The Top Left Corner

Hey, Greylock Nation! This is episode 161 of the Top Left Corner, which first aired on Wednesday, July 13 2022. I’m your host, Jay Velázquez, and I do thank you for tuning in.

We’re incredibly lucky to do what we love as much as we get to do it here at the Greylock Glass. Never has there been a better example than our conversation with Micah P. Hinson, a true kindred spirit of me personally, but more than that — his story is a kindred story to all the narratives we’ve presented that deal with the authentic, the raw, the real. Hinson is a real musician’s musician, and I know it won’t take long for you to get a sense of that.

And I want to have zero doubt, because Hinson is playing The Foundry in West Stockbridge Friday, July 15, and it wouldn’t be a stretch to say that you’d be making a huge mistake to miss this show.

He’s been compared to a whole host of artists from Bob Dylan to Tom Waits to Leonard Cohen to John Prine. All comparisons are valid, but each is inadequate and unfair in both directions. Hinson opens up his heart/spirit/guts and what pours out is his and his alone.

Rather than take up time with lengthy explanations, though, I think I’ll let the artist speak for himself. First, though, let’s let him sing for himself and have a listen to one of two tunes that graciously allowed us to play on this show. I think you’ll begin to get a glimpse with “You Lost Sight on Me,” from Micah P. Hinson And The Junior Arts Collective, right here on the Top Left Corner.

Editor’s note: We pay to have our podcasts transcribed, and though the following transcript is fairly accurate, it is not perfect. Please become a supporting member so that we can deliver a higher quality text version of our interviews to those who are unable to hear our audio programs.

Editor’s Note: The following article is derived from officially released information, published with few or no editorial changes. The Greylock Glass  occasionally provides our readers with such content if the information is factual in nature, and requires little to no interpretation or analysis, often when original reportage would not provide additional relevant information.

Top Left Corner: And with me on the line is Micah P. Hinson, who is going to be treating the community around The Foundry, West Stockbridge to an amazing show this Friday night. Thank you so much for taking time to speak with us here on the Top Left Corner, Micah.

Micah P. Hinson: And I thank you, sir. I really, really appreciate it. I really, really do.

Top Left Corner: Well, I feel especially honored because I know that you haven’t done interviews in a while and you have not, in fact, played you haven’t toured in the U.S. for a long time. So. So that’s you know, I feel I feel like I’ve got a real a real feather in my cap here as a sort of a music music reporter. Do you do you have any particular ways that you describe your work before I before I get into what I think.

Micah P. Hinson: Oh, man. I mean, yeah, I’ve been so. So I signed to a new record label, an Italian label. And this PR company I’m working with, they wanted they wanted me like to get some press together that I that I thought was fitting or that I liked the most. And I was looking through a lot of things and I saw, like, a lot of things like neo folk or. Or I mean, even like even like it’s a strange thing because even like using the, the word Americana, like that’s even like, of course it’s Americana because like here I’m from Texas like that that all makes sense. But I think so with me, like, let’s say the main things that influenced me when I was a kid was like, John Denver. Like My Buddy Valentine and the Cure. And a decent amount of classical music. And so I feel that when I when I listen to my music, I feel like whenever I play, that’s where that’s where I’m coming from. I’m not coming from a place that’s like trying to like Neil folk is like I would think of like the idea of like trying to reject or move advance upon what folk music and these types of things. And I just I’m not trying to, to advance anything. I’m not trying to to make a statement with what I do more than just these just happen. Yeah, these are my influence and this is the way that I feel. And these are the things that come out.

Top Left Corner: I’m so glad to hear.

Micah P. Hinson: It’s always an interesting one.

Top Left Corner: I’m so glad to hear you say that. And I feel like more people, more musicians need to be willing to say that because, you know, we have entered a really great era. We would talk a little bit in the green room, the digital green room about how there’s all this music available online and there’s good and bad to that. One of the things that’s really good is that people are being exposed to things that they would not normally hear. Because let’s face it, you know, in in radio days, you really had to depend on your local rock station or your local music station and college radio. And college radio was where you heard the stuff that was experimental or just sort of out of the mainstream. But everything else, you were sort of dependent on either the radio or what some buddy of yours who worked in the record store told you. And yeah, right. And so now people are able to sort of absorb different, different flavors and add it to their own music. I will say when I and I will admit that I was not deeply familiar with your work until I was preparing for this this talk when I. Here, you. I think not just of musicians, but I think of. People from other areas. Such as? There’s an author by the name of Raymond, Raymond Carver, Jr., and your songs are deeply personal. They’re slim, but they communicate so much feeling and so much story. Just as. As Carver, just as Carver’s do, his stories are slim, but they communicate a lot of meaning. So that’s kind of that. And then some photographers, especially from the Depression era, there were a lot of really talented photographers taking pictures of the American scene.

Micah P. Hinson: Definitely like the Dust Bowl and Oklahoma. Yeah, there’s some amazing things. Yeah, man.

Top Left Corner: Yeah. So I feel like you’ve got, some of your DNA may may come from other places besides music. And if you get a chance to to read any of Carver, I encourage you to do that because you’ll. I think you’ll identify.

Micah P. Hinson: That’s really rad. That’s really interesting that you are. So you would say something like that because that certainly isn’t anything. And I don’t feel that it’s anything intentional on my part, but that I think about the times that I was writing some writing the songs that would end up being like the Gospel of Progress, which is my first record about 2003. And during this during this time, I was, of course, like any, any good American boy. I was reading, you know, I was reading Jack Kerouac hadn’t particularly got into Bukowski or anything like that. But yeah, I was reading like a lot of the beatniks and stuff like that and like reading about this, this concept that I later realized is just a fucking fraud, but the concept of the American dream and stuff and, and of course, like there has to be something to me being I just watched the Elvis movie with my girlfriend yesterday and, you know, being born in Memphis then like moving to Texas. And there’s like a there’s an interesting lineage that I clearly had nothing to do with.

Micah P. Hinson: And being a Chickasaw, being native, like, there’s like these things that had nothing to do with but but they just happened to be part of me, of course. And I think I feel like maybe that is unintentionally or in some way like influence, maybe the the things that I do. But yeah, you mentioned the. The simplicity thing. And that always I’m not sure how. I guess I stumbled upon that or something. Or maybe I was just. I think I consider myself lazy for the longest time, but I realized what quote unquote art you can or poetry, whatever you want to call it, inside of that, because you can say the same sentence over and over. But the first time I say me, then the next time I say you, and the next time I say she or them, and all of a sudden just changing those, those very simple words ends up like profoundly changing the sentence entirely. And so, yeah, I’m kind of happy that I fell upon some of these writing styles or whatever you want to call them.

Top Left Corner: Well, I think I think you have you have a lot of the storytellers, probably the storytellers gift. And you you know, it’s poetry. It’s music. But your your songs very often have an arc to them. And I think that that’s that’s a real delight. And it’s not it’s not something not something I get everywhere. I would like to talk about Memphis. I’d like to talk about Abilene. I yeah, my my wife is actually from Knoxville, Tennessee, and grew up in an in a a fundamentalist household. So I actually get to hear I get to hear some of that. I get well, she’s she’s recovering. She’s been recovering for about 25 years.

Micah P. Hinson: Yeah.

Your contribution is appreciated.

Your contribution is appreciated.

Your contribution is appreciated.

Top Left Corner: So tell us about tell us about that upbringing.

Micah P. Hinson: Oh, God, dude, it’s a thing that I’ve been. Yeah. So yeah, I mean at this point in my life. So yeah, I’m really realizing I’m trying, I’m determining right now what I should say and what I shouldn’t say. So but I’ll say it like this. So I was I was married for like 14 years. I’m in the middle. I’m almost ending with the divorce. I have four children and a lot. And that directly I feel with my philosophizing about stuff that directly ties into what you’re asking about. I think and this isn’t I don’t really want to talk about religion too much, but the way. And not to be dramatic, but I feel that the way that I was raised and that fundamental Christian situation, I don’t know if it’s the same fundamentally across, but at least in the South, at least there in Texas, I think it’s very when you kind of realize like, oh, this is this maybe isn’t the way I want to live and maybe this isn’t actually on the dot at all. I think you realize how traumatizing it is because you’re being fed not only like concepts, but you’re being fed these concepts that you’re supposed to like that’s supposed to inhabit your life. And it’s supposed to be something that, like, directs your your movements and and when you don’t even know, like, what is really happening. But then you realize that you can do that for 40 years, like based on these things that you never understood. It’s a it’s a bizarre it’s a bizarre thing, man.

Micah P. Hinson: But it’s like your wife, man. I’m in recovery. In recovery from the from the church, man. It’s a strange thing, but yeah, so I was, I was born my parents are both born in Texas and they were going to college up there in the, in the panhandle. And they met in Lubbock. They got married, they moved to Memphis. And my dad was a youth minister and worked and worked at a church up there. And so I was just in Memphis for like very, very little time in my life. Like, of course, I don’t remember it that that first time that I lived there, we moved when I was probably two or something. We lived in West Virginia for a little bit. I remember maybe some of my first memories were from there, but then of course, Texas was I guess we moved to Texas when I was four or five or something like that and a little. I want to say little town, but hell, there was like 100,000 people there. And so it’s not really little. It’s just it’s the only town like I think God particularly put it in a place to where it’s like exactly three and a half hours to any major city in Texas. It’s like you have to go three and a half hours north of Lubbock, you have to go for Dallas, you have to go to Austin. It’s like a fucking no man’s land. I’m sorry for my I don’t know if I can curse.

Top Left Corner: It’s a podcast — we can curse.

Micah P. Hinson: Okay, awesome, man. Yeah, I have a filthy mouth. So and so it had the desperation, the feeling of loneliness that I feel that you would get from a small town. But. But that was a strange thing, because there’s a hundred thousand people there, but you’re out in the middle of nowhere. It’s very much a desert. It’s hot as hell then. It’s really, really cold in the winter. Of course, there’s no I don’t feel like there was any culture. I guess the only culture that was there would have been like the culture of church, I suppose Abilene for the longest time had the most churches per capita than any other city in the United States. And then for a while we actually held the most pregnancies per capita than anywhere in the United States. The high school I went to had a fucking babysitting building.

Top Left Corner: Arrows. Arrows in the quiver for Jesus.

Micah P. Hinson: Exactly. And so. So that was so I mean, I guess I tried to. I’m trying to explain maybe what it was kind of like growing up or whatever, but it was just a really. I just felt like it was a very. It was it was a strange place in the sense that if you wanted anything to happen, you had to make it happen for yourself. It wasn’t like going to a big city. It’s like he’s falling out of your front door and you can pick between all these things. This is what I want to spend my time with. These are the things that I want to be influenced by and seeing something new. Yeah, it wasn’t. It wasn’t like that. I mean, I was lucky enough to have an older brother that was connected into, like, listening to, like, industrial music. He was big into, like, skinny puppy and knits a rib and front front two for two and a weight state and all these types of things. And so I was able to get influenced by by him to be introduced to, to the stuff that I did. It’s best to kind of. Give me a bigger perspective than that little, little flat earth bubble that I was living in in Abilene.

Top Left Corner: It sounds…it sounds desolate. It sounds like a desolate childhood. Youth. Youth. Yeah.

Micah P. Hinson: It’s. It’s a place. I mean, I don’t want to, again, be dramatic or something, but so you have like a bunch so you have a bunch of churches, you have three Christian universities, you have a huge Air Force base there and you have a ton of transients, homeless people, transients, because there’s nothing out there. And so Abilene was a place that if you’re going left or right, you could, of course, go traveling if you’re going south and north. And so with the colleges, with the Air Force base and with that with the transit situation, it was a place that kind of in a strange way, maybe it never quite felt like home, because the spirit of that goddamn place was always. He was always moving, I suppose. Again, I feel like I philosophize about this fucking city a lot or what it or what or what it did to me. It was the. But of course, it was a beautiful place because it gave me because like the absence of what it had or or maybe I’m the absence, maybe it had exactly what it needed to it. It gave me the. The ability, I guess, to find in myself something, to try to explain that to myself or something to try to keep as like a friend as I was going through this stuff. Because, of course, in that small town, like I skateboard and I played music and I love fucking doing drugs and that I didn’t that did it like a wash with a lot of people around there. So it was interesting, kind of like this young boy like without a. I never felt quite at home there. And so it’s interesting stuff, man. What a fucking place.

Top Left Corner: Now, I think that it’s important to philosophize about your the place you grew up because you know you’re going to be asking questions for the rest of your life. Why do I respond to things like this? Why did that? Why does this continue to affect me like this? I thought I thought I was over that. Yes. And you have to go back and you have to look at the mold that you came out of. And if you’re if one of the pieces of your mold is Abilene, you know, that’s that’s going to be there. And I love that. You say if you wanted to do something, you had to kind of make it yourself. And then eventually you decided beyond that, I guess you you did some sort of cleaning up in your lifestyle and and sort of getting some of your shit together, going to college for a while. But you, you decided to find your way out of the wilderness. What prompted that and what did you find? What did a young Michael P Henson find when you first made it out of the wilderness of Abilene?

Micah P. Hinson: Oh. Oh, shit, man. I think. I mean, I guess the thing that. That as I got older, of course I started not. Of course I got older and I started seeing people either going to prison for drugs or dying from drugs or dying in car accidents because they’re drunk. I had several, several friends that were just they were just dropping like flies. And I remember this one day as clichéd as this fucking thing sounds, but I remember this, oh man, my fucking story. So I was dealing with a little bit of, like, homelessness, which is an odd thing to do in a tiny little town like that, or a big, tiny town like that. And I remember I was reading Big Sur by Jack Kerouac. I guess that’s the cliched thing because of course you have a teenage boy trying to figure out his fucking life and of course he’s reading Kerouac to being apple pie and stuff. And I felt like at this moment it was kind of like, of course we didn’t have drones and stuff when I was that age, but kind of the idea of like a drone shot, like all of a sudden it was like, I could see the top of my head and it fucking shot up in the air and it’s like almost I could see all the roads connecting to Abilene. And it was kind of it was strange, but it kind of really hit me at that point that it’s like, oh, I’m not I’m not I’m not trapped at all.

Micah P. Hinson: There’s roads leading out of this place in every direction and they go in every direction the world goes. And I didn’t make a move then, but but it was amazing at that point to kind of feel like my. My little mind was opening up to the to the to the concept of eternity, almost to something bigger than myself. And so, yeah, I saw I saw people dropping like flies. And it just seemed really strange. And I’d been I had been making music and I wanted to be a I wanted to be I wanted to play music. I want to be a rock star. Know I love the Smashing Pumpkins and all of these things that were going on. And so, like the first time I left with a messy situation, I guess the first time I left in my life seemingly was kind of together. I moved to Denton, which is a really, really brilliant town. And like everybody knows, Austin is the best music. I don’t know if Denton is the same way now, but everybody used to tell it. Austin is this great place for these great musicians came from. And yeah, there’s a lot of people that come out of there, but like 95% of that is going to be whatever 4% of that is going to be like, that’s okay.

Micah P. Hinson: And 1% is going to be like, Oh, shit, that’s pretty good. But in Denton, for some reason at this time, you had like, Jesus, can I remember some of the names you had, like the legendary crystal chandelier or you had like lift to experience or sin traumatic. Some of these bands went on to do some stuff, actually, but it was just this really stunning time of in a very, very and again, it was I mean, this Denton was even smaller than Abilene, just a teeny little place. But they had a college there, so it made it a bit different. And it was there that I started seeing like, okay, this is how like you talk to people and this is how you do shows and this is how you plug in your instrument, like kind of learning all those, all these simple things that seem like rudimentary almost now that I’ve done so long. But, but learning the, learning what I would be doing in the future, I suppose. But again, even even with that, even though I was trying to, to learn things and become a normal like a man or whatever, I didn’t. I never like sent like a tape or a CD to a record label I never liked.

Micah P. Hinson: Email was, of course, going on, but it clearly wasn’t what it is now. But I never attempted to go and do anything with what I was doing, even though I took what I was doing very seriously. I just I didn’t I didn’t take it to a wider place to try to get them to try to get signed and stuff. So when it eventually when I ended up getting signed and stuff, I mean I was like in another strange kind of it was an interesting part of my life, but it just happened to be that somebody in England heard some of my music and they liked it and they wanted to sign me and they called me and that was it. It was nothing that I directly had to. To make for myself. It was something that just came to me and and that was that that was a quite interesting thing to go to because I feel that. I mean, especially nowadays like self promotion. I mean, that’s that’s the way of the future. And so to get a career that I’m here like 20 years later and I wasn’t self doing anything, I’m not sure if I should find a sense of pride in that or something, but very, very different. And I’m glad to I’m glad that it all worked out that way.

Top Left Corner: I think that, you know, you have to you have to trust that some of the things that happen, whether you’re trying to make them happen or not, they’re just, you know, that luck happens and it doesn’t the luck doesn’t happen if you’re not trying. I have discovered if you’re not trying.

Micah P. Hinson: There you go.

Top Left Corner: It doesn’t you know, you’ve got to be you’ve got to be advocating for yourself. If you want the stars to align, you have to give the stars some help. But but when they do align, you know, sometimes it can seem like you’re not doing the things, but you’re really doing the things. It’s just other people are beating their head against the wall, doing the marketing. And like you said, they’re setting up tapes and they’re trying to, you know, promote their brand. But that’s not that’s not necessarily the things they should be doing. Maybe the things they should be doing is just playing and playing and playing and playing and meeting other musicians and, you know, learning their craft. And then maybe that magic will happen just sort of when they’re back is turned, when they’re not expecting it. You know, it doesn’t always, obviously, because, you know, the number of people who actually can make a living doing it is is really actually kind of ridiculously small, don’t you think? For as much music as people have in their lives, you would think more people could at least make a standard middle class living doing music?

Micah P. Hinson: Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, the music is such an integral part of human existence. Yeah. It’s weird that people have people are making a living from selling Burger King, but yet people aren’t making a living by providing humans with joy, you know?

Top Left Corner: Yeah. I mean, just, you know, if you if you offered people a minimum wage to, like, do music, I bet you we’d have a lot of people say, oh, yeah, I’ll do that instead of flip burgers. Sure.

Micah P. Hinson: Yes, absolutely. And then what? Jesus. I’ve never even thought of a concept that you just that you just brought up. But but if that was a world that we lived in. Yeah. That, that would be absolutely incredible.

Top Left Corner: Insanely cool.

Micah P. Hinson: It would be kick ass. But you know, we have to figure out how to how to tame the to because those are there’s some dangerous socialist and communist veins. And what you said.

Top Left Corner: Oh, jeez. I know, right? Gosh, I probably I probably should edit that out, because then they’ll realize that that we’re we’re we are a threat to the to the to the hierarchy, to the to the world order.

Micah P. Hinson: No shit.

Top Left Corner: But.

Micah P. Hinson: Man.

Top Left Corner: But no, I think that, you know, the the arc of of liberty is is long, but it bends in whatever direction it eventually gets there. And I think that I think that this this youngest generation, this Gen Z, I don’t want to put it all on their shoulders because I know that pisses them off. They’re like, What do you mean? What do you mean we’re going to fix the world? Why the hell are you giving the giving us a broken world? And then saying and then, like, looking at us with pride, oh, our children will fix it. Oh, thanks a freaking lot. Right. So, but, but I do think that this generation has a really interesting, strong handle on their own identity and their own sovereignty, I guess. And I think that it’s maybe the strongest generation that we’ve had. And I think that’s a damned good thing because they’re going to need to be the next couple of decades. Let’s talk a little bit about let’s talk a little bit about the music that you have. You’ve put out scents because there’s definitely you know, there’s definitely talking about arcs. There’s definitely an arc to the development of your craft from Denton to today. What were some of the the the the the crossroads where you made some choices that put you where you are now, both musically and professionally.

Micah P. Hinson: I guess like, wow, that’s a question.

Top Left Corner: The only kind I’ve got.

Micah P. Hinson: Yeah, seriously. I guess. Whoa. Shit. So musically, I feel. That I made soon. Okay. So there was a time that this record label called XL Records was doing really, really good in England. I hadn’t released my second record yet as a record called The Opera Circuit, and they had signed like the White Stripes and like Radiohead was on the label, like they were like heavy, heavy hitters. And I had done. Wow. Okay. So I had I had had to have a back surgery, a couple of discs in my back, and it popped from an accident of mine. And so during the recording, the majority of the recording of the opera circuit, I was I was like, I mean, I was in a corset. I was I was not in a very that was a really tough emotional and physical and pain time in my life. It was something that I actually had dealt with for the chronic pain of that I dealt with for 16, 17, 17 years, somehow miraculously fixed itself. I’m not sure how that happened, but I was going through that. I had just met this guy named Eric Bachman that was in a band called Arches of Love and Crooked Fingers and Very Blacks and things that really, really influenced me as a teenager. And he had I’d gone on a tour with him. He came to Abilene. We listen to my new record, he was like, Hey, I’ll take these and I’m going to be going up to Washington and Oregon and all these places, and I’m New Mexico and I’m gonna record some strings and some people I know.

Micah P. Hinson: Incredible. He comes back. The record is all, like, recorded just in my house on, like, pretty shitty equipment. But the strings were done and it felt for me like it was a completed it was a completed work. And so this Exhale label came to me and they were like, Hey, we want to give you money just to go into the studio and, and like more fully realized this stuff. And this is a time that I feel like if I was a normal human, I would have been like, awesome. They’re not, like, asking me to take away this original record. They’re not asking me to, like, betray anything. They just want to see what what I can do and and to like my direction musically or my career. I think at that time making that decision of I mean, I wouldn’t even do records in yet. And for some reason I thought that I had a better idea. And so to stick and sort of stick. But, but again, but that’s a struggle thing because I feel like maybe if I would have done that, maybe they would have tried to push me and maybe I would have burnt out and maybe I would not be doing this now.

Micah P. Hinson: Be doing this still. Right, right. But but that was definitely a time that I feel like, man, I could have I could have really upped things. And and there was another label I was talking to at the time, and they wanted me to record this opera circuit record. They wanted me to go do it with the guy that did the Sigur Ros albums. And for some reason, at that time, I was still like, No, what I’ve done in my house in Texas is better, is going to be fine. So that was that was a that was an interesting time for me. I feel like at that moment I chose. For foolishness or for wisdom. I chose. What? What I was doing was what I wanted to do. And I wasn’t going to clearly go out out of that box, whether it meant, like a big label or whether it meant whatever it meant. And of course, having a hard head or like being said and believing in what you do, that can be really good. But of course, that can that can backfire if you make the wrong decision. But, yes, there was. There was. What a huge question that was. But there was I guess that was an interesting thing. What I was. What I was going through.

Top Left Corner: It wasn’t just music musical and it wasn’t just professional. There was an element of character. There was an element of you looking into yourself and saying, What am I willing to to risk? What am I willing to to, you know, potentially allow out of my control? And I get it. I totally get that. I had a small bilingual newspaper in Worcester County, Massachusetts, and I was I was approached by The New York Times, and I hadn’t even been doing it a year. And The New York Times Corporation wanted to buy it, and they were going to give me a bunch a bunch of money. And and I knew what they were going to do to it. I knew exactly what then they were going to keep me on for three years. But I knew that I would have no control. Right. Most people, most smart people, most people with common sense would would have said, yeah, New York Times, yeah, totally. And I was stubborn, hard headed, whatever you want to call it. But I said, no, I think I’m just going to keep going my own way. It didn’t work out. The newspaper ended up folding. But, you know, there was that moment that I had to decide for myself. What? What? How much does my soul really worth? So. And there it is.

Micah P. Hinson: Indeed. I mean. Indeed, I mean. And that’s. And I guess if we look at if we look back at the record that I’ve done, that’s I guess that set like a precedent, a precedent for what I was going to keep doing in the future, because the majority of my records have all been I mean, this last record that I just finished or just it’s been taken a while, but that I finished, it’s the first time that I’ve actually had like a producer on the whole thing. And like we’re actually recording a lot of the things we actually recorded in a studio, whereas everything else it was like, I might work with a producer, but I’m going to be bringing in like the majority of stuff I’ve already done and we’re just going to clean it up, maybe we’ll add some stuff. And so, yeah, so that, so what I set with my second record is like I’m just going to do my records and whatever I feel comfortable with. That’s probably a good thing because as we were talking about earlier, but as music changed the industry and as money wasn’t coming in. If a record label says, here is a $6,000 advance, make us a hit fucking record, it’s like, Well, no, I can’t. Well, first off, more than half of that money is spent because I’ve got to pay rent, there’s taxes and all this shit, and there’s no way. And so if I would have gone through my, the first of my career being like, okay, I expect a studio and I expect that producer and I expect this and this and this. I would have gotten to a point where it’s like, Well, I can’t. I would have been paying out of my own pocket, clearly, to be making these records. And and you can’t I can. You can’t do that.

Top Left Corner: No, no.

Micah P. Hinson: No, not at all. And I don’t know. Yeah, that’s a whole confusing thing. How? The music industry. We talked about how the music industry is now and the the little the little value it seems that. Well, yeah, I think the little value that it seems like the world at large puts on puts on music. I don’t think a lot of value is put into that, at least financially. And that’s a that’s a very it’s a very heady situation. And I’m not sure if we’re ever going to ever going to figure that out, because I’m not sure how the government can’t figure out. So common laws of humanity, much less figure out what’s going to happen. What’s going to happen to the music industry. And so, yeah. So I’m glad. Yeah, that’s yeah, I’m glad that, that I stuck to the way that and of course I couldn’t say that at the time, but yeah. If I, if I hadn’t, I guess if I hadn’t have made that decision, I wouldn’t have been able to, I think still still be here and be willing to. I mean, just Yeah. To be especially with the plague that has happened and stuff. I mean, the concept of making money, you have to stick to it with the, with the some sort of dedication of a drug addict or something. Even at the times when it’s not serving you again in this capitalist society, when it’s not serving in that way and you’re having to suffer in some ways it would be it would be so much easier just to just turn around and do something else.

Top Left Corner: Well, the thing that kills me is that the music industry with a capital M and a capital I, they would have you believe that they they have the crystal ball to know what the public wants. But if that were true, then there wouldn’t be so many, especially of these young musicians that are coming out of, you know, they are building up their own following through YouTube or SoundCloud or whatnot. And, you know, I think if someone like Tessa violin and I don’t know if you’ve heard of her or whatnot, but she’s really she’s really wonderful. Tessa Violet. She just slowly in her bedroom started recording songs and now she’s touring all over the world. And it took her, it took us some time, but she’s been pretty much entirely self produced, has her own label, and she did it because she knew what she wanted her music to sound like if you had. If you had run her through her music, through the the distillation machine of the music industry, it wouldn’t have come out sounding like that. It would be completely different and it probably would not end up being the hit that it is today.

Top Left Corner: I want to talk. You mentioned the accident and you and I have have a few parallels in our life, our lives. And one of those is is accidents that really affect us and leave a mark for a long time. I was in a motorcycle accident back in the mid-nineties, and I broke both of my arms and I had both arms in a cast up to my shoulder for seven and a half, seven and a half months. There’s an amazing number of things you take for granted that you can do with your hands. That’s all I can say that. Yeah, but but so that was that was really rough. And it changed me. And it it was probably the first time I really understood what mortality meant and how close I came to that. So you had a van accident, you were on tour and and you ended up really just I mean, it was devastating physically. Talk about the that talk about the effect on your your perceptions of life, yourself, music, all of that.

Micah P. Hinson: Holy hell. So, yes, I had gone. So we just covered this a bit. I had, like, a back problem. I had surgery and all these things. And so when I would so that kind of changed my behavior on when I would tour, I couldn’t sit up for I couldn’t sit up for too long, he said. So this one day I’m laying in the back of the van. It’s just like a three seater van and I don’t have my seatbelt on because it’s fucking uncomfortable. I can’t sit up. It’s like I’m doing the best that I can and I’m sleeping and then we end up getting into an accident. And I remember like hitting the roof and my eyes barely open and thinking like, this isn’t fucking natural. And then I ended up getting my arms trapped in the broken window of the fucking van. But the van had flipped over tons of times and I was like facing down halfway through the broken window with my shoulder blade, with my shoulders touching in the front. It was highly, highly, highly, highly violent. And I remember like my head, like feeling like the the warmth of of the sunshine outside and felt like the dirt was in my face. And my band at the time was all Spanish. And I could hear them speaking English, but I knew that they weren’t going to be speaking English during a fucking emergency. And so I was like breaking some time and space language barrier or something like that.

Micah P. Hinson: And I remember like laying under there thinking like, Dude, I don’t want to. I want things to go back to normal. It was just it’s such a shock to being in such a bizarre and violent place, like, in a matter of seconds. So. I went through that. They took me out. They got they had to use like these jaws of life fucking thing. They got me out and took me to the hospital. I was in the hospital a few days. They they gave me like an MRI and all these things. And they wanted to keep me in the hospital in Spain for a very, very long time. And I was like sharing this room for a day with like a man with a hole in his skull. And I was like, I just got I just got to get the fuck out of here. And so my bass player, his girlfriend at the time was a was a medical doctor, of course. And so they were like, okay, well, we’ll let them go and you’re going to keep an eye out for him. And and I got back to Texas and I still had grass in my hair from the from the Spanish countryside and stuff. They didn’t even, like, give me like a proper arm brace and all these things. Like my arms didn’t work.

Micah P. Hinson: I guess that’s the main thing. That’s the point of what’s happening is that my arms didn’t work, my left arm didn’t work at all. And my right arm, like, maybe like 20% or something like that, couldn’t pick up glasses, couldn’t course, couldn’t, couldn’t do a fucking thing like getting to do this fucking scam calls. There we go. And. So, yeah, my arms didn’t work. I got back to Texas. I went to see some doctors there. They did a bunch of tests on my arms, and they’d realized that, like, I’d pulled. I pulled the huge cord on the inside of my shoulders. I pulled it and it had broken essentially like all the nerves inside, but it hadn’t actually broken the cord itself, which was if it had broken the car, I would have been paralyzed for life, of course, if that had been broken. And so they were like, okay, it takes this long for the very scientific. Like it’ll take this long for the nerves to go back and it’ll take this long for them to heal because they heal one inch a month. And we have to go from your shoulder to the tip of your finger to your shoulder. And so, yeah, it was it was a while of just I didn’t know what the. I mean, my arms didn’t work. And so even though they said it’ll be this and this, in my mind, I was like, Yeah, I mean, maybe, maybe things will be start working again.

Micah P. Hinson: But if my arm is only at 40% or only at 70%, like the concept of playing what I played, much less like getting better and trying to advance into the future like this is probably been drastically changed. So yeah, of course you have that until you’re going through like fits of depression. And at the time I was on drugs for my from my previous back problem, I was on fentanyl of all fucking drugs. Yeah. They had me on fentanyl for that’s the drug. I was 20 so I was on that for 14 years and then I and I looked in the mirror and I was like, dude, if you don’t quit this drug, like, you’re going to die. And so and I had a son at the time, so I quit the drugs. And then for some reason, as soon as I quit that and went through all the hell of that, my back didn’t hurt anymore. And I’m like, what the. Yeah, it was. I don’t know if if one the gods intervened and fix my spine or to the pain that I was feeling. And what I was going through was from over ten years of massive opiate addiction. I’m not sure which one it was, but yeah. So that, that arm thing man. So I was out for I guess in the end, strangely enough, I only I just stopped touring for maybe a few months because that happened in the middle of we were playing Trump Lemon by the Pixies, me and the Spanish band, and I was playing guitar.

Micah P. Hinson: Of course, when the show, when the tour, we just got one show in and we were heading to the second show when the accident happened. And, and so a few months later, of course, I needed the money and I guess I was massively high on drugs. And so we went back on the road and we did that tour and. And I just say kind of like tried to do my best version of Frank Sinatra or something. And then not only that, I also hired a string section and we went around England. We also went on to mainland Europe. And we were just it was just just strings and me singing. And so. In a pretty goddamn interesting way. It instead of like the concept of like my arms being destroyed for the time, therefore I’m going to the whole thing, the whole, the whole house of cards fumbles. I it was pretty rad, I guess, to look back and think like, oh, like that. I, I guess I gave myself that opportunity to do something a little bit, a little bit different, of course. And if you’re standing behind the guitar for that many years, once that guitar is gone.

Micah P. Hinson: I would assume that would be kind of a strange thing. But for some reason I really I really embraced it and it was pretty rad, but it definitely was. It definitely was a was a massive it was a massive setback. But an interesting thing about. I guess I can bring this in. Interesting thing about my career is that the press or the public or even the labels I’ve been on, they’ve always had some fucking fascination with romanticizing my my hardships because every one of my records has something. Whether it was the first one was like I was with some some some terrible black widow woman and I was homeless and all the drug addict fundamental households that my parents held snakes, you know, and that was the thing that was like the first record, then the second record that was made with my back accident. And then and then there was like the arm problem. And I guess there was one record I released like right as I was getting married and that, and it was like, oh, it looked like Mike is doing a little bit better. But even like Met that was like, oh, we’ll see how long that lasts. And so I met it with even something positive. At the time it was positive. It seemed positive. It still was met with a bit of this. You know, the whole bullshit, like tortured artist situation, you know?

Top Left Corner: Yeah, they. They really. Well, the tortured artist. I mean, that’s you getting a lot of mileage out of that story, you know, just scare you. Do you know I’m still here, right?

Micah P. Hinson: I’m talking to you, man.

Top Left Corner: Right. Yeah. I bring it up. I bring it up because I know that those incidents often lead to transformation. That’s what I’m interested in. And I’m less interested in the in the guts and the and the pain and the the thing I’m always interested to see what what comes out of it. You know, what what’s the what’s the growth potential? You know, for me, I it’s this is not an interview about me, so I’m not going to go into it.

Top Left Corner: I’ll just basically, I, I had not ever tested the limits of my own strength. I thought I had. And I don’t mean physical strength, I mean character. I had never really fully tested. I had hitchhiked around the country, motorcycle around the country. I mean, I had done all sorts of things, but I had never really tested the limits of my own strength until I peeled off the fiberglass tape casts with my teeth and went and found a job washing dishes with arms that had been in casts for seven and a half months. And you can imagine how thin they were. I had to wear long sleeved shirts in July in California to hide the fact that I had no muscle. I had I had skin and bones.

Micah P. Hinson: Bet it was freaky.

Top Left Corner: It was. Yeah, well, yeah, because the rest of my body looked fairly normal. Except, you know, it looked like a t. Yeah, man, I looked like it. Yeah.

Micah P. Hinson: With these kind of tiny arms.

Top Left Corner: And that’s. And that’s how I had to carry the dishes. I mean, I had to carry my dishes that way like a t rex because I had to. I had to use both arms to carry even the, like, three plates. I would, I would wash three plates and then put those away. It was I had to hide that for a month while I started building up strength from my, my boss from the other employees. Yeah, it was. And that was, that was the thing that when I think about those days, I think what was it? What was the meaning? What was the significance of that accident? It wasn’t really the pain. It wasn’t the the discomfort. It wasn’t the learning how to, as I said, do all of those things that you’re used to just take for granted. It was the, you know, who did who was I when I resurfaced? Who was I? And and I like that your story has a very similar growth element to it. You know, you found out a who was I? And I love to hear that. Let’s let’s talk a little bit because I you know, I know that you and I, if we were to sit down over a cup of coffee together, we could probably spend a long time comparing notes. And I’d love to do that one day.

Micah P. Hinson: Indeed, man.

Top Left Corner: What what I want to do is I want to talk a little bit about this show on Friday. Yeah. And I also, by the way, I just picked up I just picked up from Bandcamp. She’s building up castles in her heart. Oh, nice. So if if that’s still a tune that you’d want my listeners to hear, I have it now.

Micah P. Hinson: Okay, let’s do that. Yeah, that’s great, man. So that’s a really I don’t think even the people that maybe like religiously listen to me that’s that’s certainly like off the beaten path. But for me, that’s that’s like a pinnacle of I feel it’s like a pinnacle of sonic sound that I that I reached. I fucking love that song. Absolutely.

Top Left Corner: So let’s talk a little bit about. When I shoot at you with arrows, I will shoot to destroy you. Just tell us a little bit about where that comes from. Tell us a little bit about what you were shooting, what you were shooting for.

Micah P. Hinson: Yeah, well, that’s a. Why do all my why does all my. I feel like I have so many so much too long of answers. So when I was. So I did a record called The Holy Strangers, which was a very it was I called it like a folk opera. It was like 33 songs long and it was like 2 hours. It was it was absolutely insane. The record label said no and they would release like half of it, and they were very picky as to what was happening. And so to work and I was going through a bit of a we all have life. I was struggling with life at that time. I just had my first son and everything just seemed a bit cocky and weird, cockeyed and weird. And so I kind of felt like I was really kind of losing my way on that album. And so then when you get to the next record, which is the one you asked about the musicians of the apocalypse, I felt even, even further away from that it was it was coming to the point that. And even my wife at the time, she was actually even encouraging this, which is very fucking disheartening. But there was a time right then, especially that record, that it was like, I think it’s time to fucking hang up, hang up, everything. Like, I’ve done enough. Maybe I’m kind of dried out. Like, I finished, I’ll finish these records and maybe we’ll be we’ll be finished, which is of course, like a pretty dark fucking place. Looking back, it’s a very dark place.

