Editor’s Note: The following letter has also been sent to the Great Barrington Town Manager, Chief of Police, Town Planner, Fire Chief, Superintend of Public Works, and Select Board.
To the Editor:
This past July 3rd 2016, I helped organize a protest march of approximately 200 citizens of South Berkshire County, against the PCB dumps that General Electric recently proposed to create in the towns of Great Barrington (Housatonic), Lee and Lenox. After dredging a portion of toxic PCB laden sediment from the Housatonic River, GE plans to dump it on land adjacent to the river itself and nearby neighborhoods, the consequences of which would be ecologically devastating with vast threats to human health. (In Housatonic, the proposed site is currently used daily by local residents as a nature trail.)
After a successful walk on May 7 along this proposed dumpsite in the village of Housatonic, some of us felt it a necessary and logical next step to hold a march on Great Barrington’s Main Street. I stepped up to help organize the March Against the Dumps in July (and was able to get a 15-piece marching band to come play for the march.) We all do what we can. Since March of 2016, there have been numerous small and large actions being undertaken by people, not necessarily affiliated with any one group, (and without an operating budget.) What unites us is our love of the River, and this place – Berkshire County.
My experience with the Town of Great Barrington in organizing the protest march proved to be deeply disheartening. It has taken me months to gather the words to speak out about what transpired. At a meeting I was called to at Town Hall 5 days before the event to coordinate logistical details, I was blind-sided by the disrespectful behavior and tone of the town officials. To go into the details here are, I believe, unnecessary. Suffice to say I felt suddenly caught like a fly in a web of old-world town politics – the legacy of fear and coercion still well intact here in “America’s Best Small Town” as anywhere. I left that meeting feeling profoundly disrespected as a woman, as a youth, and as a person of color. And yet, the most disturbing fact is that I was forced into agreeing to pay a sum of $400 to the police department for two “off-duty” police details, threatened that we would otherwise be prohibited from marching. (Note that this is transpired after four weeks of emails and calls I initiated in which I had explained our detailed plans for the march.) Both the behavior of the Town, and the $400 charge, are unacceptable to the citizens of a free democracy.
I and others involved in fighting GE’s dumps plan have elected not to pay this exorbitant sum of $409.73 on principle. On behalf of the citizens of South Berkshire County, I am writing this letter to demand that the bill be paid in full by the Town of Great Barrington. The opposition to the proposed PCB dump in Housatonic is an issue that requires the town government’s utmost support — not only in verbiage, but in action. To ask the people of Great Barrington to pay for protesting an ongoing ecological atrocity that was committed by corporate greed – to put the bill on citizens instead of taking up the responsibility as a town government – is both ridiculous and shameful. And the excuse that there is not budget enough for this expense is simply preposterous in the town which boasts the highest taxes in Berkshire County! We have the right to peaceable FREE assembly. If police officers are needed to divert traffic (in order to protect its residents), it is on the town to assume such costs, not on its citizens.
The people’s history of the Berkshires is one of courageous rebellion and defiance of authority. Town Hall in Great Barrington was originally the site of a courthouse where, in 1774, two years before the start of the American Revolution, there was the first armed resistance to British Rule when the British attempted to install Crown appointed judges. After the Revolution, Shay’s Rebellion occurred in Sheffield in 1786, and before that, Elizabeth Freeman reclaimed her freedom in 1781 – once again – on the steps of Town Hall.
It was in this same spirit of rebellion that we marched in July. We believe that it would best serve the movement against the PCB dumps, as well as the future of Great Barrington, for the Town government to express its apology as elegantly as possible, and pay the bill it unduly charged its residents.
Pooja Prema
Glendale
