PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The School Committee on Wednesday accepted Thunder as the new mascot for Taconic High School and a logo is in the works.
The nickname was announced earlier this month after a series of community surveys that began in October 2021. Taconic was rebranded from its former pseudonym, The Braves, which was dropped in 2020.
Earlier this year, Titans and Rockets were the other potential identities for the school. Principal Matthew Bishop explained to the committee how the winner was named.
The school was contacted by Taconic Hills High School in New York, whose sports teams are identified as the Titans, with concerns of confusion between the similarly named schools if that mascot was chosen.
"The last time we talked we were down to our top three, which were, as you know, Thunder, Titans and Rockets, and in our initial research we were aware that Taconic Hills was the Titans and then after the last round, we realized that Titans and the Thunder were the two most popular choices," Bishop explained.
"In the meantime, thanks to the press releases and the local coverage, Taconic Hills reached out to us and they said 'Hey, do what you want but we get confused a lot and we think this would be ... ,' you know, because they are the Taconic Hills Titans and Taconic High School Titans may have been too much, it would have just added to the confusion.
"So we had a lot of debate internally about it and we went back and forth on it but ultimately the committee decided that we wanted our own identity, one that was separate, we didn't want to infringe on anyone's brand, they've had it for quite some time since the early '60s so we sort of went with the Thunder."
Bishop said thunder represents strength, energy, direction, and confidence and that will serve as an inspiration for the new logo. The only other weather-related Berkshire mascot are the Hoosac Valley Hurricanes.
There have been more than 40 initial design submissions from students after the school called for input.
They will be passed off to Heard Strategy and Storytelling — a marketing and communications agency that has offered pro bono rebranding services for schools changing Native American mascots — to help guide the rebranding process.
Superintendent Joseph Curtis revealed that his son submitted a design.
Committee member Alison McGee said thunder is both neutral and empowering as a mascot.
"I know it was a long process, and I didn't know what to expect from it and I don't think this was what I would expect but I think that shows that there was a truly thoughtful process involved," she said.
"And I just think it's hard to come up with something that is both neutral and empowering and I think that this really does embody that and is actually pretty unique. A lot of animals get chosen and I think this was, mostly that the neutrality and empowerment and I think that’s really important."
In August 2020, the School Committee voted to change the high school mascot that was 50 years old at the time. In the prior months, residents had spoken during public comments about racist implications tied to the Native American mascot.
Pittsfield High School's General mascot also came under fire for appearing as a symbol of violence.
At the time, Taconic was one of 29 high schools — down from 40 — in the state still using Native American logos.
On the other hand, some residents felt that changing the mascot would "erase the past" and felt that it "honored" Native Americans.
The National Congress of American Indians has been advocating against using indigenous mascots in professional teams since 1968 and extended that to K-12 in 2020, saying they "are symbols of disrespect that degrade, mock, and harm Native people, particularly Native youth."
The committee has worked with Heard throughout the process. It reviewed more than 230 options that were submitted through the first survey.
Committee member Vicki Smith asked what will be done with all of the Taconic Braves paraphernalia and Bishop said the new school — completed in 2018 — was designed with rebranding in mind.
"When we moved into the new school, we were very conscious of this and so we actually have new banners going up in the gym, you will see an absence of that word in the new school, so when the school was being designed that was something that we were conscious of branding with Taconic as opposed to Braves so that we don't really have any paraphernalia anymore," he explained.
"All that stuff was sort of donated or given away with the old school. We really don't have any I mean, sports teams here and there have jerseys left over that make their way into kids' hands and the supermarkets are still selling their stuff but as time goes on, we'll sort of transition that out."
Bishop acknowledged that the rebranding has been a long process and said he is looking forward to getting Taconic Thunder uniforms and more.
"It's been a long process and we've come out of it with this," he said.
"And I'm looking forward to sort of just putting the exclamation point on it with our uniform designs and things like that."
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BRTA Board Balks at Route Changes, Asks for Re-Evaluation
By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The Berkshire Regional Transit Authority Advisory Board Wednesday tabled a vote on the proposed route realignment.
BRTA currently operates 36 weekday runs with 26 available drivers, leaving 10-13 open runs available for coverage each day. The proposed plan reduces weekday service to 30 runs between the 26 drivers, reducing open runs available for coverage to about five per day.