Micah P. Hinson: And I think when I actually just recently listened to that record and it hit me in a completely different way, to me, it sounds like a human being. Again, not to be dramatic, but it sounds like a human being. Like I’m the fucking on the very edge. But I was speaking. I felt like maybe it was like to protect myself, but it was like I felt like I was speaking about somebody else. And I was speaking about, like, somebody else’s story and kind of like these made up made up concepts as opposed to, like, really realizing like, oh, you’re talking about killing yourself and maybe you’re talking about yourself and feel that it was, it was like a prophetic record, like, for myself and maybe it’s not the right word, but it was a fascinating record for me to look back on now and to be able to use that as like a, like a concrete, like historic evidence of, of where I was, where I am now, and like where where I want to be. I feel like in this time in my life, it’s I’ve been, I dude, I’ve been learning and growing and changing and attempting to learn things more than any other time in my life. And so for that to be my last record and to have that again, that that evidence has been a really, really helpful. Again with that record. I just. There’s some secrets about that record. But, you know, with that album, I really. I approached it differently in the sense that I just wanted everything to be very simple.

Micah P. Hinson: I didn’t have the strings. It was it was very. I guess I was trying to make it as cinematic and cinematic as some of my other works that I’d done right. But I think in that, in the way that I that I did it with the musicians that I did it with, I think maybe in some way it was even it even maybe even drew, whatever I was trying to escape, maybe it even drew more of that out. I just I didn’t I thought by excluding certain tools that maybe the writing would be different or something. But yeah, so that’s I have so much to say about that album. But yeah, so that’s the last one I did. And at the time I thought it was like, yeah, again, I thought it was kind of like a death nail. I thought it was going to be We’re going to be done. But I guess I can talk about this to something that I learned and maybe a person or a songwriter or even like a writer or even a fucking human. Maybe this will be interesting to them, is that it hit me maybe about a year and a half or two years ago that I was only writing from past me. I was only writing about like the feelings of old experiences and the feelings of like the stuff that I had that I had gone through. And it really hit me like a ton of bricks, like, hey, I need the one. I need to stop doing it because not only am I writing songs that way, but that’s evident that I’m thinking of my life in those ways.

Micah P. Hinson: And so whatever rules, whatever guidelines I have for my existence, I’m going I’m going off of 16 year old myself or I’m going out, who knows? I’m going back even as far as five year old myself. And so it just I just realized, like, hey, from now on, if I’m going to write songs, I’m only going to write about what I feel or what I want to feel. And I’m and that’s going to be the cutoff point. And for some reason they’re man, holy shit, I don’t know what happened, but my playing and writing songs, I mean, right now, of course, we had the plague and I refused to release anything during the plague. But I mean, I would consider based on my prior output and I’m probably sitting on like six records. And to go from feeling like I’m done writing to then now, like I don’t even know what to do with everything that it’s such a it’s such a bizarre it’s such a bizarre place to be. But it’s highly encouraging because I think what that is, it’s showing me that, yeah, that I was right, that writing from the past and sticking to that old self and it was not. It was not helping me at all. And so I think I learned that it’s less about what you go through and more about what you do with what you’ve gone through. That kind of makes sense.

Top Left Corner: I think that seems to be a theme in your life. To be honest, I mean, starting all the way back in Abilene. That seems to be, you know.

Micah P. Hinson: There you go.

Top Left Corner: What’s on the other side? What’s on the other side of the gate? The doorway? What’s on the other side of the wall? What’s on the other side of the. You know, of the. The fog of. Yeah, man. Fentanyl. What’s on the other side that you know. And I think I think the thing that’s, you know, that’s challenging for a lot of people, especially when when you have a persona and then you have the person. Sometimes it’s and this is just me kind of spitballing here, but sometimes it feels like there are forces in life that really want to restrain us from growth because it’s more convenient for us to be who we were, not for us, it’s more convenient for them. And, and, and sometimes for us. Sometimes it’s, you know, there’s fear keeping us from moving forward. Sometimes there’s habit, sometimes there’s laziness. But but there’s a lot of forces that seem to want to take away our permission to to expand and to to change. And that’s tough, because if you spend too much time, you’re basically a fossil and fossils, you know, they they just set.

Micah P. Hinson: Yes. I mean. Yes. I mean, you put that really I mean, we started we were talking about the front almost Christian type of thing for a bit. And that’s and that’s a really good point because not involving that, it’s the idea of even when you feel like it’s time to move on or you want to see somewhere else, there’s all these voices going back and saying again in this example like, it’s sin or it’s this or it’s this. It’s like things that are attached to that. It’s supposed to be attached to the morals of who you are as a person. And so not only do you have to decide, I want to be different, but you have to decide I’m going to be different. And all these fucking ghosts in my head, I have to I have to like actively ignore and not even ignore. You have to like actively correct those things. And yes. And it would be so much easier to wake up on so many days and be like, Oh, I can be whatever anybody says, you know, and that is the easier road to tow for them. Yeah. As you say. But those are those are those are those are strong things, man. Those are strong, strong things. But yeah. What a what an existence. What an existence.

Top Left Corner: Not easy. It’s not easy. And the you know, the older the older I get, the more I have to sort of remind myself intentionally, because, you know, there’s there’s this bullshit that, you know, that you’re supposed to be this thing. And now that you’ve arrived at this place in your life, that people should be able to expect something out of you. And that’s the thing you’re going to be. Well, I’m not I’m not I’m not done yet. And it doesn’t sound like you’re done yet either. So, you know, if if you’ll all pardon me, I’m going to keep growing if that’s an inconvenience for you. I’m sorry, but you are coming to West Stockbridge. Have you been to the area before?

Micah P. Hinson: I have. The closest I’ve been was I played a show with David Gray in Boston. I guess that’s the closest I’ve been here. But yeah, it’s a it’s an amazing place. I’ve actually been able to stay here for the past. I guess I’ve been there for the past six days or something, just wandering around the woods and just trying to find things. It’s, it’s it’s it’s a very strange difference between being from, of course, being in Texas and the and the definition of what a small town is. And more than that, it’s like, what is this small town look like? Yeah. And if you think of a small town in Texas and I guess it has a lot to do with geography, of course, but these are like windblown, just pretty fucked places that probably should have been deserted a long time ago. But you come to this place, I mean, I’m standing on the back porch and I’m looking at the houses and it’s like, what? What is going on? Yeah, it’s a fascinating place, man. And the people are really, really nice, man, you know?

Top Left Corner: Yeah, it’s the Berkshires are unique. They have, you know, like everywhere else. They’ve got their issues. We’ve got our issues here. But you really, you know, you couldn’t ask for a better combination of nothing going on arts. There’s a lot of arts going on and then there’s and then there’s New York and Boston just, you know, a couple, two and a half, 3 hours away. So, you know, you can you can be out of the city and you can be in the city and, you know, no time at all. And now people are talking about actually expanding the train access. So if you don’t like to drive, you can just jump on the train and be in the city in 2 hours, which would be great.

Micah P. Hinson: Hell, yeah.

Top Left Corner: So. So, yeah. You’re going to be at the foundry West Stockbridge. I know that Amy is hoping to to churn out a big crowd, and I hope so. I mean, if they don’t if people don’t come just to see the guy that has so much interesting stuff to say, I’d be shocked and amazed cause this do you have obviously I’m going to put the links to your website in the show notes. Any thoughts on this particular show? Why now? Why here?

Micah P. Hinson: Yeah, I. I guess so. Josh, the promoter, he got a hold of me before a bit before the play. And at that time I’d also gotten approached by the Newport folk people. And so before everything went weird for us, everybody started dropping like flies. I was trying to develop a tour, trying to develop something to be able to come up here. Because the last thing I did was like the Twilight Saga, the Scottish band, and this was, Oh my goodness, I think it was even before my child, I don’t know, it was years and years and years. And so to do this like it just made. I talked to Josh, of course. Then as I felt like things were becoming hopefully as safe as they could, that this would be a really fascinating thing to do. And I have had a bit of a rough, but I haven’t had like the best relationship with the US. It’s probably my fault because I money before 2008, money used to be magic. Like I would go to Europe and I would play shows and I’d come back and I’d give it to the bank and it would double. And it was like, Oh, wow. And so with that magic money machine, I guess, called the world economy, it it made it to where I didn’t have I didn’t have to focus that much on the US. And so I really just like I would do some things here and there I would go, okay. But I just kind of decided, I guess intentionally or not, I was done with it.

Micah P. Hinson: But I think coming I think the thing that I’m going to find important, I guess we’re going to test it out in a couple of days is. Maybe what I do and maybe what I want to do, and maybe the fact that I do have something that provides me with my needs over in Europe, that I can do something different over here. And so maybe it would be something as opposed to going to New York and Boston and Los Angeles and, you know, Denver and maybe as opposed to doing that, maybe like finding places, maybe an idea to like find places. If I’m turning, if I’m turned into essentially like a minstrel, just like a traveling song and dance man. Well, then why do I need if I don’t have to, why do I need to go to the Capitals? So maybe it’s an idea. So maybe doing something smaller, maybe you have of course you’re going to have a different attention span or you’re going to have a different way of of these people looking, whether they’re close to a city or not, a different way of how they conduct themselves and how they see society. And and it was just something about traveling for a goddamn day and then getting to LA and just playing for a crowd that’s just like whatever, talking the whole time. And it’s not that they’re not listening, it’s just like they’re fucking talking. And so the way the way that culture is, it’s just like, Oh, okay, this is background music, and I’m not gonna hold it against him, but that’s not really what I want to be.

Micah P. Hinson: I want to talk to people and people talk to me and and like, try to do something. I’m not here to entertain people. I’ve been saying that for years and I’m not. Yeah, I’m just yeah, I’m not with what I do. I’m just not here to entertain people. And I think that’s very, very important. And I think hopefully people come in a few days, of course, or whether they’ve they’ve heard me, that’s going to be rad because of course I rarely up here. But if people that don’t, hopefully we’ll be able to find something. And I assume that the majority of people that are going to come are probably not people that have heard of it. I’m just going to assume that. But but I think it’ll be interesting to see like what kind of what kind of magic can unfold. And I saw the venue and I like how it’s all kind of like downward facing. And so there’s no stage. Right, right. I really dig that. So it’ll be it’ll be it’ll be really nice even with that, even the US or the non US thing. I mean I’ve barely been playing again because of the plague. And so just to get out in front of some people and then try to share some stuff is going to be is going to be amazing.

Top Left Corner: Well, yeah, it’s it’s a great it’s a great venue. There are some folks in that town who are trying to, you know, the like there’s folks everywhere who would rather they’re not be actual Oh, I don’t want to get into this. That’s the whole thing. But yeah, yeah.

Micah P. Hinson: I hear.

Top Left Corner: You, you know, but it’s there’s always a get-off-my-lawn crowd, you know. And of course. Yes. And that’s that’s the pin in the ass about it. But I think that if people were to come to your show, for example, I think that they would see the value of these little venues. And they’re all across the country.

Micah P. Hinson: Across the World.

Top Left Corner: I mean, I’ve traveled across the country, and there’s little venues like this. And for the musician, I think the value part of the value is, yes, the intimacy with the crowd, but also the reconnecting with what’s actually happening in the country, you know, with places that are real, places that do not exist solely to perpetuate the sort of music money machine as LA is. You know, no one is here in doing doing what we’re doing in the Berkshires because it’s going to make us billionaires. It’s just not going to that’s not what we’re here for, but we’re here to be here to create real stuff. And I think that that’s that’s one of the reasons why I think people are going to love your show, because you just, you know, you reek of authenticity and.

Top Left Corner: You reek of this is a guy who’s singing about shit that he completely lived. This is not stuff that he heard about. This is not these are not feelings that he borrowed from somebody else. This isn’t some pickup truck that he imagines owning. You know, it’s it’s not to put a jab at New Country or anything like that, but, you know.

Micah P. Hinson: A bro country is the best man. Yeah, right. But no, I appreciate you. I appreciate you saying that, man. That’s very, very kind of you. Oh, good. That’s that’s how I hopefully want to come across to people, like, as authentically as possible. But, you know, we’re talking about LA Times. I’m talking about music in general and the and the concept of something authentically coming at you, authentically coming at you. It seems to be a bit of a rarity, you know? Yeah.

Top Left Corner: Yeah. I mean, even if you start out that way, it sounds to me, I mean, like I was in bands when I was young, it’s been a long, long time, but I can imagine just from the friends of mine who did make it to various levels, how? Quickly. You can be dazzled by bright lights and and parties and this this this sort of this all of a sudden, this celebrity mindset that pulls you farther and farther away from further and further away from the stuff that you were trying to sing about to begin with. So. Yes, exactly. I’m glad that you you you held your ground. I’m glad that you you when you were at that crossroads, you you made the choice that you did, because I think the the audience benefits from it. So we’re going to have the info up on the site. And that is this Friday night. Do you recall what the time is?

Micah P. Hinson: Oh, I think the shows are like 7:30, 8:00, something like that.

Top Left Corner: Yeah, let me see here. West Stockbridge Foundry. Yeah, that’s the other thing about the Berkshires is everything closes up early. Yeah, everything is like it starts at seven. It’s over nine. Everybody’s in bed, tucked, nice and tucked away. Yeah. 7:30 p.m., Friday, July 15th. Micah P. Hinson. Gosh, it’s been such a pleasure talking with you and great man.

Micah P. Hinson: Definitely.

Top Left Corner: And I will play these tunes, as I said, and so the people can get a thing. And it’s great that we can play these tunes because I wanted to talk about what an awesome voice you have, but really it’s perfectly paired with with your your, your songs. But I don’t have to talk about that and I don’t have to lavish any more praise on you because I can just play the song and people will get it. So we’re going to do that and until Friday, enjoy the Berkshires. I hope you get out and do some fun things and we will see you on Friday.

Micah P. Hinson: Hey, thank you so much for your time, man. I really appreciate it, man. Great conversation.

Top Left Corner: Thanks, Micah. Take care.

Micah P. Hinson: Hey. Bye, buddy.

The post Top Left Corner #161
Micah P. Hinson
live at The Foundry appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

Independence Day, 2022

[JASON VELÁZQUEZ]

And this is episode 160 of the Top Left Corner recorded Monday, July 4th, 2022. I’m your host, Jay Velázquez, welcoming you to the show, and I hope that you’re having a good Independence Day. Whatever you might be doing — maybe you’re going to a parade or grilling up some burgers and dogs or maybe getting ready to go to a baseball game or fireworks — I hope it’s safe, healthy, happy, and maybe you leave a little bit of time in your schedule for a little contemplation. Contemplation about what to Americans is the 4th of July. Riffing off Frederick Douglass’ “What, to a Slave is the 4th of July?” I think that this is a year that we should be doing some introspection about the nature of this country. And, you know, we’re going to be doing that on shows like the Top Left Corner and probably, oh goodness, certainly Growl. Other shows we’ll be talking about it going forward because it’s a conversation that is long overdue. What exactly is this country? I think a lot of the times we think we know. But if we’re not talking about it, if we haven’t reached some sort of consensus about what is the United States of America, and what do we what do we aspire to be, and are we actually doing those things that would get us there, then we’re not really, we’re just sort of on autopilot.

And I think, you know, when you put yourself on autopilot, this is where you get. But we’re not going to dwell on the negative too much today. We have other shows to do that, as I said. But we do have on this show today, we have a great conversation that is about something truly liberating, which is music. We have as our guests the Berkshires Academy for Advanced Musical Studies founder and Executive Director, Richard Boulger and Director of Development and Communications, Jane Forrestal, who are here to talk about the grand opening of this new music academy in its new home in building six of the Western Gateway Heritage Park. And they’re going to be throwing a big old hoedown on July 17th from 1 to 5 p.m.. And it is going to be featuring so much music. It is going to be headlined by the legendary drummer and founding member of the Allman Brothers Band, Jaimoe Johanson, performing with BAAMS’s faculty, students and friends, including Richard Boulger, Victor Jones, Alex Blake, David Gilmore, Dario Boente, Kris Jensen, Gina Coleman, Jim Taft, Braden Collins, Luke Zeto and probably possibly other surprise guests. So mark that slot July 17th all afternoon pretty much as as booked because you should be there food and drink will be available from the freight yard pub and you can get more information by emailing [email protected].

Since I’ve spent enough time talking, why don’t I liberate you from listening to me? And we’ll get to that conversation with Richard Boulger and Jane Forrest. All right. Here on the top left corner.

Top Left Corner: [00:00:00] And with me on the line is Richard Boulger, who is the executive director of the Berkshires Academy’s for the Advanced Medical Studies. Welcome to the top left corner, Richard.

Richard Boulger: [00:00:13] Thank you, Jason. It’s great to be with you. Good morning.

Top Left Corner: [00:00:16] So, you know, this is as it always is, it’s casual conversation. You know, we like to just sort of meander a bit. That’s our style here. And never more so than when we’re talking about music. It’s a subject that we we delve into quite a bit here. It’s one it’s one of the things that I started The Greylock Glass for to promote local music. And I’m so excited to hear and share about share news about this this awesome new institution. First, give us a sense of why this academy was conceived.

Richard Boulger: [00:00:55] Well, for me, it’s been a lifetime of searching and studying and with the likes of Freddie Hubbard, trumpeter Freddie Hubbard and Donald Byrd and many other masters, and taking so many complex ideas that they share with me and put them through a filter so that they would be accessible to young people. And for the past 20 years, before moving back to the Berkshires, I actually spent several years living in New York and teaching in Brownsville and Brooklyn and some of New York’s more underserved communities, if you will, and had great success with helping young people tap into their talents and really see firsthand transformations in their lives, not only as young musicians, but it would directly carry over into their lives as human beings. With that said, in 2020, my partner Jane Forrestal, and I decided that we are both from originally raised in North Adams, and after so many years we thought, wouldn’t it be great to bring this back to our home, to the Berkshires? And so we have taken this lifetime of experiences and now we believe it’s such an opportunity and we’re so excited to share with young people in Berkshire County and greater regional areas, to really give kids an opportunity to tap into their talents as young musicians and as artists. The the premise of this Berkshires Academy for Advanced Musical Studies is that the teaching methodology that we use, and that’s called the learning system that I’ve developed, and it’s based on the fact that your musical instrument is actually an amplifier of what you are hearing, thinking and feeling. So we teach kids that they are the source, they are the source of music, and we teach kids how to express their own unique life experiences, their emotions and all that they are as human beings.

Your contribution is appreciated.

Your contribution is appreciated.

Your contribution is appreciated.

Top Left Corner: [00:03:08] That’s very cool. And and I feel like you’ve you’ve made that you’ve given the description before because that was really a nice complete package delivered as if as if you were pitching it to a bunch of parents who might not be thinking, okay, well, my kid’s school offers music instruction, but what would be the benefit of going to a of of of going beyond that? What sorts of things would students be doing or would would youth be doing in the academy that they’re not getting at as good as the school’s music program might be? What sorts of things are going to differentiate that?

Richard Boulger: [00:03:56] Yeah, so stereotypically in almost all situations, what you see with kids when they first start to learn Music Day one generally consists of a case with an instrument inside. That’s one component. The second is a book that normally comes with that, an instructional book. The third is a music stand to put actually put the paper or the music sheet music or book onto the stand. And then you have the music instructor. So you have all these and of course the students. So you have all these different elements at one time being introduced to the kid, the child, the student. And so what I found is years ago, as a young person, just learning how to play music was it was this overwhelming and that the focus for many years was really on an external source of the source of sound was coming from an external experience, in this case, a written piece of music and a band instructor conducting and leading. And so the difference. Is it bombs? We teach our kids that they are the source. We have a whole learning system that is really based in teaching kids how to hear, how to hear, how to think and how to even feel their experiences and put that into sound. So we have a whole teaching methodology that’s very unique. And as I mentioned earlier, that was given to me through two master musicians, Freddie Hubbard and Donald Bird, none of which both Freddie and Donald never wrote these things down, these ideas down. So I’m truly humbled and blessed to be able to carry forth their ideas and share it with young students.

Top Left Corner: [00:05:37] Now, I think that’s a very holistic approach. And I couldn’t agree more that that the source you only have to look at, look at young children to see that they’ve got the they’ve got the music in them. It’s already there, you know, whether or not they are sort of, you know, naturally drawn toward, you know, strings or percussion or singing or whatever it might be. It doesn’t take a lot to draw it out of them. What is the age group that you’re talking about for for for this academy? Are we talking young kids or older kids? What what’s the range?

Richard Boulger: [00:06:24] Well, right now we’re primarily focusing in on kids 12 to 18. And that’s that’s where now our primary focus. We’re also planning on extending this our offer, our the opportunity to work with older adults, if you will, fairly we’re thinking in the fall we’ll be extending out that offer. So I myself personally have had the same teaching methodology used on several so-called non-musicians professional people. I have students who are lawyers or people in finance or doctors, graphic designers, etc., and they consistently find that in going through this process of learning the learning system, they there’s a direct carryover from how they have evolved musically, but also in their own professional lives, how they communicate with their colleagues. And they just see pronounced changes in their overall lives in addition to their musical growth and gains.

Top Left Corner: [00:07:19] This is a great area for it, and I think it’s a great area for it because, number one, there is an arts foundation here, but it’s also a great area because we do not actually have the same. Musical landscape, a live performance landscape that say the Pioneer Valley does North Northampton, you know, in the middle of the five colleges area, they’ve got many more venues that you can you can play at. We don’t have a lot of venues here, and I’m really hoping that with an increased saturation, it will sort of just sort of spontaneously generate maybe some more interest in in live performance. Tell me something about your views on and this is a big, big thing for me. There’s a lot of folks here who are you know, they’re putting on shows that are like tribute bands, which, you know, they’re fun, you know, a Beatles tribute, a, you know, Led Zeppelin tribute, whatever. And but it does tend to crowd out the space for original music. So when you’ve got tribute bands, cover bands, and that seems to be the the bulk of what’s what’s on offer on a Friday night. How do you compete with that with with original music? How do you get people to the audiences? Because, you know, the the missing part of the equation in all of this is that music is shared and the audiences have to be receptive. So what what can we do as a as a as a region to help nurture these audience, as audiences, as well as the artists themselves?

Richard Boulger: [00:09:15] Hmm. That’s a that’s a great question. I think on some level, it really does start with younger generations in terms of educating kids at a younger age. And as they grow and get older, they’ll have the the insights, the wiring and the brain, if you will, in terms of the awareness that they can have to perceive as listeners and appreciate original music ultimately and the creative process. I wanted to just touch upon something you said about tribute bands as opposed to creating original music. I always remember what Donald Byrd shared with me the one time he shared actually several, several, several times when I was working with him. It probably the lasting sounds in my mind when I think of Donald Byrd, where he used to always say to me, don’t do what they did do as they did and don’t do what they did do as they did. And I think that that’s sort of a mantra that’s been driving me for many, many years, that it’s one level to be able to and I say this very respectfully to so many great musicians, but I see it as in some way, if you’re playing what’s already been played over and over again, there’s some form of regurgitation.

Richard Boulger: [00:10:29] And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. I just feel that we also should celebrate the the magic and the majesty of the creative moment, the possibilities of sound that can can evolve if we’re open to that. And I think being here in the Berkshires, there’s just so many, I guess I’d call them sacred spaces and places like Greylock. My goodness, Natural Bridge. Yeah, the list goes on and on and on. And what does that sound like? How do we get young kids to be able to tap into go to these places and in the moment tap into these experiences and have a genuine transference of sound through their instruments in the moment, communicate on that level. So we’re really we’re really interested in helping kids compose, improvise, create their own music. And to your point, we hope to be able to start to as soon as we can, having our original groups of young musicians going out and playing in the community. Very.

Top Left Corner: [00:11:33] Very event. Very cool. That’s that’s the way. That’s definitely the way. And and, you know, the idea that there might be a Berkshires sound, whether it’s rock or jazz or blues, that’s a that’s a neat idea. I would love to I would love to sort of see what all of that distillation sort of generates when it comes to, you know, what do you what do you think of when you hear, you know, Berkshires Berkshires folk Berkshires blues. And and I see I see a lot of opportunity for that. This obviously, how many how many students do you expect to be able to have at any given week or month? Do you have a limit?

Richard Boulger: [00:12:21] Right. So for our jazz camp, which is coming up, this would be our fourth jazz camp this August 15th through the 19th, where we have 30 to 50 slots open for kids. And that’s that’s about a 50 sort of our our high end. And 30 is somewhere in there. So we are definitely encouraging. Young people to visit our website and sign up for that. Ww That Berkshires Academy AMS dawg. They can they can have more information on the jazz camp. Moving into the fall, we are also in the number of about 60 to as high as maybe even 100 students depending. But we have because of the nature of what we’re teaching, it’s each student we see, each student has their own voice. It’s not a cookie cutter generic type of approach here. It also like to say that I have handpicked a faculty that I am just so thrilled with. I consider each one of these musicians world class in every way. Number one, they all have. They’re all fantastic recording artists who tour with major, major, major labels and or artists themselves. That’s number one. So they’re fantastic musicians. Number two, they’re great teachers. They’re passionate about what they do. They they want to help each kid open up the tap into their potential. And number three, they’re just really good human beings. And to me, you’ve got to have a good heart. You’ve got to be a good person, have a good spirit to be able to connect with kids. Because ultimately what we want to do is inspire, inspire young people to want to play with the world that we live in. Sometimes more kids are interested in video games or being on a phone. How do we get kids back into playing music and really discovering the magic of the possibilities of playing a musical instrument that’s always.

Top Left Corner: [00:14:16] Well, having having two teenagers myself, that is an ever present question in this household. How do we make sure that they’re getting the the diverse set of experiences that, you know, that I had? You know, I was fortunate to have a bunch of, you know, musician, miscreant friends. And, you know, as a singer, we we absolutely were suffused with music, whether it was playing in garages or in dive bars or wherever it was. We that was part of who we were and what we what we did. And, you know, for those people who weren’t in the bands, they hung out. You know, they they were there, you know, often kind of hanging out and probably doing things that we weren’t, you know, would not have made our parents happy. But, you know, that’s kind of part of it, too, I suppose. Jane, I know that you can speak to a few other elements of bebop. What what would you say is. Well, first of all, just give us your sort of assessment of where this is going and and how it operates as an organization and how it’s going to sort of function within the broader community.

Jane Forrestal: [00:15:42] Sure. Well, that’s I can talk about that for a whole day. Yeah. So. So Band really is an organic organization that grew out of we’ve held three Berkshires Summer Jazz Band Day Camp. That showed us how energized the kids have been from learning alongside each other and with our faculty. And we really saw after the let’s see, our second day of camp, that’s when we really began to seriously think about how to bring this home and how to make it work. So the one parent said to me, I’ve never seen my daughter so energized to go home and practice new things that she’s learned about piano into in the span of two days. Chatting with with people after the child has been there for a day or two in the midst of the camp. And it’s an easy format. It’s not stressful. We start at noon, we finish at about 430 in the afternoon. It’s celebratory. It ends the camp ends with a big Friday night gala where students and faculty perform together. There’s usually solos, many solos taken. There’s usually an original song composed by the entire group that gets performed, sort of like the big world premiere of a brand new song that just came out of a week together. So one of the things that we feel about. Bringing this home is that this is a region that. Yes. It has a really strong cultural base. It has families who care about their children’s education and opportunities. But there’s not a lot of of options, as, again, we’ve heard from parents, they’re having to for additional learning. So if you have the kid who likes to play basketball during gym, will they join a league after school or they join the team? What does a music student do with their additional drive? Parents find themselves driving weekly to Northampton, to Albany, to Cambridge, Mass. And that this is a change for the region to be able to just find these resources right in their own backyard.

Top Left Corner: [00:18:07] And private private instruction is extremely expensive, too. I’m not we can talk about that a little bit later.

Jane Forrestal: [00:18:13] It is. And the expense part of it is that this is not a cheap undertaking we have in any regard. When you’re when you’re running an institution, serving a population of young people, it’s expensive. There are insurance policies to be bought and software and technical equipment, all the bills you can imagine to run something, and yet you want to make it as affordable as possible for the average family. Because one of the things that happens when a child considers an activity or a family considers it, the first thing they want to know is, can we afford it? Is it going to be just too much on us on top of all the other expenses of raising kids? And so what we’ve done is we structure our tuition to be affordable. We we are looking for a lot of support from the community, especially big business, who frankly have been doing so well in recent years that we would we would really hope that people. Realize the gift that that’s sitting right here in their midst and help us move this forward.

Top Left Corner: [00:19:27] I feel the same way about The Greylock Glass. So when you find those big businesses, you can send them my way. And whatever they have left over, they can they can help support The Greylock Glass. But, you know, the good news is that you are a 500 13c nonprofit, and that means that there are grants out there. Have you been have you been able to find things that that are good match grant opportunities?

Jane Forrestal: [00:19:55] Sure. Yeah. There are plenty of opportunities out there that are a good match. And one of the things that we ran up against, which is now beginning to shift when we first opened, was we opened in the midst of a pandemic. So the existing nonprofit culture that exists that that was already in operation here really needed huge help to just survive, to not have to close their doors. A lot of nonprofits depended on attendance, ticket buying and so on and so forth. And if you cannot reach your audience, everything ended. In our realm, we had to pivot. We went through something similar. We had to pivot all of our learning to online for the last two years during the school year. So the whether or not we qualified for grant moneys or survival money, there were there were grants put out to help nonprofits survive. We didn’t qualify because we were not in existence prior to January one, 2020. Right. We weren’t funded until April. So that cut out a lot of opportunity. However, the other thing that’s going to happen is people really are able to grasp what they can see and hear and experience. And now that the pandemic is beginning to truly lift, we’re coming back together as human beings in one space. Kids are going to be able to learn in person. People are audiences are going to be able to hear our people perform, whether it’s faculty, students or both. And, yes, I mean, you mentioned more live music venues in the region. That’s one of the things that BAAMS hopes to hopes to offer as well. So on a semi-regular basis that we put on BAAMSs presents just great events that audiences are going to love.

Top Left Corner: [00:21:58] That’s fantastic. Do you do you imagine whether you’ll be able to do it now or in the future that you’ll be able to come up with any sort of sliding scale or any scholarships?

Jane Forrestal: [00:22:09] Yes, we have been we have been offering scholarships. We really don’t want to turn anybody away who’s got any interest in studying with us. So it can be sometimes it’s a it’s a really happy situation where we’ve already received a grant from a town that says we want to support kids from name the town to attend your camp. And that’s what these funds should be used for. So when they’re earmarked like that, it’s a no brainer. We can easily help those kids out in other cases. Sometimes I have to say, okay, I’m going to go. I’m going to make ten phone calls and I’m going to try to find this tuition money for this particular student if we don’t have the funds already earmarked in our in our coffers. So it’s it can be a challenge. We. In general because the tuition is already so affordable. If you compare attendance at, say, the camps at Berkeley, we’re about a third of what they’re charging. And we’re here again. We’re right here in the beautiful Berkshires.

Top Left Corner: [00:23:17] Oh, yeah. And listen, you know, the price comparison, I’m sure, is is pretty stark when, you know, when you think of someplace like Berkeley. I am glad to hear that you do have awareness that for some families there is zero extra dollars available for these sorts of things, but tons of interest. So it’s it’s great that you’ve you’ve taken that taking the lead and creating a sort of as many as you can fit in the door regardless of ability to pay. Let’s let’s talk. And by the way, if if you haven’t hit the Mass Cultural Council, there are there’s some there’s some good grants that I think I remember seeing over the last couple of years that that probably fit pretty closely to your mission. So if I remember if I remember the names of the specific grants, I’ll send them your way. The this event. Now let’s let’s get to the reason that we’re talking the the the event that caught my eye and Gina Coleman who is I’m happy to see part of part of this event she sort of hit me to this. And it is a really fabulous sounding night of of music. Tell us about this. Is it what’s the function of it? Is it a fundraiser? Just give me the give me the skinny on here because this is going in the calendar.

Richard Boulger: [00:25:00] Yeah, it’s it’s actually an afternoon of music. So it’s July 17th, which is a Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. and it’s outdoors. So people should like bring a lawn chair and dress accordingly. But yeah, it’s an amazing event and this is sort of our way of saying We’re here. This is our grand opening celebration. And it also serves as the only big fundraiser of our summer to raise money for the jazz camp, for us to equip our new facility with a few more things that it certainly needs as any necessary things that we find when you start up. And then going into the fall lesson offerings and running the organization into the fall of 2022. So we’re hoping for a big turnout. We’re very excited to I don’t think we’re we’re talking with Jaimoe, who as you, you know, is is sort of our special guest, Allman Brothers Band, legendary founding drummer Jaimoe is is coming to play. And he he doesn’t think he’s ever played in North Adams. So this is sort of history in the making as well.

Top Left Corner: [00:26:12] It’s never too late to have a debut. And.

Richard Boulger: [00:26:16] Exactly.

Top Left Corner: [00:26:16] So this is Sunday, July 17th, 1 to 5 p.m. and this is at Heritage State Park, which is which is a great space that has been underutilized. But this is your new home now.

Jane Forrestal: [00:26:31] It is, in fact, where because of the number of guests that we expect, we’re going to be down in this sort of a central area, the courtyard area, our building is they’re building sixes all the way at the end on the left hand side of the park. It’s it’s beautifully laid out for our purposes. There’s really not much that we need to do to it to make it work. There’s two different larger performance and presentation spaces where we can also do ensemble rehearsals. Then there’s several smaller spaces with the ability for students to go in and practice or even record. That’s one of the things we’re so excited to be able to be doing eventually in the building is to record the kids original music and teach them about how to do it instead of handing something to them, teach them how to fish.

Top Left Corner: [00:27:23] Mm No, absolutely. And today it is so much easier. And I’ll bring Richard back in to the conversation here, because today you can have a laptop and that’s about it. If you if you to get started, it’s amazing what, what, what people are doing, which was already underway. I mean, let’s face it, the Internet made things like collaboration across continents for musical projects possible. And then with the. The pandemic, people started looking for even greater ways. But, you know, you can have a laptop and and do some amazing stuff. So the just the very art of recording, of music production and recording is has changed drastically in the last 20 years or so. So that’ll be interesting to see what what the students do. Richard, this is going to be an afternoon of just smoking hot music. Tell us about who’s going to be there and what we’re going to hear.

Richard Boulger: [00:28:35] Yeah, Jason. So we have we have some fantastic musicians who are going to come out in addition, of course, to Jamal, as Jane mentioned. We have guitarist David Gilmore. David is a longtime faculty member. Also, all of our members, for the most part, are going to be are also our faculty members advanced. But David has been teaching at Berklee, Berklee College of Music since 2006, long time touring with Wayne Shorter and just so, so many other great artists. That’s Dave. We have another drummer, Victor Jones, who has just met longtime drummer of Stan Getz. Chaka Khan. He’s just a fantastic, great drummer. We have the great Alex Blake on bass. Alex is a former member of Sunrise Orchestra and Sonny Rollins and Freddie Hubbard and just the who’s who of the music world. Let’s see. Keep running down the line. And we have a great pianist named Dario Valente who just won his, I think his third Grammy Award or something. So he’s doing pretty well. And let’s see, we also have a few more. We have some dear friends of ours who are going to be joining us. Also, we have a childhood friend of mine who’s now a master musician in his own right now, Jim Taft, fantastic vocalist and drummer. And just he’s a super musician and of course, the one and only Jenna Coleman. Mr. Blues, I’m just so grateful for Gina. She’s every time I’ve had a chance to work with her on a series of her projects and everything that she serves up is just pure soul.

Richard Boulger: [00:30:27] So we also finally have a great saxophone player will be joining us, Mr. Chris Jensen. Chris Jensen and I go way back to my days when we first started studying at the Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz at the University of Hartford at the School of Music back in the mid eighties. And Chris is an alumni excuse me, Chris is an alumni of Dickey Betts, Great Southern for nine years, and also the Maynard Ferguson Band for a long period of time. And Chris is actually the reason why I got involved myself, was introduced to Jaimoe and consequently started touring with Gregg Allman’s band and the Allman Brothers. So everything’s sort of coming full circle for us as sort of an extended family, if you will, of musicians and coming together for a common cause, which is to bring a spirit and energy, if you will, of just trying to introduce the community to what the possibilities of music are. I would say that there’s no rehearsals for this. There’s no music on stands. We’re just going to show up and tap into the moment and we’re going to play. And I think that’s sort of the spirit of what we honor is, is that the music itself will tell us what it wants to do. So I just couldn’t be more excited about July 17th.

Top Left Corner: [00:31:47] Nm Likewise, this is going to be great food and drink from the freight yard pub nearby. So people have they can bring their appetites for for vittles as well as, as music. The what it’s an outdoor show. Just, I don’t want to jinx anything obviously but do you have any is able to be something you can pull inside if need be.

Richard Boulger: [00:32:18] To be honest with you, we’re sort of rolling the dice here. We’ve got the number we’re looking for is we’re anticipating 400 folks to show up. So that’s about where we’re that world of a number, somewhere in that ballpark. And if it rains, it rains. But we’re sort of having faith in the guys will be good to us for that day.

