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Robert R. Moulton Jr.*
Candidate For City Council - North Adams NORTH ADAMS - When Robert Moulton Jr. first ran for City Council, he told his wife that if he won, he'd only stay three terms.
But with the end of his third term approaching, Moulton decided he really liked local government and was willing to stay if the voters, and his wife, said it was OK. "She's been a big supporter," he said.
Moulton's family has run businesses in the downtown for three generations, including Moulton's Spectacle Shoppe, of which he is president.
The 51-year-old optician and Finance Committee member thinks the city's No. 1 priority is revenue. Between union contracts and the drop in state funding, particularly from the lottery, funding resources are drying up, he said.
"The mayor does a great job but it's a bare-bones budget," Moulton said, and similar to situations of communities around the state. "I don't know where you could make cuts right now."
He approves of the city's involvement in the Notre Dame property and Clark Biscuit, as well as taking on the armory and Vietnam Veterans Memorial Skating Rink. The future of the armory's still up in the air but he thinks something can be done with it, and the skating rink (which had been operated by MCLA) was "a great move and a good thing for the public."
"I've never been crazy for the city becoming a landlord," Moulton said, but ... "Clark Biscuit: eyesore. Get downtown look in a 500-foot circle and point to an eyesore. That's a huge chunk of it. It's a huge eyesore. ... That whole area needs an uplift and an infusion of money will be a big benefit. That will be a terrific boon."
He had reservations about taking on the church property, but the way the mayor was presenting it to the councilors - that the city wouldn't put out the money unless a developer came forward - convinced him.
"We're not going to lose anything and the city, in the long term, will gain and the end result will be a great project," Moulton said.
The addition of condominiums and affordable housing at the two sites, plus the relocation of the Contemporary Artists Center at the church property, will be a welcome addition to the downtown, he said. "Sometimes you can go out on Main Street and roll a bowling ball."
He said too often people blame the city for the lack stores and foot traffic there but that it's not the city's fault. Moulton added that the Planning Board and permitting processes could be a little easier, but you still need businesses to get those processes going.
"The city's done magnificent job on the downtown, so I don't know what more the city can do," he said. However, one person owns most of Main Street, he said, not unlike the days when Sprague was the only employer. "It's up to him to market the buildings and be creative. The city's done well above what it should do."
He also thinks benches would be a good addition to the main drag, and always looks around for benches when he visits other communities. "People who live downtown, that's their front yard," he said and they should have a place to sit.
He does advocate making the benches out of stone so kids can't etch their names in them. "Maybe we should put a security camera above it," he laughed.
Moulton does have a dream: "What I envision is that someone would come to Williams College or MoCA and look around and say, 'this is a great place to have my business.'"
He'd like to see that someone come into Hardman Industrial Park with 300 jobs. "But how do we get the jobs? We put the area forward."
"I think we made a big mistake after 9/11 when a lot of high-tech places, financial places [were considering relocating.] They don't need to be in New York City," Moulton said. We should have encouraged the Chamber of Commerce to present what we had to offer, he said, "instead of 200 jobs on the 80th floor of a building, we have something here to offer - the environment, safety, the schools."
Chamber officials thought the idea to "predatory" but Moulton thinks the area missed a great opportunity.
He's most proud of an ordinance he initiated to crack down on trash left by the roadside. The city's only ordinance referred to littering, which had a warning as a first offense. "Now we have that ordinance on the books and fines and penalties for any kind of illegal dumping."
A city native, Moulton graduated from the former St. Joseph's High School in 1974. He and his wife live on Massachusetts Avenue and have two grown children.
"I'm hard working, I'm up on the issues, I care," he said. "I have no ulterior motive. I'm not going to go for mayor or governor or state representative. I'm a councilor and I enjoy it. When I don't enjoy it I'll move on."
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