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The Selectmen sent Fohlin off with a bit of the Berkshires via a painting by a local artist.
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Celebrating the restoration of the 1753 House chimney.
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Meeting with Spruces residents in 2012.
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Touring the Spruces' damage in 2011 with Gov. Deval Patrick.
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Explaining something to the Selectmen and the viewing audience.

Peter Fohlin: He Worked for Williamstown

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
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Peter Fohlin is leaving Williamstown after 15 years as town manager.
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — On the wall next to Peter Fohlin's desk in the town manager's office was a simple 8 1/2-by-11 sheet of paper on which he printed his guiding principles: "Respect, Fun, Trust, Excellence. We work for you."
 
The last phrase has become a mantra for all town employees.
 
"We have our share of difficult residents and difficult taxpayers and difficult situations, but you have to try to remember that: We work for you," Fohlin said. "You don't work for us. We work for you."
 
For the first time in 15 years, Fohlin does not work for the residents of Williamstown.
 
His long and highly regarded tenure as town manager came to end on Friday, Aug. 28 — four years to the day after one of the defining moments of that tenure, Tropical Storm Irene.
 
Fohlin's creativity in finding federal Hazard Mitigation Grant funds to help relocate residents of the flood-prone Spruces Mobile Home Park after Irene is perhaps the one accomplishment that leaps to mind in recalling his service.
 
But it is just one in a long list of successes for the town that caused elected and appointed officials in town government to bemoan his deparature since he announced his retirement earlier this year.
 
A former member of the Board of Selectmen spoke for many in April when Fohlin oversaw his last BOS meeting [he returned on an interim basis after his official retirement date, April 26]:
 
"At some point someone will write an epitaph for me," Anne Skinner said. "And I'd be content to have it read, 'She helped bring Peter Fohlin to Williamstown.' "
 
Before his retirement finally got under way, Fohlin sat down with iBerkshires.com to talk about his days in the corner office.
 
Question: So today's the last day ... the actual last day. How do you feel? I notice the absence of balloons or cake in the office.
 
Fohlin: No, I don't do those things. As I have said to my staff and co-workers for many years, I don't care about yesterday and today. I'm all about tomorrow. Celebrations — or at least recognition — is not so much about tomorrow. It's about the past.
 
But in answer to your question, on the way back from the Public Works facility, I was riding with [Administrative Assistant Debra Turnbull[], and I said, 'Debbie, it's a very strange feeling. I'm walking out of that DPW garage for the last time after 15 years.' I said to her, 'The really strange feeling is that at 67, in all modesty, you feel like you've seen it all and you've done it all, but I've never done this.' I've quit. I've been fired. I've relocated. I've been married. I've been divorced. I've had children. My parents have died. I feel like I've done everything — every significant life event. But I've never done this. It's a very strange feeling, and I don't know what to do with it.
 
Q: What are you going to do with it?
 
Fohlin: I have purposely tried not to think about that. For more than 50 years, I have been answering the question: What do I need to do tomorrow? Making to-do lists, appointment calendars. And I have purposely stayed away from structuring the next few weeks. I'm going back to our home on Martha's Vineyard on Sunday, going to have about two weeks of relaxation, including a visit from our son and his fiancee and her parents. Then, ironically, I have jury duty on the island starting Sept. 17. And that's all the structure I have at the moment.
 
I have one goal: I want to find myself again. When you're in public life, you have to do a lot of things and say a lot of things in your official capacity that are different from what you truly feel and who you truly are. So I kind of want to go back and find myself again. I want to see what I'm really like when I take off the official mantle, and I'm hoping it's better.
 
Q: Did you think about sticking it out until February or March of 2016, at the end of the Spruces project?
 
Fohlin: You may not know a fellow by the name of Edward Logue. He was the director of the Boston Redevelopment Authority back in the '60s. He's responsible for Government Center, the West End and so forth. And after Boston, he had gone to New York. And at some point along the way, he was asked a similar question about finishing projects. He said, 'I never worry about finishing projects. The hard part is starting them. They finish themselves.' I can't stay until everything's done because the town and government affairs are dynamic. I tried to get everything done before today and there are still things I just can't finish.
 
In large part, the Spruces is done. There's a lot of hard work left to do. Debbie and Tim [Kaiser] are doing it, and I have full confidence that the project will finish the way it's supposed to. I have put all of the pieces in place for Debbie and Tim and Tim Morgan to finish.
 
