Williamstown's DIRE Committee Opts for Name Change
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The town's diversity committee is ready for a rebrand.
At its Monday meeting, the people appointed to serve on the Diversity, Inclusion and Racial Equity Advisory Committee agreed unanimously to ask the Select Board to accept a new name for the panel.
Growing out of discussions at the committee's recent retreat, the volunteer body suggested that it be renamed the Race, Equity, Accessibility, Diversity and Inclusion Committee.
The new name is one part of a new charge that the committee is asking the Select Board to approve, updating the charge that DIRE received in November 2022, two years after it was formed in the summer of 2020.
The proposed new charge preserves the existing core mission of the committee, deletes some language related to process that does not reflect how the committee has functioned and identifies seven themes for newly named committee's work: housing affordability and equity; initiatives to increase accessibility; Stockbridge Munsee community partnerships; Black history, inclusion in local history; inclusion and belonging in schools; Pride celebrations and support; and town meeting initiatives (including review of potential new citizens petitions and revisions to Article 37 from Town Meeting 2020).
"We struck the section of the [2022] charge under the heading 'recommendation process,'" Andrew Art said in presenting the proposed updated charge to his colleagues. "The reason for that is that the DIRE Committee has its own process for making recommendations that has been set forth since its inception."
The new charge also recommends that DIRE's membership be capped at five with the option for the Select Board continuing to appoint additional, non-voting members with expertise in specific subject areas. Currently, the board is defined as having seven members, though only four members — Andrew Art, Ursula Bare, Shana Dixon and Smalls — are appointed.
The committee's recommendations to the Select Board included that the committee adopt a monthly meeting schedule.
And the committee also chose to adopt a new name — with a new acronym, READI — that Smalls said "highlights the positive." It also, while keeping race front and center, emphasizes that the committee wants to address issues of equity that go beyond racial equity.
The first order of business on Monday was the election of Smalls to chair the committee. He took the gavel from Dixon, who chaired DIRE — now READI — prior to her election to the Select Board in May. Dixon now serves as the Select Board's representative on the diversity committee.
One of Smalls' first actions was to emphasize a paragraph in the proposed new READI charge that calls on the committee to build, "partnerships with local organizations to promote visibility of the ongoing work, to increase community attention and work on solutions-focused initiatives."
Smalls made a direct plea to potential local partners to engage the READI Committee.
"This committee is a great place to come and get the word out about things that are social services, social assistance, things that can help the underserved in our communities," Smalls said, looking directly into the camera of the town's local access television station, WilliNet.
"If you have an initiative, if you have a matter of importance that you think will be important to promote in front of the whole town — this is the most direct way to get visibility."
The committee also announced two contests to encourage more direct involvement of community members with READI's work.
As part of its impending name change, the committee plans to replace an existing banner the DIRE Committee has used at public events. Art suggested that the panel hold an art contest to add to the design of that banner.
The committee set a deadline of Friday, Aug. 1, at 5:30, for submission of those designs with the hope that it can pick a new design at its next meeting on Aug. 4.
And, in addition, the panel is looking for nominees for its inaugural READI Award to recognize an individual or organization that is doing the work of equity, access, diversity and inclusion in the community.
"As part of the new charge and the name, we want to highlight the positive as a motivator for other organizations and institutions," Smalls said. "Expect planning for the READI Award to come out soon."
Submissions of art work for the banner or nominations for the committee's award can be emailed to sdixon@williamstownma.gov.
In other business on Monday, the READI Committee:
• learned from Dixon that the Select Board at a special meeting on June 30 approved a $6,400 expenditure from the board's fiscal year 2025 allocation of town funds to support the July 4 fireworks display at Taconic Golf Club.
• recognized local Juneteenth celebrations throughout the area.
• discussed bringing back representatives of the town's Historical Commission and Williamstown Historical Museum board to talk about inclusive history.
• decided to press the town for a resumption of support that the committee has received in the past to use artificial intelligence tools to create complete written records of READI's meetings.
• and heard an invitation from the Williamstown Chamber of Commerce to have a member of the committee serve on the chamber's planning committee for its December Holiday Walk event.
"Is it a Holiday Walk that celebrates a multiplicity of holidays and makes room for all the different identities to be celebrated, or is it a celebration of traditionalism that would be squeezed or pinched by a diversity of perspectives coming into the room?" Smalls asked.
Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Susan Briggs, in the virtual audience of the meeting, contributed via Zoom that she wants the event to do the former.
"We are looking to expand and celebrate as many holidays as possible," Briggs said. "We are pleased to have partnered with the Jewish Federation of Berkshires as well as Williams College Jewish Federation to promote their events. This year, I believe [Holiday Walk is] Dec. 5-7. While that doesn't always coincide with Kwanzaa or Hanukkah or other winter holidays, we'd love to incorporate as many as we can.
"I don't have that background, which is why an invitation would go to anyone in this group or anyone in town that would add that perspective."
Tags: diversity committee,
