To the editor:
The current housing crisis in Berkshire County, and especially the South County region, is no secret. Several important letters have been penned in these spaces recently describing the difficulty businesses and municipalities are having to recruit workers essential to our health, education, and hospitality/tourism sectors.
The recent “Business Monday Webinar” was an excellent space to listen to the issues from community members and hear from Massachusetts Secretary of Housing Ed Augustus on the new laws and regulations that will enable us to come together as a community and solve these problems. These include:
- Massachusetts Seasonal Communities Advisory Council
- Massachusetts Seasonal Communities Law
- Massachusetts Laws and Regulations for Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs)
- Affordable Housing Project Funding Availability in Pittsfield
Now is a time for action!
We have the technology and the tools to ensure that every local business and resident is able to live in a home or apartment that is safe and, perhaps more importantly, healthy for themselves and for the land that we all depend on for the food we eat and the water we drink. The recent Butternut Fire of last summer is a stark reminder of the need to change the way we build and utilize our land.
“A New Day” is a symposium that will be held on Sunday, April 20, from 12 to 4 p.m., at Race Brook Lodge in Sheffield. This is a family-oriented event where builders, developers, farmers, community leaders, area businesses, and experts in healthy home building will gather to discuss specific solutions to these existential problems facing our community.
Modern technology, combined with ancient, natural building materials like Hempcrete, is creating a circular economy that includes soil regeneration and economic opportunities for our farmers, new skills for local labor, and housing opportunities for local businesses, schools, and hospitals. There will be a cadre of builders, designers, and architects on hand who are leading the national discourse on how we can build healthy, fire-retardant, anti-microbial, mold- and pest-resistant homes that improve the lives of all members of the community.
The event on April 20 will include a Hempcrete building demonstration with learning sessions for farmers and community members on how this technology, combined with the new laws and regulations, will benefit everyone—from “soil to roof.” We will have specific information available to assist existing homeowners on how they can benefit from the new ADU laws and how local and regional builders can incorporate this technology into their building practices to create healthy, carbon-negative building materials for the people who live in them and ways that local communities and land owners can build healthy homes that will attract desperately needed young families to live and work in the Berkshire and Hudson Valley communities.
Those interested in the science and technologies behind natural home building with industrial hemp and other materials can visit these online resources:
- OSU Global Hemp Innovation Center
- Hemp — “Why This Plant Could Save The World”
- “Industrial Hemp — A Review of Economic Potential, Carbon Sequestration, and Bioremediation“
- Knowing better, we can live better!
We are living in a great period where we have the technology and land to safely build our way to solving the Berkshire County housing crisis. Join us on April 20 to learn how we can come together to grow and prosper as a community, and in good health!
For additional information, please call (914) 262.4848 or email gtamir613@gmail.com.
Glenn Tamir
North Egremont
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