WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — In January, the Williamstown Select Board decided to move town meeting back to the Williamstown Elementary School gymnasium.

 

On Wednesday, it became clear that the elementary school budget could be one of the biggest issues before the meeting.

 

Residents concerned that WES is underfunded and "slipping" said Wednesday that they will seek to amend the Mount Greylock Regional School District budget on the floor of town meeting to increase the district's assessment to the town.

 

"We are going to go to town meeting and propose, actually, an addendum to increase the budget and hopefully pass that to support not just a level service but to actually include some school improvement," Jenna Hasenkampf said Wednesday at a meeting of the town's Finance Committee.

 

"We also think we are long overdue to invest in your schools. We've shown, as a town, that we can spend that money when it comes to services like the Fire Department that we view as essential. We think our public schools are just as essential, if not more.

 

"I think that more students pass through those halls than we see a fire per year here."

 

Hasenkampf, a member of the School Council at WES, spoke from the floor at the Fin Comm meeting on the night the panel was reviewing the budget requests from both the Northern Berkshire Vocational Regional School District (McCann Tech) and the Mount Greylock district, which operates elementary schools in Lanesborough and Williamstown and the Mount Greylock Regional School, a middle-high school serving Grades 7 through 12.