“Increasing these benefits will help make sure seniors, families with children, and other residents can keep their homes warm during the coldest weeks of the year," said Gov. Maura Healey.
Selectman Ed Abrahams added that he is concerned that the same thing that happened at the gated parking lot at the end of Railroad Street will happen to the proposed gated parcel at the School Street property.
In the spirit of reflection and self-examination, herein lies The Edge's second annual Great Barrington year in review. It includes some select stories from other South County towns as well, along with embedded links to Edge stories for more information.
A draft analysis of the cleanup alternatives essentially presented two options: Excavate and dispose of soil and remediate groundwater under the footprint of the demolished dry cleaning building; or do so in a larger area around the footprint.
Whether one lane of the Brown Bridge is closed during construction or whether it is shut down altogether, the construction will be a major disruption to traffic, especially considering the fact that the town-owned Division Street bridge was closed by the state in the second week of September.
Retailers and other business owners often complain about is the thin labor pool that makes staffing difficult in southern Berkshire County. The problem is caused in no small measure by the lack of affordable housing
With the remediation that has already been conducted, along with ongoing and future clean-up, potential sale of the Main Street property could put it back on the tax rolls, thus generating revenue.
The $300,000 Brownfields Community Wide Assessment grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will be used to perform Phase One and Phase Two environmental assessments of several properties, most of them in and around the village of Housatonic.
Developer Jeffrey Cohen says the town should deal with the property no matter who eventually develops it since it will require the town’s capacities in both finding funding and shouldering liability for the legacy of dry cleaning chemicals that are still migrating across town in groundwater.
At least a half dozen offers to buy the property have come in over the nine years it has been on the market, but the offers were too low to clear debts to the town and the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection.
The chemical perchloroethylene, a known carcinogen and hormone disrupter, is “isolated to a small area in the building,” Benchmark Development's Michael Charles said, adding that the contamination was not found in the groundwater.
Removing contaminants attributable to Ried Cleaners may cost up to $1.6 million. "We have to hold the responsible parties’ feet to the fire but also be practical. We want it cleaned up and on the tax rolls.”
--- Great Barrington Town Manager Jennifer Tabakin
“As a property owner in a beautiful little town there’s nothing I’d rather see than that property cleaned up. That’s helps my property value, it helps the town.” -- Mike Arnoff, owner of property adjacent to Ried Cleaners on Main Street.
In the meantime, an environmental report says postal workers exposed to basement air are at “chronic risk” due to naphthalene, tetrachloroethylene (PCE) and trichloroethylene (TCE).
“There is a chronic risk to current postal workers exposed to basement air at the [Great Barrington] Post Office due to naphthalene, PCE and TCE” left from the adjacent Ried Cleaners, an environmental consultant concluded.
