WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Select Board on Monday voted unanimously to transition the town's diversity committee away from the role it has served since its inception in 2020.

 

On a 4-0 vote, the board voted to formally dissolve the body recently renamed the Race, Equity, Accessibility, Diversity and Inclusion Committee and allow its members to work directly with the town manager to advance the issues that the former DIRE Committee addressed over the last six years.

 

When the then-Diversity, Inclusion and Racial Equity Committee was formed in the summer of 2020, it was conceived as an advisory body to the Select Board.

 

Over the years, the relationship between the Select Board and DIRE became strained, to the point where READI Committee members last year were openly discussing whether their group should remain a town committee at all or become a grassroots organization on the model of the town's Carbon Dioxide Lowering (COOL Committee).

 

"I just don't think that previous Select Boards have been the best guides in the process of getting things accomplished in the community," said Shana Dixon, who served on DIRE before her election to the Select Board last May. "Not that this panel, right now, could be better.

 

"What I'm saying is that it has been a hindrance to work under the Select Board."

 

It was not immediately clear whether the next incarnation of the READI Committee would continue to comply with the provisions of the Open Meeting Law.