PreviousNext

North Adams Cleans Up During Annual Day of Service

Students and community members worked throughout the city to cleanup parks and walking areas.

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts students volunteered with members of the community to clean up and groom 17 different areas in the city on Saturday.

Participants in the 22nd annual Community Day of Service split into groups and were bused to locations that included Joe Wolfe Field, Brayton Hill, Windsor Lake and various areas on the North Adams walking loop.

"It's really exciting to think that in a few hours this city, in many ways, will be transformed, and it has to do with the passion and commitment of volunteers," Spencer Moser, coordinator of MCLA Center for Service and Citizenship, said.

This year, the day of service had a health and wellness theme. Amanda Chilson, Mass in Motion project coordinator, said a healthy environment and healthy citizens are directly connected.

"You want to keep your community's environment healthy to encourage people to go out and use it," Chilson said. "If the community is clean, then you are taken care of."

MCLA senior Stacy Fisher said the service day helps MCLA students get more involved in the North Adams community.

"A lot of people from the MCLA community don't feel included in the North Adams community, and this is a good way to do that," Fisher said. "It's important to recognize that we do live here for most of the year, and it is important that we understand that because what happens to the community will affect us in school."

MCLA freshman Charlita White said the day of service is a great idea and she would like to see other areas participate in a similar project.

"I live in New York, and we don't do things like this," White said. "Normally you just hire people to do this kind of thing, and I think this would be something to implement in New York."

Mayor Richard Alcombright addressed the students and said that their efforts will help strengthen the city.

"We are, in a sense, a hurting community today with the closure of our hospital, and I think that the folks in our community will see you out there today and see the presence that you make," he said. "The joy that you will bring to them will probably be immeasurable at this point in time, and you will be a prominent display of what community is all about."

North Adams Hopes to Transform Y Into Community Recreation Center

By Tammy DanielsiBerkshires Staff
05:19AM / Thursday, May 02, 2024

Mayor Jennifer Macksey updates members of the former YMCA on the status of the roof project and plans for reopening. 

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The city has plans to keep the former YMCA as a community center.

 

"The city of North Adams is very committed to having a recreation center not only for our youth but our young at heart," Mayor Jennifer Macksey said to the applause of some 50 or more YMCA members on Wednesday. "So we are really working hard and making sure we can have all those touch points."

 

The fate of the facility attached to Brayton School has been in limbo since the closure of the pool last year because of structural issues and the departure of the Berkshire Family YMCA in March.

 

The mayor said the city will run some programming over the summer until an operator can be found to take over the facility. It will also need a new name. 

 

"The YMCA, as you know, has departed from our facilities and will not return to our facility in the form that we had," she said to the crowd in Council Chambers. "And that's been mostly a decision on their part. The city of North Adams wanted to really keep our relationship with the Y, certainly, but they wanted to be a Y without borders, and we're going a different direction."

 

The pool was closed in March 2023 after the roof failed a structural inspection. Kyle Lamb, owner of Geary Builders, the contractor on the roof project, said the condition of the laminated beams was far worse than expected. 

 

"When we first went into the Y to do an inspection, we certainly found a lot more than we anticipated. The beams were actually rotted themselves on the bottom where they have to sit on the walls structurally," he said. "The beams actually, from the weight of snow and other things, actually crushed themselves eight to 11 inches. They were actually falling apart. ...