The family of Anthony E. Menard will receive friends on Thursday, June 19, 2025, from 4 to 7 p.m., at Finnerty & Stevens Funeral Home in Great Barrington. Funeral service will be held on Friday, June 20, 2025, at 2 p.m., at the funeral home, conducted by Rev. Charles VanAusdall.
In Berkshire County, poverty, the lack of transportation, rural isolation and other factors contribute to high rates of domestic and sexual violence.
-- Elizabeth Freeman Center Executive Director Janis Broderick
"Recreational cannabis means that we are talking about cannabis. That’s a good thing. Young people are asking unsolicited questions, neighbors are talking to each other. ... We developed norms ... We’re starting to talk about what does safe use look like for adults? What is the norm?" --Chris Tucci, Railroad Street Youth Project deputy director
Community leaders representing law enforcement, youth services, local government and the drug treatment community will discuss the changing landscape of marijuana’s place in southern Berkshire County with an extended question and answer period from the audience.
"As a parent, and someone who’s worked with young people who are at risk, I’m very concerned with how we protect young people from marijuana. We know that marijuana is devastating for developing brains. If your kids get drunk before school, you’re going to notice. But if they’re smoking marijuana, it’s a lot harder to tell." --Berkshire County District Attorney Andrea Harrington
After the planning board crafted a set of zoning regulations to deal with pot earlier this year, the selectboard reviewed them and most thought the regulations were a bit too lax since they would allow cultivation by-right in too many zones.
“This was my opportunity to teach Great Barrington the relevance of Du Bois’ writing, especially in today’s political climate. The community has had nothing but wonderful reactions, and it was very rewarding to have the opportunity to educate people through art and to see their reactions to it.”
— Monument Mountain Regional High School senior Sophie Shron
The birthday events for Great Barrington's most famous native son seem to signal a newfound appreciation of the civil rights leader, who had not been fully embraced by the community because of his sometimes-controversial past.
Rep. William “Smitty” Pignatelli, D-Lenox, will serve as the game-day announcer of the Community At Bat charity softball game; and Sen. Adam Hinds, D-Pittsfield, and Great Barrington town manager Jennifer Tabakin will be the team captains.
“It takes a lot of courage to be a young person today. They are growing up in a time when young people are faced daily with uncertainty in an economically, environmentally and politically precarious world.”
-- Railroad Street Youth Project Executive Director Ananda Timpane
Over the years, Laurel Scott has emerged as one of the nation's leading experts in immigrant waivers, publishing articles on the subject and speaking at events for immigration lawyers.
“We’ve always been about the needs of individuals, whether they want college or not. We ask what they need to thrive and see their future, not as something abstract, but concrete, now, here.”
-- Ananda Timpane, executive director of Railroad Street Youth Project
“It takes 25 years for a young person’s brain to fully wire for habits, likes, dislikes and skills. This is when those habits develop that will haunt us for the rest of our lives.”
--Dr. Jennifer Michaels
“We live in a wonderful town...a beautiful community. How do we get people to realize that when we’re walking along shopping there are kids buying and selling heroin?”
--- Kingsley Little, whose son suffers from heroin addiction
Shakespeare & Company Founding Artistic Director Tina Packer and Company actor Jonathan Epstein will give a talk entitled “Shakespeare and the Jews,” which will explore Shakespeare’s controversial play “The Merchant of Venice.”
Now Railroad Street Youth Project provides apprenticeships in computer coding and robotics, photography, theatre appreciation and directing, cosmetology, and culinary arts.