Top Left Corner: [00:32:39] That’s a you know, a lot of events this summer have done pretty well. So I’m going to I’m going to guess that that the gods will be good to you. Well, any I guess we have the website in the show notes. I’ll put a link to not just the. Academy, but also the event bright tickets. Tickets are on sale, I assume, right now for this event. And probably once people start hearing about this, I have a feeling there’s you’re going to want to you’re going to want to scooch. You’re going to want to hurry up and grab these tickets. Because 400 people that’s you know, that sells out quickly when it’s this caliber of of a production. I think that that’s what I want people to take away from this is that you’re not going to get this every weekend anywhere. This is a star studded band. And like you said, a bunch of musicians who are able to actually let the music make the decisions. And that’s not everybody. You know, that’s that’s something that, like you said, there’s no music stand. There’s no you just you just going, I can’t wait for it. It’s going to be great. Let me just ask you one final thing. Are there any dates, deadlines for. Pre-registering for classes that students need to know about.

Richard Boulger: [00:34:21] Right. So our jazz camp is this summer. The fourth jazz campus Jane mentioned is going to be August 15th through the 19th. And so we would ask students to sign up as soon as they can. And we’ve got some slots still open, but we are getting students that are really starting to sign up. So if you have a child student who wants to join us, a young music student in your circles, please visit our website. And definitely we’d love to work with each of you.

Top Left Corner: [00:34:51] Well, this sounds great and I’m looking forward to it. Richard and Jane, thanks so much for coming on the Top Left Corner and telling us about this.

Richard Boulger: [00:35:00] Thank you, Jason, and thank you to GreylockGlass.com and all of your listeners. Thank you so much.

[JASON VELÁZQUEZ]

Well, there you have it. Quite the event, don’t you think? It’s going to be a lot of talent, a whole bunch of music, and it is for a great cause. And I really hope that people both locally and even maybe visitors who are here for the summer, for a couple of weeks, they give their kids a chance to to experience this intensive musical academy. I think it’s going to be great. Just having knowing there’s a jazz camp around means that there’s going to be some great recitals coming up, some some cool recitals to go to. So I think we’ll have the link, of course, in the show notes and and I hope to see you there.

So that’s our show for the day for this week. Tune in next week for whatever it is I have on tap. I don’t know exactly yet. I’ve got a couple of options, but sure, until then, stay safe. Be good to each other and go easy on yourself.

The post Top Left Corner #160
BAAMS Grand Opening appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

Hello and thanks for tuning into the Top Left Corner! This episode was brought to you in part by Shakespeare & Company, celebrating their 45th Season.

The Hate (feat. Kat Riggins & Justin Johnson)

“The Hate” was written in response to a comment left on Misty Blues’ “Freight Car” YouTube music video on 12/26/21. As the African American lead singer/founder of Misty Blues, Gina Coleman, I’m unfortunately no stranger to hate speech. This incident was especially egregious for me because I’d never previously experienced such hatred directed at my music.  We find it important to shed light on this incident to demonstrate how divisive some people continue to be.  This song also serves as a vehicle for non-marginalized groups to be aware of the pervasiveness of these types of encounters. 

North Adams Public Library urges families to sign up for its 2022 Summer Reading Program with the theme Read Beyond the Beaten Path. 

North Adams Public Library launches its 2022 Summer Reading Program on June 27th. During the following month, the library will host a range of free activities for children, teens, and adults to encourage and support a love of reading. Participants can win prizes for reading. “We’ve planned a great program for folks to see the library as a place to read, have fun, and learn about their community and world,” said Nora Zahn, Youth Services Librarian. “The Read Off The Beaten Path theme evokes summer camp and the outdoors, so we’ve planned a wide range of events with an emphasis on nature and spending time outside.”

There’s also a serious side to summer reading. Research has shown that reading over the summer prevents learning loss while kids are out of school. “Students read more when they can choose materials based on their own interests,” Zahn added. “Our library is committed to supporting lifelong learning for North Adams families.” To learn more about the summer reading adventure at North Adams Public Library or to sign up, please call 413-662-3133 or visit the library’s website.

The following is a full list of events for the 2022 Summer Reading Program. Events are offered courtesy of the Friends of the North Adams Public Library, Cultural Council of Northern Berkshire, and Massachusetts Cultural Council. All events are free to attend. All events are drop-in unless otherwise noted.

• Story in Action – interactive storytelling for all ages with Allison Lerman-Gluck of Allie Tells Stories. Monday, June 27th at 6pm on the library’s front lawn.
• Author Maureen Callahan Smith – new book, Grace Street: A Sister’s Memoir of Grief & Gratitude. For adults. Wednesday, June 29th at 6pm at the library.
• Stomp Rockets with the Berkshire STEM Network for families with kids of all ages. Thursday, July 7th at 10:30am at Colegrove Park. Rain date Monday, July 11th at 10:30am.
• Tarot Workshop with Rebecca Guanzon of Wild Soul River in Williamstown. Beginners welcome. Wednesday, July 13th at 6pm at the library.
• Tie Dye – for ages seven and up. Thursday, July 14th at 1pm on the library’s front lawn.
• Matt York Concert – New England singer/songwriter live on the library’s front lawn. Saturday, June 16th at 11am.
• Macramé and Terrariums – for teens and adults. Wednesday, July 20th at 5:30pm at the library. Advance sign-ups required; beginners welcome.
• Wildlife Balloon Animal Twisting – with Ed the Wizard. For ages seven and up. Friday, July 22nd at 10:30am on the library’s front lawn.
• Garden Stones Painting – for ages seven and up. Thursday, July 28th at 1pm.
• LibraryBEATS! Drum and Rhythm Circle – with Otha Day of Drum To The Beat. Friday, July 29th at 6pm on the library’s front lawn.

Weekly Programs:

• Kids Garden Club – For ages seven and up. Mondays from 10:30-11:30am on the library’s front lawn from June 27th-August 8th, skipping July 4th.
• Toddler Time – For kids ages 1-3 and their caregivers. Tuesdays at 10:30am at the library. Ongoing.
• Teen Gardening – collaboration between NAPL and ROOTS Teen Center. Tuesdays from 3:30-5:30pm, at the library and/or ROOTS Teen Center. Now through late August.
• Story and Craft Time – with community partners and library staff. For kids ages 4 and up. Wednesdays at 10:30am from June 29th-July 27th.

The post Top Left Corner #159 — Junteeth & Fathers Day edition appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

Editor’s Note: The Greylock Glass pays to have rough transcripts of interviews produced. We attempt to remain as faithful as possible to the speakers’ original meaning, and apologize for any errors of transcription. That said, even the imperfect transcription we perform is costly. Please support us financially by becoming a member or making a one-time contribution to help us continue to provide this service.

Today is Saturday, May 21, 2022, and this is episode 158 of the Top Left Corner. I’m your host, Jay Velázquez, and, as always, I thank you for tuning in.

We have a great show today, because friend of the show Michael Lavery is on as our guest, candidate Michael Lavery. That’s right, Michael Lavery is running as the Green-Rainbow Party Candidate for State Representative, Berkshire County Third District, challenging incumbent William “Smitty” Pignatelli, who has run unopposed in the general election every race since Lee Laugenour, also from the Green Party, challenged the seat in 2012.

Many have wondered that no Republican has gone up against Pignatelli since James J. Bashour’s 2004 attempt that fell short by a spread of more than 45 points. Williams College Professor of Political Science, Jim Mahon, explained to the Williams Record in 2020 that candidates who may have identified as moderate Republicans in previous years are now Democrats. Comparing Pignatelli to Berkshire 1st District Representative John Barrett, he said that Pignatelli is “…pretty conservative on a lot of stuff, but he knows well that he is more conservative than the district.”

Pignatelli has held the same seat since his predecesor, Christopher Hodgkins, chose not to attempt to extend his own 20-year occupation of the office.

We’ll get to our conversation with Michael Lavery in a moment, but first I’d like to express our thanks to all of our supporters who make our work possible — both our much loved individual contributors and our small batch of advertisers, like Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Massachusetts, celebrating its 45th season of unparalleled regional theatre.

This show also has some casual organizational friends, like the Billsville House Concerts, presenting Allison de Groot and Tatiana Hargreaves at The Coffee Bar in Bennington, Vermont tonight at 8 p.m. A few tickets are still available, and we’ve provided a link in the shownotes.

I fell so hard in love with the sound of de Groot and Hargreaves, that I contacted them to set up an interview for The Cornbread Cafe. I wasn’t able to get it scheduled before their show, but the duo was kind enough to offer me a song to play for you on this show to wet your whistle, so right now, let’s listen to “Hurricane Clarice” Allison de Groot and Tatiana Hargreaves right now on the Top Left Corner.

Performing 8:00 p.m. Saturday, May 21, 2022 at The Coffee Bar, in Bennington, Vert.
GET TICKETS.
New album, Hurricane Clarice, available from Free Dirt Records.

Traditional music is not static; it shifts with the times, uncovering new meanings in old words, new ways of talking about the communal pathways that led us to where we are today. For master musicians Allison de Groot & Tatiana Hargreaves, traditional stringband music is a way to interpret our uncertain times, to draw artistic inspiration and power from the sources of meaning in their lives. History, family, literature, live performance, and environmental instability all manifest in the sounds, feelings, and sensations that permeate their new album, Hurricane Clarice (coming March 25 from Free Dirt Records). Recording last year in the midst of a global pandemic and during an unprecedented heat wave that saw the city of Portland, Oregon burning under 120 degree heat, these two master musicians found themselves turning to their own communities, to their families, to bring that support into the music. In fact, it was producer Phil Cook (Megafaun, Hiss Golden Messenger) who suggested the two weave their own family histories into the project by including audio recordings of each of their own grandmothers. The album became a direct infusion of centuries of matrilineal folk wisdom, a fiery breath of apocalyptic grandmother energy. And yet the beauty of Allison de Groot & Tatiana Hargreaves’ music is that they’re using these old sounds to speak to something new, to speak to a dying world.

[AUDIO: Hurricane , by Hurricane Clarice” Allison de Groot and Tatiana Hargreaves]

Michael Lavery is 51 years old and is married with two children who attend Becket/Washington School in Becket, MA. The Laverys have enjoyed living in the Berkshires since 2011 when they moved to Becket from Springfield, MA. Michael has worked in the Albany, NY area since 2011 as a Systems Administrator and Operations Manager. He currently works for PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in the Tax Division. He has been working remotely since the current Covid pandemic started in March of 2020. He is also an elected official serving the Town of Becket as a Select Board member since his election in 2017 and reelection in 2020.

Jay: Amazing. That’s all I can say. A limited number of tix are still available, so click that link in the show notes and snatch them up.

If you haven’t heard of Billsville House Concerts, by the way,
they have brought outstanding live music performances like the one at the Coffee Bar in Bennington tonight to intimate settings in the area for many years. I don’t know if there’s ever an exception, but Billsville generally books artists in the American Roots vein who they themselves want to see, give them a great spot to play in a great part of the county, a fine helping of their vegetarian cooking, a place to stay for the night – and 100% of the proceeds.

That’s a commitment to independent music very few people can boast.

Right now, let’s turn to our conversation with Michael Lavery, candidate for State Representative for Berkshire County Third District.

Top Left Corner: Michael Lavery, thanks so much for being on the Top Left Corner. How are how are you today?

Michael Lavery: [00:01:38] Doing well J. Thanks. And how’s your Friday going so far?

Top Left Corner: [00:01:41] My Friday is okay. It’s been just kind of raw, though. It’s been chilly. I’m getting I shouldn’t complain. I know that we could be California, for example, or the Southwest, but I’m just I’m I’m tired of the raw weather we’re having.

Michael Lavery: [00:01:59] Well, it is kind of odd to not have more sun in May in New England even. But I suppose with all the changes to the climate, it’s going to have unexpected weather patterns.

Top Left Corner: [00:02:14] It’s going.

Michael Lavery: [00:02:14] To have. Yeah, yeah.

Top Left Corner: [00:02:16] Until we finally.

Michael Lavery: [00:02:17] Do something different.

Top Left Corner: [00:02:18] Do something different, pull some carbon out of the atmosphere. I don’t know. I don’t know what we’re going to do about it. But but yeah, definitely we’re, we’re seeing different, different climate. And this was somewhat predicted, but not exactly. I remember listening to a fellow described New England’s weather patterns around now, but this was 25 years ago. He said New England’s weather, you know, in the first quarter of the 20th century will shift. The 21st century will shift to more of that of the sea, the Appalachian, Tennessee, North Carolina sort of climate, which is, you know, not not so cold, not so snowy winters, but more raw and rainy. And we’re getting there. That’s definitely happening. And we can talk about it. Go ahead. Yeah, I want to talk about climate, too, because that’s going to be a big part of your bailiwick, I think. Should you be successful in your bid for state representative against Smitty Pignatelli first before? Because, you know, he’s he’s talked a good talk ago about climate. But but we’ll get into that. First of all, you I think the last we had you on a show officially had you won your seat on the Beckett select board.

Michael Lavery: [00:03:52] Yes, I’m in my second term. I started running in 2017 and had to reach. Run. I guess you’d put it in T20. I ran unopposed. There were some write in candidates, but nothing to speak of.

Top Left Corner: [00:04:11] So. Yeah.

Michael Lavery: [00:04:13] I’m happy with two terms and I don’t think I’m seeking a third term. And I announced that to my select board compatriots in Beckett. So this run for Senate, if it’s successful, I would start in January on the 4th of January 2023 and I’d have a couple more months of Selectboard duty. So I’d probably have to resign my position as of January for the three months until May of 2023, when when I would have to run again.

Top Left Corner: [00:04:49] So let’s talk a little bit about what what’s your background is and then eventually lead into how you decided to run for the select board. What what’s your occupation know? What do you do? Bye bye. You know, betrayed and what’s your background?

Michael Lavery: [00:05:09] So I’ve got a degree in computer science from Connecticut State College, Eastern Connecticut in Willimantic, and that’s from 1992. I’m a 51 year old. I’ve been living in Berkshire County for 12 or 13 years, most of it in Beckett. We built our house in 2011, and my background in politics is, well, you asked my day job. I’m a currently in computer science, as I mentioned, was my degree choice. And I’ve been doing sort of Linux systems administration and website maintenance for four big Fortune 100 companies. Currently, I’m with one of the Big Four accounting firms, PricewaterhouseCoopers in Albany, but I haven’t commuted to the office in over two years, as many people can attest, due to the pandemic. So I’m working from Battle station Lavery Hacienda in Beckett.

Top Left Corner: [00:06:16] Well, I’ll tell you, I suppose there are a number of gigs that that that’s possible. And I’m guessing the computer world as a whole, you know, just as I was a Twitter, nobody was working from off from from the office. They were all working from home for the last I don’t know how long, but the the question that that is on my mind is, is really what propelled you to think that politics was an interest, a passion or or just a call to duty?

Michael Lavery: [00:06:56] Yeah. I’ve been involved in small town and small sort of collegiate government. I was a member of my student senate body and head accolades there. I let let it go for a while. And sort of only did volunteer work after the unsuccessful campaign of Mr. Sanders, our senator from north of us in Vermont. In 2016. He he lost. But he said at the end, Leo, this is you. This is your campaign. And you you have to go out and represent and do locally what I tried to do. So I took that to heart and ran. And I had just finished a master’s online for public relations and I said, I’ll put this to good use. And it worked. I ran against a third generation townee, so to speak. His father had been in town government and his mother had been town clerk in Beckett, so the chances of me winning were pretty slim, according to most pundits, political wonks in town. And what I did when it was by mandate, you know, over 25 percentage points. So that’s.

Top Left Corner: [00:08:14] Big.

Michael Lavery: [00:08:16] Yeah, that was unheard of. And I got a lot of emails and calls the next day and said, Well, I’ve never seen that. I didn’t think that would happen, but we had a good ground game and I did all the things that I hope I can mirror here. I know it’s a bigger chunk of real estate, you know, 18 towns in southern Berkshires and one of the towns is new. Smitty and I are not known to these people in Dalton at least. You know, people in Dalton hadn’t had him as their rep. So John Barrett’s not or I don’t know if it’s John Barrett or Paul Mark, but with due to the redistricting last year and the census results, people are leaving the Berkshires at least full time residents. And maybe that’ll change with the pandemic. I know a lot of people have moved into country homes and gotten out of the city, so it could have just been a timing. With the census and the COVID people still consider themselves residents of their their other house or their their apartment. But so that was what propelled me into the local politics and why I chose to run against somebody for state rep i. I want to either make this a full time job or get out entirely for the near term. My kids are at that age where they’re going to be going to piano lessons and going to soccer games and things. So I didn’t want to have a full time job. And the Selectboard thing, it’s a lot of extra hours.

Top Left Corner: [00:09:54] So sure, you’re looking to to make a difference, but you’re not looking to to stretch yourself so thin that you’re going to miss some of the best the best times. I hear you. Right. Well, and it’s it’s difficult raising a family is is not easy for anybody these days, any days. And it’s definitely not easy for somebody who’s going to be in the public eye and potentially traveling, doing a lot of traveling. I mean, you’ll be hitting the road, visiting these these towns that are represented. You’ll be going back and forth to Beacon Hill. Do you what do you think? What do you think your level of preparedness is for the just the sheer stamina that you’ll need to to to to really conquer that position.

Michael Lavery: [00:10:52] Well, I’ve had jobs that were almost as far away. I made the commute from Beckett to upstate New York for four jobs at GE. And I would think that this would be a longer than that to over 2 hours. I do have an electric vehicle and it’s got the modern Bluetooth and things conveniences so I could listen to podcasts and things. I have relatives and in-laws in Melrose, Mass. So I think at the near term I would have a place to say they have a duplex. That’s the second side of. It’s unused.

Top Left Corner: [00:11:30] That’s right.

Michael Lavery: [00:11:31] That that would be convenient. Yeah. I could stay in town for a few days and then come back to the Berkshires. I think most of these representatives and senators have a regional office that they are at a couple of days a week and they’re not always in in Beacon Hill. Yeah, but I’m not really sure. And am I ready for it? I think so, yeah. I want to do more. I want to bring my experience of small town hill town life to to the eastern mass folks who may think that Western Mass stops in Worcester.

Top Left Corner: [00:12:08] Yeah, I’m glad you say that. It’s it’s a very common oh, it’s sort of like a lot of people think that Connecticut stops in Manchester, but it’s going the other way. Right? There’s nothing there’s nothing beyond, say, Manchester or. Once that sort of hoity toity community near their.

Michael Lavery: [00:12:38] Com well or.

Top Left Corner: [00:12:40] No? I can’t recall. Well, it doesn’t matter.

Michael Lavery: [00:12:45] Middletown.

Top Left Corner: [00:12:47] No, no, no, no. It’ll come to me. It’ll just. It’s been a long time. I still live in Connecticut, so.

Michael Lavery: [00:12:53] Yeah, I spent a lot of time there too.

Top Left Corner: [00:12:56] So I don’t ask the question because I have any doubt in your physical, you know, fitness for the job. But it does occur to me, as I am just a couple of years older than you are, and it occurs to me that there are considerations that I wouldn’t have thought of even ten years ago. And one of those considerations is the amount of sort of toll that it’ll take. And I noticed that a lot of you know, a lot of, you know, politicians, they make a big deal out of their say, their fitness and health regime regimen. And and there’s a reason for that. I think it’s probably because of they you just have to be on your game and you have to be physically fit to to put up with that kind of stress. I don’t know that it has always been expected that the politicians would be as mobile as they are. But these days, yeah, it is expected that you show up regularly in each of these towns, which, you know, you think 100 years ago, 120 years ago, it just wasn’t going to happen. You were you know, you maybe do it once, do your horse and buggy tour or you do a whistle stop tour on the on the train. Everybody would come and see you. But it.

Michael Lavery: [00:14:22] Was dangerous. It was, you know, life threatening with the world, the wilds of western Massachusetts. I’ve read some history books of priests and folks who had to travel, and there was definitely scary moments on the trails back then.

Top Left Corner: [00:14:37] But I have no doubt. Can you.

Michael Lavery: [00:14:39] Imagine?

Top Left Corner: [00:14:40] Yeah, I have no doubt that it must have been pretty, pretty hairy. In fact, just some of the roads you could get you could get bogged down in the mud for, you know, a week if you’re not careful.

Michael Lavery: [00:14:53] So let’s it in modern times.

Top Left Corner: [00:14:57] Yeah, well, I wasn’t going to say, but. Yeah, I know. So, so that’s that’s something that I haven’t asked before of anybody. But maybe it’s just something this week and the like I said, I’m complaining about the cold and the, and the bitterness and maybe that’s telling me something that I should probably invest in a home in Arizona or or Florida for the winter or something. Anyway, so you are. You are not. You are not without a political sort of identity. You’re not without some pretty strong ideas about what’s up, what’s wrong with this country and probably the state. Obviously, you wouldn’t be running against Minnie Pignatelli, who is fairly entrenched as an incumbent unless you had some pretty strong ideas. What made you think that this was the next step for you?

Michael Lavery: [00:16:11] Thanks, Jay. I think that we’re at a critical time in our. Culture and. The whole history of civilization. We live in an amazing time and we’ve had tremendous modern conveniences and we’ve grown accustomed to, like you said, people have to travel all the time now. And it’s just a matter of course, we we’re not in horse and buggy days and that’s all through hydrocarbons. And we’re flooding the zone with terrible emissions. And carbon is just one of them, you know, CO2, gas and methane and things. So climate change is real and it’s human caused. We’ve entered what some folks, you know, we think in geologic terms in epochs, they’re calling this epoch Anthropocene and Anthro, of course, is Greek for humanity. So we’ve really put ourselves here after the industrial age. It’s considered the Anthropocene epoch. So it’s caused by what we’ve put in the atmosphere. And I think even if the United States and other countries, the G8 or G7, depending on if you include Russia, if we honored the Paris Accord and did those things, it still wouldn’t be enough. There’s countries coming online that want to have what we had for the last 30 years, like India and China.

Michael Lavery: [00:17:46] And who’s to say they can’t get their middle class up and use the technology and engines and gasoline powered vehicles and things? So it’s going to be tough and I don’t know that we’re going to mitigate it. So we might have to realize that we’ll have to do things differently and the pandemic put a big spotlight on it. Shipping things across the world doesn’t make a lot of sense. And if the logistics of those transportation pieces don’t fall into place, then we’re out of luck and our shelves and our grocery stores and our local convenience stores. So there’s got to be a new look at things and living locally and going back to that feudal kind of where towns had farms and and, you know, people traded goods and services. And that might be a way to do things. I don’t know how to put policies around that, but I just want to bring that attention as almost like a homeland security thing, like we have to start planning disaster recovery and and putting things into place so that we have a road map for it. If if things go south.

Top Left Corner: [00:19:09] Well, money is money is policy, right? I mean, that’s that’s the fact where you put your money is where you’re putting your policy. And we have a strong network of farmers markets in the region. We have agricultural organizations, not just one, but but a few that have been around for a long time. Some actually. There’s a couple of new ones. And it seems to me that if we had the will, we could decentralize and we could localize rather quickly if we needed to. The the challenge, of course, being that there’s land that is being chopped up and turned into little estates with little McMansions on them. And that’s a that’s a problem, I think, because as a is a talk, I mean, this becomes an almost every conversation I have about public policy is that during the Depression, during the Dust Bowl, it was New England and California and Oregon that fed the country because we lost the breadbasket. It blew away. And the wind, the topsoil was, you know, was so thin and it there was a drought and now.

Michael Lavery: [00:20:28] Yeah, Grapes of Wrath and all all of that.

Top Left Corner: [00:20:32] And now the problem is that we’re having the same sorts of threats, whether threats, climate threats, droughts and fires, except that California isn’t being spared. California is burning as is even Oregon.

Michael Lavery: [00:20:48] So every summer there’s five different major weather crises going on across the entire country. If you if they put it up on a map and it’s different, it changes every week.

Top Left Corner: [00:21:01] Yeah. So New England is one of the few places that, you know, love it for four or, you know, love it or hate it for some of its its eccentricities. But it’s one of the few places where you can still dependably grow food. We have a shorter. Growing season in western Massachusetts than in some places. But we do still have, you know, temperatures below 100 degrees most of the time. We still have an adequate amount of rain, groundwater. And if we needed to feed the country, we probably could could do along with the rest of the East Coast. We probably could, but not if we are not, as you said, putting some mitigation strategies, you know, out there right away. What? What do you think the. The appetite is locally or even across the Commonwealth for this sort of, you know, all hands on deck engagement.

Michael Lavery: [00:22:12] Well, I’d say the Commonwealth is doing better than some states and that’s because we’ve got a plan for 2050 with E-Vehicles and changing the fleet out. I think there’s a Senate bill. I haven’t read it completely that increases that timeline or narrows it down to 2035. I even think it might have passed the Senate by now, but I have to look into that. I think the Commonwealth is ready, more ready than other places, but we haven’t explored other great options that we have. Being right on the coast which wind turbines offshore and the technology’s gotten a lot better than the distance from the actual land can be increased since the Mass Wind project or Cape Wind that was shot down by the Kennedys who didn’t want to see the turbines from their McMansion or their compound on Cape Cod. But. Things like that need to be explored. You can’t outsource wind turbines to China. You have to maintain them by folks sitting in the seats in in Massachusetts. And a lot of these Gloucester men who can’t fish anymore because the lobster, if they moved to Nova Scotia, can refit their rigs and get out on their boats or whatever to climb up in a turbine and check it or all a blade out there. So these are things that people in the Commonwealth can gain experience with in greening the economy, so to speak, by using renewables and. Yes. Some of these things are dug up by young children like the lithium mines for the batteries. But it’s a lot less dangerous than uranium. And I don’t want to put up a new nuclear power plant when we’ve got sun and wind and in abundance.

Top Left Corner: [00:24:17] Yeah. That that is rears its ugly head every time there’s a threat to the to the, you know, the fossil fuel industry. There’s always this well, you know, if you people would just accept nuclear, it’s clean energy. Well, it’s clean until you have to figure out what to do with the with the spent, you know, you know, rods and whatnot. And then all of a sudden, you have things like, you know, these these cooling pools that that leak, as they did over in New Hampshire.

Michael Lavery: [00:24:59] There’s no perfect solution, even digging a hole in Utah or Nevada somewhere. And people living out there don’t want it, like the people in LA Mess don’t want a PCB warehouse from GE in their town. So nuclear isn’t the stopgap that people want it to be. There is this storage problem with wind and solar, but I think we can use things like flywheels and other forms of storage. Usually wind and solar go hand in hand. When it’s raining out it it’s windy. And likewise when it’s a sunny day, yeah, there’s there’s less wind. So using the two in conjunction, we have a lot of hydro we can use in mass to I don’t want to dam up rivers. That’s not good either.

Top Left Corner: [00:25:52] But do you know what they’re doing in Europe right now? They’re testing they’re testing out storm storm drain and storm pipes and even sewage pipe. Turbines. So yeah, as the water flows because it’s all flowing, right? It’s all going somewhere all the time. And most of the the, you know, the stuff that’s going through sewer pipes is, is liquid. And there’s some really clever designs that are sort of separating out the solids from the liquids and using the liquid channel as, as a, as a turbine. And since it’s always running, you know, so it’s like.

Michael Lavery: [00:26:39] These three foot means that we could have power off of while we’re sending pressurized water downhill or whatever. It’s just.

Top Left Corner: [00:26:48] Well, just. Yeah.

Michael Lavery: [00:26:49] Untapped energy.

Top Left Corner: [00:26:50] You know, in the Berkshires. Stick your ear next to a storm drain almost any day of the year, and you’re going to hear water flowing through it, even in even in the summertime. That’s just, you know, springs and runoff and all that. And it’s water that that you you know, it’s already in the system. You don’t have to capture it. It’s there. So that’s my little soapbox for the day. Now, your opponent, Smitty Pignatelli. I don’t remember how long he’s been in in. In office.

Michael Lavery: [00:27:25] He ran in 2002 and his first day was 2003. So.

Top Left Corner: [00:27:30] Okay. So 20 years? Yeah. 20 years. He is. What is he now? He is the. He’s on the. He’s the chair of the Joint Committee on Environment, Natural Resources and Agriculture. You would think that he’d be really on his game when it comes to this. I actually had a question about some bills a couple of years ago, and his office declined to return my calls and emails about it. And it was actually going to be, of course. Yeah, it was actually a fairly you know, I don’t want to say a puff piece because it was far from that. But there was no I mean, there was no like gotcha. It was I’m just calling to get to get a quote. So.

Michael Lavery: [00:28:20] You know, that’s part of the problem. These these folks even chairs and even if the sponsor a bill or co-sponsor it, that doesn’t mean that they’re voting for it positively when it comes up. And we don’t know because the constituents in mass don’t get to see the vote unless they stand up and say we need a roll call and it’s very hard to do so. It doesn’t happen very often. So a lot of times we don’t know how our senators and representatives are voting on these issues unless there’s a roll call.

Top Left Corner: [00:28:58] So you could you could actually be a sponsor of something so that it looks good back home, but then shoot it down and in committee so that it never goes anywhere.

Michael Lavery: [00:29:08] Not even get it anywhere. Right. So that’s one of my biggest planks is transparency and I’ve signed the pledge from en masse dot org and stated that if I win office I will definitely make that one of my priorities to change. We’re fourth from the bottom in transparency in the country and we were one of the first democracies in the in the whole country. So that just smacks of insincerity.

Top Left Corner: [00:29:35] Yeah.

Michael Lavery: [00:29:36] The speaker controls how much these guys are making guys and gals because I guess depending on what committee you’re on, actually increases your salary. So the speaker can say can nix things right from the bully pulpit. They hold a lot of power.

Top Left Corner: [00:29:55] That’s really it’s really frightening.

Michael Lavery: [00:29:58] Same day voting. That’s a no brainer, right? Like it’s a it’s a totally blue Senate and House. And same day, voting is a big Democratic issue. Right? It didn’t pass. None of the Berkshire delegations voted for same day voting. And I couldn’t believe it. I would definitely vote for same day voting.

Top Left Corner: [00:30:17] Yeah it’s know there’s there’s there’s no reason this is 2022. We have the technology to find out if you’re registered or rather to get you registered and have you voting. At the same time, we have the technology to find out if you are a if you are a resident. These are not this is not mystical, arcane stuff that we have to, you know, blow off some dusty ledger. And, no, it’s it’s easy to find out.

Michael Lavery: [00:30:44] And the technology goes for the same thing about knowing who voted where they have buttons on their desk. That’s that’s a yes or no irony. And and it’s recorded immediately, electronically. So it’s not like we don’t know how or we can’t do it. It’s already there. So transparency. Yeah, it’s a big piece.

Top Left Corner: [00:31:07] So really it’s when you don’t have the transparency, what you have is a situation where you don’t even know what questions to ask. Right? You don’t know, for example, to ask the question, well, wait a minute, are you actually in the pocket of so-and-so? I mean, you can’t even ask that because you don’t know what they did. You know, you can have a pretty good idea. You can have a pretty good idea of which lobbying groups, which institutions and industries would be trying to kill a bill. But if you don’t know how your representatives and senators voted on it, you can’t know whether or not they’re taking the side of you know, they can go back to the constituents. Well, gosh, you know, I supported it. I was the sponsor of the co-sponsor of the bill. And by gum, I was hoping that it would pass and then just nothing but those records.

Michael Lavery: [00:32:00] Since.

Top Left Corner: [00:32:01] The.

Michael Lavery: [00:32:01] Good the police. Yeah take for instance the police reform bill in the first iteration of it, Pignatelli voted against it. And when a group of his constituents concerned citizens to call them up and had a conference call with him, he said, I didn’t vote for it because I didn’t see the contents of the bill. In enough time. I only had 24 hours, whatever it was at the time. So you would think when the Act on Mask Bill came in through the committee that he would vote for that because one of the elements of the bill was a guaranteed 72 hour period when any bill before them would need to be reviewed. Well, wouldn’t you know somebody voted against that, too? So you can’t have it both ways. Mr.. Mr.. Representative.

Top Left Corner: [00:32:52] I just yeah. And that’s that’s amazing. That’s amazing. So basically, you’re voting you’re shooting down something so that you’ll always have an excuse.

Michael Lavery: [00:33:02] It seems so out here that a lot of people are interested in politics. But you can look some of this stuff up online and find out, you know, the Green Party has four pillars, the environment which we’ve spoken about and voter access, I think we just touched on. But social justice, I’m for drug decriminalization. A lot of the people in jail right now are prisoners just because they had low level nonviolent drug crimes that, you know, personal use. I’m not talking about decriminalizing drug lords and cartels and things amounts, but if you’re just in your house or on the street and and not causing problems otherwise, it’s just a moral issue at that point. It’s not drugs. The war on drugs we’ve lost long ago. It’s it’s just got to stop. We’ve got too many people of color and minorities and poor folks in jail for for relatively minor things.

Top Left Corner: [00:34:05] Yeah. Yeah, it’s it’s it’s staggering the number of people that are languishing still for, you know, very nonviolent, minimal impact situations here. And and there are other things, you know, people are talking about that.

Michael Lavery: [00:34:26] Poor fellow, Miguel Estrada, was not violent. He would have maybe been harming himself. But there were discrepancies even in the police stories early on from when they filed their official report about whether Mr. Estrada in Pittsfield was distraught that night. And his girlfriend even said later that the police reports changed. So the VA has to investigate that and have an independent report come out.

Top Left Corner: [00:34:55] Yeah, I know that Andrea Harrington’s office is investigating, I think, and I haven’t spoken with their office, so I don’t know. But I’m guessing that they probably were not thrilled that the police came up with their own finding so quickly. That unsurprisingly said, Oh, no, we actually acted completely within the confines of our of the operating, you know, manual there. It’s you know, I wasn’t surprised. I well, I should say I wanted to be surprised because I wanted to think that here in this day and age, you know, after after George Floyd, after after everything, after, you know, Philip Castillo out in Minnesota. Just that there would be a a serious and and public and fairly transparent. An investigation by the police that lasted more than a couple of weeks. I don’t know how I don’t know how you expect to be taken seriously when you release your your findings that quickly and they exonerate the police officers? No, I don’t know. I wasn’t there, so I can’t be sure what happened.

Michael Lavery: [00:36:24] Body cams. We have body cams that these folks were in big cities. We have. It should be a county wide.

Top Left Corner: [00:36:34] Should it be a statewide thing? I mean, that’s that’s a that’s a bit a that’s a bit of legislation that you could sponsor that you could author that. Definitely across the state. Now, there are some people who are against body cams saying that they end up being used against communities more than they end up protecting communities against police misconduct. I don’t know enough about the subject to know how that works. I would think that more. I would think that more video would be better. But I think it has to do with the fact that police get away with accidentally shutting off their cameras or accidentally forgetting to turn them on at certain points in time, whereas they never forget.

Michael Lavery: [00:37:20] Recording gets lost.

Top Left Corner: [00:37:21] Yeah, the recordings. Yeah, the recordings never get lost when they’re capturing somebody’s committing a crime so that, you know, that’s always kind of suss. Okay, so let’s talk about some other issues. We’ve talked climate, we’ve talked policing and transparency. We have some other big issues in this state. We’ve got the the the the. Fair Share Act, which is going to be on the ballot as well. And we’ve got issues of really gross wealth disparities here in the Commonwealth. What? What do you think that we need to know about that? And what do you propose we do to start addressing that?

Michael Lavery: [00:38:19] Well, it is a big issue. It’s a big issue countrywide. And the 1% owns more wealth than the bottom 40%. And stats like that. I think in the Commonwealth we have a number of millionaires and the fair share tax would. Would benefit us greatly to the tune of $1,000,000,000. I don’t know the numbers, but I definitely.

Top Left Corner: [00:38:44] So 2 billion a year, I think I think it’s about two. I think it’s 2 billion a year. Yeah.

Michael Lavery: [00:38:49] Yeah. So it came through the millionaire’s tax and maybe the wording on that smacked some people the wrong way. So fair share sounds, you know, that’s a good way to put it because. People who are benefiting more by virtue of the society we have here and politically protected or policing protects these businesses. And you can’t say. The way that we’re structured where businesses can flourish. It’s not like a third world country where even driving your products down the streets in Mogadishu or whatever, you have to provide your own security. We don’t have to do that in America. So people who have big businesses do benefit and they historically pay less in taxes because they have good accountants.

Top Left Corner: [00:39:44] So yeah, we’ve seen we’ve seen some really great stories coming out of The Intercept and other places that show how this is just recent, how if you make above a certain amount, you’re almost guaranteed not to be paying any taxes because they use what is a very clever method of borrowing to to finance their living expenses. So by by investing in their companies and then borrowing money. Then they always have this tax write off that the, you know, the interest that they’re paying on. On borrowing money. So it’s a really clever, clever scheme. And I would argue with you, actually. But push back anyway. You said a little while ago that the that there’s not as much interest in politics in out here in western Mass, in the Berkshires. I think it’s actually that there is a lot of interest in the things being exactly the way they are. I think I think that there’s a tremendous issue in politics as long as they remain exactly the same.

Michael Lavery: [00:40:57] That could be. Yeah, I agree with you.