Service change proposals:
Elimination of Routes 1A, 2A, 21A, and 921.
Evening service reductions on select routes, using data-driven decisions, where ridership declines.
Elimination of Route 14, now serviced as an extension of Route 12 to 8:55 PM.
Route 21(B) operates as an all-day South County Loop with extended evening service.
Route 34 added to end of Route 3
New route, Route 999, would go through Pittsfield, North Adams, and Great Barrington and operate the Pittsfield Walmart Express (Route 912) a couple of times a day to serve high-demand places. Designed to replace the 1A and 2A trips and have limited stops.
The most up to date route realignment proposal can be found here.
"I just want to start off by saying that, you know, this is not something that we look at as a permanent solution, rather than this is something that we can work with for the time being, until we get to something a little bit more permanent that makes any sense. I just don't want anybody to think that this is our final solution to our issue here," said Deputy Administrator Ben Hansen.
Member Sarah Fontaine asked how many drivers they need to get to for the routes to be what they are currently.
Administrator Kathleen Lambert said there is currently 26 drivers and one who will retire next month. She said they are hoping to hire 10 to have extras to fill in when people are sick.
"We have a strategy for redeployments. So when we get more drivers, the first thing we're going to do is add that extra bus to the 999, to support that whole county ride. The next we're going to do is we're going to add drivers to the end schedule to the 34, 12, and 21 and, depending on how we can work out with the union, try to get the regular people with regular licenses trained in house, operating a vehicle and then working on their CDL so they can learn and earn at the same time," Lambert said.
It was also brought up that Berkshire Community College will be offering CDL [commercial drivers license] classes and Lambert said BCC agreed to locate its new bus-driving simulator at the BRTA facility. At least on of BRTA's trainers will be there to support the Passenger Endorsement training.
"We think that the simulator is going to generate and support itself eventually, because we can have students coming from New York and Connecticut and Vermont coming in to train in that center, which is simulated there." said Lambert. "It's a no-brainer, and we'll always have access to it, so that'll be great."
Fontaine said this new proposal seems to be a lesser of all evils.
"Nobody here wants to reduce bus service. I think that's pretty obvious. None of us want to do in the face of what the reality is. It sounds like it might be better off to have a. Reliable service every two hours, rather than an unreliable service that is still every two hours, that's what I'm assuming," Fontaine said.
Lambert said what they are going for is reliability and safety. Chair Douglas McNally also added that the unreliable service does not have the mitigation of Route 999 as an option.
Lambert also said she does not want anyone stranded and that by having a route without cancellations, no one will be, and those who are still on the bus at the end of the day will be dropped off at the Intermodal Transportation Center (ITC).
Member Rene Wood said she was worried about the people who will be left at the ITC.
"I don't live in Pittsfield, but I am concerned that we're kind of thinking that somehow people who get back to ITC, which is a good place to get back to, are somehow going to be able to afford a taxi or Uber, or somehow to get home every day or every time that they come back. I'm going to pick on a BCC student. I don't know if there is an agreement with a taxi firm to be here at that time to kind of support people who may need that type of thing, or really, if, in fact, they're going to end up, they're here, but they're dumped," she said.
Mayor Peter Marchetti echoed the same concerns.
"While we were sitting here, I went on my Uber app and I have a 12-minute wait for one Uber that is working in the city of Pittsfield right now, at 4:30 in the afternoon, when it's work time. And I'm going to guarantee you at nine o'clock tonight, if I go to here and say, I want to go home. There's no Ubers available. That's a reality, a taxicab, even worse. So I'm a little bit concerned that we're just gonna dumb people in the middle of the city," he said.
It was suggested that anyone still on the bus could be dropped off on the way to the Downing Industrial Park garage or the bus could even take a slight detour for drop offs in Pittsfield.
"We will stay in service as long as we have buses driving back to the garage. I do want to make sure that everyone knows that currently we do do that. We're just doing it from Allendale, which isn't very far, if we do end at ITC, then we can reach out as we get back to Downing, you know, we can drop them off along, you know, Tyler Street, East, what have you I mean, because why not stay in service if we're driving already," Hansen said.
Wood then asked about those who might be going to BCC and live in another town other than Pittsfield.
