Williams College President Thanks Berkshires Healthcare Heroes

By Maud S. MandelGuest Column
11:51AM / Wednesday, March 16, 2022Print Story | Email Story

In 2020, COVID-19 turned our lives upside down. Medical and public health experts rushed to treat the sick and contain the spread. At Williams, we closed our campus and helped students leave for their safety — a sad milestone in our 227-year history.

Today, the college is once again bustling with students, faculty and staff, learning, living and working on campus. Throughout the Berkshires, communities are starting to emerge and look to the future again.

Thursday, March 17, was the second anniversary of Williams' closure. Today, the college's senior staff and I want to thank the outstanding medical and public health professionals of Berkshire County and the region for caring for area residents so well throughout the pandemic.

Presidents and CEOs Dave Phelps and Darlene Rodowicz at Berkshire Health Systems and Tom Dee at Southwestern Vermont Medical Center provided strong leadership as they and their teams of devoted doctors, nurses, staff and volunteers organized and ran testing programs, traced close contacts and provided dedicated care in extraordinary circumstances. At the same time, they also offered expert counsel to Williams and other area employers and organizations.

Our gratitude extends, too, to all the heroic first responders, health-care professionals and public health specialists who have worked so hard these last two years.

The people of the Berkshires have been through a lot. We mourn the many whom we have lost, and work to support others still on the long path to recovery. But with spring finally on the way, we at Williams want to take this moment to publicly thank the good people — partners, colleagues, friends and neighbors — who have helped bring hope back to our beloved Berkshires.

Maud S. Mandel is the president of Williams College.

Tags: COVID-19, Williams College,

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Williamstown Studying Major Overhaul for Main Street

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
05:14AM / Wednesday, July 29, 2026

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The town is working with a Worcester civil engineering firm to redesign Main Street with an eye toward a major project sometime in the next decade.

Community Development Director Andrew Groff was before the Select Board on Monday night to talk about Town Hall's use of a $500,000 state grant to do preliminary design on major improvements to that portion of Route 2 that runs from Water Street west to the Field Park rotary, through the middle of Williams College's campus.

Groff introduced the elected officials to Amanda Bazinet of Worcester's Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, who is helping the town to develop a plan for Main Street that would align with the commonwealth's Complete Streets Program.

"Our project goals, in addition to the increased pedestrian and bicycle accommodations, is just, in general, improving the sightlines and improving the intersection geometry," Bazinet said.

"Complete Streets … has a lot of different facets to it. As Andrew had mentioned, the goal is to improve the safety for all of the roadway users — not just the motorists. We're looking at improving it for pedestrians, bicyclists, anyone using a mobility device. We want to create streets that are safe for all ages and abilities to use. So, while bicyclists will still be allowed, legally, to use the roadway, we want to look at providing a separate bicycle accommodation along the corridor, whether it's a shared use path along both sides of the streets that is a little more accessible to young children or older people with disabilities to look at all transportation options."

One goal is to encourage "active transportation." The Massachusetts Department of Transportation, who the town hopes one day might fund the construction, has a "healthy transportation policy," Bazinet said.

That MassDOT funding would come through the Transportation Improvement Program, which is managed locally by the Berkshire Regional Planning Commission. The design work underway now is being done with an eye toward going after TIP funding years down the road.

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