Top Left Corner: [00:41:01] I mean, it’s it’s not so much that I you know, look, I, you know, I’m doing a piece right now on on. The hypocrisy of the, you know, the sort of white ally, you know, Black Lives Matter, you know, movement here in the Berkshires. And if you go through various businesses, websites, you look and you realize that. Most of the Berkshires only hires white people to any kind of management position. There’s almost there are almost no people of color in management in the Berkshires. There are some there are some exceptions. But in general, the folks who are running the show are typically white. They’re typically very often Protestant, although there’s there’s a certain amount of Catholic as well, the source of a lot of Italian and Irish influence here in, say, Pittsfield. But there’s a tremendous amount of sort of elitist, you know, classist and racist hiring practices. I could give you some I’m not going to because I don’t want to go spilling my my, you know, story here. But there are some businesses who, you know, they have been in business for a long time. And there isn’t not just in the upper management, but there isn’t a single person of color working there at all. We’re talking places that have, you know, 30 and more employees. Oftentimes, they don’t have to because if they have under 50, they pretty much escape any notice at all. But it’s it’s really I think it’s the case that there’s a lot of folks, especially out here in Western Mass, that want things to remain exactly the same. And again, that’s my second time up on the soapbox. I probably should stop and we should ask. I get I just get I just get so disappointed in some of the. Well, good.

Michael Lavery: [00:43:24] Yeah. I don’t I don’t see it all over the place. But I know Becket in particular, it’s like a 98% white population and I’m sure a lot of other small towns are similar. So it’s it’s troubling, but I don’t know legislatively what to do about it. I think we have to just make our towns more compassionate. And Becket has signed a compassionate agreement. We voted on it in town meeting one year. It has no teeth to it, but it definitely says, you know, to folks who are looking at this town as a possible place to live. The Selectboard, as a group, signed the Multicultural Bridge Pledge called Not in Our Town, and it’s about not allowing prejudice or racial or any type of sexual orientation or gender bias happen in the town. So those are things that you can do.

Top Left Corner: [00:44:24] I think that there are some things that people can do. I think that I think that because there are so many nonprofit organizations, especially arts organizations in the Berkshires, there are some things that you can legislate. For example, if I own a construction company and I get a job from to work for the state doing say, you know, asphalt or a bit of road or whatever, I get some state job, I win a contract. I am required to try to to make sure that I am hiring a certain percentage of people of color and women, and that if I am getting any supplies, I have to I have to look for vendors of color and women.

Michael Lavery: [00:45:18] So it can be done. I work for GWC and it’s very proactive in diversity and they do things in HR where they look at the number of people of color, Asian folks and women in the higher levels of the echelons. And they say, look, it’s not about a quota system, but it’s bringing to the attention of the executive officers and saying, we did this, increased it this year, but we could do better. Sure. I always interview folks like the Nflx has this policy of always having a person of color on the coaching staff when they look for new people. But that may have been a farce, as we’ve seen with the whole Patriot scandal.

Top Left Corner: [00:46:03] Yeah.

Michael Lavery: [00:46:04] Calling the wrong guy and saying, Oh, you got the job. Oh, you’re the black guy. I meant they call the white guy who didn’t get who got.

Top Left Corner: [00:46:12] Yeah, well it was I think that no, that was a scandal. And I think but you know, obviously there was there was some thought given to at least acknowledging that that they got a problem. But what I’m talking about is the nonprofit organizations that are getting millions and millions of dollars from taxpayer money through the Mass Cultural Commission, and they are not held to any standard. There is nothing that tells that says that they have to do their their supplier. You know, they don’t have to sdo supplier diversity. They have to go they don’t have to go through the SDO programs. That’s the Supplier Diversity Office. They don’t have to seek out people of color, business of color as contractors. You know, for example, if they if they do some architectural work or they do some contracting to whatever and whatever, put in a new plumbing system, they don’t have to do anything to try to comply with the same things that that construction companies, for example, have to do. Now, construction companies are. They are providing a service that is tangible that you can see, for example, a road that you can drive over. Right? Whereas some of these arts organizations are providing services that are taken advantage primarily by the extremely wealthy, and they don’t have to give anything back. There is no requirements that they do that. So that’s the second little bit of legislation that I would recommend that, you know, you think about because this is, as I said, come out here to the Berkshires, millions of dollars worth of taxpayer money that’s coming with no strings attached, or at least no racial, you know, minority women, LGBT. I mean, there’s no there’s none of those strings attached that there would be for for other businesses.

Michael Lavery: [00:48:17] So thank you, Jay. That’s food for thought. We are considered like the cultural hub out here, especially in the summer months with the BSO coming out to Tanglewood and Mass, MOCA and various venues. Even Jacob’s Pillow here in Beckett had an incident, a lady, a person of color with, you know, sort of dreadlocks and the cornrow type hair had some people sitting behind her. They were both audience members, you know, dressed to the nines for an outdoor event. And they were just touching her head without asking permission. And it was like, what the heck even is going on? So to pay close attention. And they took immediate action. It was nothing against the pillow, but they just it was like a spectacle. It was treating people like like characters in a carnival or something. It was terrible. I am sure it’s still out there even in 2020 or 2022. You know, we say we’ve come so far. We had a black president, our multiracial president and first lady, and people thought that was it. We were done, we accomplished it, but it’s gotten back backwards again a little bit with our orange person, the Cheeto himself.

Top Left Corner: [00:49:41] Hmm. Well, I think it hasn’t gotten a lot better under our President Biden. I think the challenge that I have with this president here is that he has been responsible for so many things over his over his decades of public service. I mean, he is responsible for Clarence Thomas being. The Supreme Court justice in office.

Michael Lavery: [00:50:08] Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I remember I was in college and watching the hearings, like Clarence Thomas and that lady who spoke against him. And it seemed like he wasn’t going to get into the Supreme Court role. Now, look, 20 years on, 30 years on, he’s still there.

Top Left Corner: [00:50:27] Well, I think it makes a big difference. And and I think that it’s similar. Well, look, this is Anita Hill, professor. And, you know.

Michael Lavery: [00:50:35] I couldn’t remember her name.

Top Left Corner: [00:50:36] And she and, you know, they were asking all manner of inappropriate questions that had to do with her personal life. There were designed to shame her and to to cast doubt upon her character. The questions were never about, you know, you know, can you explain, you know, it was it was never about Clarence Thomas. It was about destroying Anita Hill. In fact, there were other women who claimed that they had also been assaulted by Thomas and they weren’t allowed to speak. And the person who made that decision. Was Joe Biden. He was the one who decided ultimately that no one else could testify against now Chief Justice Clarence Thomas. And why it matters is because there is a Roe v Wade challenge that is before the court right now that apparently has already been decided since there was a leaked document. That was the leaked decision that was written to overturning Roe v Wade before the arguments had even begun. And this is a situation where the chickens come home to roost and.

Michael Lavery: [00:51:56] Well, the two party system is complicit in that. The Democrats have had ample opportunity when they were in power to make this a an issue decided in Congress and codify it into law. And they wanted to make it a political football so that they could raise funds on abortion rights. And I think that’s part of why the third party or the fourth party or however many parties need a seat at the table. And, you know, this might be a watershed event that this whole decision that was leaked here for a third party option.

Top Left Corner: [00:52:29] Do you do you think. Now, obviously, we’ve had some luck in the past getting interest both in the Green Party, Green, Massachusetts, Green Rainbow Party. And we have had some interest in, say, the Berkshires DSA, Democratic Socialists of America, of which I’m a member. And I yeah. And I think that there is the opportunity for people to, to, to start realizing. That the two party system is not the way to go. A lot of people are hoping that there’s going to be this national level, you know, sort of take down of the two party system. Most people realize that it really happens over a long period of time and it starts at the local level as you’re doing right as you’re doing right now. Tell me about your hopes for for getting people interested in a different way.

Michael Lavery: [00:53:40] Look, I’m going to be honest. And Green Party hasn’t won a state office, I think, nationally. So there are people who serve in Green Party and they were elected in a different party, but they changed to Green Party. So I might be the first and that would be great. But I just want to move the needle and start the discussion and expand the conversation and talk about issues like we’ve just been speaking about for a little while here. And I think that’s what we need as a country. We’ve got to start locally. The federal government is a mess. The two party system. It’s like a wrestling match where one is the shoe, as it’s called, the wrestling term for the evil character. And then the other guy is is the hero. And it’s like those old timey railroad stories with the Snidely Whiplash twirling his mustache. And the hero comes and they don’t actually get anything done. They just rescue the princess. And these issues that are top, front and center news for the mainstream media, it’s a show we have to sort of get back to the old way of doing things and get to the issues that we can all agree on. And I think climate change is a huge part of that. There’s other issues like gun control, 70 or 80%, both parties doing surveys on the street. Just regular people want some form of gun control like sensible reform. The other thing, abortion, too. I mean, these decisions the Supreme Court are making are are the minority. 20% or less of people want abortion to be illegal. And the Supreme Court has gotten into this representing the. The political class. It’s it’s no longer a democracy for and for the people. It’s largely an oligarchy. Yeah. And we’re getting close to almost an autocracy.

Top Left Corner: [00:55:44] Well, that’s the thing. If we don’t if look. And that never ends well and I think this is one of those things that the oligarchs never seemed to remember. It doesn’t ever end well for them. Right. I mean, in fact, having a blatant, in-your-face autocracy, autocracy is one of the most dangerous places for it to be if you happen to be one of them. I mean, you know, you know, we just have to look back to, you know, France in 1787 or. Or, you know, some place like, oh, when they overthrew Slobodan Milosevic, that was in. Was that in Yugoslavia?

Michael Lavery: [00:56:36] Certain glasnost or in my history.

Top Left Corner: [00:56:40] I’m going I’m I’m struggling here. But the case is people eventually say it’s not worth it. It is the only thing we can do is is make sure we put an end to this by any means necessary. And I would say that this is really the wrong America for that to for that to take place, because if the poor are not allowed a seat at the table, if minorities are not allowed the seat of the table, if people who are just generally, you know, disenfranchized because of their position, say, as labor. I mean, we haven’t even talked about, you know, the labor issues of the day. We certainly could. Is there any other main issue that that we didn’t get to that you wanted to address, at least briefly?

Michael Lavery: [00:58:01] No. I think we’ve covered most everything that I had on my plank. The. The website’s up on Michael Avery for issues and contact info. I do want to say that I want to bring things to more transparent and Beacon Hill and and climate change is real and we’ve got to do more for a future of our children. We’ve been robbing Peter to pay Paul. And Peter in this case is our kids. And they’re going to be handed a bill that that we made for them when when they grow up. So we’ve got to change our ways. And thanks.

Top Left Corner: [00:58:42] Do you have any do you have any events coming up in like meet and greets or I guess I guess people can hit your website for that and we’ll put a link to that in the show notes.

Michael Lavery: [00:58:52] Yeah, there’s page on there. I should put up an events page on June 18th, so I’m opening up a trail here in Beckett and it won’t kind of be a campaign event, but people can see what I’ve kind of done in office. And this trail is something the town was just holding on to and land that was unused. But I got a grant in place and we’ve put some new trails down and and it’s going to be great. A lot of people have started to use it already. So cool that’s going to be here here in Beckett.

Top Left Corner: [00:59:21] So it’s an opportunity for people to shake your hand for sure. All right. Well, Michael, I want to again, thank you so much for coming on the show and giving us sort of an inside look into your your thinking. It is definitely an ambitious campaign. And as I do with every candidate, I wish you all the best of luck.

Michael Lavery: [00:59:44] Thank you, sir. It was a pleasure and look forward to great things for your organization. The Greylock Glass.

Top Left Corner: [00:59:52] Thank you.

Michael Lavery: [00:59:52] Sir. Big supporter.

Top Left Corner: [00:59:54] Thank you, sir. Have a great weekend.

Michael Lavery: [00:59:57] You too. Good bye.

[End of NTRVW]

Well, that’s our show. Thanks for listening, and until next time, stay safe, be good to each other, and go easy on yourself.

A fascinating individual who hopes to be a breath of political fresh air come November. We’ll be following this race closely, and I suspect you will too.

Bye now!

The post Top Left Corner #158 — NTRVW: Michael Lavery to challenge Pignatelli for State Rep. appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

Enjoy our interviews with the other Williamstown Select Board candidates,
Bilal Ansari and Randal Fippinger.

Editor’s Note: At this time, we are able to provide a rough transcript of interviews. By choice, we edit the text of our conversations to remove verbal pauses (um, ah, uh, you know, etc.) and fragmented phrases not to make the speakers look smarter, but to make it easier for audiences who are unable to listen to the podcast and must rely on the transcript. We attempt to remain as faithful as possible to the speakers’ original meaning, and apologize for any errors of transcription.

That said, even the imperfect transcription we perform is costly. Please support us financially by becoming a member or making a one-time contribution to help us continue to provide this service.

And this is episode 157 of the top left corner here on The Greylock Glass — GreylockGlass.com. I’m your host, Jay Velázquez. And as always, I do thank you for tuning in. Whether you’re listening on your commute, whether you’re cleaning the house, taking the dog for a walk, however it is that you put us between your ears, I thank you. It means a lot to us that you’re here with us seven-plus years later. This episode is special because — well, they’re all special, but this one is especially special because — it is the third and final part of a three-part series that interviews each of the candidates for the Williamstown Select Board’s two seats that are up for grabs. So get that. You get two seats. You get three candidates when the music stops, whoever doesn’t have a seat. Well, that’s musical chairs for you.

So we’ve heard from first Randall F and then we heard from Bilal Ansari. Today, we’re going to be hearing from Jane Patton, who has been. This will be her. If she wins, this would be her fourth term, three year term on the select board. And she says, win or lose, this is the last time she’s running. So we might have given her a couple of extra minutes because let’s face it, she’s been there for nine years now. And and it’s kind of hard not to not to explore certain issues with people who have, like, you know, been right there at the hub of that wheel.

We have to have an apology to make because the audio on my end just sucked. And frankly, I don’t I’m not exactly sure what’s going on, but I think it has to do with my microphone, which is I’ve had it since the very beginning. I’ve had it for seven years now and it’s, you know, recorded hundreds and hundreds of hours. It’s been just a workhorse and it’s probably dying as as various equipment does die. You knew that my computer died last year. This is no different. If you want to help us keep from falling apart like some. Like the black pearl, you know, the Pirates of the Caribbean, the sort of ragtag falling apart ship. This is kind of like that. This is kind of like a pirate ship, this little ragtag news organization. And, you know, I wouldn’t say that the boat’s leaking, but, you know, it could use it could use some some pitch and polish here and there. Please consider helping us out. This is your local news. You know, this is I do this for you. If you’re listening, it’s because you care about local issues, events. And if you care about local issues and events and you you want to hear about it in long form, right? We’re not talking 30 seconds, SoundClips. We’re not talking two minute sound clips.

We’re talking an hour-long interview with the candidates. No one else is giving that to you. Just nobody. So if you want to help keep that kind of in-depth news alive, please visit greylockglass.com/membership and join up. Join up at whatever level you can afford. Are there five bucks a month? Ten bucks a month? 100 bucks a month, whatever you think it’s worth. And whatever fits your budget. If a monthly membership is not for you, by all means, you can look around, you’ll see links to PayPal, your links, see links to donate cryptocurrency links to just throw a dollar in the hat, if that’s what you got. Trust me, if there’s a way, if there was a way to digitally send us, like chickens or cows or potatoes or something, whatever, we’d take it. But in this case, currency is where it’s at and we need it. So please, visit greylockglass.com/membership to keep this show alive.

Now, it’s a long interview. We we delve deeply into these issues, so we should probably get right to it. I just should let you know that this episode is sponsored by Shakespeare Company’s 45th season. Tickets on sale now Shakespeare dot org. And you can go there and buy tickets to the approach which opens next month or any other show that they’ve got going on. All right. With that, let’s get right to the show.

I moved to the area in 2020 to work for an online retailer founded by Williams College Professor and some of his students. I met my wife Emily Eakin later that year, and together, we moved to New York City to follow my high-school dream of living and working in Manhattan someday. My career was focused on catalog direct to consumer businesses, working for several well-known catalog and retail companies – among them J. Peterman, Sundance, Bloomingdales and Victoria’s Secret.

We moved back in 2008, and in 2009 our twin girls were born. I shifted gears on my career to focus on them for a bit which was a real luxury because I was not able to do that when my son, now 29, was born. We absolutely love living in Williamstown — there is no better place to raise children, and it makes me very happy to call Williamstown home.

When the girls started going to Williamstown Community Preschool. I began joining boards and doing freelance work for some local businesses, my favorite being The Williamstown Theater Festival. In 2017, I began working for the Taconic Golf Club, which is amazing, given that I love golf so it really doesn’t feel like work!

I first ran for the Select Board in 2013. Win or lose on May 10, I will not run again. On the whole I have enjoyed my time on the SB — even when it was a challenge. I am better for the experience, and am grateful to the residents of Williamstown for the opportunity to serve.

Top Left Corner: And with me on the line is Jane Patton, who is running for a fourth term as a select board member here at Williamstown. Thank you so much for coming on the Top Left Corner.

Jane Patton: Thank you so much for having me.

Top Left Corner: Well, it’s exciting. I really have neglected Williamstown. To be honest, I’ve focused a lot on North Adams in the last couple of years because they had their issues as as well as any town, I suppose. But I often wonder if I’ve just been shy because I live here and I don’t want to muddy the waters to too much where I live. But I guess you have to eventually just dove right in and get into the thick of it. And we have had a pretty thick couple of years here in Williamstown, have we not?

Jane Patton: I think that’s a gracious way of putting it. Sure.

Top Left Corner: Yeah. Well, before we get to that, I know that most of our listeners know who you are. They know. I believe you’re the general manager at the Taconic Country Club Golf Club.

Jane Patton: Yes, I am.

Top Left Corner: And they know that you have been on the on the select board for three terms. Now, why don’t you for just those people who don’t know you just give us a sense of your your Baxter, your origin, your superhero origin story. And as we were talking about in the green room, why are you running for a fourth term?

Jane Patton: Well, let’s see my superhero back story. I grew up in a town outside of Saint Louis, Missouri. Most of my family is still there. I credit my dad and my three brothers for pretty much everything I am today. They made me tough and resilient, so I have mad love for them. My entire work background prior to here was in direct to consumer catalog. I was early adopter in that in the late eighties. And over time left Saint Louis and worked for some fairly big name companies. Jay Peterman Sundance Catalog out in Utah, Bloomingdales and Victoria’s Secret also worked for the Vermont Country Store up in Manchester. When we first came back, I moved to Williamstown in 2000 to work for a company called Ziba, founded by William’s professor and some of his students, among others. And later that year, I met my now wife, Emily Akin. We spent about six or seven years in New York City working. We kept our house up here originally in Adams. When I was 16 years old, I went on a school trip to New York and on top of the World Trade Center deck, told my history teacher that I would live and work in New York one day. And he looked at me and his very droll way and said, Miss Patton. Young ladies from Saint Charles, Missouri, do not live and work in Manhattan.

Top Left Corner: All it took to set your course. Yeah. Hey, that happens more often than not. The people who say, no, you can’t do that. They don’t always know who they’re talking to. Do they.

Jane Patton: Know? Especially not in this particular case. So I came back in 2008 and moved into Williamstown. In 2000, nine or twin girls were born. I had the opportunity to to stay home with them for a bit. Well, I’m focused on her career, which is just a luxury for me, because I was not able to do that with my son, who is now 29. The girls go to Mount Greylock. This is their first year. There seems to be the assimilation has been has been good. And then starting at about 2013 and was ready for me to stop living that life of leisure. Although twin four year old girls are not exactly, exactly leisurely and I started looking around for things to do. There was an opening on the Selectboard, so I ran. I also started working with the Williamstown Theater Festival because I have a huge love for theater and other consulting jobs around town. And then in 2000 and late 2016, I started here at Taconic, which just melded it as something I love to do with all of my skill background. And it’s been it’s been wonderful. This is the sixth season that I’ve been here, so.

Top Left Corner: Oh, good. Well, very good. I appreciate your work. If only because I don’t go off and I probably never will. But I sure like fireworks, so I appreciate your work putting that together.

Jane Patton: Oh, thank you. Yeah, I should. I should keep that in every bio. That’s going to be, I think, my legacy more than any other thing.

Top Left Corner: Hey, I know I do. It’s a it is a crowd pleaser. It is anybody who can make a couple of thousand people say, ooh, and at the same time, you know, that’s there’s there’s a power to that. Can you. Here’s a question. I know this is maybe using the power of my my microphone a little bit too much. Can you get us a discount on the Vermont crackers? Do you still have any any connections there?

Jane Patton: I do not. I’m so sorry.

Top Left Corner: Because, you know, because I don’t mind driving up there to get them. I probably wouldn’t think to order them because it’s, you know, half the fun is going there. But if somebody were to just like have I have a couple of cases in there in the garage at all times, I would probably sneak around and put a a fiver in your in your palm. So I asked, you know, just Vermont crackers, they’re really addictive. If anybody doesn’t know that these huge like soup crackers, they’re like oyster crackers, but like on steroids, I love them. So the question that I did not ask Randall, but I should probably ask you but I did ask Bilal is if Williamstown were a person, who would it be?

Jane Patton: Yeah, I saw that in Bilal’s transcript and I was thinking about that. I don’t I don’t think I could make it one person, I think. I think Williamstown, especially right now in that there’s a I don’t know the whole story, but there’s something about every time you step into a river, the river is different. Even if you step into it at the same spot every time one of these towns is constantly. Evolving, especially right now. And with the work that college is doing. And we get a new we get a new 500 kids who start every freshman year, their freshman year, that are here for four years and make their impact and and colleges interest in diversity and equity in terms of the student population has an impact. And so, you know, I liked Bill’s analogy but a person. I don’t know many people who who change that much and evolve and grow and get bigger and smaller and run faster and slower depending on the environment around them.

Top Left Corner: So you’re going you’re going to go. Your answer is a river. Maybe this is a river goddess that whose name you know, but a river. No, we can do that. And I think that’s a really well, it’s an apt description because you can drive through this town and people you know, people tell me this all the time they have, you know, they vacationed here ten years ago or they had their honeymoon here or whatever. And they’ll talk about how they were gone just for a few years. And they’re back to visit and it’s changed. And I’m like, Really? I don’t see it. But that’s in part because we’re here. We don’t always see those changes. We don’t always feel that. And that’s probably a good thing for the most part, because we have discovered that change is controversial. It can be you can have growing pains associated with change and and it can be uncomfortable for people who do not appreciate change. And that has been one of the subjects of conversation, these last lo these last couple of years in particular. And we spent some time on this with both both other candidates. So we kind of have to touch on it here. The DIRE Committee was a force that that really drove some conversation, and many people will probably attribute it some of the change that occurs to the DIRE Committee and other people in the community who who were part of this, the Movement for Diversity, Equity and inclusion. What are your thoughts on the last couple of years? What are your thoughts on the DIRE Committee? Do you think it’s set out? It achieved what it set out to do? Yeah. Anything that you care to comment on, given that you were you worked with them pretty closely as the Slate board.

Jane Patton: Yes. So I think depending on where you were at in the process and at what level you were engaged or one was engaged, the impressions are going to be vastly different in terms of what was accomplished, what was an accomplished work didn’t work, etc.. The things about DIRE that I am very pleased about with a caveat is I think our first conversations in town about the racial equity issues certainly raised at the select board were early June the first or second, maybe the first meeting after the horrific murder of George Floyd. And we I’ll speak for myself, although I’m confident the whole board felt this way. We’re overwhelmed. By the comments, and I personally was shocked to hear the things that people had experienced. I found it very disturbing, disheartening. I was not in a place of denial. I was really more in a place of, oh, my gosh, how could we have not known about this? And we had subsequent meetings off cycle to allow more conversations. And I was the I had cycled on to chair that May. So I was the chair of the select board at the time. And in talking with the vice chair and the manager at the time, I said we need to form a committee, an advisory committee to hear about these things and find out what’s going on and and have it pull together a group.

Jane Patton: And we did that. And we did it with with really, I think, unprecedented swiftness in terms of town government moving on things like this. I believe by the July 13th meeting. So really a month, we had interviewed and spoke with folks who either put their name forward or their names were put forward and named the committee and were ready to roll up our sleeves and and get started on it. So in that regard, I view that as a as a significant success. The caveat is, I don’t know if taking a little bit more time would have been more prudent in terms of fully identifying exactly what we hoped would come of the committee, formulating our thoughts more. I think it was our maybe our second meeting or third when we heard about the lawsuit, which was. Devastating. And by devastating, I mean just utter shock that this was going on and had been going on for some time and having absolutely no idea about it. Again, I don’t know. I can’t say exactly what might have been done differently in forming DIRE. Had we known that information. But it certainly did not put any of us on any kind of solid, comfortable footing. The hope that we had in the first meeting was pretty quickly.

Top Left Corner: Tempered.

Jane Patton: Tarnished, well tempered, tarnished by now there’s questions of. Okay. We’ve got issues of transparency or lack of transparency in the police department. What about the Selectboard? And the SELECTBOARD is just kind of like what? What what is going on? None of us had been through anything approaching anything like this. We are getting. Tons of questions and criticisms from from residents. We’re getting hit on the other side from town council who are like, there’s a way to do this and, you know, just scaring you to death for fear of, you know, doing or saying the wrong thing, which is their job. But, you know, didn’t make it didn’t make the situation any easier. And so I think from the jump, as soon as that piece happened, it made the. The dire climb that the path to to what we had hoped we might eventually get to. It really knocked the wind out of everybody, I think, and knocked us off course a little bit.

Top Left Corner: Do you feel like the work of the Dire Committee did made any any headway in the hearts and minds department?

Jane Patton: I do. You know, it’s I don’t know. I don’t know how many it did. It certainly did with me. I told somebody a story not that long ago about sitting with some long time Williamstown residents who were like, How, how can this be? And I don’t get it. And I was really starting to research more into just systemic bias. Unintentional bias. Not not realizing that that that things we had grown up with are phrases that we had grown up with that were inherently racial, especially racially biased. And those moments where you just kind of hit yourself on the side of the head and you’re like, Oh, my gosh. That’s crazy. I have used this phrase forever. I had no idea. It never occurred to me what the origin of the phrase was, because it was so commonplace. And then when you kind of take take a minute and say, okay, let me try to let me try to hear and feel and see a different perspective on this on this thing. Even as I’m telling you this, I kind of get shivery on my arms because that’s how I felt at that moment where I went, Oh, my gosh. And so I have been trying in my own ways, I’m not really a soap box person. I’m always floored that anyone ever really cares about what I have to say. But I have tried in my way, on an individual basis to try to show people how my journey has progressed and and invite them to consider doing doing the same. You know, there’s there’s an opportunity here for people who know when you’re frustrated that there were times when. There was an opportunity for to be to educate. And instead maybe you were belittled or ridiculed because you were uneducated. And I’m trying to make it a point not to do that to anybody else. All right. I want to invite people to to be open to the idea rather than be like, what’s wrong with you? Why don’t you know this? It’s more, hey, let me talk to you how I got here?

Top Left Corner: No, I think that that’s an approach that’s going to work really well with some people. And I think that while, you know, the the the nation as a whole is is way behind the eight ball when it comes to, you know, fixing this. I think that the fact of the matter is you have to you have to figure out each person just about what is it going to take? I mean, what I and the reason I ask this question is because you can have policy, right? You can create programs. You can bring in consultants. You can do all kinds of things. And each of them will be good for what they’re worth. But it is the individual. For example, we have ample evidence that financial institutions from large ones to local banks, they do not approve loans, nor do they do business with same businesses of color. And even when you account for everything, all the variables, the same loan that would have been applied for by a white business, white owned business is rejected for no other consideration. And therefore you have to say, well, they each had a degree from a college, a respectable college, that each had a good business plan. They each had a presentation that was well done. End of the day, why did this person get it and why did this person not get it? And it’s staggering. I mean, the results are staggering and it’s costing by some estimates, it’s costing the country. And Massachusetts is a lot, millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars because of the business.

Top Left Corner: That’s not happening. The commerce. The commerce. So even if you just cared about commerce, you should want equity because equity creates GDP. So that’s my soapbox right there. You mentioned the police department and I want to get to that because that’s tied up in all this, obviously. But my main concern is the point of transparency that you you brought up. There are some who have criticized the Selectboard for not leaning on. I guess it would be the town manager and having the town manager lean on the police department for greater transparency. Some still criticize the decision not to be more forthcoming about how the whole let’s make a list of of troublemakers in Williamstown, how that occurred. They feel like that there really could be more coming out of that. And there is a big question mark about what happened to the conversations that were supposed to be geared toward what kind of police department do we want to have, what this is one of the reasons why you say you want this fourth term, because this is a mess you inherited, a mess you were dealing with. And this is a mess that you don’t want to pass on without trying to take a crack at it and seeing what you can do to resolve some of these issues. In your mind, where are we with the police department examining its past behavior, its present makeup and its future, I guess, sort of priorities?

Jane Patton: There’s a lot to unpack there.

Top Left Corner: Yeah, I know. Sorry about that.

Jane Patton: You know, it’s all good. So I think one of the things that became pretty clear, so we had the committee that met last year and the search committee and there was a falling out of sorts and folks were very upset with the town manager and some committee members quit in protest or advisory search committee members. And I think what we got to. Then was the town manager. The permanent town manager really has to be part of the process of hiring the permanent police chief. At the same time, the Selectboard in about October got to two candidates for the new town manager, both of them having lots of positives about them, but neither kind of being the full package. And so we did not go with either of those two. So the police chief’s search has been delayed further. I will make this extraordinarily clear in every. Interview I had in both sessions back in the fall and the one we just completed. Every candidate was asked by me. If they understood that while they are the hiring authority of the police department and they they, the town manager, has the sole responsibility of firing a police chief, that the events of the past, the lack of transparency of the past would no longer be acceptable. Certainly not by me. And given the situation, I’m pretty confident. Not by any member of the select board for hopefully ever. The the communication. Regarding police performance, regarding any issues. I mean, that stuff, honestly. Never came up. And that was one of the aha moments for me, which was.

Jane Patton: You have got to ask more questions. You have got to probe and probe and peel away at that onion and make sure that people understand that some kind of pro forma report is no longer what this board wants. And I believe that that’s where we’re at. The new guy. And I’m happy to report last night we approved his contract. He’s starting on July 1st. His name is Bob. I’m going to mess it up, but I’ll take a stab at it like maricon. He has a lot of experience in community relations and DUI and so forth. That made him a really compelling candidate for this job. He understands that he owes the select board this kind of transparency that we’re looking for and having him be part of the hiring process now and taking ownership, if you will. Never mind that feeling. He’s got skin in the game in terms of getting the right chief in here, other than this is the chief, you know, and that’s not. I also don’t need anyone to hold Chief Ziemba in high regard. I think he has handled himself with extraordinary grace throughout all of this. I do think we have to have a search. We cannot do this without a search. I have never been in favor of not having a search because it’s too critical. And so that’s where I think we’re going to be starting at a at a whole different place with this new town manager and ultimately the the permanent police chief. That they understand that transparency at a bare minimum is absolutely critical.

Top Left Corner: The the search for a new police chief. When would you like to see a final name?

Jane Patton: Oh, my gosh. Well, I’m going to say as soon as possible, which is way too big.

Top Left Corner: I mean, six months a year.

Jane Patton: At the most. You know, it’s probably time to have the conversation about restarting some kind of group. Discussion about what what we’re looking for what what across all. Manner of voices in town. More of this, less of that. We are in the process of the accreditation. We’re in the process of the the work with the SPC, making sure that we are able to quantify what it is that the town of Williamstown needs for their next chief. We are we’re not a Boston or Springfield. We’re not a Pitt Pittsfield in terms of the the different layers of of activity, criminal activity that that those towns have to deal with. We are kind of on a natural corridor, which is why there’s a fair amount of drug issues that go on. But what do we want? I, I think it’s possible that we end up looking at things and maybe we reallocate some funds from one bucket in the budget to another bucket that that focuses more on the, the social work aspect. When you hear the statistics of the number of calls really in every in every town that are more mental health related than criminal activity and someone in distress, and then it escalates because they’re in distress.

Top Left Corner: One out of four.

Jane Patton: Right. It’s crazy.

Top Left Corner: Let’s switch, though, to another issue that is going to affect life in Williamstown for generations. It is our two zoning, the question of how many, how big, how close in what what is your understanding? Of the. The reasoning behind decreasing lot size, increasing number of units. What’s what’s driving this?

Jane Patton: Well, there’s always an ongoing conversation about opportunities for housing that is that is affordable for people. Affordable housing is another one of those phrases that folks immediately jump to a to a conclusion. And a long time ago, to town managers ago, Peter Solon said to me, what we we need affordable housing for sure. But what we really, really need is housing that is that is affordable for the average person. Williamstown has this gloriously bucolic setting. There’s green everywhere we look. We have been extremely prudent and mindful in terms of conservation, whether it’s agricultural or permanent conservation or what have you. I know there is a lot of feeling and emotion around this and fear, right? Because it’s change. I know there are folks who say, why rush this new plan? The comprehensive plan will be will be done sometime next year. I kind of go. Any of these zoning changes. If they happen, can be undone. If it turns out this is a horrible idea. Permanent conservation can’t be undone. Some of these other things that we do to preserve the land can’t be undone. The zoning can be if necessary.

Top Left Corner: Yeah, but you can’t. You’re not going to. But you’re not going to. I’m going to step in here. You’re not going to undo 50 houses that get put up in a development in South. You’re not going to. You’re not going to undo them, if that’s. If that turns out to be a bad idea. You know, you’re not going to undo a hundred years, 100 unit housing complex. I mean, you’re not going to kick people out of their homes and tear down the buildings if it’s a bad idea. So how do you mean you’re going to undo this? If it’s if it’s I mean, you’re basically saying go back to the town and read redo the bylaws again.

Jane Patton: What I’m trying to say very simply, is it’s not permanent. I think the chances of a hundred home developments anywhere in Williams town is extremely unlikely. I think that is I think that is people who are fearful of change or don’t want the landscape around them to be vastly different than it is today. I don’t know if you were here in 2016 when Rebecca was petitioning to be able to be rezoned to perhaps have a conference.

Top Left Corner: Yeah, I was.

Jane Patton: And people went crazy. There were people who were just I mean, that’s the last time I think we’ve been this divided. And and just my luck, I was the chair that year as well. And the way I view it is we’re trying to make zoning changes that are perfect for everybody or perfect for the town or and and the reality is that’s not realistic.

Top Left Corner: Well, to me, it sounds. It sounds. Okay, look, listen, we’re going to perfect for somebody. I think it will be perfect for somebody. I think it will be perfect for developers. I think it’ll be ideal for a developer who wants to put up a property maybe worth $2.53 million. I think it’ll be perfect for that, that clientele. I don’t think it’ll be perfect for, you know, housing that’s affordable for people. I, I don’t see given how much land stock is available. And I used to be a tax assessor. So I know a little bit about this given the amount of available housing stock. I don’t see any houses that are going to be built, that are going to go that are going to list for under a half a million dollars. That’s just not going to happen. And probably the few houses that might get built are going to be probably closer to the million dollar mark. So I don’t actually see affordable housing or a housing that’s affordable as the main driver. Change my mind, I’d like I would love to have you change my mind.

Jane Patton: I don’t I don’t think I can change your mind. My point of view on this is this stems from, again, people being afraid of change. I understand that a house that’s, you know, five, $600,000 is not affordable housing for most people. I am not in favor, however, of putting off change in perpetuity because we’re afraid of what that change might bring. I don’t believe a I don’t know where anybody would would build a development of that kind. I just think it’s a little bit of a people. People are afraid of it. 20, 23. Oh, come. If we wait for the comprehensive plan, maybe they’ll be answers there that make people more comfortable with the idea. Chances are pretty good it won’t. So it just feels like one of those issues.

Top Left Corner: Okay, so why did we do. Why do we have this 15 year plan, this comprehensive plan, and it’s going to be here in 13 months or so. It seems to me, based on what people have told me, that quite a bit of that is going to be invalidated, because if you allow for more houses, more units to be built, smaller class sizes, it is going to change everything from how many students could potentially be enrolled in the school to the water usage to to the landfill. There’s really nothing that’s not going to get touched by a change in the bylaw or potentially touched by a change in the bylaws. And if we don’t wait for the 2024, 2023, then the the comprehensive plan will be invalid. A plan that we’ve paid for will become invalid. Am I am I off the mark there?

Jane Patton: I don’t think any development or anything will happen in the amount of time from town meeting to when the comprehensive plan would be done.

Top Left Corner: But you could conceivably get permits pulled. In that amount of time.

Jane Patton: You could conceivably. Yes.

Top Left Corner: So if I did have if I had a farmer who was willing to sell me, you know, whatever, 50 acres and and I’m going to turn that 50 acre farm into a development. It could happen, conceivably, if if it is allowed, that could happen. Assuming that it’s not already in agricultural conservation, the idea.

Jane Patton: Sure, we could we could make that argument for just about anything. Another thing that could happen is that Farmer, who’s had a difficult time finding people to help them farm goes back to an old model, which is they have a building on their property. That part of the worker’s payment is room and board, and it may allow for a farmer to stay on that family farm. That is also conceivable.

Top Left Corner: I would like to see that that part of this interests me greatly.

Jane Patton: Me as well. Now, that’s a positive, potentially positive outcome for the farmer that I think helps. You know, create a scenario by which we are supporting local agriculture, etc. But rarely is that the potential conceivable idea that folks come up with. It’s the negative of somebody could suddenly build a 100 home development and not see how it could literally help people who are who are saying it’s a struggle to hang on to their family farms.

