Second Street Elects Four New Board Members

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Charlie Catacalos, Becky Crane, Daniel Lowenstein and Roberta McCulloch-Dews.
PITTSFIELD, Mass — Second Street Second Chances has elected four new members to its Board of Directors: Charlie Catacalos, Becky Crane, Daniel Lowenstein and Roberta McCulloch-Dews. 
 
Charlie Catacalos, a newcomer to the Berkshires, grew up in Maryland near Washington, D.C. After attending Temple University in Philadelphia, they spent half a year working in cultural institutions in the Adirondacks. They eventually found their way to North Adams, where they have resided for the past two years. Catacalos is the Exhibitions Research and Content Editor at the Berkshire Museum and enjoys their job of learning new things and sharing with others. They also serve on the board of Berkshire Stonewall Community Coalition, the oldest LGBTQ+ nonprofit organization in the Berkshires. In their free time, Catacalos writes music, makes ceramics and spends time with their 16-year-old cat, Percy.
 
 Becky Crane, LICSW, has been a resident of Berkshire County since 1983 and has worked in downtown Pittsfield in various roles since 2006. She has worked for the Child & Adolescent Services division of the Brien Center in several capacities and was a substance abuse educator for middle and high schools from 2006-2008. Crane earned her social work degree in 2010 and returned to the Brien Center, where she worked with youths and their families as a psychotherapist and spent a year and a half in the Child and Adolescent Crisis Stabilization Unit. From 2014-2020, she worked as a psychotherapist at Williams College. Crane currently serves First and South Church and Cathedral of the Beloved as an independently licensed clinical social worker. She and her husband of 40 years, Doug, have three children and two young grandchildren, with another on the way.
 
 Daniel Lowenstein is a lifelong Berkshire resident and a local business owner. He graduated from Monument Mountain Regional High School in 2009 and attended Bates College and UMass Amherst with a major in sociology. After several years of employment in various managerial positions, Lowenstein opened a retail storefront with his brother in 2019, where he manages the business full time. His hobbies include painting, photography, blacksmithing, metal sculpture, hiking and fiction writing. As someone who has personally experienced drug addiction and incarceration, Lowenstein says it is both an honor and an exciting opportunity to be part of an organization that offers aid and guidance to the formerly incarcerated.
 
Roberta McCulloch-Dews is the Vice President of Marketing at Greylock Federal Credit Union. She previously served as Director of Administrative Services and Public Information Officer in the Mayor's Office for the City of Pittsfield. A communications professional with more than 20 years of experience, McCulloch-Dews began her career as a newspaper journalist in 2000 and later transitioned to marketing communications and public relations. She serves as a trustee on the board for the Norman Rockwell Museum and is also a board member of the Girl Scouts of Central and Western Massachusetts, the Samuel Harrison Society and the Berkshire Immigrant Center. She is a youth mentor with Rites of Passage Empowerment (R.O.P.E.) and a founding member of the Equity and Diversity Committee for the Central Berkshire Regional School District. McCulloch-Dews is a former commissioner on the Berkshire County Commission on the Status of Women. In 2015, she was selected as a finalist for the Berkshire Trendsetters Changemaker Under 40 award, and in 2016, she was part of the inaugural class of Berkshire Community College's 40 Under Forty winners. She is the host of the award-winning podcast, “Backstory – Let's Hear It.” She graduated from New York University with a bachelor's degree in print journalism and, in 2019, earned a master's degree in social and public policy from SUNY Empire. McCulloch-Dews and her husband, Warren Dews, Jr., have three children, Warren III, West and Kennedy.
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15 People Displaced in Pittsfield Home Fires

Staff Reports

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Fifteen people were displaced after 2-alarm home fires this weekend on Springside Avenue and Elaine Drive. 

On Friday evening, the Fire Department responded to a structure fire at 209 Springside Ave., which took a four-hour battle to extinguish and resulted in a partial roof collapse. The next day, on Saturday evening, crews knocked down a fire at 121 Elaine Drive in about an hour. 

The garage and part of the single-family home on Elaine Drive were gutted to the frame, along with a vehicle parked in the driveway. On Springside Avenue, the top level and porch of the multifamily were burned through.  

A GoFundMe has been started for the family of the Elaine Drive home, which includes several young children.  The fundraiser, with a $5,500 goal, explains they lost their home and all of their belongings. (iBerkshires.com does not confirm or endorse fundraisers; they are provided as information only.)

There were no civilian or firefighter injuries, and both incidents are under investigation.  One dog was rescued on Springside Avenue. 

On Oct. 10, around 6:15 p.m., PFD responded to the Springside Avenue home for a reported structure fire and saw a 2 1/2-story wood frame multifamily with a heavy blaze showing from the second-floor front porch, extending out. 

The building suffered a partial roof collapse, which prolonged extinguishment. The fire was brought under control after about four hours.

“An aggressive offensive attack was mounted by first arriving crews stretching hose lines into the building as well as primary searches that proved negative. Ladders were placed around the structure to provide access as well as escape if needed. An off-duty Fire Captain had also been on scene early in the incident to help evacuate the structure and rescue a dog,” PFD wrote in a press release. 

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