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North Adams 'Rises' for Elizabeth Freeman Center

Mayor Jennifer Macksey, holding an 'Enough' sign, declared October as Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Mayor Jennifer Macksey proclaimed October as Domestic Violence Awareness Month in the city on Tuesday at the start of Elizabeth Freeman Center's Rise Together walk.

The annual fundraiser and awareness event was held in six communities across the county beginning Sept. 16 in Pittsfield.

Local officials and community members marched down Main Street to First Congregational Church and back to City Hall to stand against gender-based violence.

The center's goal is to reach $150,000; as of Friday afternoon, the center has raised more than $88,000.

Macksey spoke to the crowd gathered before the walk about how domestic violence has touched many lives, including her family.

"As you know, domestic violence has touched my family and my friends, and this event just brings us all together to cherish memories. So today I honor. I don't even want to say honor. I proclaim October Domestic Violence Awareness Month, but I specifically want to shout out and remember Jillian Tatro, Jordan LaBarre, and especially my cousin Brittany LaBombard," Mayor Macksey said.

Tatro, of North Adams, was murdered in 2022 (her husband was charged); LaBarre of Pittsfield was murdered in Colorado this year (a man she knew has been charged); LaBombard of North Adams was murdered in Nebraska in 2023 (her estranged husband was charged).

The Freeman Center served 2,045 survivors and 2,183 children during fiscal 2025; 276 of those clients were in North Adams. 

"Whereas domestic violence and sexual assault are not public health and safety issues we want in our community, they affect individuals and families of all backgrounds, identities and communities and whereas the trauma of domestic and sexual violence impacts not only the victims of survivors themselves, but also their families, their friends, their workplaces, their schools, their neighborhoods and the entire community," Macksey said.

State Rep. John Barrett III also spoke on how important the work the Elizabeth Freeman Center is doing.

"This is an organization like I say I'm so proud to be affiliated with in the job that you've done, because there's so many of us here that have been touched by domestic violence, sexual violence, and especially in all ages of our communities. So I think today, we are not only symbolically talking about it, but we're celebrating the work that's been done, and must continue to be done over the next several years," Barrett said.

Executive Director Divya Chaturvedi said she joined the center around the same time last year during the walks and was moved by the speeches and movement

"I joined EFC last year right before the Rise walks, right during the week of Rise walks. And then when I attended the North Adams walk, it was something else. It's a somber walk. It's a realization of what truly happens when you are facing domestic violence. And the importance of our work and what we do," she said.

She explained the many programs and preventative programs the center does. The center's website says Berkshire County has a rate of restraining orders 37 percent higher than the state average.

"We get over 3,500 hotline calls in a year, which is a huge number, and we serve over 2,000 survivors every year, and equal number of children that they bring," Chaturvedi said. "We have survivors from every town, almost every town in Berkshire County, big and small. Some of the numbers are so big for the population of that town, and that shows you the scale of the problem.

"Domestic violence can happen anywhere, anytime, to anyone. And as they say, everyone knows someone, and our numbers are reflective of that." 

The center's memorial sign held the names of 18 victims of domestic violence murders in the county since 2006.

"There have been 18 murders since 2006 which seems such a huge number to me when I joined this county," she said. "We will never forget their names. We carry their names at every walk. We will remember them, and we will make sure that they are never, ever forgotten."

MCLA Shows Off Mark Hopkins' Needs to Lieutenant Governor

By Tammy Daniels iBerkshires Staff
05:26PM / Saturday, November 15, 2025

MCLA professor Maggie Clark says the outdated classrooms with their chalkboards aren't providing the technical support aspiring teachers need. 

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The outdated lockers are painted over, large air conditioners are in the windows, and professors are still using chalkboards and projectors in the classrooms.

 

The last significant work on Mark Hopkins was done in the 1980s, and its last "sprucing up" was years ago. 

 

"The building has great bones," President Jamie Birge told Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll, as they stood in a third-floor classroom on Friday afternoon. "The envelope needs to be worked on, sure, but it's stable, so it's usable — but it just isn't usable in this form."

 

The "new" Mark Hopkins School opened in 1940 on Church Street and later became a campus school for what was then North Adams State Teachers College. There haven't been children in the building in years: it's been used for office space and for classrooms since about 1990. 

 

"I live in this building. Yeah, I teach the history of American education," said education professor Maggie Clark, joining officials as they laughed that the classroom was historical. 

 

"Projecting forward, we're talking about assistive technology, working with students with disabilities to have this facility as our emblem for what our foundation is, is a challenge."

 

Board of Trustees Chair Buffy Lord said the classroom hadn't changed since she attended classes there in the 1990s.