"I don't think there have been sustained conversations with South County Connector. So we're going to drop people in Pittsfield," she said. "How can we pay you to pick up those people that live in Stockbridge, live in Lenox, live in Lee, all the way down the route, so that these people can continue their education? I mean, that's workforce development. So I have to agree with what the mayor said, I think there's a lot of this that still needs to be resolved."
Marchetti also spoke about the Link 413 service and if it is taking drivers away that they need.
"Does that mean are two drivers are taken away from the 26 that we need? Or is that a separate situation? Because if we can't service here, why are we adding why are we taking drivers away for something else, when we can't fix the problem here," he said.
Member Ray Killeen said they voted for the Link 413 back in May that all agreed to and they put themselves in that situation. Marchetti responded that maybe he had been naive at the time and did not realize this could have potentially put them in jeopardy and Killeen agreed.
The mayor said he has spoken to other community leaders and has heard negative reactions to the new proposal. There needs to be more discussion with city and town leaders, he said.
"I take the job seriously, and I have to worry about what my counterpart up in North Adams thinks. And I spoke with Mayor [Jennifer] Macksey earlier today, she's not in favor, and it could possibly be because we're talking about reductions, and we don't have the information. So the whole dumping them here at the ITC doesn't work for me, so that's a reason for me to vote no."
Lambert and retired administrator Robert Malnati said they have hosted countless public meetings and have offered to talk to anyone with concerns or they could have called.
"I've offered to anybody who's been on a meeting with us, I will go anywhere, go any place, to try to explain why we're doing this," Lambert said.
Great Barrington Director of Public Transportation Tate Coleman said he has raised a number of concerns and wanted to know more about the data behind the changes and these decisions were collaborated with Town Manager Liz Hartsgrove.
"I'd like to ask whether it may be possible, echoing Mayor Marchetti's comments, to propose an alternate motion that would direct the BRTA administration to re-evaluate, acknowledging that service changes and reductions are necessary, to re-evaluate work with Berkshire Regional Planning Commission more comprehensively before going to public input and show clearly how the changes are based on publicly available data about ridership, cost performance data developed collaboratively with stakeholders, again before the public comment period, in terms of developing that proposal and then coming back to this board within 30 to 60 days," Coleman said.
Lambert said it would be tough to do a re-evaluation as they don't have the money for a study and that this is just to solve an acute problem right now. She did suggest that they applied for a Build Grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation of upwards of $6.1 million for software and money to support new drivers and microtransit, and money to support readjustment and planning.
Coleman reiterated his suggestion saying he is hoping for a redesign of the current proposal not the current system.
He also asked since they are losing a driver, will a new route be proposed again with more loss of drivers to which Lambert said they will not.
McNally said he is worried that if this is pushed any longer, they will become an unreliable service that will lose ridership and reiterated that it is not long term. Lambert said it has caused a loss of ridership of up to 6 percent.
"I'm just worried that if we go into the hurry up and wait two weeks or a month or 60 days down the road, we're going to start being so unreliable were going to start losing ridership," McNally said. "People are going to stop using the bus the third time we get out there. And that's happening on a regular basis now. So this is not going to be the long term solution."
Member Mary Reilly asked what would be a reasonable time after implementing this plan to judge its effects; Lambert said six months.
"We'd be circling back in the fall, and when we get drivers on board and get the workforce stabilized, as we can add service back. We will continue to do that, but it's going to be a good six months before. Remember, it's six weeks to train one person. We need at least five or six to start with, and we're hoping for 10," Lambert said.
Marchetti brought up how Lambert spoke at a Pittsfield City Council meeting but did not extend the same courtesy to North Adams and thinks everyone needs to start working together to have the right information for the county as a whole.
"I'm a no because I don't think we followed a process that was efficient enough to gather information. And if we want countywide efforts, and we want us to be working as a county, whether it's transportation or housing or mental health issues or addiction issues, we have to start working together and not in silos," Mayor Marchetti said.
After some more deliberations Marchetti said there is a Berkshire County Municipal Association meeting with all of the town leaders on Thursday and invited her to speak there. Lambert also said she plans to have a meeting with the South County Connector as well to discuss schedule coordination.
"If we're not ready, I understand, but it's not going to change the situation. So I want everybody to be aware of that," Lambert said.
The board decided to table the vote and come back on March 26 to have more discussions on the route proposal.
Two-thirds of Pittsfield schools need focused or targeted assistance, according to 2025 accountability data from the Department of Secondary and Elementary Education. click for more
