Williams Receives Another Racial Harassment Report

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WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — A Williams College student has reported an incident of racial harassment on a public street late Saturday night, according to a campus-wide email from school officials.
 
Director of Campus Safety Services Jeffrey Palmer and Vice President for Institutional Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Leticia S. E. Haynes sent the email Wednesday morning about an incident that reportedly occurred at about 1 a.m. Sunday morning on Hoxsey Street.
 
A Williams student reported that, "an individual driving a white 4-door pickup with Mass plates shouting a racial slur and threatening physical harm," the email read.
 
The email was accompanied by a photo of the vehicle alleged to be involved in the incident. The license plate is illegible in the photo.
 
"We are asking anyone with information about the vehicle [pictured] to contact Campus Safety Services at 413-597-4444 or the Williamstown Police Department at 413-458-5733," the email read. "We thank the student who contacted us about this incident and to remind everyone that hateful actions like these have no place here."
 
The email reminded anyone needing additional support to reach out to Haynes' office or the Davis Center at Williams.
 
The campus has seen an increase in such incidents since the start of the fall semester, prompting several such emails to the college community and a discussion at Town Hall by Williamstown's Racial Equity, Accessibility, Diversity and Inclusion Committee.
 

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Williamstown Board Signs Off on Utility Infrastructure, Conservation Restriction

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Select Board on Monday approved one request from Berkshire Gas to install equipment in the town's right-of-way and put off another request pending more information from the utility.
 
Berkshire Gas was before the board looking for an OK to install a telemetering station on Church Street near the elementary school and a regulator station on North Street (Route 7) near the Clark Art Institute's satellite parking lot.
 
A senior engineering technician from Berkshire Gas attended the meeting to speak on behalf of the former request, but no one from the utility attended to support the North Street proposal.
 
"There was supposed to be someone else to talk about the regulator station," Wes Scalise told the board.
 
Town Manager Robert Menicocci and Department of Public Works Director Craig Clough told the board that the proposed 5-foot tall structure generated some safety concerns on the part of Town Hall.
 
"As you come around what is a relatively blind corner, you have a parking lot there during peak time that has a lot of traffic going in and out," Menicocci told the board. "We wanted to get a sense of the size [of the proposed installation] and whether any work was done to analyze what sight lines are like when people are pulling out of that lot."
 
Clough told the board that when he met with Berkshire Gas on the application, he suggested that the regulator station should be installed as far from the curb as possible and, if the Clark was amenable, out of the town's right-of-way entirely if possible. 
 
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