Letter: Show North Adams Children They Are Valued on Oct. 8

To the Editor:

A lot has been said for and against building a new Greylock School in the city of North Adams. The rhetoric is getting heated over the cost, over the impact on property taxes, over the need for a new school building faced with a declining student population. These are all good points for discussion and the cost to the city and further to the taxpayer should not be ignored.

As former mayor, city councilor, School Committee member and School Building Committee member, I have certainly had my share of whether or not things are needed and affordable. Managing a city and a school district are full of choices based not only on need but on funding. Today as a city and a school district, a very important choice needs to be made.

The Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) has put the city through a long and thorough process to see if in fact we need this school. Having been through that process with the building of Colegrove Park Elementary, I can assure you that the MSBA does not simply give based on want, but totally on need. Their process assures that the community is in need of a school building and that funding will only come if all criteria are met …. including student-projected populations.

I believe we sometimes think that because we aren't as prosperous as other cities, we are not deserving of the best. Well we are, and our kid's are. Do our kids deserve a building built to meet the standards of today's educational and safety requirements? Do they deserve a physical environment that leads to increased social and emotional growth and health? Do they deserve the same physical learning environment of other kids in the state? Do our teachers deserve to instruct in an environment that is built to keep kids happy and focused on learning? I would answer "yes" to all.

I have said many times that our kids are our most precious asset and our responsibility to them as a city is that we provide them the best education possible. We have an opportunity to secure the infrastructure of elementary education in the city for many years to come. And most importantly, we have an obligation to tell the children of North Adams that they are valued.

Please vote "Yes" with me on Oct. 8.

Richard Alcombright
North Adams, Mass.

North Adams Voters to Decide Greylock School Project

By Tammy DanielsiBerkshires Staff
08:45PM / Sunday, October 06, 2024

Mayor Jennifer Macksey at the project forum held at Greylock earlier this summer. She says she feels optimistic about the vote. 

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Voters will decide the fate of the long-gestating Greylock School project on Tuesday.

 

There is only one question on the ballot, whether to approve a debt exclusion that will allow borrowing for the project outside the limitations of Proposition 2 1/2 for the life of the loan. It is not an override.

 

The City Council approved the spending in July but a ballot vote is required to exclude the debt.

 

A yes vote will move the project forward; a no vote will essentially kill it.

 

Voting will take place from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. at St. Elizabeth's Parish Center.

 

The questions about the project have largely revolved around two issues: the cost to the taxpayer and enrollment. 

 

The School Committee voted last year to reduce from three elementary schools to two in light of the student population declining and to reconfigure the grades in the remaining schools as a better educational option. Colegrove Park would become a Grades 3 to 6 school and the new school a prekindergarten through 2 early education center.