Letter: Voters Should Reject Changes to RR Zone

Letter to the Editor07:00PM / Sunday, May 15, 2022Print Story | Email Story

To the Editor:

Williamstown residents attending town meeting on Tuesday, May 17, would be well-advised to watch the most recent "Talks on the Hill" at Williamstown Rural Lands, now playing on WilliNet.

It is hard not to conclude that town voters should reject the Planning Board's proposed articles with respect to our Rural Residence districts. In a succinct 30-minute presentation on "Low-Density Development," Regina Fink and Annika Harrington provide viewers with a deep understanding of the complexities of rural development and housing, delivered with a clarity that has been lacking from the Planning Board itself.

With neither research nor actual planning, the board is bringing a lengthy and confusing list of changes to town meeting. In origin and conception, several proposals treat the General and Rural Residence districts as equivalent, reducing lot sizes, decreasing frontage requirements, and allowing multi-unit buildings in both, as if equity were somehow served by using the same broad brush on zones that are different for a reason.

Rural Residence lands are not on the town water and sewer, they are farther from services and goods, and they provide important ecosystem benefits, such as farm and forestland, wildlife and plant preservation, stormwater management and carbon sequestration. As the climate crisis changes the paradigms by which our society can expect to live and survive, it is disheartening to see our Planning Board present us with a shallow, outdated, and naïve plan that will only further fragment our vital rural areas, without the slightest advantage in terms of affordability and equity.

The proposals are being championed by those who are rightly concerned about the lack of affordable housing in Williamstown, but Ms. Fink and Ms. Harrington pointed to research showing that the simplistic approach proposed by our Planning Board could have exactly the opposite effect, driving up housing prices and only further limiting access to the rich.

I urge town voters not to support the Planning Board's ill-conceived proposals for the Rural Residence district. Let's demand instead that the Board come back again after having done their own actual planning, research, and creative thinking.

Anne O'Connor
Williamstown, Mass.

Tags: town meeting 2022, zoning,

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Williamstown Select Board Evaluates Town Manager

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
05:39AM / Wednesday, October 28, 2026

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — In 2022, the town still was recovering from the twin blows of a global pandemic and a lawsuit that exposed disturbing allegations against the town's police department.

The latter ultimately led to the resignation of the police chief and the town manager. To replace the manager, the Select Board at the time turned to Robert Menicocci.

Menicocci represented a break in style from his immediate predecessor, who was a more prominent voice in town government. That prominence, in part, was a product of the times: When town boards and committees were not meeting in-person and access to town hall itself was limited at the height of the pandemic, the manager's voice in Zoom meetings was more front and center.

In his four years in the corner office, Menicocci has helped shepherd the police department on its path to certification and helped the town weather the fiscal storm of skyrocketing costs linked to inflation – particularly sharp increases in the cost of health insurance that hit hard for a labor-intensive endeavor like municipal government. All the while, he has been a little more taciturn, while always willing to participate, when appropriate, with responsive answers in discussions of the Select Board and Finance Committee.

On Monday, the current Select Board – completely turned over from the 2022 edition – pushed Menicocci to be more of a cheerleader for the town.

"Do you see your role more as a behind-the-scenes guy and our role is to be out in public?" board member Matthew Neely asked Menicocci during the board's review of the manager's job performance. "Or is there more of a role for you in that? So many people, if I say your name, they're like, ‘Who?'

"I would have assumed your role would be more public facing as well, and more, for lack of a better word, leading the charge as opposed to running day-to-day operations. I feel you're strong running day-to-day. But something we all wish is we had a little more of a proactive [manager] …. Since we need development, need all these things in town so much. … I'd love to see more outward energy, I guess.

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