Top Left Corner: I hear you. I mean, look, I’m not I’m not about fear mongering, but I did grow up in a town very much like Williamstown, where the hill that I went sledding on as a kid is now just a bunch of boxes, boxes with cars in the garage, in the driveway, and not even very nice ones. So and it destroyed the scenery. It destroyed the character of the neighborhood. And it was it’s an eyesore now. And I’m not against development. I know that this this town needs housing, for sure. It needs housing. People can afford to to either rent or own. But I do think that there are always going to be those who take advantage of such opportunities for personal gain and don’t really so much care about how it affects the town 50 years from now. So that’s kind of where I think some people are at. Even if they get a little bit Henny Penny and the sky is falling. But but let me ask you once more to the to the 15 year to the the the master plan here is if this goes through, doesn’t that mean we need to have the potential? Repercussions of this change to the bylaws factored into this 15 year plan, because otherwise there’s really no point in continuing with the 15 year plan if that potential change, the minimum potential change and the maximum potential change are not factored in.

Jane Patton: And why wouldn’t they be factored in?

Top Left Corner: Because they’re nearly done right. I mean, this plan is it’s been in the works for a long time. There’s been research and has been I assume I mean, unless they’re just sitting around on their hands and there’s going to whip it out of the last minute, I assume that there’s been a lot that has been based on what was expected to be the case in this town. But I don’t know that they can just I don’t I don’t know that they can just shift gears that quickly and say, oh, well, okay, well, we’ll just we’ll do this. And I’m just wondering if if that’s something that has to be maybe tied to this.

Jane Patton: I think it could be tied to it. There could be an addendum to the plan if the plan is literally 80 or 90% complete, I guess I heard 2023 and that to me is still about seven months away, that there might be time to add to it or say the plan is going to be two months later than we thought because we want to factor this in.

Top Left Corner: Right. And I think I think people would be fine with that. Yeah.

Jane Patton: Yeah. People want to factor it in to the plan. I don’t see any reason why we would not factor it into the plan.

Top Left Corner: I brought up school the possibility of an effect on the number of students that we could have if we had more housing. I mean, let’s face it, if the goal is to have more housing, then we can’t say, well, we’re probably not going to have that much more housing. I mean, if the goal of this are to is to create opportunities for housing and in in the the meetings that I’ve listened to or I’ve watched on Zoom, that seems to be what people are saying. So we can’t say, well, you know, we’re going to make it possible, but we don’t really expect there to be housing increases. We just built this new school. Right. I mean, so there is an effect on on the capacity of Mount Greylock. I won’t go there right now, because as as you say, we don’t know what’s going to happen. But schools are a huge part of any city or town’s budget. In many cases. It is the the lion’s share of the budget. And I know that the select board does not have a direct hand on the the switches and the levers of school committee business. But, you know, you do have the power of the purse. And I’m wondering what your experiences, thoughts on hopes for the the public educational system here in Williamstown is in 2022. Where do you think we are and where do you think we need to be?

Jane Patton: Well, so our kids went to West for a couple of years and then we left West at the end of the second grade and they went to Pine Cobble through sixth grade. And now we’re back in the school district at Mount Greylock. So I’m still kind of winding my way through some of of of this and working at times to keep my maternal overly personal viewpoints separate from being able to look at it a little bit more objectively. I, I, I think the building is amazing. I’m mostly pleased with what I see. I know that there are those that believe we could have even more programs and more. You know what the word is. Given that word home of college and have an incredible community of professors and their kids and so on, making sure the caliber of the education is is exceeds really what we need. I think there’s work to be done. I am a fan of the current superintendent. I find him to be personable and accessible and able to hear constructive feedback without immediately getting. Defensive. So I’m almost as concerned. And this is in general, this is not specific to Mount Greylock. I’m concerned about the mental health and the emotional health of school kids right now, school age kids. I’ve seen a little bit of what social media can do even to 12 year old girl. And I’m not going to lie to you. It’s kind of heartbreaking. So I want to make sure that there’s enough resources there to to balance that along with the academic piece. Right. We all we all want our kids to get into the best whatever and do do the best. I grew up in a family where it was not an option not to go to college.

Jane Patton: It was not acceptable. My parents didn’t go to college. It didn’t matter if college was a good fit. It didn’t matter you were going. It’s the only thing that counted. And I’m really pleased to see that a little bit of that path is starting to be like trade. School is good, art school is good. Not everybody’s built for college and that’s okay. So my focus, I think. Right now is while I care deeply about the academics, I want to make sure. After two years of COVID and what social media is doing to the universe that we’re school is a safe place for kids and that they’re able to have their emotional needs met. And mental health really is what I’m trying to say, not emotional. I should make sure their emotional needs are met. But I think you get what I’m saying. That is that is very important to me right now. I don’t know if you’ve seen the just the I think there’s been about 16 or 20. College athlete suicides nationwide in the last year or 18 months. And it’s kids on the outside who seem to be academic stars, athletic stars, socially involved from every angle. They look to be like they’re living their best life. And nobody sees the pain and the stress. So how do we help young people manage that and be able to talk about that and get the help that they need? And I think a lot of that much like we need a little bit of of that. Look, in the police department for mental health issues, I think schools can be a better resource for that.

Top Left Corner: The last thing that I am going to ask and then I’m going to open it up to you is climate mitigation. We are well into a climate catastrophe and it is coming. It is there’s nothing that we’re going to do to stop it. We have we have apparently blown past the 1.5 degrees Celsius that that we that we could not blow blow by, you know, one degree, one and a half degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. I should be specific. It’s going to happen it’s going to happen in the next 15 years, probably to maybe ten years. And there’s nothing we can do to stop it. And there’s going to be real serious consequences, not just in terms of weather and our own particular climate here, but also in terms of things like climate refugees, some of whom are not going to be, you know, poor. They’re going to be very affluent. In fact, they’re already here. I’ve talked to people who’ve moved here and said they moved here because of Hurricane Sandy and then the pandemic. You know, first it was it was Sandy and they said they never want to live through that again. And then the pandemic hit and they said, forget it, we’re out of here.

Top Left Corner: So I would say that for a lot of folks who are looking to relocate to the Berkshires, in fact, there’s an article in Wired this month, Wired magazine, about how there are a number of people from affluent areas in the city who are looking to bail into places like the Berkshires. So obviously now that it’s in Wired, you can be sure it’s going to start happening at at strength. So things are going to change and we might have to face things like drought here in the Berkshires. We might have to face things like, you know, do we have to grow more of our own food? Because the Midwest is now a dust bowl and California is on fire. And and because of world affairs, we can’t count on importing food from South America or China. I mean, these are some some questions that we that they seem abstract until you go to the grocery store and there’s something that’s like 50% more than it was last week. What are your thoughts on Williamstown, what? William Towns? William Shea That’s hard to say in the possessive William’s towns climate readiness and what might we do to increase our mitigation strategies?

Jane Patton: Well, that’s another big one to unpack.

Top Left Corner: Is the only questions I ever, ever bring with me. I’m sorry. It’s, you know.

Jane Patton: No, no, it’s okay. Yeah. You know, I think I think the work certainly that that we’ve done with. Conservation is is pretty critical. The the cool committee and their work. The the the solar powered. I’m still so proud of myself. Four years ago doing solar panels on my house when the first kind of wave of it came through, I keep thinking how proud my dad would be of me for having done that. I mean, I think we have to examine everything and maybe it’s time for a larger look at the the bigger things at hand. I, I really I hadn’t heard a lot about climate refugees. I knew we certainly had an influx post-pandemic. And once everybody figured out that Zoom might really be the answer for a lot of people who no longer wanted to live in a city like New York or Boston. So but hearing you say that, that’s one of those moments where it’s like, well, yeah, that that makes sense. So I think the folks on the cool committee, hopefully this is part of the comprehensive plan. What is what is our natural water supply options? What are we doing to increase that? That doesn’t do other harm in some form or fashion, the tree growth and making sure we are not unnecessarily overharvesting trees. And if if trees have to be harvested, what are what are we doing with those trees to re reuse them? And then every tree we plant plant more. That is that is such a huge issue that even even hearing myself talk about it, I hear overwhelmed in my voice. So I, I think I’m going to be thinking about this for a long time after I hang up the phone and I don’t have a pet. That answer for you. So I’m going to try to make one up on the fly.

Top Left Corner: No, that’s that’s fine. And I appreciate I appreciate that there are no and this is the beauty of being in a we’ve never been here as a species before situation. There are no guaranteed solutions. I do know that we have a a an active agricultural commission, and I suspect that they are going to be absolutely essential members of any conversation that we have about climate readiness and and mitigation strategies if the drought in the South, Southwest and the West continued. New England could be tasked again with providing food for the nation. And I don’t know if we’re ready, quite ready to do that. Although Williamstown, as I said, is in better shape than many. So I just want to leave the floor open to you. There are a number of things that you’ve discussed in that I saw in The Eagle and on WMC with Josh Landis. You brought up a few items. Anything there that you want to talk about or anything brand new that you would like people to know that that is on your agenda if you should snag this fourth term.

Jane Patton: Anything brand new? No. Although I’m going to be paying a lot more attention to some things thanks to this conversation. So I appreciate that. And I mean that I am I am just fiercely committed to. The town is only the second place that I have ever called home. This is my home. I want to be part of the conversation and the healing. The last two years, I showed up every day in every meeting. It was not always easy. I It was hard. It’s the hardest thing I think I have ever done over any extended period of time. And I’ve had to do some unnaturally hard things in my life. And I want people to know that I will be here again every single day trying to listen and learn and make a positive impact where I can and remove the negative impacts where I can. And this is absolutely the last time I’m going to run when I lose. But I do think it’s important for people to know that I have a level of tenacity and determination that is is really pretty significant. And I think it’s to the town’s benefit to have somebody like that in that chair for another three years.

Top Left Corner: Well, where can the good people of Williamstown go to find out more about your tenacity and and stay up to date with what you’ve got going on with your campaign. Do you have a website, Facebook page.

Jane Patton: And just been using my personal Facebook page? I don’t I don’t have the bandwidth to try to set up a separate website or anything between work and kids and another family. Things going on here. You can look me up on on Facebook and you’ll see messages. I am planning a two listening sessions in the next few days at the at the log and me being me, I literally need to go double check because I don’t want to mess up what I said or what I’ve set up. So that that should tell you something right there.

Top Left Corner: Well, what you can do is you can always just get that to me. I’ll put it in the show notes when you when you confirm that up and I’ll.

Jane Patton: I’ve got it.

Top Left Corner: Oh, you got it.

Jane Patton: Okay, go ahead. I just really want to when I say something important, I really try to make sure I get it right. So this Thursday, from noon until 130 at the log and Monday May 2nd from 430 to 6 p.m., I’ll be in the front room at the lab just hanging out. If people want to come by and chat or ask questions or what have you.

Top Left Corner: I think you’re going to be at the heart.

Jane Patton: Good. Sorry.

Top Left Corner: There’s you’re going to be a special session meeting with seniors, with other candidates at the Harper Center on Friday morning, isn’t that correct?

Jane Patton: That’s Friday morning. And then there’s an if that’s. Some kind of forum on Friday night. I’m not sure yet if we’ve heard the final. Is it Zoom? Is it live? Is it hybrid? So that’s Friday evening with all three candidates. And tonight is the League of Women Voters candidate forum from 6 to 730.

Top Left Corner: And I think the willing is is covering that. Do you know if that’s so?

Jane Patton: Yeah.

Top Left Corner: Yeah. So I don’t think that this will be ready in time for that unfortunately. But we’ll we’ll certainly put a link to it. You know, this is going to come out tomorrow morning, so we’ll have a link and I’m sure that will Annette will get it up there usually fast. It’ll probably be up by tomorrow morning anyway so people will get a chance to see that. And I’ll put links to your Facebook page and I’ll put the the dates that you have that you’ve offered here, and we’ll find out about Friday night as well. So, hey, Jane.

Jane Patton: Good. You can put my email address if you would like.

Top Left Corner: Which which email address is it?

Jane Patton: That’s the Peyton Patton 721. At Yahoo.com.

Top Left Corner: Okay. Well, Jane Patton, it has been a real pleasure to have you on the top left corner here. I know that I kind of kept you in the hot seat for a little bit longer, but I figure you’ve got three terms under your belt. You’re used to it, especially with some of the meetings that you’ve had to sit through in the last couple of years. Three our for our meetings, this probably seems like a cakewalk. Definitely. If anything else comes up, if you’re going to do any other meet and greets, let us know and we’ll update the page, the show notes. But until then, have a great week. And as I do with all candidates. Good luck. This this May.

Jane Patton: Thank you very much. And everybody, please, no matter who you vote for, please go vote on May 10th. It matters.

Top Left Corner: What happens. Rock on. All right. Take care, Jane.

Jane Patton: Thank you. You too. Bye. Bye. Bye.

The post Top Left Corner #157 — NTRVW: Jane Patton candidate for Williamstown Selectboard appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

Enjoy our interviews with the other Williamstown Select Board candidates, Jane Patton and Randal Fippinger.

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This is the Top Left Corner, number one hundred-fifty-six which first aired Saturday April 23, 2022. I’m your host, Jay Velázquez, and I thank you for tuning in to this episode, which is sponsored by Shakespeare & Company’s 45th Season, featuring new and classic works, tours, talks and more.

Today, we’ll spend the whole hour speaking with Assistant Vice President for Engagement at Williams College, Bilal Ansari, who, along with Jane Patton and Randal Fippinger, are running for two seats on the Williamstown Select Board. We cover a lot of ground, so let’s get right to it.

TLC: And with me on the line is Bilal Ansari here on the top left corner. Welcome, Bilal.

Bilal Ansari: Thank you for having me, Jason.

TLC: Yeah, I guess. I guess it’s been a little while, and I suppose it should not be any surprise to folks that that the Top Left Corner is interested in this election. Do you know we’ve never actually endorsed a candidate for any office before.

Bilal Ansari: Really?

TLC: No, he’d never have. I mean, people can usually.

Bilal Ansari: And it’s really it is really strange having a name like Top Left Corner and people would, I guess, would assume that you would be leaning towards a particular way with a name like that.

TLC: Well, I’ll tell you, you know, it didn’t occur to me when I picked out the name. Believe it or not, it was only because Williamstown and North Adams are in the top left corner of Massachusetts.

Bilal Ansari: Oh. I didn’t even.

TLC: Right.

Bilal Ansari: I took the other perspective.

TLC: But that’s what everybody’s thought, that’s all. “You might as well just wear it on your on your sleeve there, Jay.” And and it turns out most people can get a pretty clear sense of which direction the wind blows around here.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah.

TLC: So, but, you know, I haven’t I haven’t, although I may I may this this season, people have said, you know, you’re really kind of kind of a wuss, you know? What are you afraid of — taking a stand? So who knows? Maybe I’ll maybe I’ll take a stand. We’ll see. Nobody will know until after the interviews are over, though, that’s for darn sure. This is this is going to be a really important election. And a lot of folks, I don’t think, are aware of just how important I really feel. Like the puzzle pieces that get laid down on the board in May are really going to be what shapes the future of Williamstown for at least a couple of decades. What do you do? You see it that way or.

Bilal Ansari: I agree. I agree. I do see it that way.

TLC: Now what? Give me your your sense of your understanding of Williamstown. If Williamstown were a person who is Williamstown?

Bilal Ansari: Hmm. Prince.

TLC: Prince. Why?

Bilal Ansari: Because. I believe that. Prince was about. Beauty. Prince was also in a world in a Top Left Corner, all to himself. And Prince was beautiful to be around. To experience, to take in. Um, a lot of beautiful things came from Prince creatively. And Prince was, Prince was all about that Purple Rain. And I think that, yeah, I think Williamstown is very purple. Not only that they attribute themselves to the Purple Valley, but as much as we we we bleed blue, we show up red and a lot of ways. And therefore, the blend of that is purple. And we are. And so in that way, I identify us with Prince.

TLC: Okay, I like that. And you know, Prince, not easy to understand, I’m guessing, if you’re if you’re not familiar with him. There are a lot of things that we learned, I learned, after his death that I guess we’re not completely secret, but they weren’t, you know, publicized that much. And I was always surprised to find that there’s there’s always something new to learn about the the myth, the man. But let’s talk about you for a moment. You are I think you said in the digital greenroom, are you an associate vice president for engagement or did I get that right?

Bilal Ansari: I am assistant vice president, yeah, for the the the engagement on campus.

TLC: Okay. Tell me a little bit about what that job is all about.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah. That job here at Williams is recognizing William’s long history with its relationship to to nonwhite males have been a problem in their engagement with creating a environment that that people of a diverse background feel like they belong, creating an inclusive space and making sure that when they’re here, they’re they’re treated with equity has been a challenge here. So they’ve they’ve they have created an office of equity and inclusion on where I work in. And and a part of my work is going around the different units and this college, the the academic units, the athletic units, the the staff units of student services all over the campus working on, on making sure that there’s DEI planning where they everybody is taking ownership of it. Some people don’t don’t understand it. So we teach. We helped them to to make sure recruitment is on point. Retention is on point. And just having workshops around like implicit bias, you know, and those type of things. And so and then my then also just myself is just making sure that what we, what we, what we espouse, we that only do internally across the campus but also to the surrounding all like region.

TLC: Well, and that’s I wanted to I’m glad you brought that up at the end of your sentence, because that’s where I wanted to go with that. Williamstown. It is not an easy town to understand. As I said a moment ago, if you’re not if you haven’t been here for a while at least, certainly if you were born and raised here, it’s probably almost invisible. How strange it can be. But this town and the college are stitched together, or perhaps woven together in ways that are good and bad, depending on your point of view and depending on the issue. But how is it that the what happens at Williamstown Williams College when it comes to diversity and equity and inclusion, how does that bleed over into the town? How could it how should it have an effect on what happens in the rest of the village?

Bilal Ansari: Yeah. No, that’s a good question. I mean, I mean, for one, I mean, I think that, um, I know that there are faculty member here that find it difficult finding affordable places to live. Buying a home is a challenge for many of the of the faculty staff. Administrative staff are just as hard, if not harder, to find a place to live here in town, to feel that this city or this town, they belong here. There’s like a barrier. And then then the hourly staff are even. It’s more even that much more difficult because they have no opportunity or hope to live here and then even travel. Transportation is a is another layer of a barrier, even though they’re essential workers and have to be here most of the time. The difficulty of just being here, working here is almost equivalent to how it is a difficult getting here from anywhere in the state. It’s just off the beaten path, I mean, surrounded by mountains and and so and so the lived experience here is a challenge. It is unique here. I remember I was speaking to a member of the faculty and he said, what the secret sauce to Williams turning out brilliant students is that there is no Boston, there is no around the corner, there is no Boston life. You know, there is no New York life, you.

TLC: Know, city.

Bilal Ansari: Now everything. Yeah, yeah, there is no you are here to study and that’s it. And it’s a concentration of just cut off from everything else and, and, and, and you have to really dig in here. And so what comes out of here is, is therefore therefore much more concentrated, much more intellectually rigorous. You know, that’s the the hope.

TLC: That’s certainly the reputation. That’s certainly whether it’s whether it’s myth or fact. There are certainly some intelligent students. They get here. They’re already smart when they get here. And I’m guessing that they leave a lot more prepared, certainly a lot better connected than they could ever hope to be just about anywhere else. And I’d like to think that they understand that with that level of connectivity, truly to the corridors of power, that they have a responsibility to kind of look around and see what good they can do in the world. But that’s just me on my soapbox.

Bilal Ansari: So that’s exactly.

TLC: You know, it’s just, you know, if you’re going to be able to pick up the phone and get, you know, pretty much like almost any sitting senator on the line within 5 minutes, you know, that’s power.

Bilal Ansari: That’s power. Yeah.

TLC: All right. So let’s talk a little bit, though. I don’t want to get too into the inside baseball of the Dyer Committee. But tell me a little bit about your experience with that. What did that what did that help you with in terms of getting ready for this this election season, as far as your knowledge of the town and what did it accomplish that you’re proud of and what what do you wish that the entire committee might still achieve? That it has not achieved.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah. So I mean, the diary committee, I mean, you have to define it as a it is a radical it is a radical idea in and of itself. In Williamstown. It is an innovation itself, a radical innovation. And the first year we were just trying to like define how we self manage. And so we had a representative or a liaison from the select board as a member. And so and so the idea was to within that self management to put, put, put forward resolutions that would provide a sense of a transmission of this this creation of, of, of this radical new idea of space and Williamstown, where diversity, inclusion and racial equity is being talked about. And so that was that idea was to build and strengthen a connection. And we were hoping to be able to create and facilitate learning so that that all provides a safe space. The first year, though, was fraught with. Things that we didn’t see coming. There was a lawsuit. There was the MCAD report. There was. There was. I mean, there was there was a lot of upheaval from from those reports. There was there was mismanagement. There wasn’t there wasn’t a feeling of safety in town of of the of the residents and all that was coming and voicing.

Bilal Ansari: So we weren’t able to kind of scaffold those things as we normally set out, laid out to do. We were kind of tasked with doing things that were a bit beyond our original scope and plan and hope, and we were just trying to manage all of that. And and in that confusion, people didn’t acknowledge the harm or the fault and they try to cover. And so it kind of broke down the connection and it shut off learning. It didn’t facilitate learning. And so and so all of the the the people of marginalized identities, we, we, we felt that we were like carrying water or we were the butlers and the maids to kind of just kind of hold the tray. And when we want when people want to be served, they’ll pick from us. Or when there’s a mess they want us to clean up, they’ll call us in. But that was basically it. And that wasn’t it didn’t feel like labor. That was, that was at all, like, equitable. Um.

TLC: So so are you suggesting that, that the, that the committee, as it was composed, did not within itself function as an inclusive and equitable body?

Bilal Ansari: No, we yeah, we did. We, we tried to set that up, but the things external within the town, we were charged with handling that or trying to advocate for that or our, the platform in which we were given. We were we were the echo of that and therefore the conduit from the select board who was on the dyer felt. I felt as if, um, or I don’t know what, that I can’t speak on what they, what, what she felt. But there was a kind of a breakdown and the liaison or the act and the action items of the resolutions, nothing was ever done. And then there was a side picked from the union. When the police union wrote that letter, the select board, instead of working with us to kind of create a restorative practice with, with the police force and the union, they kind of sided with the union and kind of scolded us.

TLC: Yeah, they kind of left you flapping in the breeze is what they did.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah. And so that connection was, uh, was lost. And I think the differentiation between actual leadership also was lost because they actually needed to differentiate themselves from just rubber stamping a police union, who was hurting, who was emotional, who felt they were flapping in the wind themselves. They there was an opportunity lost there that they could have created a kind of like a leadership where they were able to hear both sides and kind of restore some peace. But instead, they they they chose a side and and there was no no, no opportunity for a restoration.

TLC: Well, this is all this is assuming all of this is assuming that it was ever intended that things would happen, that things would get done. I mean. Right. You know, I’m not saying that they weren’t. But, you know, there’s a lot of I mean, history has so many examples of blue ribbon committees that have the best of intentions. They start out with a lot of a lot of fury, a lot of vinegar, and then it just sort of they discover after time that they were really there to make headlines at the beginning and then to go quietly away. And certainly the DA, the dire committee, you had a I’m sorry. Oh, look, I’m not I’m not saying that that’s what happened, because the.

Bilal Ansari: Truth hurts.

TLC: No. And but there still is a diary committee, right? I mean, so it’s not like it’s gone away. I’m sorry.

Bilal Ansari: But it is defunct, though. I, I can just tell you that I feel that the dire committee is now a die, you know, committee. I think the the cry has been lopped off the racial equity. The the the the has been lopped off. They it’s feels gutted. It feels like an intentional gutting of the dire, original or original intent, aim and purpose.

TLC: Okay. So I’m guessing that there are a lot of things that you. Optimistically had hoped for. You probably did not expect that when the blowback happened as as anybody should in a town like like Williamstown, if you don’t expect that, there’s going to be a sort of an entrenched mindset, even if it’s a minority, you’re going to have to contend with some very old school, potentially racist, potentially bigoted beliefs. And they’re going to they’re going to come for you. And that’s, you know. Right. They and they did I mean, not not as as with the the vengeance that that I would have predicted. They were actually somewhat tame, I guess, and how they handled things and, you know, tame by American historical standards, I should say. I mean, you know, but. You know, there were times when I put you know, I put a Black Lives Matter sign out on my front lawn. I’m on a cold spring road. Sometimes at night, I’d hear like a something stop outside my thing. I turned my lights on, and then there’d be the squealing of tires and I a shouting. And then they take off. I know what that is. I know that somebody who’s harassing me because of the sign, you know, I’m not stupid, but that was as bad as it ever got. So thank God for that. But here’s the thing. You did achieve a few successes, I think. And before you pronounce dire, dead and forgotten. Tell me what you think you achieved.

Bilal Ansari: I mean. I think the year one, I think we achieved what we hoped for was transparency. We looked at the policies that were just the policies have not hadn’t been updated since 2003, hadn’t looked at. Nobody managed them. They just were just old and outdated. And we we, we said, hey, can we get a review and updating of these town, these offices that town taxpayers are paying to be managed properly? Can we get a review of these things so that we can just review them for the implementation or the kind of review? And in light of what was passed in Articles 36 and also in Article 37, can we just do that? And so I think we, we, we, we, we did get that ball rolling where they have now started to review those and look over the things and the and every department is is actively trying to review those things. And so I think that was initiated by us. We did keep their feet to the fire when the MCAD report came out and because there was a concerted effort to kind of just put it under the rug and kind of just blow it by and just move ahead without holding people, holding people accountable. And so accountability is one of the things that I hope to continue forward with the momentum that we were able to do that in year one. Dyer We we we elevated the voices of the marginalized so that they do feel like they actually belong here, so that there were people who felt like, hey, having these people who are on a police force that have violated laws, why is it okay that I don’t feel safe and yet they can continue maintaining their jobs? Shouldn’t we have this under review? Shouldn’t there be new leadership? And that was accomplished.

Bilal Ansari: And there were people that were perpetuating harm who were all like removed. And so and so the things also that we built a norms and values within how we operated as a committee that was centered on, on, on compassion towards those whose voices are generally and on a normative basis within the margins. We centered a young black man. We purposely made him our chair, the youngest member. We purposely made the young black men our chair, and gave him the leadership role. We centered the voices of around racial equity. And and so these are type of things that we’ve modeled. And we were trying to model this in a restorative way because a lot of times select boards or town leadership does things to people. And doing things to people is punitive. Sometimes they do things and they don’t do they do things for others and not for others. And that’s neglectful. And sometimes they say, you know what, we’ll give you this platform and this is for you. And so it’s like a permissive. But we were trying to build a model that we were doing things with people because we believe that human beings are happier and more cooperative, more productive and more likely to make positive changes in their behavior when those in positions of authority do things with them rather than to them or or on their behalf. And so that’s what we were modeling.

TLC: Okay. Well, let’s let’s move to something that you mentioned and see if we can’t tie it to to what you just said about doing things with or with other groups, with other authority figures and other, you know, subsets of the community with and not to the police department when the conversation first started about, you know, you know, there’s going to be a search, there’s going to be a new chief. And then there was going to be a conversation in town about what? Kind of police force we want. Now, obviously, the police force is a pretty, pretty high dollar budget item. So this is something that should concern people, if only economically. Right. If that’s their chief concern. I don’t know that those conversations happened the way some people expected that they would about, you know, honest to goodness, open conversations about how would we like the police to operate, how we like them to behave. I mean, some conversations did occur, but I don’t know yet. And I’m not sure that that we’ll find out for time, you know, for years to come, whether or not we have taken full advantage of this moment in terms of recreating the police department in an image we want. What what is your status? What is your take on the status of the the parts of the law? What is your take on the status of. I was talking about Pittsfield just earlier today. What is your right? So we can talk about that, too, at the end. What’s your what is your take on the status of the Williamstown Police Department? What what is your hope for the future?

Bilal Ansari: Yeah. So listen, I was really disappointed that when the SPC was conceived and put together that not one black person was invited to sit on that or I know I was not invited and I was one of the I worked with my ziemba my Zumba has my cell phone, I have his we text all the time, but yet I did not get an invitation to kind of sit on that, to kind of have those those those deep and personal like, you know, conversation and what the day when we would come together with the with the DOJ to kind of look forward, we were not invited to be a part of that conversation. Not and that was that was offensive. But I showed up anyway because it matters. It matters that we are at the table despite the offense. And I showed up and I was really, really happy to hear from the officers themselves. I had a conversation with the union union president and I had a conversation with some of the younger the the younger officers. And it was good to be able to listen to them like they were like, hey, I man, I’m like, I wasn’t a part of the force when all of those bad things happened and that the cop report. I yes. I witnessed that the the the force is toxic but I’m not but I wasn’t a part of that. And I just felt like I was kind of dragged in and and I was not able to share my story. And I was so happy to be able to say, you know what, what, what’s what’s your story? Let me hear your story and be able to look a young officer and I who had nothing to do with that crap, but just to hear them out and then for them to hear me out and to know that that we can move together knowing each other in our in our human frailties, but also on the strength that we we actually took time to build a relationship.

TLC: Meaning, do you believe that anything that that anything that represents some of the positive change that you’re talking about, is any of that being codified? Is any of that being, you know, actually, you know, seared into the into the the hide of of the police department? I mean, otherwise, you know, if it isn’t if it doesn’t become part of the the the police department’s charter, if you will, there’s nothing there’s nothing legally binding. So what what what is that?

Bilal Ansari: So yeah. So the cultural changes that I hear that are happening from my second hand, Hugh. Hugh, who’s on the board, has told me that they are now holding, holding officers accountable. There’s actually doing if somebody does anything wrong, that it’s not just being a talking to. There’s actually accountability being done for the first time. So I imagine that things that happen, I heard from the officers themselves that things are different now. And I ask, what does that mean? And they they affirmed that people are being held accountable. They just can’t do anything. The toxic environment is becoming less and less. Okay. And there’s just they they do recognize there’s a there’s a still a few, you know, old timers that are still there, but they’re in a minority now. And so I, I have good hopes that the police department is heading in the right direction. Yes.

TLC: All right. Well, I guess we’ll just have to see we’ll have to see what becomes of the chief’s position. Right. But because that can, you know, change. A lot of people point to grassroots organizing as a great model, and it is. But in organizations it is typically top down. The attitude comes from the top down. And so I think that that is probably the most important determinant of where which direction the department’s going to go. I mean, I personally have not had. I don’t think I’ve had a negative a single negative interaction with the police here, other than the fact that one of them actually kind of scraped my car once when he was coming around the corner. But we worked that out. We worked that out. You know, it was kind of you know, I didn’t I didn’t want him getting in trouble for that. It was an accident and it was a beatable car. So, you know, he probably got a piece of junk on the road anyway. So let’s let’s switch gears here. I want to talk about I want to talk about the subject that is, you know, potentially the most. The most. What’s the word I’m looking for? Divisive, I guess. Topic since all of the dire conversations started happening. And that, of course, is the situation of rural, of R2, of zoning, of allowing for smaller lot sizes, more units per lot in the village, out of the village density, preserving local character. All of these issues wrapped up in this zoning issue. That was really I mean, I could have told them just by looking at it that they were looking at a six hour meeting. I don’t know how they thought they were going to get that done in 2 hours, that first one. But anyway, so a real, real struggle to get people to see eye to eye on this zoning. What what do you what do you thinking about when you when it comes to this this issue of density? Yeah.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah, good question. So, Ted, all I watched you or I watched how he defines like restorative practices as, quote, human beings are happier, more cooperative and productive and more likely to make positive changes in their behavior when those in positions of authority do things with them rather than to them or for them. And I believe that in order for this to be an inclusive move by the planning board to try to implement Articles 36 and 37, you can’t do things to South like Williamstown or for South like Williamstown, rather, you have to do things with them. And as you so aptly put it, in 2 hours it felt as if things was being done to them and and people were sitting on their soapbox and they were talking as if they’re doing things for them. But none of that did I hear those amendments, those articles, whether anything’s done with them, any deep, thoughtful thing. And we have an opportunity in town to think really strategically about what our future looks like. But it doesn’t happen by doing things to or for people. But but it requires the patience to be able to do things with them. So I’m not I am not in favor of those three two votes. Those three two votes are telling every other one is five one or four one or four or five for a purpose, because they were because there’s a witness there. And the other ones are contentious because it was it feels and it is a punitive it feels like a punitive doing things to and for others. So I’m against that process. Although the outcomes may be maybe proposed to be good, it’s never good when the process is not done with people. It’s not a restorative process. So I’m against it.

TLC: Let’s, let’s I’m it’s interesting that you sort of you focus your very process oriented individual. I can tell which is which is rare. A lot of people are they are, you know, ends or or, you know, what’s the result going to be or what’s, you know, what’s the prey, what’s the who gets the credit or the blame. But the process really does matter. And I think that you’re right. When people when people can tell that you’re looking down your nose at them because you’re trying to convince them that, you know, it’s best for them, they’re going to dig in their heels like like like never before. And any hope that you had of getting getting people to see your way of thinking is gone. But let’s talk about the specifics of it in addition to the the process of it, because what we’re talking about is a situation where you have some people saying, well, you know, we can’t we can’t make people. I guess this is mostly Mr. Winters. I’m talking, but we can’t make people build low income housing or affordable housing. We can’t tell them where the where they can take advantage of this, you know, this new, new bylaw. All we can do is hope that they do the right thing and build some affordable housing in much the same way it was the the you know, the question was asked, well, what about water resources? Do we know if there’s enough, you know, under water availability or are there underground water availability? And he said something along the lines, well, I mean, that’s you know, that’s up to the health department.

TLC: All we can do is determine how many lots. And then it’s up to them to determine whether any specific well can be drilled or septic system can be put in. Which to me and I’m just going to say it point blank for the record, I think it’s hogwash. I think that you could put in 50 units in one place and there might not be a water problem for the first year, two years, three years, and then all of a sudden, four years later, nobody’s got any water in there. Well. Because you didn’t do a hydrology study because no one did a hydrology study. So I don’t want to hear this. We just determine how many are topographically possible and we leave it up to the health department. I don’t you know, that’s that’s just me. So obviously, I want you to either agree with me wholeheartedly or fight me on this.

Bilal Ansari: I agree with you wholeheartedly. That’s doing things to people.

TLC: No, no, seriously, seriously. Go ahead.

Bilal Ansari: Ask what happens when you do things to people, let’s say. I get it. Winters is tired. He’s been on there the longest time. He’s had to sit through the torture of the the of the of the of the of the abuse and the hairsplitting of what’s going to happen post the spruce then and do it here. Build here and not here. Like, I get it, Chris. You’re frustrated. I get it. But that still does not is still not okay to ignore those very real things that you just mentioned and and slip into doing things to people instead of with people. Just be patient. If you can’t be patient, move on to somebody else can.

TLC: What about the question that somebody asked? They said, listen, we’re spending tons of money on the 15 year plan, this master plan. If we allow these these changes to take place, then nothing in that plan will be valid. Nothing.

Bilal Ansari: Hmm. Hmm. That’s a that’s a good question.

TLC: I mean, some things will be more valid than other things, but nothing will be untouched. Because you’re talking then about another who knows, maybe another 400 housing units. We don’t know.

Bilal Ansari: We don’t know. But again, it just takes. The patience to just say, you know what? Let’s not just forge forward because doing nothing is worse than doing something. Even though something may feel good immediately, it may long term be be worse.

TLC: Can we wait until they. Right. Could we wait until the 15 year plan is complete? Do you think that that’s a viable option in June of 2023?

Bilal Ansari: I mean, I don’t think that’s that’s I don’t think it’s this or that. I don’t. And.

TLC: Well, if you change the bylaws of the town. If you change the bylaws of the town, it is definitely a this or that.

Bilal Ansari: Right. Right. You’re forcing that because you’re doing things to force that hand. Right. But but my position is not that.

TLC: Okay. So I ask again, would it be reasonable to wait until the to the the master plan is done before having this conversation would be reasonable to table this conversation.

Bilal Ansari: That’s what I that’s what I said initially.

TLC: Okay.

Bilal Ansari: I am. Yeah, that was my initial statement. I am not in favor of moving forward on this until we think deeply about it. And I think the strategic planning of it is what what is required.

TLC: Okay. I just want to make sure that there wasn’t any way any wiggle room. I wanted to make sure that there was just one, one path, my friends.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah.

TLC: You’ve got three. You’ve got three.

Bilal Ansari: My way or the highway?

TLC: No, no. You’ve got what you’re saying. No, no. You’ve got three doors and you have two. You know, this is like the. What is it? Let’s make a deal with Monty Hall. You’ve got three doors doing number one. Doing number two or no? Doing number three? No. Okay. So let’s talk again about things that are. Things that are. That represent long term change, that we should think carefully about the climate. The climate catastrophe is upon us. There are already climate refugees, domestic in this country. If you if you doubt that, ask somebody that you meet who happens to be from New Orleans, and you ask them when they moved, when they wanted to leave New Orleans. And I can almost guarantee you it’s not going to be a date. It’s going to be a name. And that name is Katrina. We have climate refugees. And if we have another hurricane in New York City like Sandy, you can be sure we’re going to have more climate refugees coming up this way. Or hot spells in a New York City above 100 degrees for more than a week or so. You’re going to see some more climate refugees. And I guess to me, that’s one of the reasons why we want to make sure that before we go, making any big changes or any big decisions that we take the climate remediation and when there’s no remediation that we can do, but certainly resiliency planning we can do. What are your thoughts on what Williamstown can do in terms of resiliency, planning and regarding climate change?

