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Adams See Race for Selectmen Seats

iBerkshires StaffPrint Story | Email Story
ADAMS, Mass. — The town will see a three-way race for the Board of Selectmen in the annual town election. 
 
It is the only race on the May 5 election ballot. 
 
Incumbent Joseph J. Nowak will face off against Jay T. Meczywor and Jerome S. Socolof for the two seats up for election on the board. Both seats are for three-year terms.
 
Selectman Richard Blanchard is not running for re-election after serving four terms. He and Nowak were first elected in 2013.   
 
Nowak is a retired from the state Department of Conservation and Recreation and was a co-founder of the former Adams Agriculture Fair. 
 
Meczywor is a physical therapist at Berkshire Sport & Physical Therapy and chair of the town's Finance Committee. 
 
Socolof unsuccessfully ran for the board in last year's election. He is an associate professor in arts management in the Fine and Performing Arts Department at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. 
 
Newcomers on the ballot are David Rhinemiller, chair of the Planning Board, for a three-year term on the Board of Health; Christian Ricahrd Rowe for a five-year termon the Planning Board; and Stephanie Melito for representative to the Northern Berkshire Regional [McCann] School Committee. 
 
Running for re-election unopposed are Moderator Myra Wilk, Treasurer-Collector Kelly Rice, Assessor Lorraine Kalisz, Library Trustees Virginia Phelps Duval and Karen Kettles, Cemetery Commissioner James Taylor, Housing Authority member Ann Bartlett, and Hoosac Valley School Committee member John F. Duval and Erin Milne, both representing Adams. 
 
No one has submitted papers for the a three-year term representing Cheshire on Hoosac Valley School Committee or for a one-year term for Cemetery Commission and five-year term for Redevelopment Authority. 
 
Running for town meeting member are:
 
Precinct 1: Deborah Nowicki and Gregory Nowicki for two two-year terms, and one open seat for three years.
 
Precinct 2: Catherine Foster, Charles Foster, Andrew Harmon, Howard Rosenberg and William Schrade Jr. will vie with incumbents Donald Bury, Scott Cernik, Edward Janik, Sandra Moderski, Andrew Przystanski, Norman Schutz, Tanya Wilson-Malloy and Mitchell Wisniowski for 10 three-year terms; and Paula Grover is running unopposed for a one-year term. 
 
Precinct 3: Russell Duval, Kathryn Anne Gigliotti, Jerome Socolof and Kelly Szkasz are running for one of 10 three-year terms against incumbents Patricia Conroy-Shepley, Richard Frost, Raymond Gargan Jr., Kelly Craddock-Kelley, Amy Oberlin, Robert Patterson Jr., Melissa Schaffrick and Barbara Ziemba; Christina Satko is unopposed for a one-year term. 
 
Precinct 4: Kathryn E. Perras and Edmund St. John III for two two-year terms; one two-year term, two one-year terms and five three-year terms are vacant. 
 
Precinct 5: 15 candidates are vying for 10 three-year terms. Newcomers are Kathryn Foley, Denise Fortier, Jacqueline Kelly, Stephanie Melito, David Rhinemiller, Christian Rowe and Caroline Scully; incumbents are Kathy Hynes, David Lennon, Sarah Lesure, Erin Milne, Michael Ouellette, Linda Rhoadds, Ashley Satko and Barbara Tarsa. 
 
Partial terms are to complete vacated offices; each precinct has 30 representatives. 

Tags: election 2025,   town elections,   
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Structure Fire in Adams Closes Schools, Calls in Mutual Aid

Staff ReportsiBerkshires

Fire Chief John Pansecchi, in white, talks strategy on Wednesday. 

ADAMS, Mass. — At least eight fire companies responded to a Wednesday morning a structure fire in the old MacDermid Graphics building.

Firefighters and responders from Cheshire, Dalton, Hinsdale, Lanesborough, Lee, Savoy, North Adams, Pittsfield, Williamstown. Hinsdale also sent its rehab bus and Northern Berkshire EMS was on the scene with its rehab trailer. 

The fire was reported at about 7:30 a.m. and black smoke could be seen looming over the old mill building at 10 Harmony St. Harmony and Prospect streets were closed to traffic. 

The Adams Police Department posted on Facebook that Hoosac Valley Elementary School and Berkshire Arts and Technology Charter Public School classes were cancelled for Wednesday. The schools are located not far from the structure.

Their post also reads, "Children on the bus already for Hoosac Valley Elementary School will be brought to the middle school gym at Hoosac Valley High School."

"BArT was already in session and will be evacuating to the Adams Visitor Center."
 
Fire Chief John Pansecchi said firefighters are approaching the blaze by pouring water at it from every angle.
 
"We have a fire in the building, looks like we have a lot of fire in the building and we're trying to get to it," he said. "Places have already collapsed prior to the fire, place that have collapsed since the fire, so not a lot of activity inside the building."
 
The mill, the former W.R. Grace, is made up of a number two- and three-story structures covering about 236,749 square feet. The fire was located in a long building toward the back of the property that runs alongside the Ashuwillticook Rail Trail. The roof was fully engulfed in flames and collapsed in on itself around by 8 a.m.
 
Trucks from Williamstown were being situated in the Russell Field parking lot and firefighters were trying to find a location where they could attack the blaze from the trail. 
 
Pansecchi said the building is supposed to be vacant.
 
"I was working when the call came in," he said. "My guys did a great job getting set up putting some hose lines and being prepared and got some plans put together when I got here to extend that and that's what were looking at."
 
The cause of the blaze is unknown at this time but the state fire marshal was on the scene. 
 
Pansecchi said firefighters are providing observations from the outside and the North Adams drone has been deployed to determine the extent of the blaze. The buildings are large and unsafe in most cases to enter. 
 
"We're making good progress but we're not at a point I'd call it contained," he said. "There's already places that have caved in prior to this."
 
He's been joined by fire chiefs from the various departments, who have been aiding the attack from different fronts. 
 
"It's a really big help [having them] because you've got so much going on fighting a fire you don't think of the other things," the Adams chief said. "They start making suggestions."
 
Some of the structures on the complex date to 1881, when Renfrew Manufacturing built to produce jacquard textiles. It was the last asset of the company, and its machines and inventory were stripped out in 1927. 
 
The mill's had various owners and periods of vacancy over the last century, but was probably best known as W.R. Grace, a specialty chemical company that bought it as part of the acquisition of Dewey & Almy Chemical in the mid-1950s. 
 
MacDermid took it over in 1999 but closed the plant three years later, putting 86 people out of work. 
 
The property has been vacant since and was purchased by 10 Harmony Street LLC for $53,500 in 2019, according the online assessor's records. Principal of the LLC is listed as John D. Duquette Jr.
 
Staff writers and photographers Breanna Steele, Jack Guerino, Tammy Daniels and Marty Alvarez contributed to this article.

 

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