I've been asked if I didn't want to stay until Cable Mills is finished. I tell them, 'Cable Mills is finished.' They're just not done yet.
 
I've reached a point where, for a lot of different considerations, the time was just right.
 
Q: People tend to be fixated on the short term, so when they talk about your accomplishments, they talk about the Spruces, they talk about Cable Mills, they talk about the town's bond rating. What are we missing by not looking further back?
 
Fohlin: I'm very happy about Field Park. I guess what I like about it is the subtle elements of that design are so subtle, the nuances are so subtle that people wonder: Why does he think Field Park is significant? But every time I drive around Field Park, I can tell that we did it right. There are no kinks, no glitches. And to be able to do that without any degradation of that historic park is very satisfying.
 
Having a little fun modeling a lost trenchcoat in 2012.
Mass Highway Department replaced seven bridges in seven years in this town. And that's a testament to the working relationship we developed with Mass Highway. Tim Kaiser started it before I got here. We strengthened it with Ross Dindio and then Peter Niles. I don't believe in criticizing or picking fights in public. I don't think it's a useful way to get things done in government, so we always wanted to be the town where Mass Highway most wanted to work. 'How can we help you?' 'How can we make your job easier?' And they've done some wonderful things for us, not only working with us but without our asking.
 
Q: And more to come, hopefully, on Water Street.
 
Fohlin: Yeah, I hope so.
 
Q: One other thing I want to ask you about, and I'm assuming it's your handiwork but maybe it predated you: The 'We Work for You,' slogan?
 
Fohlin: I brought that here.
 
Actually, the way that came about is, back in those days I was driving a black 1962 Cadillac with the big fins in the back. I came up ahead of my family, and my cat and I were in the Cadillac on the ferry, coming across Nantucket Sound, and I was thinking that this might be my last job. I was asking myself, 'How do I want it to go? What do I believe in? What am I going to stand for in my last job?'
 
I started out with 'Respect.' People in the building have to treat each other with respect. We have to treat the taxpayers and the residents and the visitors who come into the building with respect. We have to treat the media with respect. Because if we don't respect one another, then we can't get past that. It's so basic.
 
And then always high on my list is we've got to have 'Fun.' If we're not having any fun, this isnt' worth doing. So not every element of what we do, not every moment is fun. But at the end of the week, you've got to say, 'I had fun this week,' even if you're working hard.
 
'Trust.' The trust either has to be there or we have to build it or we have to gain it. And we certainly have to show it. If we don't have trust, we can't get projects done, we can't take chances with one another. We can't float an idea if we don't trust that the idea is going to be heard with respect.
 
Then I got to the point where, what's the prize? The respect, the trust, the fun, where does that go? And I said, 'Excellence.' We've got to have excellence. I have a difference of opinion with a certain person in town. This person told me that she expects excellence. And I said, 'Oh, that's a hard way to go through life, being disappointed every day.' I don't expect excellence. I strive for excellence. I inspire for excellence. We have to reach for excellence, but we can't expect it. That's a little tiny bit below expecting perfection, and we know we don't expect that. We strive for excellence, but if I expected excellence from every person every day in ever act, I'd have a lot of disappointment.
 
And it's obvious we do this because we work for them. We have to remember that we're not doing this for ourselves. We're not doing this to glorify our own existence.
 
Q: In this job, I imagine, you see people at their angriest.
 
Fohlin: Sometimes.
 
Q: Having been here as long as you have, how easy or difficult is it to take guff from someone over some issue today and six months later engage them in another context?
 
Fohlin: Not difficult at all. I like to think that I treat everybody the same. I know for a fact that some people that I seriously dislike on a personal level do not know that because they come to Town Hall when they come back to Williamstown and stop in to see me, hug me, shake my hand.
 
And that's OK. I don't feel like I'm being false with them. I simply say, 'I may not like you, but I will treat you with respect and I do work for you.' That kind of makes things a whole lot easier.
 
It's very, very fatiguing to get involved with personalities. If you start dividing up the world into people you like and people you don't like, you run the risk of being a lonely person. And it just gets in the way of getting the job done and it saps your energy.
 
I never carry grudges. That goes along with my notion that I don't care about yesterday or today. I only care about tomorrow. And I always want to believe that the next time I see that person it's going to go better than it did last time. That's part of the challenge. I'm not put off by people who come in who are angry. I try to understand why they're angry ... and sometimes I have to help them figure out why they're angry. They don't know. That's part of the problem with anger. It blurs your vision. So when people come in and they're angry, I try to help them put the emotion aside and talk about the issue, not about the anger. I believe every problem can be fixed, and for the most part we're able to do that. I like to think everybody goes away satisfied if not happy.
 
