through town meeting or by some sort of paper ballot or townwide survey.

Town Administrator Paul Sieloff advised the board that such a survey would cost about $1,000, of which $800 would go toward postage alone. Sieloff said he was trying to determine if the town has any remaining funds from previous expenditures to study school issues.

Sieloff said that a townwide ballot would be a less expensive option but would still entail some cost.

As for the secret ballot survey at special town meeting that the board considered at its Nov. 9 meeting, Sieloff said town counsel recommended against writing the voting mechanism into the warrant article.

"It would have to be a motion on the floor to have a paper ballot," Sieloff said.



In the end, the board voted to strike the question on whether to look at other options — like a tuition agreement offered by the Adams-Cheshire Regional School District.

"As far as I'm concerned, I think we probably should table it," Selectman Robert Ericson said. "It doesn't seem to be going anywhere. Although, we've gotten input from a number of people, I've gotten more input from townspeople who want to stay with Mount Greylock  — at least I have."

While Williamstown voters on Tuesday will face a single-article warrant, Lanesborough's Dec. 1 meeting will have five articles. The Mount Greylock Regional agreement will be first on the agenda.

With Monday's votes, the boards of selectmen in each town as well as the Williamstown and Lanesborough finance committees have recommended approval of the amended agreement, which will allow apportionment of capital expenses to adjust during the life of a bond.

Currently, the regional agreement locks in apportionment based on two factors — student enrollment and state-equalized property value — as measured at the time of bonding.

The amended language uses the same two factors but allows for them to change over time as property values and the percentages of students at Mount Greylock from each town rises and falls. Under the amended agreement, student enrollment will be adjusted on a five-year rolling average, similar to the number Mount Greylock uses to apportion annual operating expenses.

Article 2 on the Lanesborough warrant will see whether the town will agree to transfer $4,000 from the town accountant expenses into the town accountant salaries account.

Article 3 would regulate the number of certain domesticated animals on a property. If passed, the bylaw would restrict property owners with less than 1 acre of land from keeping more than six "individual animals or fowl." Up to six chickens would be allowed; roosters would be prohibited on lots less than an acre in size.

Article 4 would add a section to the town's bylaws banning overnight parking from Nov. 1 through March 31. Currently, the Board of Selectmen enacts the winter parking regulation each year.

• Article 5 would create a bylaw on door-to-door solicitation, requiring solicitors to register with the chief of police, pay a $25 application fee (plus $5 for a registration card) and limit solicitation to the hours of 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., among other regulations. Minors under 18 soliciting for a non-profit (like Girl Scouts or Boy Scouts) or religious organizations would not be subject to the proposed regulation.

The full warrant will be posted on the town's website.


Tags: apportionment,   MGRHS,   special town meeting,   town meeting warrant,   

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Berkshire Wind Power Cooperative Corporation Scholarships

LUDLOW, Mass. — For the third year, Berkshire Wind Power Cooperative Corporation (BWPCC) will award scholarships to students from Lanesborough and Hancock. 
 
The scholarship is open to seniors at Mount Greylock Regional High School and Charles H. McCann Technical School. BWPCC will select two students from the class of 2024 to receive $1,000 scholarships.
 
The scholarships will be awarded to qualifying seniors who are planning to attend either a two- or four-year college or trade school program. Seniors must be from either Hancock or Lanesborough to be considered for the scholarship. Special consideration will be given to students with financial need, but all students are encouraged to apply.
 
The BWPCC owns and operates the Berkshire Wind Power Project, a 12 turbine, 19.6-megawatt wind farm located on Brodie Mountain in Hancock and Lanesborough. The non-profit BWPCC consists of 16 municipal utilities located in Ashburnham, Boylston, Chicopee, Groton, Holden, Hull, Ipswich, Marblehead, Paxton, Peabody, Russell, Shrewsbury, Sterling, Templeton, Wakefield, and West Boylston, and their joint action agency, the Massachusetts Municipal Wholesale Electric Company (MMWEC). 
 
To be considered, students must submit all required documents including a letter of recommendation from their school counselor and a letter detailing their educational and professional goals. Application and submission details will be shared with students via their school counselors. The deadline to apply is Friday, April 19.
 
 MMWEC is a not-for-profit, public corporation and political subdivision of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts created by an Act of the General Court in 1975 and authorized to issue tax-exempt debt to finance a wide range of energy facilities.  MMWEC provides a variety of power supply, financial, risk management and other services to the state's consumer-owned, municipal utilities. 
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