Letter: Comment to Ken Swiatek's Letter on Zoning Proposal

Letter to the Editor04:00PM / Wednesday, March 16, 2022Print Story | Email Story

To the Editor:

Ready. Fire. Aim. That seems to be a common way of doing town business in Williamstown these days.

It may be a holdover from the Covid Crazy Days of Zoom-only discussion, where having an eye-to-eye, in-depth conversation was nearly impossible. And it is not just the Planning Board. Educating our townspeople on fact-based reasons for a proposal seems often to elude many of our public representatives. Opportunity for questioning and public comment BEFORE an idea or expensive new hire is officially put forth for a vote seems to have taken a back seat in town decision-making. And our out-dated town meeting is no place to hash out important issues. For many good reasons, the majority of eligible participants cannot participate.

Spring is a time of new beginnings. Haven't we agreed that we will make a special effort to make all voices heard? Even those who may feel or be marginalized? Understandably, our civic leaders are weary and battle-scarred. We must thank them for serving through a very challenging period. But now let them make a concerted effort to hear and value the many voices who wish to be heard on a number of critical issues facing our town. We will all be the better for it.

Donna C Wied
WIlliamstown, Mass.

Tags: zoning,

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Mount Greylock School Committee OKs Updated Policy on Seclusion, Restraint

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
05:57AM / Tuesday, August 25, 2026

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Mount Greylock School Committee recently approved an updated policy on time-outs, seclusion and the physical restraint of students.

The policy is based on updated state regulations that came down last winter. Superintendent Joseph Bergeron told the panel at its August meeting that his office waited on recommendations from the Massachusetts Association of School Committees that were released in May and ran the proposed changes past the district's legal counsel.

That timing — and an expectation from the commonwealth that districts have the updated policy in place for the start of the 2026-27 academic year — led to an expedited process for the School Committee, which did not do a first read with a vote at a subsequent meeting as is its practice.

"Policy JKAA speaks to the ways the school district and our procedures shall abide by the updated state regulations," Bergeron said. "We're not going to have a lot of leeway.

"Nothing about the way we interact with our students on a day-to-day basis is being shifted by this."

For example, the commonwealth does not allow schools to use "seclusion," or, "the involuntary confinement of a student alone in a room or area, with or without adult supervision," except some extreme cases, like when, "when student behavior poses an imminent threat of assault, or imminent serious physical harm to self or others, but only if safeguards are accounted for," the updated policy reads.

"From the state's perspective and my perspective, the idea of locking a child in a room without adult supervision is something we've never done," Bergeron said. "And it's something the state wants to make explicitly that nobody ever does."

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