Update: After this article was published, the town issued its informational packet for the March 24 Selectboard meeting. The tentative date for the special town meeting is Thursday, April 17 at 6 p.m. at Monument Mountain High School. At the March 24 meeting, the Selectboard will vote to either approve the meeting date or reschedule it. Original article below:
Great Barrington — Will residents support the town in purchasing the water systems of the Great Barrington Fire District and long-troubled utility Housatonic Water Works? Are these acquisitions even legal, or will they be challenged by both HWW and the Fire District? Will this create further legal problems and headaches for Great Barrington residents, or will it help Housatonic residents finally have access to safe, clear, and affordable water? These are just some of the many questions that face the Selectboard at its meeting at Town Hall on Monday, March 24, at 5 p.m.
The meeting will be held both in person and virtually via Zoom.
In December, resident Sharon Gregory started two separate petitions to call for a special town meeting so that residents could vote on the town purchasing both HWW and the Fire District. In a previous interview with The Berkshire Edge, Gregory explained that the intention of the petitions was for the town to acquire both water systems to merge them into a single water district.
The first petition asks for the town to acquire the Great Barrington Fire District for an amount not to exceed $2 million, while the second asks for the town to acquire HWW for an amount not to exceed $2.3 million.
In late October, consultants from DPC Engineering LLC of Longmeadow and Harwich Port, Mass., issued a town-commissioned study on the value of HWW’s infrastructure. The report states that HWW has a negative net value of $31.3 million.
According to Gregory, there are two state statutes, including State Statute 1886 Chapter 311 and State Statute 1897 Chapter 229, that allow for the town to acquire both water operations. Through these statutes, a two-thirds majority vote at a special town meeting would be needed to approve the town purchasing both water systems.
Gregory recently submitted both petitions to Town Clerk Josh Risen, who determined that the petitions had sufficient signatures, 300, for the special town meeting to go forward.
On its meeting agenda on March 24, the Selectboard plans to schedule a date for the special town meeting for residents to vote on acquiring HWW and the Fire District.
Fire District Commissioner and Chair Walter “Buddy” Atwood has stated in interviews and public meetings that the Fire District has no interest in acquiring HWW. “We don’t want to take on [HWW’s] debt because there isn’t an easy way to divide the debt up,” Atwood said at a January roundtable with Gregory, hosted by Berkshire Edge contributing columnist Peter Most. “They’re not part of the Fire District, which we can tax. [Merging both systems] would cost us. We’d have to have more employees, and we’d have to do it. We don’t know their system, so we don’t know what the problems are. I believe we have the right number of employees to handle our system. If we’re taking on increasing our system by 50 percent, that’s not going to work. It’s a system we don’t know, and they have a different method of accessing water. It comes from a lake. Our water comes from a shallow well. They’re drawing it out of a lake.”
Meanwhile, Gregory argues that merging both systems would save customers money by consolidating the facilities, management, and employees of both companies. “There have been only two people running HWW, and they both get paid $118,000 a year,” Gregory said at the roundtable, referring to company President Fred Mercer and Treasurer James Mercer. “They spent $217,000 on contractors last year. It’s not like you have to pull somebody off the street and say, ‘Could you figure out the pond?’ They have specialists who they have dealt with for quite some time. It’s not necessarily all of the Fire District’s people who are going to be responsible for this, for the ongoing maintenance, of course. And I think the shared expenses and the guarantee of quantity and quality of water are very important to the town of Great Barrington. I find no comfort that we have no secondary source of water.”
Also on the March 24 Selectboard agenda is an executive session to discuss strategy concerning ongoing litigation between the town and HWW.
In early February, Stockbridge and Great Barrington filed a motion with the Department of Public Utilities requesting that Housatonic Water Works reverse its planned rate increases.
In early March, the Attorney General’s Office filed its opposition against the motions.
