WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — This winter's renovation of a defunct Main Street hotel is the kind of commercial development that town officials are hoping will generate non-residential property tax revenue.

 

But it is unknown whether it will bring the kind of boost that other big projects have provided in recent years.

 

Recent work on the Orchards Hotel, which was acquired last summer by Garden Properties and Development LLC, was mentioned at Monday's joint meeting of the Select Board and Finance Committee at Town Hall.

 

"I would prefer to see our growth not come from adding new infrastructure, but using the infrastructure we already have in place, whether that's the Orchards or the [Williamstown Theatre Festival] and the tourism industry in general," Select Board member Stephanie Boyd said. 

 

"I was very happy to hear that we finally have some funding to design the next several miles of the bike path. So soon we'll have a bike path that goes from, pretty much, the Vermont border all the way to the Connecticut border. I think we should start thinking now on how we leverage those types of things to build economic development more toward tourism in town."

 

Tourism — including the world-renown Clark Art Institute and Tony Award-winning theater festival — and education are the town's most prominent industry.

 

Williams College, although by far the town's largest single taxpayer, is tax exempt for most of its properties, including the new art museum under construction on the Field Park rotary at the former site of the Williams Inn.