I am leaving The Advocate after four years for graduate school. I hope you will allow a thank-you that is also a farewell.
For four years it has been my job to be curious and to listen to people. It has been a trip. I’ve shared a van with a blue-eyed llama on Yokun Ridge in a thunderstorm. I’ve learned to shape glass beads over a blowtorch and to tell the spore patterns of ferns. I’ve played Irish jigs at an accordion festival. I’ve met people in junkyards, churches, banks, dairy barns, at a fish hatchery, in schools and in retirement homes.
I’ve talked with people who talk for a living and listened to people who have rarely been listened to in their lives. There’s nothing you can find in the outside world that you can’t find in any town in Berkshire County, if you look — grief, homelessness, elation, diversity, honor or greed, hard work.
So thank you, to everyone who has talked with me, to the people who welcomed me, offered me a glass of water, let me sit on their kitchen counter and discuss creation; to the playwright who introduced me to Wittgenstein, to the artist who gave me a bright, noisy day painted on rice paper, to everyone who has ever thought to tell me they valued my work. I’ll remember.
There are some people I have spoken to more regularly. I began as a Lenox reporter, and Lenox has stayed at the heart of my beat. Thanks, too, to Town Manager Gregory Federspiel for his endless patience with endless questions.
For four years, I have had a ringside seat at the Lenox Select Board meetings every other week — and enjoyed it. Management is the art of making too many decisions with too few resources, and this board does it well. I have seen the Lenox Select Board meet rudeness with courtesy, accusation with information and ignorance with gentleness. On the rare occasions when the town has forced it to act in a way it felt was fiscally irresponsible, it has bowed to the town’s wishes and followed them with energy.
Thanks to Robert Akroyd, Timothy Doherty, Terrence Field, Kim Flynn, William “Smitty†Pignatelli, Janet Pumphrey, and Mr. Federspiel along with them, for teaching me a great deal, directly and indirectly, about the importance of clear communication.
Thanks, finally, to everyone I’ve worked with at The Advocate — everyone who has ever stayed up late putting a paper together and driven home listening to British radio on WAMC; to Judith, my first editor, who taught me to interview and introduced me to Ido Merlini’s marble yard on a summer afternoon; to Heather Linscott and Linda Carman, for trail rides in the early fall when the leaves were changing in the mountains; to Mike Card and Becca McClaren, who taught me the first principles of copy-editing; and very much to Glenn, who taught them to me all over again and never accepted a shabby or unclear sentence. I’m a better writer for it.
It has been my job to explore Berkshire County, and in four years I haven’t come close to finding all there is to taste and see. Right now, outdoor kilns are firing pottery in wood ash, china pots are brewing karalian maple tea, farmer’s markets are selling goat cheese and radishes, native plant nurseries are sprouting young sunflowers, oboists and Shakespearian actors and modern dancers are practicing out of doors; road crews are filling potholes, assessors are debating tax rates, land trusts are surveying fields along the back roads, mares are dropping foals, libraries are sending out thousands of books — and the marvel is, I know where to find all of these things, within 20 miles of my desk.
Remember that we live in the kind of place other people spend money, time and effort to get to. Listen to the evidence of the thousands of people who work in it alongside us. And have fun, whatever you do.
[The Advocate thanks Kate Abbott for four years of dedication, hard work and caring.]
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Lanesborough Planners Bring STR, ADU, Signage Bylaws for Town Vote
By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — The Planning Board held a public hearing on the much anticipated bylaws for short-term rentals, accessory dwelling units, and signage to be presented at the annual town meeting.
For the past few months, planners have diligently been working on wordage of the new bylaws after Second Drop Farm's short-term rental was given a cease and desist because the building inspector said town bylaws don't support them.
The board voted on each of the four articles and heard public comment before moving to entertain any amendments brought forward.
A lot of discussion in the STR section was around parking. Currently the drafted bylaw for parking states short-term rentals require two parking spaces, and with three or more bedrooms, require three spaces but never more than five.
There were questions about the reasons for limiting parking and how they will regulate parking renters choose to park on the lawn or the street. Planners said it is not their call, that is up to the property owner and if it is a public street that would be up to the authorities.
Some attendees called for tighter regulation to make sure neighborhoods are protected from overflow.
Lynn Terry said she lives next to one of the rented houses on Narragansett Avenue and does not feel safe with all of the cars that are parked there. She said there can be up to 10 at a time on the narrow road, and that some people have asked to use her driveway to park. She thinks limiting to five cars based on the house, is very important.
The wordage was amended to say a parking space for each bedroom of the house.
Rich Cohen brought up how his own STR at the Old Stone School helps bring in money and helps to preserve the historic landmark. He told the board he liked what they did and wants to see it pass at town meeting, knowing it might be revised later on.
He said the bylaws now should not be a "one size fits all" but may need to be adjusted to help protect neighborhoods and also preserve places like his.
After asking the audience of fewer than 20 people, the board decided to amend the amount of time an short-term rental can be reserved to 180 days total a year in a residential zone, and 365 days a year in every other zone. This was in the hopes the bylaw will be passed and help to deter companies from buying up properties to run STRs as well as protecting the neighborhood character and stability.
They also capped the stay limit of a guest to 31 days.
Cohen also asked them to add "if applicable" to the Certificate of Inspection rule as the state's rules might change and it can help stop confusion if they have incorrect requirement that the state doesn't need.
The ADU portion did not have much public comment but there were some minor amendments because of notes from KP Law, the town counsel.
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