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City Hall's lighting went live on Friday.

Pittsfield City Hall Lit Up With Kinetic Lights

By Andy McKeeveriBerkshires Staff
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City Hall and the Dunham Mall are complete and now the focus is on Park Square. Private building owners in the downtown are also considering lighting projects.
PITTSFIELD, Mass. — City Hall is the latest to be lit up with multi-color lights by Berkshire Lightscapes. And more of downtown is on deck.
 
Berkshire Lightscapes privately raised more than $50,000, which was matched by a state grant, to install kinetic lights in Dunham Mall, City Hall, and Park Square. Concurrently, downtown building owners are working on joining the effort to light up their own buildings with the Shipton Building expected to be lit in in the coming weeks. 
 
"We're not just doing light for one individual building, we are talking about connecting the buildings," said Elie Hammerling, who headed the effort. 
 
The multi-color lights are programmable for each place.
 
In the winter, Dunham Mall was light up with rotating snowflakes, which in the spring switched to a blue design pattern. City Hall was lit up with rotating colors last week and training was held for a few city workers to learn about reprogramming the lights to recognize certain occasions. Philips Lighting had organized the training.
 
"The Berkshires Lightscape project reflects the very best of community engagement, collaboration, and demonstrates how a great idea can become a reality. The addition of energy-efficient, LED lighting enhances the beauty of our downtown and will create opportunities to expand Pittsfield's economy. We look forward to the exciting next steps ahead," Mayor Linda Tyer said in a statement. 
 
The non-profit Berkshire Lightscapes paid for the city hall lights -- to the tune of about $20,000 -- from the fundraising on matching state grant. Steve Oakes, however, will be doing it on his own. Oakes owns the Shipton Building at 142-156 North St. and is purchasing his own light for that building.
 
"The South and North Street corridor has a great medley of architecture. There are so many opportunities to install a friendly wash of light from these innovative LED fixtures. If enough buildings participated the combined effect could be a unique and welcoming signature for the city," Oakes said in a statement. 
 
Hammerling said other building owners are now in the process of considering lights. Those buildings include Barrington Stage, the Colonial Theatre, and the Crawford Square Building. He said those building owners haven't made final decisions about purchased  but are "extremely interested."
 
"There are a number of property owners on South Street and North Street who are getting renderings from Philips," Hammerling said, adding that beyond those three he's been in talks with other business owners.
 
Hammerling said he's hoping to see two or three more buildings lit up by the summer and as many as a half dozen by the end of the year. He sees it as a rolling effect after one or two business owners join, then others will follow.
 
"It is the pioneers that take the leap because they believe in the concept," Hammerling said.
 
The Park Square project is currently in the works. That one is a little more complicated as the city and Berkshire Lightscape works out the design, where the lights will go, and what features will be added. The organization presented an update to the Parks Commission recently, the details of which can be read here.
 
"It is a historic park so you want it to be done a certain way," Hammerling said.
 
The effort began in December 2017 when the organization piloted lights on 100 North St. The goal is to use light in "artistic and tasteful" displays that add some life to the downtown, Hammerling said. He said downtown could use more people and businesses and the lights help create a more energetic feel.
 
"It'll be attractive for restaurants and other people to see energy in the downtown," he said. "We want to make the street as attractive as possible and have businesses feeling comfortable that it is an exciting space."
 
He envisions a day when the kinetic lighting is all coordinated throughout the city's downtown. It's taken a year and a half to go from nothing to two areas lit up, but another step has been taken toward the goal and Hammerling believe much more lays ahead for Berkshire Lightscapes.

Tags: downtown,   light show,   North Street,   

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Crosby/Conte Statement of Interest Gets OK From Council

By Brittany PolitoiBerkshires Staff

Architect Carl Franceschi and Superintendent Joseph Curtis address the City Council on Tuesday.

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — With the approval of all necessary bodies, the school district will submit a statement of interest for a combined build on the site of Crosby Elementary School.

The City Council on Tuesday unanimously gave Superintendent Joseph Curtis the green light for the SOI to the Massachusetts School Building Authority by April 12.

"The statement I would make is we should have learned by our mistakes in the past," Mayor Peter Marchetti said.

"Twenty years ago, we could have built a wastewater treatment plant a lot cheaper than we could a couple of years ago and we can wait 10 years and get in line to build a new school or we can start now and, hopefully, when we get into that process and be able to do it cheaper then we can do a decade from now."

