In listening to Representative Smitty Pignatelli speak at the kick-off event for the Gateway Task Force for Sustainability, I heard a call to action on multiple fronts. These included researching potential ways for the schools to be more sustainable, the need for more sharing of essential tasks and staff between towns, and the need to look at supporting economic growth in the communities. Smitty pointed out the shrinking demographic base across all of Western Massachusetts, efforts in the Berkshires to streamline operations, and repeatedly indicated that significant help can’t be expected from the state. He often used examples of workplaces that couldn’t find sufficiently trained, or substance free, people to fill vacancies and pointed out that this was both a challenge and an opportunity.
While Smitty was asking us to face the facts, at least one audience member indicated that Smitty’s gloom and doom scenario missed the potential for significant growth in the region in terms of economic opportunities, an abundance of unoccupied housing, and an infrastructure built to handle many more residents than currently lives in the area. The response from a steering committee member was that that was one of the reasons for convening a task force: to get input, review options, and provide a possible means for the Gateway hilltowns to move forward to increase opportunities, improve conditions, and be able to use resources in a more efficient and equitable manner. Smitty did seem to indicate some agreement with this as he spoke about the need for broadband digital connections in our towns and the need for key investments being made by towns and the schools.
Smitty also pointed out the need to plan for the future rather than living in the present or reliving the past. That we need to begin planting the trees that may not bear fruit in our lifetime but will provide for those yet to be born. That we are essentially planning for career opportunities, economic opportunities, and operational opportunities that may not even exist at this time. That we need to think outside the box and create a list of 10 to 12 items that may work out well for our towns and the schools and may require legislative action outside of just additional funding.
This will be a very interesting process that will require a degree of collaboration, communication, and I suspect some potentially tense moments as various factions look at options for changes in the schools, in our towns, and in our overall approach to economic growth and opportunities within our geographic area that are outside of many people’s comfort zones. Given the long history of budgetary issues between the towns and the schools, I’m sure that frank and open discussion is both necessary and desirable, but that moving forward in a progressive manner will require a basic agreement on factual issues, the willingness to trust the expertise of both town and school officials, and a shared understanding that this means change for all parties involved. This process will not be quick or easy and is really a potential set of steps that would need to be adopted by the governing bodies of the organizations involved in such change.
As we move forward, we may wish to keep Denis Waitley’s words in mind – “Change the changeable, accept the unchangeable, and remove yourself from the unacceptable.”
