Letter: Bilal for Williamstown Select Board

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To the Editor:

I am writing to urge Williamstown voters to elect Bilal Ansari to the Williamstown Select Board on Tuesday, May 10. Dr. Ansari has dedicated himself to a life of service, to helping people resolve difficult situations. He listens intently and responds carefully with compassion. He appeals to our best nature. These are essential skills needed at this moment in our town.

Dr. Ansari does not believe that he alone has the solutions to all of the challenges facing our town. Instead, he wants to hear from those comfortable speaking up and also those who, until now, have not felt comfortable nor heard at all. He believes it will take a village to share concerns and work together to make Williamstown a better place for everyone to live and work and grow. But making that happen takes a special type of skilled leadership.

Bilal Ansari is the candidate blessed with that skilled leadership and a stake in our town's quality of life. He has deep roots in this town: his ancestors lived and worked here. He is committed to an approach based in kindness and inclusion. He is the candidate who can and will help us reach a new, inclusive and more equitable chapter in our town's history.

I ask for your vote on May 10 for Bilal Ansari for the Williamstown Select Board. Thank you.

 

Hugh L Guilderson, Ph.D.
Williamstown, Mass.

 

 

 


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Williamstown Select Board OK's 'Heroes' Banners, Names Skate Park for Max Rothschild

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires.com Sports
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. – The Select Board Monday voted, 4-1, to allow the Hometown Heroes banners program, joining several other communities around North Berkshire.
 
The vote finalized a conversation that began at the board’s Sept. 14 meeting.
 
As happened two weeks ago, several residents spoke from the floor of the meeting to raise concerns that the banners send the wrong message by glorifying the military and promoting military service to young members of the community.
 
Unlike two weeks ago, however, more people turned out Monday to urge the board to accept the plan to hang the Hometown Hero banners on utility poles around town between Memorial Day and Veterans Day starting in the spring of 2027.
 
One of those supporting the banners was the former chair of the Berkshire Democratic Brigades, who told the board that the banners are one small way communities like Williamstown can help make up for a “blemish” on the nation.
 
Sherwood Guernsey reminded the board members that the thousands of men and women who made the sacrifice to serve in the Vietnam War were not, by and large, honored for their service in their own time.
 
“When soldiers came back after incredibly difficult conditions … what happened in this country?” he asked. “I remember so well that it was extremely quiet when they came back, to say the least. There weren’t any crowds supporting them. There weren’t any parades saying, ‘Yes, you fought for this country.’ Whether I believed in that war or not, and I did disagree with that war.
 
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