The proposal rebuilds Conte Community School and Crosby on the West Street site with shared facilities, as both have outdated campuses, insufficient layouts, and need significant repair. A rough timeline shows a feasibility study in 2026 with design and construction ranging from 2027 to 2028.

Following the SOI, the next step would be a feasibility study to determine the specific needs and parameters of the project, costing about $1.5 million and partially covered by the state. There is a potential for 80 percent reimbursement through the MSBA, who will decide on the project by the end of the year.

Earlier this month, city officials took a tour of both schools — some were shocked at the conditions students are learning in.

Silvio O. Conte Community School, built in 1974, is a 69,500 square foot open-concept facility that was popular in the 1960s and 1970s but the quad classroom layout poses educational and security risks.  John C. Crosby Elementary School, built in 1962, is about 69,800 square feet and was built as a junior high school so several aspects had to be adapted for elementary use.

Ward 6 Councilor Dina Lampiasi said the walkthrough was "striking" at points, particularly at Conte, and had her thinking there was no way she would want her child educated there. She recognized that not everyone has the ability to choose where their child goes to school and "we need to do better."

"The two facilities that we are looking at I think are a great place to start," she said.

"As the Ward 6 councilor, this is where my residents and my students are going to school so selfishly yes, I want to see this project happen but looking at how we are educating Pittsfield students, this is going to give us a big bang for our buck and it's going to help improve the educational experience of a vast group of students in our city."

During the tour, Ward 5 Councilor Patrick Kavey, saw where it could be difficult to pay attention in an open classroom with so much going on and imagined the struggle for students.

Councilor at Large Alisa Costa said, "we cannot afford not to do this" because the city needs schools that people want their children to attend.

"I know that every financial decision we make is tough but we have to figure this out. If the roof on your house were crumbling in, you'd have to figure it out and that's where we're at and we can't afford to wait any longer," she said.

"We can't afford for the sake of the children going to our schools, for the sake of our city that we want to see grow so we have to build a city where people want to go."

Councilor at Large Kathy Amuso, who served on the School Building Needs Commission for about 18 years, pointed out that the panel identified a need to address Conte in 2008.

Curtis addressed questions about the fate of Conte if the build were to happen, explaining that it could be kept as an active space for community use, house the Eagle Academy or the Adult Learning Center, or house the central offices.

School attendance zones are a point of discussion for the entire school district and for this project.

"At one time I think we had 36 school buildings and now we have essentially 12 and then it would go down again but in a thoughtful way," Curtis said.

Currently, eight attendance zones designate where a student will go to elementary school. Part of the vision is to collapse those zones into three with hopes of building a plan that incorporates partner schools in each attendance zone.

"I think that going from eight schools to three would be easier to maintain and I think it would make more sense but in order to get there we will have to build these buildings and we will have to spend money," Kavey said, hoping that the city would receive the 80 percent reimbursement it is vying for.

This plan for West Street, which is subject to change, has the potential to house grades pre-kindergarten to first grade in one school and Grades 2 to 4 in another with both having their own identities and administrations. 

The districtwide vision for middle school students is to divide all students into a grade five and six school and a grade seven and eight school to ensure equity.

"The vagueness of what that looks like is worrisome to some folks that I have talked to," Lampiasi said.

Curtis emphasized that these changes would have to be voted on by the School Committee and include public input.

"We've talked about it conceptually just to illustrate a possible grade span allocation," he said. "No decisions have been made at all by the School Committee, even the grade-span proposals."

School Committee Chair William Cameron said it is civic duty of the committee and council to move forward with the SOI.
 
He explained that when seven of the city's schools were renovated in the late 1990s, the community schools were only 25 years old and Crosby was 35 years old.  The commonwealth did not deem them to be sorely in need of renovation or replacement.
 
"Now 25 years later, Crosby is physically decrepit and an eyesore. It houses students ages three to 11 in a facility meant for use by teenagers,"
 
"Conte and Morningside opened in the mid-1970s. They were built as then state-of-the-art schools featuring large elongated rectangles of open instructional space. Over almost half a century, these physical arrangements have proven to be inadequate for teaching core academic skills effectively to students, many of whom need extra services and a distraction-free environment if they are to realize their full academic potential."
 
He said  the proposal addresses a serious problem in the "economically poorest, most ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse area" of the city.
 
Cameron added that these facilities have been deemed unsatisfactory and need to be replaced as part of the project to reimagine how the city can best meet the educational needs of its students.  He said it is the local government's job to move this project forward to ensure that children learn in an environment that is conducive to their thriving academically.
 
"The process of meeting this responsibility needs to begin here tonight," he said.
 
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