Bilal Ansari: Yeah, I think that. So like I told you at the beginning, I was a part of the planning of the college. So with our new with our new president, Maude Mendell, she started a strategic planning process. And and the college has built all of their strategic planning on three principles. One of the principles is sustainability, the carbon footprint, reducing that, just being really intentional about that. That’s number one. That’s one of our core principles in which everything is built upon that we’re doing going forward. The second one is DEI diversity. Equity and inclusion is another principle that that is an axis in which everything turns around here going forward. And the third is on transparency, accountability of how things are governed here. And so I think those principles are beautiful and wonderful. If they can be applied across the board here in town or like adopted, you should look at the sustainability of it. You should look at how this is actually implementing or supporting the articles 36 and 37 at the town unanimously voted on around DEI. And also you should make sure that it’s being done in an equitable community or a community centered way that appreciates the differentiation between the center of Williamstown and the south of Williamstown, the, dare we say, Irvin part of town, and the more rural part around town. And those people are sitting around a table thinking collectively and collaboratively with each other.

TLC: Let’s tie this to the climate, though. This is great. This this could apply to anything, though. Let’s tie this specifically to the climate crisis that is already in session.

Bilal Ansari: Okay. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I agree. I mean, I listen, I. I agree that I mean.

TLC: Transparency is great. You know, transparency is great. Di is great and sustainability is great tied to the climate and tied to how the decisions that Williamstown makes today might impact the residents who are dealing with a very ugly climate picture in ten years or less.

Bilal Ansari: Well. Well, just look at the spruces. Yes. They were wiped out.

TLC: Yes.

Bilal Ansari: I was there waist deep in mud, trying to pull people out, trying to help them bring hundreds of volunteers because of a climate problem, the deforestation, deforestation to build that dam in the airport and then not listening to the corps engineers who told you you’re going to need to fix these pipes because the runoff is greater. And when a storm comes through here, these people are vulnerable. And that was ignored. And you know that these rivers rise. So they were hit on three sides. And then when that happened. The human impact was never acknowledged. Address and taking personal responsibility, governmental responsibility. It was just ignored and passed on. And those people were displaced. Gone. Never to return. A community. A people of Williamstown who worked blood, sweat and tears and retired from working here in Williamstown or nearby, wanted to retire here. Gone because of climate change. And our neglect. Our neglect.

TLC: So when we’re talking about what decisions Williamstown can make in the future, you’re going to be, I imagine, keeping the spruces forefront in your mind.

Bilal Ansari: Oh, yes.

TLC: That’s what I was told.

Bilal Ansari: Yes.

TLC: Yeah. See, I push. I push for a reason. Bilal, you know that I want to bring out the best in every guest, no matter who they are, no matter how much they agree or disagree. Go ahead.

Bilal Ansari: Good. Well, let me push back. I want to push and ask you for your support. Yeah.

TLC: Well, like I said, you’ll find out after I interview all three candidates. I will I will probably do an endorsement. As I said, it’ll be the first time in seven years, over seven years that I’ve done an endorsement. So that’ll be something that’ll probably I’ll regret. I’m sure I’ll regret that. Let’s talk about one last thing before I let you go. If you’ve got another 5 minutes, talk to me about education. It is just about the largest line item on any town’s budget. And, you know, we are we’re going to be paying for that new school for some time. We are dealing with an. And always unknown when it comes to whether or not the school has the resources that it needs. And there are some people who have said to me privately that they are not sure how Williams can have can be the number one liberal private liberal arts college in the country. And yet we have a high school. That only offers Latin and Spanish. Right. So this is this is kind of a the bee in my bonnet. And I know that the. The Selectboard does not have a direct hand on the levers of of the educational system here. But, you know, it’s not as if you’re totally disconnected either. Because let’s face it, the selectboard does handles things like money. Right. So talk to me about your. Understanding of the status of the educational system. And I think it’s important, you know, and if you don’t if you haven’t been able to spend that much time on it, I get that. It’s a big and complicated. Subject. But like I said, it’s just about the largest line item we have in this town. So I’d like to know what your thoughts are.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah. I mean, I so I sit on the Mt. Greylock School Council and that’s my that is my that is my view. And, and I’ve just been on it for maybe a year, year, year or so now. And so I’m just learning how things work. What are the needs, what are the strengths, what are the weaknesses, what are the opportunities, what are the threats? I’m just starting to kind of make my make my assessments from from I guess from an inside view. I used to work at Williams for the Center for Learning and Action and that and and I know how very much engaged through experiential courses and engagement through through all of the kind of the the the courses and partnerships that and staff that they have to working with the school systems to kind of support and to to help the, the school system. That whole department is dedicated with staff and members of faculty to kind of help there. And so they’re they’re they’re there are concerted efforts. Could it be better? I would say yes. It could be better. It could it could we be doing more? I would say that it could be doing more. And we are working at trying to identify those gaps and trying to feel to fill in those gaps. The Center for Learning and Action has only been around for maybe about five or six years now, or maybe a little bit more. And and so it is still a department knew and, and it could, it could use more, um, more like, like funding to actually to help do more.

Bilal Ansari: But I think that, that eventually with the number of faculty member who have students who have, I mean, who have children who are going to be going through that, through that, through that like school system, it does seem to be like, should that not be a priority number one? And and I’m going to say it like I said it at a DB meeting for the Parents Network last night that I feel and I don’t know how much has been given, but I feel that to give $700,000 for to build a new police station and not have a and not have that distributed early where it shows that it that the more support should be going towards schools. And I think more more it makes more sense to build a fire station since we have all these buildings and risk of of loss that way then to give 700 K to a police station. So I hope that our that that our resources as you pointed out for for like language, maybe even for music, I brought up on our Council for Dance, for things of the arts. And so I am hoping that our kind of like support of the school systems just increases. I know we’ve been doing a lot with the work, helping a lot of we’re helping a lot on that front. But I really hope that we we as our strategic plan internally starts to look beyond beyond our walls, that I’m sure that it directly is going to raise all ships and Mount Greylock and the regional school system will definitely be one.

TLC: Well, sounds to me like you’re in a in a good position to kind of keep an eye on those things. So that’s good. Let’s, let’s, let’s get this nailed down. Obviously, you’ve got ways for people to to get in touch with you. What what are the what what would you recommend that you have a website, Facebook page. What’s what should be the people’s first point of contact.

Bilal Ansari: Yeah. The first point of contact is my campaign manager, whose name is Arlene Kirsch, and that’s who I would reach out to first for. And then Huff is my vice chair of my campaign. Huff His last name is like Huff. His last name is like a little simpleton. And Andrew Art is also on my finance guy.

TLC: Do you have a Facebook page or a website?

Bilal Ansari: No, no, I don’t have a Facebook page and I don’t have a website. I’m a low budget guy. I don’t have the big pockets of those those other people that are running. But you can just look look us up. On on. Yeah, I guess my email and I can forward you to them. My email is my first name, Bilal dot, my middle initial which is like w dot my last name Ansari at gmail dot com.

TLC: Okay. So if people have questions about anything we’ve talked about, by all means ask away and Bilal will be very happy to, to satisfy that. Do you have any events coming up? Do you have any like meet and greets scheduled?

Bilal Ansari: Yes. If you reach out to me, I will get those to you. We have we have a meet and greet coming up on the 15th. And and and there’s a few and there’s a few others. So. But reach out to me and I will get those those events that are coming. There’s four that are scheduled Zoom meetings. And if you reach out to me, I will I will give you an invite to one of those four Zoom meetings that we have planned.

TLC: Excellent. All right. And I will put a link in the show notes to your email address so people can do that. For now, Bilal, it’s been a real pleasure to have you back on the show, as I do with all. All candidates for all elections, they would see the best of luck. And we’ll see if these of these big questions, if they if you get a chance to answer them.

Bilal Ansari: Okay. Yeah, no, I look, I, I, I look forward to it. And again, I ask you for your support. Everybody whose ears this touch, this is blowing. And sorry, I am asking you for your support, and I thank you for this opportunity to share.

TLC: Rock on. All right, thanks. And have a good weekend.

Bilal Ansari: All right. All right. Bye bye now.

The post Top Left Corner #156 — NTRVW: Bilal Ansari candidate for Williamstown Selectboard appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

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Jay Velázquez: This is the Top Left Corner. And you are listening to Episode Number 155, First released Saturday, April 2nd, 2022. I’m your host, Jay Velázquez, and I do thank you for tuning in. I just want to let you know that some of the stories that we’ve been working on have been very intensive, a lot of research, a lot of interviews, and that means a lot of time and effort. And if you appreciate the time and effort that we put into local journalism for you, please consider joining our little, little band of merry supporters by going to Gorilla Glass Dotcom and tapping that support us link in the very top of the page, in the red, in the smaller menu. It’s really the only way that we can be guaranteed to have the resources that we need to keep working for you, because that’s why we do what we do. It’s it’s to keep you informed and sometimes entertained. So please become a member at $5, $10, any amount that fits your budget and your commitment to local news.

Today, on this show, gosh, we have a good conversation. We’re going to be joined by Henry Rose and Jim Mahoney of the Berkshire Fair Share Committee. There is an amendment that is gathering some attention here in the Commonwealth and it is the Fair Share Amendment which seeks to do some crazy-like tax the rich at a level that’s not even close to what they were being taxed back in the fifties and sixties, etc..

FAIR SHARE AMENDMENT RALLY

WHAT: Rally in support of the campaign to pass the Fair Share Amendment 

WHEN: Monday, April 4, 2022 at 2 p.m. 

WHERE: Berkshire Community College, Connector Building, 1350 West Street, Pittsfield 

WHO: Local teachers and school officials, students, labor leaders, elected officials, and activists from the Berkshire Fair Share Committee, a local group of activists working with the Fair Share Campaign’s Western Massachusetts regional organizing team

Jay Velázquez: But, you know, enough that would put some money in the coffers for use for programs that benefit everybody. And that’s what it’s all about, right? Making sure that there’s money to keep the state running. And that includes the towns because the towns rely on state money as well. So we’re going to be spending the entire hour. This was not my intention, but the content of this conversation is just so fascinating. I decided, why not? I’m not going to make it a premium premium episode. That was the thought. But now I know everyone needs to hear this will make it available to everybody will do the whole show. I think you’re going to want to listen to the entire thing front to back. So there is that. And I will say that this episode is sponsored by Shakespeare and Companies 45th season tickets available for both the classic and the modern shows that you can get to by going to Shakespeare. Rg And I am sure that this early in the season there are still some good seats left, I hope. But anyway, let’s get on with our show and welcome Henry Rose and Jim Mahoney to the top left corner.

PITTSFIELD – Local teachers, students, elected leaders, and community and labor activists from the Berkshires will gather at Berkshire Community College on Monday, April 4 at 2 p.m. to rally in support of the work being done in the Berkshires to organize and campaign for the Fair Share Amendment, the proposed state tax on incomes above $1 million which would raise approximately $2 billion a year for spending on transportation and public education. 

The event is hosted by the Berkshire Fair Share Committee, a local organization of activists working with the Fair Share Campaign’s Western Massachusetts regional organizing team. It will feature a speaking program and opportunities for those in attendance to learn more about the Fair Share Amendment, the campaign, and upcoming events – including the first area canvass slated for Saturday, April 23. 

The Fair Share Amendment, backed by the statewide Raise Up Massachusetts coalition of community organizations, faith-based groups, and labor unions, will appear on the November 2022 statewide ballot.

WHO: Local teachers and school officials, students, labor leaders, elected officials, and activists from the Berkshire Fair Share Committee, a local group of activists working with the Fair Share Campaign’s Western Massachusetts regional organizing team

WHAT: Rally in support of the work being done locally to campaign to pass the Fair Share Amendment 

WHERE: Berkshire Community College, Connector Building, 1350 West Street, Pittsfield 

WHEN: Monday, April 4, 2022 at 2 p.m. 

The Fair Share Amendment will allow Massachusetts to improve our transportation and public education systems without asking working and middle-class families to pay more. The proposed amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution would create an additional tax of four percent on annual income above $1 million. This new revenue, over $1 billion a year, would be spent on quality public education and affordable public colleges and universities, and for the repair and maintenance of roads, bridges and public transportation. (To ensure that the tax continues to apply only to the highest income taxpayers, who have the ability to pay more, the $1 million threshold would be adjusted each year to reflect cost-of-living increases.)

The Fair Share Amendment would only raise taxes on the wealthiest 0.6% of Massachusetts households: those who have more than a million dollars of taxable income in a single year. They can clearly afford to pay a little more – just 4 cents a dollar on their income above one million dollars in a single year – to make the investments we all need to deliver broadly shared prosperity.

Now, people from all walks of life are coming together to create better schools and transportation. With the Fair Share Amendment, we can make the big investments we’ve been putting off: new public-school buildings with great educators, safer roads and bridges, affordable public college, access to vocational education and job training programs, fast and reliable public transportation, and pre-K classrooms for every child. Learn more at raiseupma.org/fair-share-amendment-2022.

Raise Up Massachusetts, which has led the campaign for the Fair Share Amendment since 2015, is a coalition of community organizations, faith-based groups, and labor unions committed to building an economy that invests in families, gives everyone the opportunity to succeed, and creates broadly shared prosperity. Since our coalition came together in 2013, we have nearly doubled wages for hundreds of thousands of working people by winning two increases in the state’s minimum wage, won best-in-the-nation earned sick time and paid family and medical leave benefits for workers and their families, and started to build an economy that works for all of us, not just those at the top. Learn more at raiseupma.org.

Greylock Glass: And with me on the line, I have Henry Rose of Williamstown and Jim Mahoney of Dalton to talk about the Fair Share Amendment. Gentlemen, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us today.

Henry Rose: Thank you for having us, Jay.

Greylock Glass: Well, I wouldn’t miss it for the world. You know, fair share. It’s such a. It’s such a dog barking in the background. Hey, dog. No, no, that’s. That’s the other bus. But the dog has learned that that the kids come home on the school bus. But she’s not very bright and she doesn’t understand that once the kids get off the bus, the little kids bus isn’t going to deliver more children to us. At least, I hope. I don’t think it’s going to. So she should be fine now. The Fair Share Amendment. It definitely has a ring of something that makes perfect sense to us. It it harkens to all of the the sort of. Equitable impulses, should I say, of the human, human species. But it is not something that is a given in the society that we all do get our fair share. One of you, please give us a little bit of a background on this, this initiative and how it got started here in Massachusetts.

Henry Rose: Well, we’ve had a flat tax in Massachusetts of 5% for a long time. And that flat tax of 5% is not fair to low income earners, because 5% when you’re a low income earner is quite a burden, whereas when you’re very wealthy, 5% is not as much. But in addition, the uber wealthy are able, through various investments and strategies and paying consultants and paying accountants, they’re able to even avoid paying that in a lot of cases. And plus, the the uber wealthy have managed with the federal tax laws and various loopholes managed to avoid paying federal taxes to a large extent. So our state legislature in two sessions overwhelmingly passed the the Fair Share Amendment, and this is to amend our state constitution to have an additional 4% surcharge on incomes exceeding $1 million. And the way you do a constitutional Massachusetts constitutional amendment in our state is it passes the legislature twice and then it goes to the voters. And then we’ll be voting November 8th on whether or not to impose an additional 4% surcharge, a tax on incomes over a million, meaning your first million, if you’re if you’re that wealthy, is taxed at the usual 5%, but your second and your third and your fourth, etc., a million is taxed at 9%. And these monies are specifically designed to go for education and transportation.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. Now, let’s break this down a little bit. You said that 5% is not is not the same across the board. Just just give us a hypothetical situation. Let’s say you’ve got a family of four and the combined family income is say, say $35,000. Is it possible that 5% is really that big of a chunk?

Henry Rose: If you’re barely making it, I submit to you that yes, it is. If you’re barely making it and struggling to pay your rent or your mortgage plus your food bill, I submit that that’s a huge burden and you don’t have to look hard to find people who are struggling.

Greylock Glass: What what does it look like? What does 5% look like to somebody who’s in one of the higher brackets?

Henry Rose: Okay. So first, their first million is taxed at 5%, but the second million gets taxed at 9%, meaning it’s an additional 40,000 on that 1 million. Do you really think the uber wealthy are going to miss that, that amount of money? I think one of the strongest arguments is that people in this very elite income bracket, of which there are about 20,000 people in the state. Do you realize that they are managing to use tax avoidance schemes already to minimise their burden? They’re able to do various investments things, things that allow them to offshore their money or use tax avoidance schemes already. So the fair share is fair because it’s not as difficult for somebody in the elite class to afford the extra 5% and they’re already using tax avoidance schemes.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, yeah, no question about it. That. The the number of families or households that are making below even just a minimum, you know, say $40,000. You know, you could conceivably, if you lived extremely frugally, you could raise a family of four on on 40 to $50000. But it would be so tight you could not have a single unexpected bill. So you’re right about that. Now. Millionaires are not the typically not just getting wages right. They are their, you know, earnings from other sources, you know, from from investments, for example, from property rentals, things like that. Does this include those sources of income as well?

Henry Rose: Yes, this is on taxable income when you do your Massachusetts taxes. Taxable income is what we’re after here. It would include it would include unearned income, although, like I said, they have ways to to avoid it, depending on what they do with their investments.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. So this seems like a no brainer. And as you said, the very wealthy are not going to miss this. But there has been pushback from various quarters. What who would you say the biggest opponents of this are and what are the justifications for for trying to squash this?

Henry Rose: The two biggest opponents, as mentioned in a recent article in the Berkshire Eagle, are the mass fiscal alliance. And the National Federation of Independent Business, NFIB And I submit to you that these entities represent the interests of big business, not small business. The average small business has an annual income of like $100,000. These organizations represent big business, and they also have undisclosed donors in many cases. So it’s about greed and it’s about how much how much is enough? And it’s about paying one’s fair share so our society can function better and. We have a tremendous need, especially in the area of transportation and education.

Greylock Glass: So yeah. Jim It does. It certainly seems like a family making say for making 40 or 45,000 is definitely going to feel the pinch does feel the pinch of 5% or so. And on the on the on the flip side, a higher earning income family is, you know, as Henry said, it’s not going to you know, it’s not going to be any sort of a hardship. Talk about you know, talk about maybe where we. How we got to this point where society has such deep divisions in in in not just income but wealth equality.

Jim Mahon: Yeah. Well, wealth inequality is always going to be worse than income inequality because it’s the result of income over time. And if any given amount of time that people accumulate income and some people on the top are accumulating more, then, then they will accumulate more wealth. So that’s that’s just one of the facts out there. But you have to think also about the larger picture about how we fund the things that are mentioned in the Fair Share Amendment. So we we fund transport or transportation and train transportation infrastructure with the sales tax, with gas tax. And if you’re looking at public transit with fares, these are all regressive. These are all things that hit poor people proportionately harder than they hit people who are richer.

Jim Mahon: Then you look at public education. It’s funded dominantly by local property taxes. Now that that’s inequitable because there’s going to be rich districts that have a lot of money and there’s going to be poor districts that have very little. So and it’s not just that this is sort of for high school and so on. If you look at the state education system, if you look at our community colleges and you look at our university system, well, yeah, that’s funded at the state level, but we’ve been funding it awfully. It’s been the funding for it has been reduced as a proportion of the total and the fees for University of Massachusetts have gone up incredibly since the 1980s.

Jim Mahon: So if you go back and look at the fees, the in-state fees, for example, in 1983, they were you can look at this as it’s on the US website. They were 3926 year dollars. In 2020, they were $29,768. That is the in-state required fees and tuition went up by seven and a half times over this period, while the Consumer Price Index only went up about 2.6%, 2.6 times. So so if you take a person who’s making, you know, not much money in an hourly wage job, they’re just not going to be able to pay for UMass. Back in the 1980s, a person could work minimum wage jobs, maybe a little bit on the side while they were in school and then during the summer and they could pay for the UMass tuition and fees. You can’t do that now. So basically in this country, we’ve created an awful lot of inequality since 1973 and we’ve reduced economic opportunity for people at the same time. So you’d think you’d think that if you’ve you’ve got more and more inequality, you think people would get more and more concerned about it in the tax the tax system and the fiscal system of tax and spending would do something to counteract it.

Jim Mahon: But it actually hasn’t done that and it hasn’t done it in Massachusetts. So yeah, it makes it really hard. So if you think about it, middle income people pay about a little over 9% of their income in state and local taxes and in the top 1% pays less, largely because they’re, you know, how nice their homes might be. They have all kinds of assets that are not houses. They’re not subject to local property taxes. So so they pay less. And of course, there they also have money in other states and so on. So, you know, it’s just it’s inequitable.

Jim Mahon: And it’s been it’s it’s really been for Massachusetts. It’s been a result or it has resulted in a great deal of loss of economic opportunity. And, you know, there’s not enough room in our vocational high schools. We’ve got a long waiting list someplace in places like McCann. And, you know, it’s not only is it a loss of equal opportunity, it’s kind of stupid because it costs somebody. It costs the state about a little less than $70,000 to put somebody through UMass or one of our public colleges. And that person’s going to contribute on average, about 146,000 in taxes during their lifetime. So that’s a pretty good deal for the taxpayers of Massachusetts.

Greylock Glass: All your money right there.

Jim Mahon: Yeah, except except that we keep not funding it. So if you just look at the way this is, this has evolved, it’s just. Let’s put it this way. Every one of these people who gets become successful and maybe is in a position to pay this millionaire’s tax. The 4% surcharge on incomes above a millionaire, $1,000,000. An awful lot of those people are going to say, yeah, I made it on my own. You know, this is an equal opportunity society. And I and I made it because I’m smarter and I worked harder and and so on. There’s going to be a lot of people who will say that to themselves. But at the very same time as this has all been going on the last couple of generations, we have kicked away the lower rungs of the ladder that get people up to the to the higher incomes. We’ve made it harder and harder to get success, to have an equal opportunity to win the race. And so the people who are making it are making it. They’re doing okay. But an awful lot of people are left behind in the economy that we have today. And this fair share amendment is trying to do something about that.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, I first of all, I want Henry to respond to that because I can tell you he’s got some things to add to it. And then we’re going to go back in time to the regret to the progressive era. Henry, what? What say you? Is this is this your what you’ve observed over your lifetime that things have gotten progressively unpleasant, progressively regressive, I should say?

Henry Rose: Yeah. Jim and I are friends, and we’re in the same organization together, so our worldview is very similar. So it’s not like I have a different viewpoint. I want to emphasize vocational education, which Jim touched on. We’re not just talking about university education, state university education, which is very important. And I agree with everything from the calendar year 2020 20 to 2021, 8000 Massachusetts students who wanted to attend vocational high school were waitlisted, and in that same year, 2000 students who wanted to go to a vocational program had no vocational program in their district.

Henry Rose: They just built a new high school in my town of Dalton, the Central Berkshire regional district. It has no vocational program in it. It has shop, which is good for learning things like home repair. But it’s not going to get you a middle class job that helps you to support a family and a good taxes and benefits society. So I want to emphasize that when we say education, we mean pre-K K through 12, vocational community college and public college, all of which have been underfunded. And I want to emphasize that the vocational programs are really lacking. In fact, I did volunteer tutoring of a student last year, an eighth grade student locally, and he’s now commuting to Northampton. An hour each way to get the vocational program that he wanted. And that’s a ridiculous amount of time for a ninth grader to be spending.

Greylock Glass: That’s appalling. That’s absolutely appalling. I want to go back to the progressive era we had between 1880 and 1915, 1920. A lot of conversation about these topics already. There was talk about wealth inequality. There was talk about a growing poverty, a base of poverty in the United States. And it was not so bleeding heart. Of course, people I’m sure that use the phrase bleeding heart back then, but it wasn’t so divisive back then that people didn’t say, you know, you’re probably right, people die. You know, children dying of malnutrition is probably not a good thing. But today it seems like there is, Jim, as you pointed out, there is this attitude that people should just pull themselves up by their bootstraps. You know, knuckle down, buckle down, do it. Do it to it. What’s the and you hinted at this this idea that the rungs are maybe it was Henry who said the bottom rungs have been kicked out. Can you go into that just a little bit about. About how that happened and about how that manifests itself. Either Jim or Henry?

Jim Mahon: Well, I can start. I think you don’t have to go back quite as far as the progressive era, although I do hope that we catch some of its its ideology at some point. But in order for somebody who is successful in in the financial sense to enjoy their success, I think in the United States anyway, people always tell themselves that they were the winners of a fair race. And. And so a really crucial part of it is the assumption that the race was fair and that that we had equal opportunity and so on. And I don’t think people go around saying to themselves that I won because of my my blue blood. And I’m really different from other people. But I think in the United States, it’s mostly about I, I showed my merit by coming out on top or being being pretty successful.

Jim Mahon: But the crucial part of that is the assumption of equal start. And when you go through a period when people have really made the starts, much less equal for everybody, then it’s harder and harder for these people to say to themselves, Yeah, I made it because of my merit, because I’m special. So you don’t have to go back to the progressive era. And I think the reason is because you could see in the post World War Two settlement of the idea that we would educate lots of people as far as they wanted to go because we knew that it would be beneficial for our entire society, the spirit of the GI Bill, for example, and the spirit of well-funded public universities.

Jim Mahon: Think of the University of California, which used to be the Berkeley campus, used to be the rated as the best university in the world, public or private. And, you know, you think of UMass and UMass was a really significant undertaking for the people of Massachusetts to say, this is what we’re going to do. We’re going to build this so everybody can get as much education as we as they want, and that’s going to help all of us. Well, starting in the 1980s, the commitment to that vision fell away. And I think it was no surprise that it was happening when Washington was controlled by what you had a Republican president and you had people talking in terms of we have to free up the markets, we have to free up people to do what they what they want to do with with their money and tax them less. And we have to let them free their animal spirits and everything will be great.

Jim Mahon: And I think what we did was we allowed some people who had already had advantages to really take advantage or to really make make a lot of money from those. And meanwhile, we forgot about the dynamic part of the system, the idea that you have to you have to create an ability for people to move up. And that’s when the we started creating a great deal of inequality in the economy. And then what happened was, rather than have public policy react against that inequality, public policy tended to make it worse starting in the 1980s.

Jim Mahon: You can just see it very, very clearly in the commitment to UMass and other institutions in Massachusetts and the institutions of higher education. And I think, yes, as well in the K to 12 and in vocational. So yeah, it’s and when you do all those things, you ultimately degrade the system that is supposed to be creating equality of opportunity. And you know, in a perverse sort of way, you are undermining the argument of the people who made it, that they made it on their own, because, in fact, they must have had some advantages because they didn’t have to start at the lowest rung, the lowest rung of that ladder.

Greylock Glass: Michael Parenti, who’s the. Progressive thinker, speaker academic has said for many, many years that. The nineties especially brought about these changes, in part because the battle for the hearts and minds had been won. You know, there was no competing system to which anyone might be tempted to turn. And corporations and the upper classes started to ask the question, why should we pay out of our hard earned money so that there could be a standard of. Why should the working class have a standard of living that allows them these things, in fact, allows them the chance to compete with us if they’re particularly entrepreneurial? Why should we be investing in our own demise?

Greylock Glass: Better to keep them down and hungry, hanging on to their bleeding fingernails so that they don’t have time to think about the dynamics, the gears that are at work. They can just focus on getting to work and back. And and that way we will assure that that it will be a self-fulfilling prophecy for decades to come, which is where we are, where people are rehashing that trickle down hogwash. Again, that we’ve got to we’ve got to, as you said, we’ve got to let people free up their money so that it’ll trickle down eventually. It doesn’t, as Michael Parenti says, it doesn’t trickle down. It is siphoned up from the pockets of the workers into the bank accounts of the wealthy. And I think that that is you know, that to me, when we heard people talking in 2008 about the the the reasons for the economic collapse.

Greylock Glass: Now that’s a huge subject and I know we can’t possibly go into it, but the thing that really got to me was people saying, well, why is it that we had these policies in place that promoted homeownership? There’s all of these people out there who, you know, they don’t they didn’t really work for homeownership. They didn’t save you should have, you know, 30%. Why should people be able to get a loan with 20% down payment? You know, this loose money that was accessible by the working class, that’s what caused the the collapse. People should not expect to be able to just own a home because it’s the American dream. After all, if you get the dream, there’s nothing to dream about anymore. Let them dream a little bit and let them have a little bit less of the stuff there.

Greylock Glass: And that pissed me off because I thought that is so disingenuous. There were, you know, as you probably know, when you own a home, as you pointed out, that’s generational wealth. That is the starting place. If you don’t if you have property and it could be a house, it could be other forms of property that you can pass along to your heirs. That’s that leg up, that’s that rung of the ladder that well, that you just don’t see anymore. And we won’t see if this if these trends continue. Henry, I know we haven’t heard from you in a bit. Do you have anything to to remark upon? I know Jim does, but what do you. What say you?

Henry Rose: Well, Jay, I’m really glad you said trickle down, because I want to inoculate your listeners against the propaganda that they’re going to hear over the next few months. In an attempt to discredit the Fair Share amendment. And I’m sick of hearing about trickle down. Trickle down does not work. It’s a slogan used by the uber wealthy and the corporations to to not have fair taxes, to not have progressive taxes, and to benefit the very wealthy and the corporations. I’m also sick of hearing the term job creator like we tax the the upper incomes more equitably then they won’t create jobs anymore. And that that’ll hurt the economy. I think nothing. I think that’s far from the truth. I think that businesses, especially small businesses, want an educated workforce and they want roads and bridges to ship their goods on. And by having an educated workforce and adequate transportation, that that will enhance our economy. But trickle down hasn’t been working. And those are slogans you’re going to hear from the the the propaganda machine that’s going to be ramped up against those the the the opposition on the fair share. The opposition to the fair share is going to spend several million dollars over the next several months to discredit the movement. And you’re also going to hear things like, well, our schools are already good.

Henry Rose: Well, are they really preparing people for a 21st century economy coming out without staggering debt? I’d say no, and we need to do something about it. We had an extremely prosperous time in our history in the 35 year after World War Two, and it was because we invested in our people, we invested in education, the people got good jobs and we’re able to contribute meaningfully and paid good taxes. It floated all boats. Jim Yeah, well, I think you could just say trickle down has been tried. We’ve been it’s been something that people have put in to put into public policy.

Henry Rose: And in the United States in general, the tax code, we’ve basically seen the tax code be very, very kind to people with capital income. If you if you’re worried about getting audited by the IRS, you’re much more likely to get audited if you’re somebody who claims the the earned income tax credit than if you’re a millionaire who with capital income. So we we we certainly have been coddling people who who make that kind of money. And we’ve been trying that now for a couple of generations. It’s not working. So I really do think that if you think about what does trickle down mean, it means ultimately the mechanism that’s supposed to be that supposed to work is that these people are supposed to be spending or investing and you’re supposed to be getting a job out of that.

Jim Mahon: Well, who knows where their investments are going? Who knows how many whether they’re actually going into things that that involve jobs. It might be you get a better wage as be becoming their gardener or something. So that yeah, maybe trickle down is just about becoming servants of rich people. I’m not sure it’s something that everybody wants to look forward to. The thing that distinguishes this vision that we had in Massachusetts was we’re going to get people educated so they can become independent, so they can be autonomous people with an education, with skills to offer in the job market. So they don’t have to wait for something to trickle down for themselves. So they can be so they can go out and find a good job and they can find a job in private sector and public sector. And and that means with an educated workforce, then the public sector and the private sector are both going to be able to offer more challenging jobs and more high productivity jobs and be more prosperous for everybody.

Greylock Glass: You know, I know that this is not exactly part of the conversation, but it’s definitely part of the equation. When I was. 16 lo those many decades ago I had a job pumping gas. And this was back in the days when you pumped gas and then you washed windshields and rear windshields and you checked oil and checked air pressure and then somebody would give you a nickel and think they were being exceedingly generous to you. This is in Litchfield, Connecticut. So you can imagine the sorts who would roll through with their with their Mercedes diesels and it would be, you know, five below. And they would literally tip me a nickel or a quarter and say, this is for you. And I say, well, thank you, ma’am, that I was freezing. But, you know, you know how much I was getting paid. This was in the mid eighties. I was getting paid 650 an hour. You know what? The minimum wage was four and a quarter. I was 16 years old. They started me at six. They bought me up to 650. They didn’t have to. They could have left me at minimum wage. But to many people in the eighties, minimum wage. Was something that you were almost embarrassed to pay. You. Minimum wage was there to protect the most vulnerable people who could only do certain jobs that required a lot of supervision and no skills, no customer service, no customer contact, no handling money, no learning how to patch a tire.

Greylock Glass: I mean, that wasn’t something that you pay. So minimum wage was really something that you would use to protect the most vulnerable, not if you actually expected any brains, any hard work, any, you know, personality to be applied to the to the job. So I really feel like this whole argument about minimum wage, I have I have been screaming, pulling my hair out, trying to get people to explain what it really was meant to be. Not just to bump it up to 15 because bumping it up to 15, we’ve been asking for 15 for ten years now. I mean, now that we need 25, especially given that inflation is is kicking us in the teeth every every week, the the arguments are going to be against this. You know, the fair share are going to be coming from the same people that are arguing against minimum wage. If you could talk a little bit about. How? There is a group of people who who really don’t pay any income tax and and shouldn’t, you know, they get a return or they they don’t pay any. And you brought up the point that you are more likely to get audited if you if you declare the earned income tax credit, then if you’re a multimillionaire, why don’t these people just hire accountants? You can find the loopholes for them. I mean, that’s, you know, that’d be the sensible thing, right?

Jim Mahon: Yeah. Well, yeah, the higher accountants. The higher accountants part. Right. That’s that’s good. Yeah. No, but a lot of actually interesting because they’re the IRS does barely fund a program called the the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Program. But the but many people end up going to the paid preparers who will take two or $300 off the top and say, look, here’s the money, you know, and then they’ll get give the rest of them to give the rest of the refund to people right away. And then and then, you know, and then take take take the refund when it comes in.

Jim Mahon: And so, yeah, it’s the equivalent of a payday loan where people are worried about because because they’re worried about these audits, they take it to say H&R BLOCK and H&R BLOCK will basically take this money off the top and give them what is effectively a payday loan because they’re anxious. So basically the IRS, because it because it has this high rate of of auditing on these returns, makes people anxious and makes and sort of drives them into the arms of these these companies that really just charge a wazoo. I wonder if we could get back to the things that are going to be said against the Fair Share Amendment? Would that be okay?

Greylock Glass: Yes, definitely.

Henry Rose: Another thing that you’re likely to hear your listeners likely to hear is that this is going to make the millionaires move out of state. And I. Well, it could be some truth to that. The benefit of the fair share, which is estimated to be capable of bringing in between 1.3 and $2 billion a year every year. The benefits would far outweigh the few individuals that might choose to move out of state. And we’re talking about maybe 20,000 people in the state of 7 million people. I want to point out that several states already have a progressive income tax or something similar to what we’re proposing. And the 9% on your second million wouldn’t be the highest tax rate in the country. California has a top tax rate of 13.3%, and not every California millionaire has moved to Florida to escape Tech. So you’re going to hear all kinds of propaganda, and that will be one of them that the job creators will move out of state. And I don’t think that’s going to be the case.

Henry Rose: And, in fact, if we have an educated workforce and we have the transportation system to get the workers to their jobs and to transport the goods, I think you’re going to see businesses wanting to come to Massachusetts to have their jobs and their businesses here. So we’ll be a lot of propaganda that will be thrown out. I also want to point out the Fair Share amendment is sustaining. It’ll be every every year. It’s not a one off like like the ARPA money that’s coming in. Right. So that we can sustain transportation. And when we say transportation, we mean not only buses, we mean potholes, bridges. We mean having rail systems that make sense for the 21st century. We are so far behind on rail in this country is pathetic. I mean, wouldn’t it be wonderful if if we could have a train that could get us to New York or Boston that’s reliable. That doesn’t take 4 hours to get. It doesn’t take 4 hours to get you there.

Greylock Glass: Right. I mean, nowadays, if you want to go from the Berkshires to New York City, unless it’s…

(dog barking)

Greylock Glass: No? dog?

Sunny the Dog: No.

Greylock Glass: I will have a studio one day. A soundproof studio. It’ll be wonderful. It’ll be a dream. If you want to go to New York City from the Berkshires, you have to plan on finishing up whatever it is that you’re doing by 445 or something like that. Pm. There isn’t another way to get back. I mean, they have one that goes from here to the to New York City at 5:00 in the morning or 6:00 in the morning. And then there’s one that comes back and drops you off here at, whatever, 9:00 at night. But like you said, it takes forever. Europe. Asia. Lord, the trains they have there, they’re just it’s a marvel that they they they actually get it. So, you know, and they didn’t have the big three investing in in ripping up the trolley tracks back in the sixties and seventies either. In fact, we’re having something of a of a spiritual twin conversation as that of between David Barsamian and that old firebrand, that 88 year old firebrand Ralph Nader. On Alternative Radio this week, this most recent edition, they had, in fact, he used the term job creator.

