Pyschiatrist: North Adams Community Dealing With Trauma

By Rebecca DravisiBerkshires Staff
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Dr. Alex Sabo encouraged those affected by the hospital's closure to lean on a support 'team.'

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The stopgap measures are in place.

Local banks are working with those who lost their jobs to smooth out finances. Agencies like BerkshireRides are working to make those who need to get to Pittsfield for doctor's appointments have a way to get there. Visiting nurse and hospice services are back up and running in North County.

But none of that takes away from the feeling of trauma the community has experienced with the closure of the North Adams Regional Hospital nearly three weeks ­ ago — trauma that has been experienced by North Adams before and is a real phenomenon.

"You could see the way economic trauma get translated into depression and suicide," Dr. Alex Sabo, chairman and program director of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Berkshire Medical Center, said Friday at the monthly forum of the Northern Berkshire Community Coalition.

Sabo spoke to a capacity crowd in the basement of First Baptist Church about how members of the community affected by the situation can cope.

First, Sabo said, people have got to remember the basics: sleeping, eating well, exercising a little while recognizing that there is a challenge to overcome.

"Sometimes these very simple things fall of your list," he said.


Next, he urged people to find a "team" to help.

"Don't let anyone in the community go it alone," he said. Next, people should break the problem down into bite­sized pieces and realize what they can and cannot control.

"It's pieces of a puzzle," he said.

And sometimes all those things don't work and some people are more adversely affected than others, becoming depressed enough to perhaps contemplate suicide.

"Don't hesitate in this time of trauma to reach out to ... professionals," he said.

That's because working through the trauma can lead to a silver lining.

"Terrible stress can actually make you stronger," said Sabo. "If it doesn't make you sick or kill you."


Tags: closure,   NARH,   NBH,   

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Mount Greylock School Committee Votes Slight Increase to Proposed Assessments

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Mount Greylock Regional School Committee on Thursday voted unanimously to slightly increase the assessment to the district's member towns from the figures in the draft budget presented by the administration.
 
The School Committee opted to lower the use of Mount Greylock's reserve account by $70,000 and, instead, increase by that amount the share of the fiscal year 2025 operating budget shared proportionally by Lanesborough and Williamstown taxpayers.
 
The budget prepared by the administration and presented to the School Committee at its annual public hearing on Thursday included $665,000 from the district's Excess and Deficiency account, the equivalent of a municipal free cash balance, an accrual of lower-than-anticipated expenses and higher-than-anticipated revenue in any given year.
 
That represented a 90 percent jump from the $350,000 allocated from E&D for fiscal year 2024, which ends on June 30. And, coupled with more robust use of the district's tuition revenue account (7 percent more in FY25) and School Choice revenue (3 percent more), the draw down on E&D is seen as a stopgap measure to mitigate a spike in FY25 expenses and an unsustainable budgeting strategy long term, administrators say.
 
The budget passed by the School Committee on Thursday continues to rely more heavily on reserves than in years past, but to a lesser extent than originally proposed.
 
Specifically, the budget the panel approved includes a total assessment to Williamstown of $13,775,336 (including capital and operating costs) and a total assessment to Lanesborough of $6,425,373.
 
As a percentage increase from the FY24 assessments, that translates to a 3.90 percent increase to Williamstown and a 3.38 percent increase to Lanesborough.
 
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