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Board of Selectman Chairman Ronald Turbin conducts Monday's meeting.
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Heather Clemow describes the results of an online survey about the proposed Williamstown flag.

Williamstown Selectmen Seek Flag Submissions, Set Tax Rate

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
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Resident Kenneth Swiatek, left, urged the board to consider a Residential Tax Exemption to help strapped homeowners with property taxes.
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Board of Selectmen decided on Monday to ask for submissions for potential designs for the first town flag.
 
For the second meeting, the board considered a proposal developed by a group of citizen volunteers that incorporates five themes that group considered central to the town: education, the arts, agriculture, open space and history.
 
Earlier this month, the Selectmen decided to solicit comments on that design through an online survey. On Monday, they heard that a strong majority of the comments received were positive from more than 30 respondents.
 
But the board was still hesitant to go forward with designating a town flag without a more "inclusive" process.
 
The Selectmen hit upon the idea of an open submission process for town residents, who will be able to throw their designs into the ring by Nov. 14. According to language drafted by Chairman Ronald Turbin, submissions should "consider the great assets of our town" and be scalable to the dimensions 4 feet high by 6 feet wide.
 
"You guys are thematically correct," Selectman Hugh Daley told members of the design group present at Monday's meeting. "Thematically, you hit the quadrants."
 
The colorful design submitted by volunteers is divided into four quadrants depicting the themes of agriculture, open space, arts and education with the central image of the 1753 House, the historical replica at Field Park that was erected to celebrate the town's bicentennial in 1953.
 
The discussion Monday night, which dragged out for more than an hour, considered options up to and including putting to town meeting the question of what the town's flag should look like. Ultimately, the board decided on a course that allows for more submissions but keeps the process moving.
 
"The bigger principle is that the flag is going to represent the town," Andrew Hogeland said. "It should be selected in a process that let's everyone compete."
 
The Selectmen took far less time to decide two issues relative to the town's tax rate.
 
At the annual tax classification hearing, the Selectmen decided that the town again will have a unified tax rate for fiscal 2015.
 
Each year, the town's elected body must decide whether to have a single tax rate or a "split rate" that taxes residential and commercial property differently.
 
Veteran Town Manager Peter Fohlin advised the board that while he could not say for certain the town never had a split rate, he has never met anyone who remembered a time when it did. Fohlin also advised the board that given the relative lack of commercial property in town, it would take an enormous shift in tax burden to the commercial side in order to provide any meaningful tax relief to residents.
 
The town flag design created by a group of Williamstown volunteers. The Board of Selectmen agreed the themes contained in the design are what it wants to see in a flag.
Fohlin also pointed out recent evidence of a continued erosion of the commercial tax base.
 
"I think we should be concerned that Atlas Money Management is moving out of Williamstown [to North Adams]," Fohlin said. "Kapiloff Glass has made a big commitment to Adams because they have no place to expand in South Williamstown. Connors Brothers moving company has a satellite operation in Adams because they can't accommodate their healthy business in Williamstown.
 
"Businesses don't need any more reasons to not be here."
 
The Selectmen voted 5-0 to stay with a unified tax rate, which will be set by the Board of Assessors at a later date in consultation with the Department of Revenue in Boston.
 
In a related tax matter, the board considered a suggestion raised by resident Kenneth Swiatek at last year's tax classification hearing. Swiatek at that time urged the board to consider a Residential Tax Exemption to ease the tax burden on residents with less expensive homes at the expense of higher-valued homes and second home owners.
 
Fohlin explained that under the commonwealth's Residential Tax Exemption program — which has been adopted by 13 communities statewide — the town can provide an exemption of up to 20 percent of the average property value in town.
 
For illustration purposes, he used the hypothetical average home value of $400,000 and the hypothetical exemption of 10 percent.
 
"You would take $40,000 off of your own property when computing your real estate tax," he said.
 
Since the town has to raise the same amount of money with or without the exemption, it would have to raise the property tax rate to make up the difference. But homeowners with homes worth less than the average home would still pay less in property tax — even at the higher rate — than they would without the exemption.
 
Using Williamstown's projected 2015 tax rate of $15.61, Fohlin developed a chart that showed that with a 10 percent exemption, the town's "break-even" point (at which a homeowner would be unaffected) would be $423,515 in valuation. The owner of a $200,000 home would see his or her tax bill drop by $293; the owner of a $600,000 home would see the tax bill go up by $231.
 
"Lesser valued primary residences save money, and higher valued primary residences pay more money," Fohlin said. "All residential properties that are not primary residences will pay more money."
 
That's because non-primary residences (second homes, for example) would not be eligible for an exemption. Even at the hypothetical "break-even" point, the non-primary residence owner of a property worth $423,515 would see his or her tax bill go up by $555 if Williamstown implemented the 10 percent exemption.
 