Greylock Glass: And you could just hear the acid dripping through the radio. Through the radio, because he had many of the same takes that we have here. The idea that transportation is is in shambles in this country and its intent. He would say that it’s intentionally in shambles. It was no accident and it’s no accident that that investment has not been made in education. It’s not an accident that that this this this gap between the the working class and the wealthy haves has gotten so obscenely wide. So if you get a chance, I’m sure it’s I think it’s still available as a podcast. This week’s episode of Alternative Radio with with David Barsamian featuring Ralph Nader’s is very similar. What are some of the counter? I mean, you’ve offered some great counter messaging. It’s going to create twice as much as it as it takes in in terms of value to the to the Commonwealth. But what are some of the bullet points that people should keep right here in their front, in their shirt pocket for conversations they might have with people who are pushing this trickle down? Poppycock.

Jim Mahon: Well, I’ll just go back to what I said before. It’s been tried now for two generations and it’s not working. And so if you go back and you look at what it what it took for when we had a fully funded vocational education system at the secondary level and when we had more equitable funding for all primary and secondary education, when we had a more fully funded UMass system and community college system, when we had all those things, there were all the rungs in the ladder. It was, it was people could move up. You could move up with a minimum wage job. By the way, when minimum wage was was made more for people, you know, the federal minimum wage at $7.25 an hour is pitiful. And it hasn’t been raised in a long time. And it’s and each time it gets raised, it doesn’t get raised enough. It’s you know, it was it was pretty good back in 1973 or so. But now it’s falling behind inflation. So so these things are all part of the same the same problem.

Jim Mahon: Like I said at the beginning, social inequality keeps going up. And instead of doing anything about it through public policy, we do the opposite. We make the tax system more comfortable for people who have a lot of money. And we make the the way we fund roads and bridges, the way we fund education, we make it more regressive, we make it more inequitable. And that’s not working. It’s not working for an awful lot of people. And I think a lot of the political division in this country comes from people who have a high school education or community college. A couple of years in community college, finding that a lot of doors are closed to them, that they’re they’re in debt and that and and then somebody starts lecturing them about how they should work harder. And at some point they’re going to, you know, they’re going to get mad.

Greylock Glass: So ask these ask these millennials and these gen Zs to work harder. See? See what that gets you in a couple of years. Yeah. I’m going to ask the $64,000 question. You ready for it? This is this is the one boy, if you can answer this one, we’ve got a real shot at change. There are people out there. Who follow the cult of personality down the primrose path into thinking that they are part of the ascendant class. That they are upper middle class or whatever they think they are, when in fact they’re not. They are falling behind. They are hanging on by their bleeding fingernails. But they think if you ask them, oh, well, they’re middle class. And they think that when they believe they listen, they follow the Pied Piper, the Pied Piper, whoever that Pied Piper might be when the Pied Piper tells them that. A minimum wage raising that is just for losers and that taxing the rich, even though these people I mean, you’re talking about incomes over $1,000,000 a year, right?

Greylock Glass: So ask these ask these millennials and these gen Zs to work harder. See? See what that gets you in a couple of years. Yeah. I’m going to ask the $64,000 question. You ready for it? This is this is the one boy, if you can answer this one, we’ve got a real shot at change. There are people out there. Who follow the cult of personality down the primrose path into thinking that they are part of the ascendant class. That they are upper middle class or whatever they think they are, when in fact they’re not. They are falling behind. They are hanging on by their bleeding fingernails. But they think if you ask them, oh, well, they’re middle class. And they think that when they believe they listen, they follow the Pied Piper, the Pied Piper, whoever that Pied Piper might be when the Pied Piper tells them that. A minimum wage raising that is just for losers and that taxing the rich, even though these people I mean, you’re talking about incomes over $1,000,000 a year, right?

Greylock Glass: I mean, most of the people that I’m talking about, the middle America types, you know, the common clay who are not going to be making $1,000,000 a year, they never have to worry about it. Somehow they feel like they’re being attacked because they associate with the Trumps of the world, with the the the the somehow associated with the billionaire class. I don’t know how this happened, but they really think that all of this is communist propaganda and they think that they are somehow targeted by all this and that they are they’re going to somehow lose. How do you get these people who are hard working? You know, they they they go to PTA meetings. They they coach Little League Baseball. I mean, they’re good community members, but they really think that this is some sort of liberal plot. How do you get them to disconnect? Just unplug from the from the the machine for a bit, which is called Fox News. And and actually, listen.

Jim Mahon: Well, let me start with this. I would say make Massachusetts great again. There we go. In fact, if all we’re saying is let’s go back to the political economy that we had around education and around public funding and amount around our tax system that we had in the 1960s and seventies. Let’s go back to that. Let’s go back to the mid 1950s when the top minimum tax rate, the top marginal tax rate was 91%. So let’s go back to that. So these are all things that came out of the Second World War when there was a sense of shared sacrifice and clearly know the Second World War, the period afterwards inherited that. And it didn’t start to get taken, taken down until the sixties a little bit and then later in the 1980s. So so yeah. Make Massachusetts great again. Let’s go back to the kind of funding commitments that our government had to to schools and to roads and to UMass. And and then we’ll be great again.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. Henry.

Henry Rose: J. You mentioned Donald Trump. And I’d like to emphasize that this amendment is nonpartisan, that I’ve talked to people who voted for Trump and still see the tremendous merits in this. They look at it from the point of view of this will benefit my town. This will mean that we’ll be able to fix that bridge that’s been out for a long time, that I won’t put my car out of alignment driving on a road that is riddled with potholes that I’ll be able to send my kid to school and maybe pay off my own educational debts too, and let them get a middle class job. And it will benefit towns like like the town I come from. So I want to make sure that any of your listeners out there who might have voted for Trump are not alienated by this, that they feel that this is something that will benefit their town and them personally. This is not partisan.

Greylock Glass: No. And I’m glad that you bring that up because, you know, I. I asked the $64,000 question, how do you get to them? And obviously you have. How did you start that conversation? That’s what I want to know. How did you get them to just sort of put their pre any preconceived notions they might have had on hold? What were the sort of rhetorical tactics that you used?

Henry Rose: Well, you’re assuming that they’re automatically oppositional to this, which I think is a wrong assumption. And the couple of people I talked to realize that their own town will benefit by getting a greater share of state income taxes. And the way to get a greater share is to increase the pool that the state needs more revenue to give that give it to cities and towns. The patient and transportation measure would do. I don’t think I did anything terribly creative to get people to say, that sounds good. I think the fact is that people who voted for Trump are not monolithic.

Greylock Glass: I agree with you. I do. I would say that those people who listen to say Fox News every night, they are fed a steady stream of anti raise the minimum wage pablum. They get that and and they believe I know people they near and dear to me who I have conversations with and they say, well, Tucker Carlson says this or whoever says this, and I can’t get them to understand that minimum wage is is so woefully inadequate. They really believe that anybody who says that minimum wage is not enough just isn’t working hard enough, or they just need to stop spending money, $4 on their coffee and maybe they don’t need that that fancy iPhone. I’m like, no, no, no. Has nothing to do with the coffee or the iPhones. It’s minimum wage that we need to talk about. So I think that you’re right, they’re not monolithic. But I am going to push back a little bit and suggest that there will be some people who have been they’ve been they’ve been at the fountain for a long time, and they’ve been drinking that message for a long time. And there will be some oppositional attitudes.

Greylock Glass: Hopefully, this is Massachusetts, and our oppositional attitudes are smarter than they are in other parts of the country. I don’t know. But. But I really do want to to find more and better ways of getting this message across. You would think that just, you know, knocking on doors and saying, we’re going to take some money from the rich and give it to you. To me, that usually works for people, I would think. But, you know, we’ll just have to see say we have, gosh, not as many months. I had a conversation about this about a year ago. With Sony, Bykovsky and Friends and this is now going to be just what we going to eight months now something like that before it’s on the before it’s great. Yeah. So what are people going to do. What can they do to help spread the word, push that message out there and gain some converts into the fold here?

Henry Rose: Well, one suggestion I have is to point out that it’s estimated some 70% of voters polled are in favor, that it passed our state legislature overwhelmingly twice. And we’ve come before several select boards. And already the ones that we went to have have endorsed the measure, including the Pittsfield City Council, the Dalton Select Board, the Windsor Select Board, the Lee Select Board, the Lee School Committee and the Pittsfield School Committee. And these are the places we’ve just gone to over the last few weeks, and they’ve all endorsed it. So there are a lot of good people that have thought about this, heard our presentation and have endorsed it. So I want to point that out to them.

Greylock Glass: Excellent. T-shirts, bumper stickers, any place that they can go for those? I mean, I would definitely slap one on my bumper.

Henry Rose: The bumper stickers just got printed and we are having our kickoff at DCC, a kickoff media event at PCC on April 4th at 2:00 at the location at PCC known as the Connector. The Connector is a building that you get to by driving to the upper parking lot at 2:00 on April 4th, and there’ll be several local dignitaries speaking. And by the way, the entire delegation from the Berkshires, meaning our state reps and our state senator, are all in favor and they’re all going to be there. So there’s massive support for this right now. And the bumper stickers, well, we’ll have them at that event.

Greylock Glass: Fantastic. And in the meantime, I know that it’s just a few days away, but in the meantime, where can people go to find out more? What where can they bookmark a Web page or a Facebook page? What what’s your what’s your contact? Central location.

Henry Rose: You can go to raise up Massachusetts.

Greylock Glass: So I have RaiseUpMA.org/Fair-Share-Amendment-2022/. I will put a link to this in the in the show notes. And I see that there’s a Facebook, Twitter and Instagram presence as well. So I’ll put some links in there as well. And so people can perhaps follow y’all on social media, and that way they won’t forget that April 4th is the place to come to get loud in support of this, grab a bumper sticker. And. And make this happen now, if it does happen and. Go ahead. Go ahead, Henry.

Henry Rose: RaiseUpMA.org is a good place to go.

Greylock Glass: Yes, I will have that link in the show notes and people can go there and they can get they can read more about it. And and probably there’s a fact sheet there. So if people need to to have those bullet points at the ready, as I said, to convince people who might be on the fence, I’m sure that fact sheet will answer the questions. All right. Well, gentlemen, Henry Rose, Jamon, I want to thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us here on the top left corner. Let us not lose contact if you if we need to talk again before November. Let’s do it.

Henry Rose: Thank you for having us. Thanks a lot.

Greylock Glass: Take care. Bye bye.

Henry Rose: Bye bye.

The post Top Left Corner #155 — NTRVW:
Berkshire Fair Share committee appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

Enjoy our interviews with the other Williamstown Select Board candidates,
Bilal Ansari and Jane Patton.

You’re listening to the “Top Left Corner” on The Greylock Glass.

Editor’s Note: At this time, we are able to provide a rough transcript of interviews. By choice, we edit the text of our conversations to remove verbal pauses (um, ah, uh, you know, etc.) and fragmented phrases not to make the speakers look smarter, but to make it easier for audiences who are unable to listen to the podcast and must rely on the transcript. We attempt to remain as faithful as possible to the speakers’ original meaning, and apologize for any errors of transcription.

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And this is the top left corner episode, number 154. I’m your host. You will ask us. And I do thank you for tuning in. This was going to say tuning in on this Wednesday, March 23rd, 2022, which is when this episode dropped initially originally official pub date. But I don’t know when you’re listening, so whenever you’re listening, I hope you enjoy the show.

Randall Fippinger is announcing his run for select board here in Williamstown. And it occurs to me that I have done next to no interviews, candidate interviews in Williamstown. I’ve done a whole bunch of North Adams, but none. Well, I’d have to. I’d have to think back. I’m not sure when. Maybe, maybe one election I did, but gosh, not many in the seven years we’ve been doing this. So I’m very, very pleased to be covering some some Williamstown politics.

Jay Velázquez: It’s going to be a tight race. And this is the first conversation that I’ve had with the candidate this season. And we’ll be getting the other two who are running for that seat, hopefully in the next couple of weeks. But our show is going to be 100% that conversation, which I think you’re going to find very informative. And and without further ado, let’s get to that interview with Randall Fippinger. here on the top left corner.
Randal Fippinger: Thanks.

Greylock Glass: Randall Fippinger, welcome to the top left corner. Thanks for coming on.

Randal Fippinger: Good evening. Thank you for having me.

Greylock Glass: Well, we are just coming out of a planning and zoning meeting in Williamstown that we both attended virtually via Zoom. And it’s probably still going on. It’ll probably still be going on for at least another hour or so unless they decide to, you know, to delay discussion until the next until another time. What was your take on the on the sort of the tone of that discussion, which was primarily about. Encouraging or allowing for growth in in the town. What’s your what’s your take on on how that conversation was going?

Randal Fippinger: For starters, I was impressed with the robust conversation. There were so many different viewpoints. It was nice to have a civil conversation where everybody, it appeared, could have their comments heard. So I was very encouraged by that. I was very encouraged by more than a couple of folks saying, hey, I don’t normally agree with this person, but they made a really good point, so I’m going to agree with them on that. And there was so many people taking positions or offering comments and perspectives that I think shows that you can’t really categorize people like they are always this or they are always that, and so on that level, I am very encouraged by this conversation.

Greylock Glass: It is a standard Norman Rockwell, New England sort of democracy. So I will say this. I mentioned in the lead in to this to our conversation that you are, of course, announcing your candidacy for select board of Williamstown. First of all, as I as I do to every single candidate, I wish you the best of luck. But tell me is is an issue as this weighty doesn’t issue as as weighty as this give you pause because that’s there’s a lot of people who are going to be really deciding who they vote for based on the position on this issue.

Randal Fippinger: And I can see that. I can see that this is a very important issue. I think we have so many important issues to face with this town. And if people are going to come down on this issue, then that’s great if it gets people out to vote. So we get as many people as possible into the electoral process. I favor that.

Greylock Glass: I’d be I’d be so tempted to say I’d be so tempted to say, you know what? This was not something that I wanted to to make part of my platform. You’ll just have to wait and see how I how I feel. No. But let’s talk about your decision to enter this this race. First of all, for those people who are not aware of your sort of your involvement in the town, why don’t you give us a little bit of your background here where you’re from? I know that you weren’t always in Williamstown and you weren’t always in charge of that, that big performing arts center on campus. What? Who is Randolph Eppinger?

Randal Fippinger: Well, and just as a caveat, know there’s sort of no one in charge of it. I mean, the fact that he’s in charge. But what’s nice about the SC2 centre is that it houses many different constituents and there are different people, so there’s no one in charge. I.

Greylock Glass: That’s very generous of you to say. That’s very generous of you to say. But I have seen you running around trying to make sure that things happen like they’re supposed to happen. So. So you’re the guy who’s not in charge, but but you certainly are involved in a lot of what’s going on over there. So I’ll accept that. I’ll accept that. I’ll accept that caveat. But let’s go let’s do the let’s do the back story. What’s your origin, your superhero origin story?

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Randal Fippinger: Well, I worked in the performing arts in the nineties. I was very lucky to get jobs sort of off-Broadway in the early nineties after I got out of college and I worked for American Ballet Theatre. So I worked off-Broadway as a stage manager, and then I worked for American Ballet Theatre and got it first stage being a stage manager and running their tech and then ended up winding up going on the road on tour for the better part of five years. And then as luck would have it, that was during the first dotcom boom and Wall Street was hiring tons and tons of people at the time. And I sold myself to Goldman Sachs in 1997 as someone who could manage large based technical projects, which I could. And I got hired on at Goldman Sachs to work on their global review system for their fixed income division. And from there, I progressed to helping manage their physical infrastructure. And so I was working on trading floors in New York and in London. In fact, on 911 I was standing on the currencies, currencies and commodities trading floor in London, and part of my job was to help manage disaster recovery for all of the European offices. So I did that for a number of years and it was awesome, but I needed to get back into the arts. And so I got recruited to go to an arts management program at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, which I did, and started a family. And from the Kennedy Center, I went to New York City to become the general manager and then eventually the executive director of the Jose Lehman Dance Foundation.

Randal Fippinger: And by that time, we had two children, and it became increasingly unaffordable for me to live in New York City. And then when the job here at Williams came available in 06–07, I took a stab at it and got the job. And we moved the family up here in February of oh seven and started raising kids here. And so my life here at Williams progressed with how the job changed at Williams over the years. So first it was a very narrow kind of job. And then with the adding of the outreach part of my job, I got to start making collaborations around North County. For example, one of the very first things that I did was start a collaboration with Mount Greylock Regional High School to get all of our artists to go to a class, some class with Mount Greylock. Coach Gill I have put him in so many different types of dance classes over the years. He is such a trooper, and so that’s the first thing I did. But then over the years, I’ve come up with different types of initiatives and different partnerships with different groups listening to their needs and trying to first use the arts and then other types of collaborations to bring people together. And I have to say one of my favorites, and I’m so happy that it is surviving, that it’s surviving. Covid is a project with Brighton Elementary School. We are working with a group of us are working with the 21st century after school program over there. And what we’re doing is and we’ll get back to this after COVID is lifted, is bringing elementary schools, students to Williams because we did this just before COVID started.

Randal Fippinger: So we’re going to get back to it where we would have a cohort of these elementary school students and we would teach them dance classes in our large, beautiful dance studio. And we would teach them for. I think it’s 12 weeks is the program. And then at the end of the program, we would have a performance on our stages and invite all of their families and have a pizza party for them. And the idea behind this program is, besides the fact of using performance to help young people feel confident about themselves and their growth. But the other sort of subversive part of the program is to make them feel confident about being in a college setting. So the program is not about us going there, but very intentionally then bringing the students to Williams, for example, the costume for the performance is a Williams College T-shirt, and we want them to be able to walk around their school saying, I earned this shirt, I earned this right to own, to be part of the Williams community. And I want to their families, many of whom don’t feel comfortable coming into a place like the SC2 Center. I want them to feel comfortable saying, Oh my child is there. I see a place for myself here. So the subversive part of this program is to say, Hey, you have a future at college. It could be Williams or it could be another place, but this is a future for you. And that’s sort of what the arts does.

Greylock Glass: That is, you know, that’s that’s an important part of I think, the the fact that there are groups of folks who just expect that they’re going to college. It’s just so it’s assumed and they may have, you know, been on college campuses when they were little for various reasons, the, you know, maybe even attended some sort of alumni event with their parents. Who knows what? But it’s just it is part of the reality. And for other groups of kids, it’s not necessarily part of the reality. I know just living here in town and just knowing that my kids can walk around town and walk on campus, do different events on campus, it’s going to change what their perception of of what’s available to them. And like you said, they may choose to go somewhere else besides Williams, but but it’ll be in part because they just assume that they can have it. Now, I want to bring back I want to sort of bring this back around to something that you said, that you you connect people as part of your job. That also, from my experience with you, has always been your personal characteristic of you as well.

Greylock Glass: You’ve always been very excited to say, Hey, Jason, do you know this person? Do you know that person? Let me introduce you to so-and-so. Come over here, you know, and you’re always connecting people together. I don’t know if you realize that it’s a it’s a personal characteristic, but you’re very good at it. I will say that. Thank you. Not everybody. It doesn’t always occur to everybody that that they can do that and they can create a network of of new acquaintances, new professional acquaintances, new friends, really, just with just bringing two people together for a handshake that can do it. Now, you take that. You have already taken that that gift, and you have applied it to town. I don’t want to say politics because I think it transcends politics to town initiatives and the town sort of. Personality and growth going forward in various initiatives that you’ve been part of, and in particular the Dyer Committee. And you’ve also worked with the police department. So why don’t you shift and let us know a little bit about how you started to get involved in the sort of care and feeding of this town.

Randal Fippinger: Well, as I started, especially during COVID and after George Floyd, I was very much part of the activist community in Williamstown, and I marched on Colonial Village. I marched on the police station, and I started to build connections there and get to know people. But what became apparent for me is as smart, thoughtful and passionate as that community was and still is. And I still call all of my friends and I respect them so deeply. But that was sort of only one part of the conversation that I saw happening in town, and that’s why I wanted to reach out to and that’s why I volunteered to be part of Dyer and also accepted the invitation from the interim police chief when he asked me to join the committee, the Special Police and Community Partnerships Committee that just recently had its event at Mount Greylock Regional High School. I remember when Interim Chief Zvimba sent me that invitation and he showed me the list. My initial reaction was, Oh my gosh, I really don’t like some of those people or I feel uncomfortable. That was my initial reaction. But I went into it and we were meeting on a regular basis since last summer and we have all come to get to know each other and changed our perspective of each other. And that for me just reinforces the value of getting to know somebody and spending time talking to them and it shifts your perspective so much.

Greylock Glass: Well, did that experience do you feel did that manifest in an effectiveness? We have we have gone through a couple of years of real, real backbiting and some and some real vitriol. Have we come out the other side of that, or do you think that progress and adequate progress has been made?

Randal Fippinger: Well, I don’t think we’ll ever come out of a situation where everybody will agree with each other and will live happily ever after. I actually don’t want to live in a world like that. I want to live in a world where there are people passionate on both sides, but a U-shaped curve, where there are passionate arguments on both sides, but the majority is sort of clustered around the center, sort of pushing around, but trying to create a consensus around a community. Because I believe, you know, to govern, you need a coalition of many different voices. And I don’t think any governing coalition should be all of one party or another. I think it’s very valuable to have contrarian voices or opinions. And as long as we can all respect each other’s perspective, then I think that’s valuable. And that only adds to the conversation.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. Well, that’s. Well said, I think. I don’t think you’re going to get to too many people who would disagree with you, at least not publicly. There are a lot of folks who would like there to just be one party or one set of ideals. But but, you know, we can’t have that in in a pluralist, plural pluralism as we have here. The the issues, though, I mean. I don’t imagine that your your passion, your fire is to sort of immerse yourself in administration and administrative responsibilities. What are some of the things that maybe they are? Maybe that really is what you’re all about. I like paperwork. I like signing forms. No, it’s it’s a big job. I mean, you know, you really do give up a little bit of your life. And as much as you want, actually, as much as you can, you can afford to be on the select board in any town. But this particular town has a has a particular set of issues that are sort of on the table now. What what were the the one or two or even three things that really made you decide this is the time for for Randall to to to get to get in the game.

Randal Fippinger: Right. But before I answer that, I do want to give a shout out to our town administrators, their awesome public works town clerk, all of them, the people that are the professional administrators. They keep this the deep state.

Greylock Glass: The deep state here in the deep state of Williamstown.

Randal Fippinger: Gets the yes. But first for me it was issues such is the issues of the Dyer Committee diversity, inclusion and racial equity. Those issues are super important to me, whether it’s about race, LGBT issues, social, economic issues, class issues. Those issues have played out and have intersected with my life in many different ways. And so to be part of this in a more formal way. So, for example, I did a show with the dining services folks at Williams a number of years ago, and so much of that wrapped around social issues, class issues, how people feel respected and cared for as individuals. And to have someone mop a floor and have an audience celebrate that person, I think that is wonderful and beautiful, and I’m glad we did it. But on some level, that’s as far as it goes, despite how much I bring to that. And so being on a committee like the dark committee and then eventually hopefully on a select board, I can say, well, I see these issues, I’m interacting with these. And so how can I address systems that make people feel uncomfortable that are dividing us, whether it be by class or race? What are the inclusivity issues? I really admire the superintendent and the cameras. The position that they’re talking about there is DBE, diversity, inclusion, equity and belonging. And I think belonging is a really important thing that we need to be adding to this. We all need to feel like we belong in this community.

Greylock Glass: But do you suppose the difference is between inclusivity and belonging?

Randal Fippinger: Inclusivity is. I think more of a system. Is a system of saying, okay, there is a place for me here. So I think that one is a systemic issue and one is maybe a little bit more cultural. I look at belonging as we have a cultural. We are saying everybody belongs is here, and we are actively trying to change our culture to make everybody feel like they belong. Where inclusivity may be about the structures that allow people to be here or are capable of being here.

Greylock Glass: Your parents say that you have to let your little sibling play with you a game that’s inclusivity. You happily inviting your little sibling to play with you is belonging.

Randal Fippinger: You are so good at this. Much better than me.

Greylock Glass: Oh.

Randal Fippinger: Should be ready to selectboard, my friend.

Greylock Glass: Never. It’s not going to happen. It’s not going to happen. You know, I might be willing to do another stint on the on the assessors board because, you know, being a tax assessor, that’s how you make friends. I’ll tell you that right now. Make a lot of friends quick that way. No. So anyway, the the point here is is well taken that these. The Williamstown. It is a. It is a place where there are some really amazing people with amazing intention and amazing sort of systems of, of of being open to change and to progress. But intention, as you say, in your press release. That it’s hard to govern from the picket line. It’s hard to govern from a place of good intentions or even acting on good intentions. What do you suppose? The opportunity is right now to sort of codify a lot of the good intentions that people have expressed. Through some of the different. I’ll just come out and say some of the conflicts that we’ve been going through. What do you think the opportunity here is to make those make progress stick?

Randal Fippinger: Well, I think, for example, I was so heartened to select board meeting a couple of weeks ago or maybe a month ago, a couple of meetings ago, where there was an extensive conversation about town D-I training, diversity, equity and inclusion training. And what impressed me about that was not the conversation about if we should be having it or why we are having it, but what type are we having and who is included in that to what level of town government and potentially even to the larger community outside of town government. So I think that. The activist conversations. I celebrate their work and I celebrate the community. Feedback to that has helped bring us to that point. So when we talk about codifying it, it’s things like that. It’s things like working with the Stockbridge, Muncie community. The fact that Williams has offered them a toehold on Spring Street and that the town has been open to to Indigenous Peoples Day projects in Field Park. And I’m sure there are other initiatives as well. So I think we are. Moving forward in that direction. We’re starting to codify some of the changes that make this town more inclusive. I think we have so much more work to do and so many of these hot button issues. I mean, we have so much work to do just in the police department. I think the interim chief is trying real hard and I look forward to a robust conversation when we get to that search process. But that needs to be changed. The policies need to be updated, and they haven’t been updated in almost two decades. So I think we’re we’re starting to gather momentum. And I think the town is supporting that momentum. And I think that’s the opportunity for the Selectboard candidates and other government candidates.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. Now, you know, Chief Z is walking a razor, razor thin line.

Randal Fippinger: Yes, he is.

Greylock Glass: And I’m aware of that. I don’t know how many people understand just what kind of pressure he’s he’s under from places that you see, from angles that people can see and from angles that they can’t see, that that should be taken into consideration. That said. What? There’s a lot of folks who don’t feel like enough has been done, that certain issues did not get addressed thoroughly or to their satisfaction. What was what has been good? What still is not quite up to your satisfaction in the in the discussions around policing in Williamstown. Both the the last well, the various conflicts and controversies and also the question of what we want policing to look like going forward.

Randal Fippinger: Well, let’s take for example, there are a number of pieces to that, but I’ll just take one slice to start at least is the CARES Act and having social workers participate in some potential conflict resolution when because when things get elevated or when there is a situation in town and there’s potentially a mental health or mental illness related issue or some other issue that is not necessarily in violation of a law. It’s just a conflict. Our police officers are asked to do so much and solve every problem. They are the first line of defense and the first responders for such a spectrum of issues. And I just can’t imagine how challenging intellectually and emotionally their jobs are. And so the fact that there is discussion about having social workers support that and support conflict resolution, I think is awesome. And I think that is a direction that we need to be going in and diversifying how we respond and how we support conflict resolution to some of the other issues. I think we just need to have a clear understanding. So expressing a frustration is not hearing enough about police policies where all the policies are at the moment. The Dyer Committee, and especially in its first year, was so vocal, appropriately vocal about wanting to highlight how things have not changed and how things have not come to light. And I support that. I support the efforts that they did. And I would want to see more of the change happening in the police department brought out publicly so we can all participate in the revising of the policies.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. Well, there’s there’s no question that there was a lot there was a real appetite for public contribution to the to the discussion around what we want, because this is a once in a generation chance to make a decision about what what the flavor of our of our policing should be. Do we want to be more like, you know, Andy Griffith or do we want to be more like Barney Miller or do we want to be more like NYPD Blue? I mean, you know, there’s there’s a lot of different styles. I can tell you that having having had friends who were both in local police departments and state police departments, the the secrets that they’ve told me is that there’s a lot of animosity that’s sort of baked into police work these days. I have a friend who said that in the academy. And throughout his tenure in the in the Hartford, Connecticut Police Department, there is a the the public is your enemy. Every single assume that every single one of them is on is on crystal meth and is carrying a loaded weapon. Doesn’t matter whether they’re little old ladies or whether they’re six foot seven black guys or whether they are they are seemingly pregnant. You know, 30 year olds treat everyone like they are a potential death, you know, death threat. And that is across the board, that’s across the nation. And that kind of policing is just not exactly, I think, what Williamstown is looking for.

Randal Fippinger: Right. And also, you know, I point out that there are many in our community that feel like policing is being handed out unevenly. There are many minority members of our community that feel very specifically targeted by police. So there is a real discrepancy in that. And that also needs to be a vital part of the conversation about police reform in this town.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, well, I’m sure it’s going to go on for some time. This is a conversation that has a lot of moving parts. Let’s talk a little bit about a couple of issues that are near and dear to both of us. I’m sure education. I have heard this complaint from a number of parents who, while they praise individual teachers and individual initiatives, certainly the you know, the two Jakes over there at Greylock are there. They have made some some improvements, I will say, especially in terms of communication, which is getting better. But I’ve heard a lot of parents suggest that for the reputation that Williams that that Williams that Williams lends to Williamstown, I should say, the school system is not as as five star as we as we could have. Yes. Given especially the property taxes that we take in.

Randal Fippinger: Right. I would 100%. I have an 11th grader, Mount Greylock, and I am sorely disappointed at some of the lack of infrastructure that he is receiving. So I would agree with that 100%. I try not to be too loud of a parent, but I am very frustrated with some of the things and I need to advocate more for my son and hopefully that will support other parents. But I agree with you completely.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, I would say to of course, advocating for your child is not something that everybody can do at the same level, nor should they have to feel like they’ve gone. They have graduated from a, you know, a mediator training course to go in and talk to the administration. Or sometimes it feels like a hostage negotiation course. But certainly. There are questions about things like Why is only Latin and in Spanish offered? In this this world that we live in today, while Spanish is certainly you know, I encourage I encourage people to learn Spanish. It’s not the only language I would offer as a school. I would think that, you know, Chinese Mandarin would be an exceptionally useful language, as would Arabic, and today perhaps even Russian. So why? What do you think? Do you feel and I know that there’s like a school committee and people can get involved in a lot of different ways. But as you look toward a potential seat of sort of the, you know, the the overarching administrative power there of the select board, do you feel like you have a a duty to try to bring more of the town’s resources and willpower to bear on creating an educational system that will actually and I know that we’ve talked about this and we will talk about this when we talk about the zoning, the planning and zoning issues. But that will be attractive to people who want to move their families here.

Randal Fippinger: I think that if you’re talking about the Select Board’s specific role in that, I think that what the Select Board so obviously as you mentioned, there are other governing authorities such as the school board and the council that. Support, manage and oversee the school systems and regional school systems with the superintendent. The Select Board has the bully pulpit. It has the ability to call attention to issues and highlight issues to support, to support and advocate change. Because as you noted, at the end of your question about bringing people into town and was noted in the planning board meeting just before we got on the call, is that tourism is very important for us. Yes, Williamstown. Sorry. Williams College is certainly an anchor, but tourism is hugely important to this town and this town. Having a reputation of being a place where parents and families want to be, whether it is in town or regionally and participate, is very, very important. So the select board, even though it may not be the person who goes and makes the change, it can advocate for change. It can set a standard of of. Quality and expectation for the school system.

Greylock Glass: Well said. It’s difficult because there are a lot of the the cables are sometimes sinewy between the different governing bodies. And I feel like sometimes that’s a good thing, obviously, to have some separation of powers. But sometimes I feel like what we really need is a little more sort of a unified, unified theory of progress, not to you know, not to suggest we could changing the bylaws today. But I do think that there are a number of. A number of areas that need to be addressed and they need to be addressed soon. I feel like there is an element of urgency. These days that I haven’t felt in a long, long time. Right. And I think that one of those areas is education. Another area is climate crisis remediation and preparation, which I think is tied into agricultural preservation also. And I will just say very briefly, in the thirties there was this thing called the Dust Bowl, and it happened in what used to be the breadbasket of America, all the soil up and blew away. And there are a lot of reasons for that bad soil management, etc. But we’re dealing with the situation where vast parts of arable land are either burning up or they’re being flooded every year. And in some cases, the drought.

Greylock Glass: It’s not so much that they’re burning, but the temperatures are so high that plants cannot physiologically come to fruition. Like literally in Florida. There were a couple of years recently where corn crops would grow, but because above a certain temperature they shut off. They don’t die, but they don’t produce fruit over. I think it’s like 118 or something, 115. They at a sustained high temperature, they stay alive, but they don’t put out fruit. Right. And that means that as parts of the country get get above that for long periods during the growing season, that means that the number of acres available to grow food to feed this this country diminishes not because it’s been developed, but just because of climate realities. And during the Depression, Oregon and Northern California and most of California fed the West Coast, New England and parts of the South really made up for the loss of productivity in the breadbasket and where the sharecroppers were were fleeing Oklahoma and western Tennessee and places like that. So this is a sort of a long winded lead in to the questions of climate crisis mitigation and preparation and agricultural preservation. What do you see as a concern and what do you see as possibilities for Williamstown in these these areas?

Randal Fippinger: Well, I celebrate the town having the cool committee and celebrating, highlighting the fact that we’re paying attention to it. But I think as a town, we need to do more and be more proactive about climate mitigation or climate preparation. I think climate preparation kind of change preparation because it is going to happen and I think this world is going to be a very different place climate wise ten years from now. And to your comments about city flight, it may have started because of COVID and it may take a lull as we exit from COVID. I think it’s going to start again. I think people are going to find places like Williamstown that have a relatively mild and stable or at least predictable climate and are socially very stable, are people coming? And so we need to be preparing for that through our town infrastructure and we need to be preparing it for it with housing and with having sensible climate issues in town that are realistic. What I mean sensible. I mean equating that with realistic that we can actually do as opposed to something that we wish for, but it’s just not going to happen.

Greylock Glass: Well, you know, I think to your point, if New York City were to see another, you know, say, Hurricane Sandy, yes, there will be climate refugees here and there could be hurricanes larger than Sandy that hit the city and or even even other other cities like Boston. You know, that could be a real disaster. The the issues of climate change and agriculture, I really think. My my own particular fear is that there will be because that there will be such a such pressure on the existing farms to produce food. And remember, we get a lot of food from other countries, especially Chile and other places, Mexico. And if anything were to happen. To the world economy or to those individual countries where and we can’t rely on that kind of export or importing ability, then we we’re going to have to make up for it somewhere. And good.

Randal Fippinger: That’s happening in Ukraine. A smart person just recently highlighted to me that they think that the Ukraine invasion is not at all about Naito or Nazis or anything like that. And it’s about food and it’s about the fact that Ukraine is the breadbasket of Europe. And so and we place we prices are changing. There was a story on I think it was Marketplace. It was either Marketplace or a PBS NewsHour in the last day talking about how the country how Zelinsky is trying to get the folks in the regions that are not under attack right now to at least keep on producing food for the country. So, yes, agriculture is so hugely important. It’s going to be shifting in Europe significantly. And what we’re doing in this country. You mean you look at the water in California, you know, the Colorado River is getting pulled so many different ways. And it isn’t the Colorado River, the one that is dry by the time it reaches the ocean.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, it wasn’t it wasn’t like that not to too long ago. Yeah. It’s and you know, and now you see why people don’t like to talk to me, because I bring up this, this kind of garbage and and I make I put everybody off the food. So that’s I think that that’s spot on. Now, granted, we do have a lot of people here who have, say, great big yards. And if they wanted to, they could believe it or not, they could. You know, I think that Williamstown could produce easily 80% of what we need. And a lot of people would laugh at that. And I say, don’t laugh at that, because actually the city of Paris, up until it really started experiencing a densification in the 20th century, the city of Paris grew all of the food it needed and exported to Great Britain during the winter months. They harvested their horse manure from their livery cabs, their carriages, and they composted it. And they had little farms throughout the city limits of Paris that are half an acre, one acre. Little things, itty bitty farms. And there was so much success that they were able to feed themselves. So a lot of people say, well, you know, what could Williamstown do? What could what could the Berkshires do to feed? Well, a lot, actually. We could do a lot to feed ourselves. So I just I really I like to be the one whose I’d like to be the squirrel who’s got, you know, a nest full of nuts over the winter. It’s always been me. Good.

Randal Fippinger: Yeah. And every little bit helps. You know, there are no silver bullets to say, okay, if we do this one thing, we’re. We’re solved. It’s just like with climate change and climate remediation or climate change remediation, we need to be doing lots and lots of little things because we miss the opportunity to do the big things. And so now we need to just do the best we can with the changes that are going to be happening to us, both in terms of climate and green food production.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, agreed. Agreed. And I think that that’s something that, you know, the has not been lost on our state legislators. I mean, there are a number of bills that have been some are still languishing in committees, unfortunately. But there have been a number of bills that have been brought brought before the the state House that discuss a lot of these things. And Western Massachusetts and the Berkshires have come up in some of these bills in terms of what can the state depend on if need be? So, you know, the people in the Berkshires, western Mass, we could be, you know, generating some healthy income, selling to the good folks in Boston if we were, you know, ever needed to. Right. Right. What about and I know that this. That, you know, you’re probably not able to talk all night since we’ve been we’ve been online listening to meetings, that meeting for a while. But that issue of of land density, since we just brought that topic up and housing, we listen to a lot of voices, as you mentioned at the top of the show, the top of the segment that you were impressed at the amount of civility that people displayed more or less. And I would say that there are a lot of voices there. Did you have any particular. Feelings about how much we how much ground we could cover in the next want to know say 2 to 5 years and adding What would you like to see in terms of new housing in this town you’re talking about? Do you think another couple of hundred units that could be, you know, 2 to 3 bedrooms, do you think another 1000 units? I mean, what would be what would be something worth shooting for or have? Or is it too early to to say?