Q: We've been talking for a little while now, and neither one of us has mentioned the name Williams College ... When you're in a town with such a large, dominant land-owner, employer — some would describe Williamstown as a company town. How has that dynamic worked or not worked over the last 15 years?
 
Fohlin: Our personal relationships with Williams College administrators are exemplary. As individuals, we get along with respect and trust to a person. We have no interpersonal differences with the important people at Williams.
 
Ten years ago, Alan Chartock asked me if the college does enough for the town. And I said, 'I don't think we do enough for each other.' I think we can always do more.
 
I think Williams College is too inward looking. The internal politics and dynamics at Williams are unfathomable to outsiders. It's an extraordinarily difficult environment within which to manage, and it makes their external relationships much harder than they need to be. It's the nature of collegial management.
 
My single largest disappointment is that I have not succeeded in getting the college to play chess instead of checkers. Too many decisions are made singularly with a short-term vision. There's not enough long-term visionary dialogue and planning between the college and the town. I'm disappointed that I haven't been able to make more progress in getting them to play chess instead of checkers.
 
Q: I was going to ask you about regrets. Certainly, thinking as much about the future as you do, there have to be things you thought about and planned but don't have the time to get to.
 
Fohlin: I regret that I wasn't born 10 years later. Had I been born 10 years later, I would have been able to stick it out until Tim Kaiser retires, and I wanted to do that. But I can't. By the time Tim retires, I'll be somewhere between 75 and 80, and I don't know if I'll still have my health.
 
If I had been born 10 years later, I would be able to mentor and nurture and see [Town Planner] Andrew Groff, [Building Commissioner] Ryan Contenta, [Building Inspector] Rob Rosier, [Community Development Administrative Assistant] Sarah Hurlbut, [Assistant Treasurer] Rachel Vadnais really grow into the strong management team that we're going to have. If I had been born 10 years later, Debbie Turnbull and I could have been a juggernaut. As it is, we've only been together two years, and our experience has been swamped by the Spruces. I feel badly for Debbie that I haven't been able to train her at all in municipal government. She's a godsend to the Spruces project, but I haven't been able to give her the time that I should have in municipal operations.
 
If I have a regret, it's that I was born 10 years too soon.
 
Inducting Cheryl Shanks into the mysteries of fence viewing in 2008.
Q: It sounds like when I asked you about legacy, your answer might be the staff that you've assembled.
 
Fohlin: I'm really proud and pleased of the young people we've brought aboard recently but I don't consider them to be my legacy because their accomplishments are all about them, not about me.
 
Q: Someone had to hire them.
 
Fohlin: But hiring around here is also a team effort. I don't do much of the hiring. Mostly I do the firing. When we hire, it's a real team effort and we scout prospective candidates. We're like a baseball team. When we need somebody, we go looking for that person. We don't just take whatever walks in the door.
 
Q: Looking ahead, you said you have no concrete plans, but is there an unfinished painting at the house in Martha's Vineyard? Are their hobbies that you're looking to explore.
 
Fohlin: I'm concerned about that aspect of my future because, for one thing, Martha's Vinyeard is geographically restrained and remote, so by definition there is a scarcity of opportunity. I will not go back into public service under any circumstances. I won't serve on volunteer committees.
 
Q: Not going to run for Select Board?
 
Fohlin: Nope.
 
I've done that now, and I'm not going to do it anymore.
 
What concerns me is that we've been able to find stimulating things to do here: Spring Street, Field Park, Spruces project, the water line on Cold Spring Road, affordable housing, Cable Mills ... So there's opportunities for exciting things to be done if you look for them and you recognize them when they recognize themselves. I just don't know .... I wake up at 3 o'clock in the morning with an idea, and I don't know where I'm going to get my mental stimulation on the Vineyard. And my mental stimulation has to be active, not passive. I don't want to study astronomy unless I'm going to go to the moon. I'm a doer, not a studier. I have a concern there about how that's going to work out in the future.
 
Q: But you're also a problem solver. Now this is your problem to solve.
 
Fohlin: I'm a problem solver. I'm not sure I'm going to find any problems [laugh]. That's the challenge.

Tags: Q&A,   retirement,   

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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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