Swiatek used Monday's meeting to urge the Selectmen to consider the more progressive tax strategy of the Residential Tax Exemption, which he argued would make home ownership more affordable to a wider range of residents.
 
"I've lived here some 30 years, and many good people have moved out just because their property taxes would be less in another community," Swiatek said.
 
Fohlin told the board there are arguments on each side.
 
"The clear advantage in the eyes of the proponents is that it makes what we might call affordable residences more affordable," he said. "It makes it easier for people who own lower-valued homes to stay in their homes longer. It's not clear to me that people struggling with home ownership live only in lower valued homes. But it does reach out to those people who own homes less than $400,000 and makes it easier for them to stay in their homes.
 
"The disadvantage to this from my perspective ... I have lived and worked in a town that had it. It splits the community. It causes a chasm between yer round residents and seasonal residents, second-home owners."
 
Fohlin pointed out that those second-home owners, who generally don't have children in the public schools, put less demand on town services and therefore shouldn't be asked to shoulder a disproportionate share of the tax burden.
 
The Selectmen chose to take no action on the question of whether to implement the exemption. Selectman Thomas Sheldon noted it was a matter that deserves more study and townwide consideration.
 
"I can say one thing unequivocally, and that is that I would not vote to do this tonight," Sheldon said. "If there was a warrant article or something, there could be a full democratic decision on this."
 
In other action on Monday, Fohlin updated the board on the results of last week's Municipal Electric Aggregation meeting. Williamstown and nine other communities -- including North Adams -- opted to accept a bid from Hampshire Power for a one-year contract at 12.191 cents per kilowatt hour.
 
Starting in November, that is the rate electricity customers in each town will pay for their power unless individuals opt out of the aggregation program and make an affirmative choice to pick another electricity supplier. By way of contrast, Fohlin noted that Nation Grid's latest filing with the Department of Public Utilities is for a per kilowatt hour price of 16.182 cents for the next six months.
 
The towns' representatives (including Fohlin) at last week's meeting opted not to lock their communities into a longer-term contract because their sense on the advice of their consultant is that electricity prices are likely to come down in the future.
 
"The market is at a high point," Fohlin said. "It's not a good time to sign long-term contracts."
 
Fohlin explained once again that electricity customers currently choosing "green energy" at a premium price will continue on those plans unless they choose to join on at the aggregate rate.
 
Fohlin, Police Chief Kyle Johnson and Public Works Director Tim Kaiser met with state highway officials to talk about the Five Corners intersection. The Department of Transportation gave its blessings to safety modifications Johnson recommended at the board's Sept. 8 meeting and outlined changes the state wants to make to Route 7 and Cold Spring Road (the only town controlled part of the South Williamstown intersection is Hancock Road, or Route 43 west of U.S. 7).
 
Fohlin said the state plans to modify the intersection so that the two entrances to U.S. 7 from Route 43 come in at 90 degree angles. The hope is that the change will increase visibility to drivers stopped at the intersection and attempting to either cross or turn onto the through highway.

Tags: fiscal 2015,   flags,   property taxes,   tax rate,   

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Williams Seeking Town Approval for New Indoor Practice Facility

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Planning Board last week gave Williams College the first approval it needs to build a 55,000-square foot indoor athletic facility on the north side of its campus.
 
Over the strenuous objection of a Southworth Street resident, the board found that the college's plan for a "multipurpose recreation center" or MRC off Stetson Road has adequate on-site parking to accommodate its use as an indoor practice facility to replace Towne Field House, which has been out of commission since last spring and was demolished this winter.
 
The college plans a pre-engineered metal that includes a 200-meter track ringing several tennis courts, storage for teams, restrooms, showers and a training room. The athletic surface also would be used as winter practice space for the school's softball and baseball teams, who, like tennis and indoor track, used to use the field house off Latham Street.
 
Since the planned structure is in the watershed of Eph's Pond, the college will be before the Conservation Commission with the project.
 
It also will be before the Zoning Board of Appeals, on Thursday, for a Development Plan Review and relief from the town bylaw limiting buildings to 35 feet in height. The new structure is designed to have a maximum height of 53 1/2 feet and an average roof height of 47 feet.
 
The additional height is needed for two reasons: to meet the NCAA requirement for clearance above center court on a competitive tennis surface (35 feet) and to include, on one side, a climbing wall, an element also lost when Towne Field House was razed.
 
The Planning Board had a few issues to resolve at its March 12 meeting. The most heavily discussed involved the parking determination for a use not listed in the town's zoning bylaws and a decision on whether access from town roads to the building site in the middle of Williams' campus was "functionally equivalent" to the access that would be required under the town's subdivision rules and regulations.
 
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