Bascom Lodge to Open Memorial Day Weekend

ADAMS, Mass. — Bascom Lodge will open to overnight guests and visitors on Memorial Day weekend.

Manager Peter Dudek told the the Mount Greylock Advisory Council on Wednesday that the lodge has overnight reservations starting on May 24. Park roads are scheduled to open on May 18 and the War Memorial Tower on May 25.

John Dudek and Brad Parsons retired from the Bascom Lodge Group last year, 13 years into the group's 25-year lease with the state. Peter Dudek, John's brother, is running the operation this season.

"We're opening on Memorial Day weekend and want to have the usual assortment of the cultural programming every Sunday," he said, adding that the historic building is booked for weddings and other events, too.

Built in 1930, the lodge sits atop the state's highest mountain and offers nine rooms for boarding at different privacy levels, dining, and special events. It has accommodations for about 34 people and has hosted popular dinners and an array of programming. 

Dudek said it has full lodging staff but needs additional employees in other areas.

"When we first started it was really easy to find help. They just came to us automatically," he added. "But over the years, you have to advertise more and more and that seems to get very little."

He said the operating hours, as usual, will be just on the weekends to start and then move to five or seven days a week during the summer. It will be closed on most Mondays and Tuesdays but reservations won't be refused on those days, Dudek added, though dinner may not be available.

In the coming week, a program will be added to the Bascom Lodge website. There is Sunday programming starting on opening weekend into early September and some on Wednesdays as well.

Housing Secretary Makes Adams Housing Authority No. 40 on List of Visits

By Tammy DanielsiBerkshires Staff
05:27PM / Wednesday, May 15, 2024

Executive Director William Schrade invited Secretary Edward Augustus to the rededication of the Housing Authority's Community Room, providing a chance for the secretary to hear about the authority's successes and challenges. 

ADAMS, Mass. — The state's new secretary of housing got a bit of a rock-star welcome on Wednesday morning as Adams Housing Authority residents, board members and staff lined up to get their picture taken with him. 

 

Edward Augustus Jr. was invited to join the Adams Housing Authority in the rededication of its renovated community room, named for James P. McAndrews, the authority's first executive director. 

 

Executive Director William Schrade said he was surprised that the secretary had taken up the invitation but Augustus said he's on a mission — to visit every housing authority in the state. 

 

"The next logical question is how many housing authorities are there in Massachusetts? There's 242 of them so I get a lot of driving left to do," he laughed. "This is number 40. You're in the first tier I've been able to visit but to me, it's one way for me to understand what's actually going on."

 

The former state senator and Worcester city manager was appointed secretary of housing and livable communities — the first cabinet level housing chief in 30 years — by Gov. Maura Healey last year as part of her answer to the state's housing crisis. 

 

He's been leading the charge for the governor's $4 billion Affordable Homes Act that looks to invest $1.6 billion in repairing and modernizing the state's 43,000 public housing units that house some 70,000 low-income, disabled and senior residents, as well as families. 

 

Massachusetts has the most public housing units and is one of only a few states that support public housing. Numbers range from Boston's tens of thousands of units to Sutton's 40. Adams has 64 one-bedroom units in the Columbia Valley facility and 24 single and multiple-bedroom units scattered through the community.