Randal Fippinger: Right. I’m not expert enough to say we need 550 houses along a timeline, but I think we need I, I support Chris Winters and the other folks when they say we need to create opportunities for more affordable housing to be brought up, to be built in this town. And yes, some developers, there’s a chance to take advantage of that and not all of it will happen. I think some of these warrants won’t get passed at town hall, but this is an incremental step in that direction. But I think that we very much need to instead of it’s I think it’s less about a specific number and creating opportunities for people to build or for for there to be a sufficient rental market. The rental market in this town is terrible. And one of the small business owners mentioned that only one or two of our employees can even find a place to live in Williamstown. So we need to create an environment where people can build and we’re economic. I heard one definition of economics, and it’s the study of incentives. We need to create incentives where people will build housing, sensible housing, affordable housing, lowercase a affordable housing in this town. And so I think that’s the direction we need to be going in. And so I’m less in favor of saying, okay, we need to build 300 units in this in this town. I like the fact that, say, for example, 330 Call Avenue is built, but I wouldn’t say be an advocate. Okay. We need to go for more of those in the next five years. I think that isn’t necessarily the answer.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. What do you suppose? You know, there are plenty of ways that towns can offer incentives to, you know, say, manufacturers. You know, they can they can give them tax breaks for a certain number of years. Some of the language was very sort of Pollyanna ish that we can hope that the developers offer. Right. You know, which I feel like is come on, people, we’re not all babes in the woods here. We know what happens. Don’t don’t try to you know, don’t blow smoke, you know, sunshine around here. We we know that people do what is in their best interest if they if they have any possible means. And if you’ve got the money to buy a chunk of land and develop it, you typically do what’s going to make you the most profit. This is America. This is what people do. However, there are times when you can, as a town or a city, you can say to a corporation, Hey, I’ll tell you what, if you do X, we’ll give you a break in your taxes of this percent for this many years. Nobody brought that up. Is that something that that maybe should be thrown into the mix?

Randal Fippinger: Absolutely. I think that we should be trying a lot of different strategies, whether it is a developer who wants to do a larger unit, has a certain number of affordable houses or further units in whatever development and learn from other communities and do what’s available for us under our current state and federal laws. I grew up in I grew up in a in New York City, on Roosevelt Island. And it’s an island underneath the Queensboro Bridge. And when I was there in the seventies, in the eighties, it was a small development led by Housing and Urban Development’s housing program. And we lived in middle income housing, subsidized housing, and we bought an apartment and my parents, not me, bought an apartment. And part of the deal, the HUD deal, was that we had to sell it. My parents had to sell it for the same price that they bought it for, plus any capital improvements they made and they lived there for 15 years, I think was ten, maybe ten years excuse me, ten years. And they had to sell it, I think it was $25,000. And this is an apartment in New York City. And I think they sold it in the late eighties. And it was just shocking to me. Even the young me then was selling an apartment for $25,000 in New York City. So I think that there are a lot of incentive programs and a lot of clever ideas around the country that we can bring into this conversation.

Greylock Glass: Yeah. There were a lot of a lot of interesting ideas brought up. Also, I think somebody brought up the idea that we should allow farmers to teach. Well, one idea was that there should be perhaps a sort of a therapeutic community, a farming community, which I have said for some time would be wonderful. And it’s actually has its roots in New England. I don’t know if you know this, but many, many New England towns have something called Town Farm Road, and Town Farm Road is typically the place where the town set aside a farm to peop to to house people who lost their ability to, to provide for themselves. And they would often work doing whatever it was. Very often widows, war veterans who had nowhere to go and sometimes sometimes, you know, debtors. But the idea was that the town would create little, little shack houses for them, and at least they had somewhere to go and they would, you know, take care of some chickens and then take care of a garden. And, you know, there’s a certain authority and shame to it back in the day, but that doesn’t mean that it has to be that way.

Greylock Glass: There could very easily be a farm that is who is sole function is to sort of re reintegrate people back into society. I don’t know that you’re going to get a lot of buy in from Williamstown on that idea, but I can see it working. The other idea the other idea that somebody said was that we could allow farmers themselves to develop a certain amount of land for the purposes of having either interns or young, you know, whatever workers live there. You know, you could get really creative, potentially, and create a sort of a. A system where developers are able to develop on a farmer’s land. The farmer gets to keep those units and rent them out and the the developer gets to to sell them, basically. But the, you know, there’s all sorts of things that could be done. So without going into I realize I just gave you like a five minute lead in here, but without going into too much more detail, what do you think the right time frame for public input on this these issues is when it comes to the what’s before the planning board?

Randal Fippinger: Well, you know, the planning board has a set of warrants that many of them will make it to town meeting. But this isn’t the end of conversation. And I fear sort of the unwritten or the the unsaid message in some of these conversations is we either have to fix it all now or we have to stop it all now. As if what we do at town meeting on May 17 is the be all, end all. So much of this town has changed, you know, over the last hundred or so years. I mean, Hopkins Forest used to be clear cut. And so I think it is part of a larger conversation. We need to. I am in favor of experimenting and trying and doing things and but then continuing the planning process. So when I advocate in being in favor of many of these warrants, it’s not to say that I am not in favor of continuing a conversation, of planning and bringing up these ideas. But I think we need to try something. We need to do it right away or else we’re just going to keep on talking. But I love these ideas and I hope they come into the larger planning process next year and the planning board next year.

Greylock Glass: Hmm. Well, we shall see. I can tell that it’s going to be a set of a suite of issues that are. Going that they run the risk of bringing further division into a town that’s already seen an awful lot of it. Right. For a town of our size. I’ll tell you that the fact that we have weathered I don’t even know what would happen if people actually could could have met in person for some of these meetings. Maybe it’s a good thing that they were held on Zoom. If you’re looking for silver linings. So let’s talk just briefly before I let you go about your campaign. Obviously, people can read I have reproduced your press release in the show notes, show notes to this episode with a note that I’m just simply doing that. What what is the next step? Do you have a campaign manager? Are you going to you’re going to be hitting the yard sign shop wherever you want, even know where you get the yard signs. But where? What’s next and where do people get a hold of you?

Randal Fippinger: Well, I will be developing a website, but that is that I actually have the domain name, Randi and JD.com, and that will be up in the next day or so since I am at the point of ramping up the process in terms of a campaign manager, I’m taking a page out of Adrienne Marie Brown and looking at emergent strategy. And instead of being so hierarchical and saying, I’m going to have this one person as the campaign, it’s more of a campaign committee. I have quite a number of friends in town who want to contribute as they are able to be part of the dialogue and helping me think, think about it and think about how to what priorities and that we should be looking at in town. And I also have to confess, and I think this is speaking to some of your points, some of the people that want to help me don’t want to put out their name publicly, because there have been so many sort of harsh public attacks over the last couple of years. And so part of my candidacy is making it so that folks like we can get back to having a conversation where I feel bad that some of my friends don’t want to show their face or associate publicly, not because of me. They support me, but it’s because they don’t want the repercussions of it. And I think we all need to feel empowered to be part of the community dialogue, irrespective of race, socioeconomic class or or perspective opinion.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, I think it’s worth pointing out that the Norman Rockwell painting I referred to before, which is freedom of speech, it shows it shows a man very non self-aware, very non self. Yeah. A conscious individual in clearly what a worker’s clothes standing up at a town meeting and you know, there’s some people make giving him the you know, the side eye a little bit, but they’re not. They’re not looking like they’re ready to attack. And I’ve always, you know, call me naive. Call me, you know, hopeless romantic. But I still believe that that’s possible, that we can have respectful dialogue, that we can have disagreements that don’t end in a fractured community that takes a generation to repair. How are we supposed to get anywhere if it’s going to be another 30 years before two families will even speak to each other? I mean, there aren’t. Go ahead.

Randal Fippinger: You know, that’s that’s one of the things that that dire is doing. And I certainly don’t want to take outsized credit of it. I am just one person in a larger set of group of really smart, passionate people, but about giving a safe place for conversation and again, getting back to Adrian Marie Brown. You know, and it’s not just her, but other thinkers, but the whole notion of calling in instead of calling out and saying, well, in restorative justice, Bilal Ansari, who’s another candidate, was advocating this restorative justice when he was on Dire about trying to fix harm and fix these conversations. And so that it’s not trying to be divisive and that we’re trying to welcome people into a conversation. We’re going to be making mistakes and we’re going to because you just can’t get it all right all the time. And I think the Dire Committee wants to model this, but I think as a town on the select board, I want to continue to model having a safe conversation where we’re calling people into the conversation, even if sometimes we’re making some mistakes. Mm hmm.

Greylock Glass: I think.

Randal Fippinger: That’s. And Jane was saying I want to say sorry. And Jane, if I’m going to mention Bilal, I would also say Jane Payton as well. I think all three candidates I think this town will do great if whomever the two candidates, the two people that they elect.

Greylock Glass: I think that’s a great way to leave it. Randall, you and I are going to talk for just a minute. After I say goodbye on air. We’ll have our on air. Goodbye. But then. Then we’ll talk for a couple of minutes. So I’m going to redo that and just don’t go away. When I say goodbye, say goodbye, but then stay on the line. Well, Randall, I think that that sounds like a great place to leave it. I’ll tell you what. I will put Randy Pepper intercom in the show notes so people will be able to. And I’ll have a little note in parentheses that says may not yet be a live site. So I guess you better get your web designer on that and get something up there, because I’m sure people are going to want to find out more about you. And I’m sure you’ll have a newsletter and calendar of events where you’re going to be speaking. Do you have any speaking, you know, sort of meet the meet the candidate events lined up yet?

Randal Fippinger: Not public ones. I’m just trying to get out to places and have conversations, one on one conversations, you know, going to meet people in less public environments so we can just have private conversations, but the more public events will be happening soon.

Greylock Glass: Okay, so look for the sign that says free beer. And that’s what we’re going to find. No. Anyway. Well, Randall, thanks so much for speaking to the top left corner and we’ll talk again soon. Bye bye.

Randal Fippinger: Thank you so much.

Greylock Glass: And I’m going to shut down the recorder.

Well, there it is, as you can tell just from the conversation we’ve had with one candidate. This is going to be a race to remember. And I think it’s going to be a race that’s going to determine. Quite a bit that goes on here in Williamstown for well years to come. So I think this is going to be one that people watch closely. I know we will be. And as I said, we’ll be trying to get the other candidates on as soon as possible. Randall Ebinger says that he thinks there are no bad candidates and I think that’s very kind. It’s a very diplomatic way to approach the issue. I think it’s not everybody’s way to approach the issue. Some people take the gloves off and we’ll just have to see what happens as the days and weeks wear on. But in any event, a lot of these issues are going to be coming up over and over and over again.

Jay Velázquez: And we’ll just have to see what happens. Should I? Should I run a candidate debate? I have not done that yet. I should, I think, maybe host a debate from The Greylock Glass. And I don’t know where it hold it somewhere where there isn’t any alcohol, probably because we don’t want to get people too riled up. But we’ll see. We’ll see if I can come up with a venue and in a time and see how that goes. If you like this show, remember that this the stuff that’s good for the public. And this is Eat Your Peas journalism, you know, the the vitamins, the nutrients. This isn’t the stuff that gets tons and tons of hits. It’s not the stuff that gets shared around like cat videos. If you like this kind of program, if you think it’s important to democracy, to public involvement, please do your part and pitch in.

Go to greylockglass.com/support and find a method of contribution that suits your your budget and your willingness to support local news. Because without this, without your support, we can’t do it. Frankly, it will not be possible to do it. So again, gorilla glass dot com slash support. Do what you can. And we will try to keep the public service nature of this independent news thing going. Thanks for listening and remember. Stay safe. Be good to each other and go easy on yourself.

For Immediate Release

[Williamstown, MA, March 22, 2022] Randal Fippinger is proud to announce his candidacy to serve as a member of the Williamstown Select Board. Fippinger has a long track record of building community partnerships, all grounded in deep, respectful outreach and relationship building and an abiding belief that all voices deserve a space. He is excited to extend the ongoing initiatives of the town’s Diversity, Inclusion, and Racial Equity Committee (DIRE) to his potential role as a representative of Williamstown residents on the Select Board, working in partnership with the Chief of Police for supportive police reform and with community members to find affordable and accessible housing solutions, among the many other pressing issues facing Williamstown.

“For me, there is a time to protest and there is a time to govern,” Fippinger observes. “I joined fellow community members in protest at the Williamstown Police station in 2020 and was a dedicated member of Williamstown’s Racial Justice Police Reform (WRJPR) activist group. We helped galvanize a community conversation around twenty-first century policing and the need for more transparency between the Town and its citizens. However, it is difficult to govern from the picket line. Important systemic change happens by building coalitions of engaged citizens. I want to continue to be part of that coalition building in support of progressive and inclusive community change.”

Fippinger is the current Chair of the Williamstown Diversity, Inclusion, and Racial Equity committee (DIRE), a member since August 2021. In this role, he is able to build upon his dedication to a wide range of community engagement work; he has served as a member of the recent Special Police and Community Partnership (SPCP) Committee (hosted by the Department of Justice and the Williamstown Police Department) and on the Board of Directors of the Roots Teen Center (2019-2021). With many years of behind-the-scenes facilitation at the ‘62 Center at Williams College, Fippinger brings his supporting-role mentality to the many partnerships he has fostered; with Williams’ Davis Center to help create Williamstown’s 2019 and 2020 Indigenous Peoples’ Day exhibits at Field Park; with Williams College Museum of Art to wrap the ‘62 Center for Theatre and Dance with images celebrating essential workers during COVID; with Brayton Elementary School to create a program that validates and empowers students and their families through dance; with Mount Greylock Regional High School and the Center for Learning in Action for the last 10 years to bring world-class artists into the classrooms; with Williamstown Elementary School’s Words Are Wonderful program to provide a performance space for schoolwide participation; and with Williams’ Dining Services to celebrate their vital work by producing an original piece created and performed by food service professionals. A common vision and guiding principle Fippinger brings to these initiatives and projects is his enthusiasm and ability to always ask, “What can I do to help?” 

Fippinger has lived in Williamstown since 2007. His wife and partner, Sarah McNair, is an Occupational Therapist working in Pittsfield. Together, they have three teen boys who have attended three north county public high schools, McCann Technical School, BART Charter, and Mount Greylock Regional High School. At Williams College’s ‘62 Center for Theater and Dance, Fippinger is the Visiting Artist Producer and Outreach Manager. Prior to calling Williamstown home, he lived in Washington DC and New York City, working for some of the country’s leading arts organizations including the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, American Ballet Theatre, Manhattan Theater Club, and the José Limón Dance Foundation.  Fippinger says, “I studied performing arts curation, but years earlier received a practical education in finance developing trading floor infrastructure for Goldman Sachs. Fippinger worked at Goldman Sachs from 1997 to 2000, in both New York  and London, where he rose to the level of Vice President. When not busy parenting or working, he loves to run, cycle, read, and enjoy the beauty and culture of the Berkshires. Fippinger looks forward to many conversations with members of our diverse community and welcomes your outreach at [email protected].

The post Top Left Corner #154 — NTRVW:
Randal Fippinger, Williamstown Select Board Candidate appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

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A large greenhouse that was due to house thousands of seedlings and starts in the coming month was destroyed by the latest windstorm to roar through the region. You can help:
Contribute now: GoFundMe.com
Follow Windy Ridge Farm on their Facebook page

Jason Velázquez: And this is Episode #153 of the Top Left Corner. I’m your host, Jay Velasquez, and as always, I thank you for tuning in. This episode dropped Thursday, March 10th, 2022. I don’t know when you have downloaded and tuned into this, but I hope you’re having a great day, just the same. On this show, we have someone I have been meaning to to get on the program for some time now. Julia Lemieux, who is the founder and director of Windy Ridge Farm, just over the line in Franklin County, in Hawley, Massachusetts. Julia is one of a new generation of farmers who is really the total package. She understands not just the art and science of growing food, but she she really has a sense of how to connect with the customers and market her goods.

In one way, it’s a good thing. In another way, it’s not a good thing. The farmers today they have to do more than just, you know, grow good food. They have to connect with their customers. They have to do the social media game. They have to, you know, be out there networking. So it takes a lot more time. It’s a lot more effort when it comes to communications outreach. But again, it educates a lot of us who don’t necessarily have contact with the world of local agriculture. You can find her, in addition to at her position as a farmer at Windy Ridge farm, she is also the director of the Pittsfield Community Garden Program, which — and I didn’t know this — this actually really touches the lives of many, many people in the community and provides nutrition to families, a much, much greater number of families than I had known. She also put some time in helping to mentor youth groups. And of course, you can find her during the regular season at farmer’s markets throughout the Berkshires and western Massachusetts. Julia is one of those folks who just gives and gives of herself, and it’s a damn shame that that doesn’t spare her from from bad luck.

The wind storms that came through the Berkshires just a few days ago were devastating to a lot of folks, and Julia was not spared. Her greenhouse, which is which is quite large and heavy — you wouldn’t think that it would be easy to lift it off the ground, but Mother Nature did lift it all the way off the ground and basically made an accordion out of it. And she is not only trying to get ready for a new season, but now she has to find a way to replace this structure, and I’m going to take the time that I would normally spend pitching you about how you should be contributing to the Gorilla Glass.

I’m going to say, Hey, don’t contribute to the Gorilla Glass today in the show notes at GreylockGlass.com. Look for this episode; you’re going to find a link to her GoFundMe. It’s critically important that we do all we can to to have the backs of the farmers who work so hard to bring quality local food to our region. So I really do want you to go there to her go fund me and, you know, pitch in five bucks, 10 bucks, one hundred bucks, whatever you can, because we cannot afford to let farmers in our community suffer for something that’s as she’ll talk about is going to be more and more likely with climate change affecting weather patterns everywhere. The Berkshires are not going to be entirely spared just because of our location. So without further ado, let us have on the show. Julia Lemieux of Windy Ridge Farm.

The Greylock Glass: And five, four, three two. Julia Lemieux, thanks so much for coming on the top left corner. It’s it’s great to have you on. I wish we had you on during better circumstances.

Julia Lemieux: Yeah, yeah, nice to be here.

The Greylock Glass: So you are the the owner, director, founder of Windy Ridge Farm. You got a little more than you bargained for out of the name this week. Is that is that not so?

Julia Lemieux: Yeah, the name has some irony at the moment. It’s always a little breezy up here and we’ve definitely had some wind events before. But the last two nights, Sunday night and Monday night were particularly windy and Monday night we had a really strong front come through the region and it completely destroyed one of our greenhouses here at this farm.

The Greylock Glass: I saw I saw some images of that, and I have to say, I’m so sorry. I know how heartbreaking that can be. And and you know, I think, you know, we get gusts a lot of the time, but those winds that we had were just sustained. You’ve had greenhouses up there for a number of years now. Have you ever worried about this, this kind of wreckage?

Julia Lemieux: I definitely have what I call wind anxiety any night that it’s windy, I’m kind of up and aware of what’s going on and checking to see if we still have power and checking on the green houses. And we’ve had other minor damage events with the greenhouses over the years. And it is, I think that because of climate change, unfortunately, we’re just going to see more extreme weather events. And one thing that I really worry about in our region is higher, higher wind events because of funny.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, that for some reason, Holly, both sides of the ridge get it pretty, pretty bad. The the thing is, these are not little, you know, backyard greenhouses. These are heavy. I guess their aluminum frame is aluminum probably or galvanized? Yeah. So I mean, these are not good.

Julia Lemieux: They’re galvanized steel frame. Yes, so they’re this the way that this greenhouse broke. I watched it when it was happening. I have happened to be out trying to work on a generator and it it it collapsed and folded in. It blew up into the air and pulled it in on itself like it was made of cooked spaghetti. But this is heavy gauge steel. But the wind was so strong that it just crunched that thing right together.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, it looks like a giant picked it up and just sort of played with it. Like I tried to make a cat’s cradle.

Julia Lemieux: You know, the giant wings, basically.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, no. It’s it’s something to see now. This is this is one of those things that many people don’t fully appreciate. They know that farming is hard work. They know that it takes dedication. Some people kind of understand that it’s more than a job. It’s kind of it’s kind of who you are. It’s kind of your life. They don’t always understand that you really are. At the mercy of the environment. Talk a little bit about some of the things that this, you know, and you can bring climate change back into it if you want to, because I want to. I want to go back to that for a bit, but talk about some of the things that you have to put up with weather wise in the last few years that a lot of people don’t think about.

Julia Lemieux: Sure, yeah, I mean, one of my favorite sayings when I’m at the farmer’s market with customers is that we’re growers, not magicians, because we’re farming. Every every year is different. The weather is never going to be exactly the same twice. There’s always going to be variables more so than I think any other business, really. And that is how it becomes kind of like part of who you are and part of your lifestyle because the hours are, you know, more than more than most jobs, that’s for sure. And yeah, it’s just kind of a different business and there are a ton of variables and people will sometimes complain, you know, why isn’t the lettuce ready yet? Or, you know, why is why does this plant look this way? And you know, all I can do is do the best I can with the inputs that I have. But the bottom line is I can’t control the weather and I’m not a magician so that we are where we’re at. We’re at the mercy. If Mother Nature gives us three weeks of cloud, when we’re growing out our tomato seedlings, they’re going to look a lot different than they do. When we have three weeks of Sun and I as a greenhouse grower, I can’t do anything about that. Right, right. It comes up a lot. And you know, in that way, it’s kind of a good chance to offer people a little bit of an education on what farming is really like, especially at the farmer’s market.

Julia Lemieux: When you’re maybe dealing with with folks who aren’t farmers and and don’t really know what day to day life is like on the farm. Yeah. And again, in terms of climate change, we always we’ve definitely had other wind damage here at the farm. Nothing anywhere near this extreme. And then also the if this had happened in August, it really wouldn’t be as big of a deal because I would have some time to try to get funds together and plan a new build and order all the parts. This greenhouse is normally filled at the beginning of April, and we grow out seedlings in it for about a month and then we deliver all the seedling orders during the month of May. And then we use the space for in-ground production for the rest of the summer and fall. So it it happened. The timing could have been worse. It could have been two or three weeks from now, but the timing couldn’t be a lot worse and we’ve never had damage that’s occurred at this crucial moment in the growing season. And we still expect there’s usually some spring winds as the seasons kind of change out here in Holly. And I’m still I know that wasn’t the last windy day we’ll have in March and April. It’s always kind of a breezy couple of months in the early spring. Well, that’s the thing.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, that’s the thing that really freaked me out because this I mean, we haven’t. We’ve just we’re just beginning that season.

Julia Lemieux: Yeah, the switch. Yeah. And usually the time it gets dangerous when the ground is really thawed because it’s so soft. And that’s when a lot of damage will happen with structures and trees in the wind because they lose that frozen winter ground to this muddy. We go into mud season and we haven’t really turned that switch yet up here if we’ve had a couple of muddy days. But as we’re talking right now, the ground is covered with snow. Again, we’ve got snow and falling snow.

The Greylock Glass: And now I mean, they call snow the poor man’s fertilizer, but I’ve had enough of that fertilizer. To be honest, this year, you know, I think I think about climate change and I think about the the extreme heat that so much of the country gets these days every year, a little hotter, little hotter. And I think about the crop failures that we’ve seen in corn and wheat and certainly the fires in California and elsewhere have destroyed so much of the fruit production. To me, New England is as challenging as it can be to be a farmer in New England. New England seems like a really important region of the country to protect when it comes to farming. Just because we have not and I’m knocking on wood here, particleboard anyway. We are we haven’t seen the the most dramatic impacts of climate change yet. And yet if you look at western Massachusetts, you see more and more homes coming up little in McMansions. Do you have any thoughts about the ability of New England to sort of become a powerhouse of agriculture again as needed, especially with what’s going on on the global stage?

Julia Lemieux: Yeah, I mean, I think with New England, there’s a couple of things. One is, I really do believe that we’re slightly more cushioned from near near-term climate collapse. Like you said, we’ve we’ve been lucky and that we haven’t had like large wildfires and some of the other really awful things that are happening around the world and around the country. And then also, we’ve got a lot of smaller, more diversified farms in the area. So, you know, out West, you’re looking at huge monocultures and that that just doesn’t work. That is not a model that will sustain us into the into the far future. And so what what New England has is the model that works better. I’m not saying it was perfect, but smaller scale, diversified production has more climate resilience than any of these large scale farms, and I don’t know that it’ll happen in our lifetime. But at some point, those those large industrial farms there will be collapse. We don’t have enough genetic diversity in what is being grown. What people are eating is far less diverse than it was a hundred and fifty years ago in terms of the types of food and the varieties within those types of food. We’ve got one or two companies that are, you know, supplying I’m thinking of cheese as an example. One company supplies the culture that makes about half the world cheese. And so when you have when you have that type of control of the food system, it’s not going to end well. And what we need are the small scale diversified farms and businesses. And I think New England’s got a really healthy population of that, particularly in western mass, but New England as a whole. So I just think it’s it’s a good place to be and we’re really lucky to be able to live here.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, we’re also not facing the erosion that a lot of the other, you know, parts of the country, especially the Midwest are facing. I was reading just this week about micronutrients and how in recent studies there are far, far fewer micronutrients in the soils where most of America’s food is being produced. But in the case of New England, we don’t have quite that erosion because we don’t have, you know, hundreds of square miles of flat, flat growing, you know, tillage that will blow away in the wind.

Julia Lemieux: But yeah…

The Greylock Glass: You know, we have we have all of these rocky hills and dales and in nooks and crannies,

Julia Lemieux: Yes, nooks and crannies. And you know, if you ask any New England farmer, our best crop is our rocks.

The Greylock Glass: Usually we get some, we get some good rocks.

Julia Lemieux: Yeah, shale grit requires some different modes of thinking to make it to global soil and to make it a good place to grow healthy food. But I think in general, it does have a, you know, better micronutrients and something that’s been monographs for decades.

The Greylock Glass: Right, right. Well, I I guess I do want to, you know, point out and many of our listeners and the readers of the of the show are pretty familiar because, you know, they’re farmers market shoppers, they’re they’re aware of of a lot of these issues, they might not know you, though the, you know, those in Pittsfield might. Why don’t you describe your role as the as the community garden director of Pittsfield?

Julia Lemieux: Yeah, yeah, so we in addition to having our little certified organic farm up here that we founded in 2009, in Holly since 2013, I’ve been working down in the city of Pittsfield with the Office of Community Development there, managing acting as their city community gardeners. So I’m managing a few community gardens throughout the Morningside and West Side neighborhoods in Pittsfield, and we’ve got five garden sites currently. And over the years I’ve helped various, you know, nonprofits and schools either get a garden program in space going or help them maintain or revitalize existing space. We work a lot with some of the larger food pantries in Pittsfield or South Congregational and the Christian Center on Robin Vav. We actually have a community garden at the Christian Center, so that’s, you know, we grow some food for community members, folks help out in the garden who are from the neighborhood. We work with a few team groups, including roots driving. They do like a youth work program, some really great youth development in Pittsfield. So we have those groups in the gardens and we’ve got a couple, we’ve got a garden at a housing development, so we’ve got residents that grow their own food. And then we also grow some food for other residents who, you know, aren’t able to be in the growing space or don’t want to be. We bring the veggies back in for them. So it’s been a really amazing program. Covid was was difficult for us because one of the main benefits of gardening in my eyes at that scale is the therapy that you get being in community in these spaces.

Julia Lemieux: And a lot of the community members I work with are disabled or are very high risk for COVID complications. So we we sort of had to decentralize over the last couple of years and come up with schedules, so we wouldn’t all be in the space at the same time. And so we really had to adjust what the program looked like the last two years. And I’m looking forward to getting back into educational events. We’re doing a see starting event at the beginning of April at the Berkshire Athenaeum and things like that, where we can gather in groups again and be in community together. So I’m looking forward to that. And we’ve always had a we have a couple of gardens at elementary schools as well. And during the pandemic, a lot of our in-person educational programming had to, you know, it went away, schools were closed. And so we’ve been gradually working our way back into that educational programming for the K to five age group, which I think is so, so, so important that kids know that they can grow their own food. Yeah, yeah. It’s a great program in the city. Does they fund this program? And they’re very supportive of the program and it’s an important piece. There’s a lot of environmental pollution and Pittsfield from General Electric, and I think it’s it’s nice to see the city getting behind a program that kind of works to. Revitalized and just bring some environmental justice to some of these neighborhoods that were harmed so deeply by that pollution.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, yeah, no, I think I think certainly it’s always a matter of making sure that the next generation has the foundation, you know, for understanding and for and continuing. We certainly can. It’s clear should be clear anyway by now that we cannot rely on five companies to bring us 85 percent of our food. You know, listening to you, I think most people should understand that you are. You’ve been at this game a little while and you’re, you know, one of the region’s, you know, experts. There’s a lot of a lot of smart farmers out out our way, but you’ve definitely been, you know, you’ve been at the practice a long time. If somebody were want, would you want to hire you for consulting? I don’t know where you’d find the time. Yeah, but but you’d be up for that, right? If if a town wanted to start a community gardening program, they could they could contact you, right?

Julia Lemieux: Absolutely. Yeah, no, I’m always I’ve definitely talked to a lot of folks outside of Pittsfield on whatever they’ve got going on for their projects. I, because of the farm business, is mostly organic plants and then we do a little bit of produce. So I always try to aim for months that are not, you know, April and May and June because they tend to be really busy months for our business. But later in the summer and the fall and the winter months especially, there’s more bandwidth for helping people kind of do a little bit of, you know, what is their vision and how do we make that happen and sustain it over the long term? Because that’s an important piece to a lot of these community led projects and making sure that it has a long term future and that it won’t end up, as you know, people kind of have interest initially and then and then they don’t, and it becomes really hard to maintain.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, yeah, I have seen those. There’s a few schools in western mass that had garden, you know, like sort of as I don’t know whether this is a club or as a class, but there are greenhouses attached to schools sitting disused. And it’s so sad to see that somebody had the fire at one point in time, but it’s sort of, you know, petered out. But I think when people see it, see you at the farmer’s market and see that the I mean, you’ve always got just the most gorgeous starts. So if if this well, if the rest of this spring doesn’t, you know, doesn’t keep up, it’s abuse of you. I’m sure you’ll have. I’m sure you’ll have more, more great starts and people can find you OK. There’s a lot of information. A lot of it’s going to be in the show, notes listeners. We’re going to have links not only to windy ridges social media page, and we’re going to have links to probably the farm markets that you belong to. And in other places. But what I really want to do before we before we do that and that way people can find you where you’re growing because I know you update your your Facebook page of where you’re going to be.

The Greylock Glass: So once they have that, they have almost everything. But right now, I want to talk about this greenhouse. I want to circle back around because that’s key greenhouses. I have A.. And and after we say goodbye, like technically on the phone, I’m going to want to keep you on the phone afterwards because I want to talk to you for about something, but. I have been to the farm tech catalogue, and I drool, I drool over the greenhouses. There’s like a ninety six footer that I want so badly, but it is not cheap. It is. I mean, you could buy a house for about the same same price as these greenhouses. These are show they’re not cheap, but it cost of steel has gone up so high in the last couple. Yeah, that yeah, it’s it’s insane. I just wanted to buy fencing and I’m like, Oh my lord, that fencing is out of, it’s out of control. So you’re talking thousands of dollars to to repair this, this greenhouse and you started. It is a go fund me, right?

Julia Lemieux: Yeah, I did start a go fund me at 3:00 in the morning yesterday. A couple of hours after I watched watched us lose our greenhouse. And yeah, just just knowing that again, the cost of everything has really skyrocketed the last couple of years, particularly steel and the cost of labor. So I started to go fund me yesterday and I I’ve been really, really touched with how the Western math and beyond community is kind of rallying around this project. So that been a bright spot in the last 48 hours, for sure.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah. Well, you know, you are a pillar in the in the community, in the agricultural community and just in general. And I think people, you know, you’ve been good people to to so many people, you’ve been helpful. You’ve always been willing to share your knowledge and your experience with folks. And I think that it’s one of those cases where it actually comes back to you. It’s nice to know, isn’t it, that it actually does. Sometimes it really, really.

Julia Lemieux: And it’s nice again being in such a rural area. You know, my customer base is all over. I have accounts in Connecticut and in the Connecticut River Valley and over in the Berkshires. So it’s it’s a little geographically disjointed and it’s been amazing on the go fund me and on social media. Just sometimes when I’m up here working by myself, you forget that there are people behind you. And so when something unexpected like this happens, it’s just it’s been really sweet to see, you know, folks that are far away and not right at the farm are ready to help and want to see things get put back together.

The Greylock Glass: Yeah, yeah. And and I hope that our listeners will join in that that effort because we really want to see I mean, I can either grow my own store or I can buy a Julies. And I think I would rather just buy Julius because she does them so well. So we want to definitely get you up and running again. Again, stay on the phone after we say goodbye. But so I guess for now, we’re going to put the link to that go fund me in the show notes. People can go there and give till it hurts. And and Julie, I just want to say thanks for talking to us and we will see what the farmers markets this summer.

Julia Lemieux: Oh, yeah, I look forward to it, we’ll see you then.

Jason Velázquez: Again, look for the link in the show notes to Julia’s GoFundMe page. It is so important that we not let down our local farmers when they need help. It’s hard enough as it is getting so little sleep working so physically, such physically demanding work and then putting on a smile every Saturday morning or whatnot to show up and face the crowds at the farmers market.

Jason Velázquez: You just you have no idea and and you never get any, you never get any rest. So please do your part pitch in a couple of bucks to help. Windy Ridge Farm replace that greenhouse. And of course, the links to her social media presence are in the in the show notes as well. And I do hope that she’ll follow her because then you can find out what she has and when it’s going to be ready all season long. As you heard she is the and I’m not kidding, I buy my starts from her too. She is the place to get everything from tomato starts to. I think she’s typically has cucumbers, peppers, but find out. I mean, that’s what that’s what why you should follow her on Facebook and other any other social media platforms that she uses. Because then you’re not going to get to the farmer’s market and wonder why all the all the tomato starts are gone. You won’t do that because you’ll know weeks in advance when they’re going to be ready. So that’s that. Another edition of the top left corner under our belts and I look forward to, well, actually, you should be looking forward to the next episode is going to feature conversation with a cold case specialist who, you know, works on cases that are, you know, 10, 20, 40 even more years old.

Jason Velázquez: Dr. Sarah L. Stein, who was a psychologist who who looks at this from a much different perspective than the gumshoe your standard gumshoe way. And we’re going to be talking to her about even though she doesn’t have direct knowledge, but we’re going to be talking to her about the Benoit disappearance and then later murder and and other other some of murders that she has been following. Tracking you a little bit. We also are going to be joined by Andrea Harrington, District Attorney of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, who is going to give her take on this. This very well. It’s a heart wrenching case that has been in the public consciousness lately, so please do. Be sure to tune in next week. And don’t miss that episode. There may even be some bonus content that’s available only to members, so it might be a good time now to sign up for a membership of $5 or more to make sure you don’t miss out on any of that. Ok? That’s our show for the week. Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, stay safe. Be good to each other. And for God’s sakes, go easy on yourself. Bye bye.

The post Top Left Corner #153 —NTRVW:
Julia Lemieux of Windy Ridge Farm appeared first on The Greylock Glass.

Hey, Greylock Nation —

On this episode, we speak with Mike Pawula of the Celtic Punk band, The Tossers, playing the Flat Burger Society Tuesday, March 8 with guests Crazy and the Brains. Enjoy! (transcript below)

Editor’s Note: At this time, we are able to provide a rough transcript of interviews. By choice, we edit the text of our conversations to remove verbal pauses (um, ah, uh, you know, etc.) and fragmented phrases not to make the speakers look smarter, but to make it easier for audiences who are unable to listen to the podcast and must rely on the transcript. We attempt to remain as faithful as possible to the speakers’ original meaning, and apologize for any errors of transcription.

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Good morning.

Mike Pawula: Good morning, Jay. Thanks for having me.

Greylock Glass: Hey, it’s it’s great to have you here on the top left corner and we talk about all things related to the literally the top left corner of Massachusetts. That’s the Berkshires, the northern Berkshires specifically, although you’re going to be playing in Pittsfield at the Flat Burger Society, which is central Berkshires. But you know what the hell. So you are. You’re coming from Chicago. And you are. Is the whole band from Chicago, did you meet at school there or what?

Mike Pawula: Well, I mean, I can. I should say we, you know, we’ve been around quite quite a few years, so we’ve had, you know, we had some departures over time, but but your voice looks so young. Well, thank you. I try. Rock and roll keeps rocking, rolling around, I guess. Um, you know, the band started mostly, you know, there was a couple of people who grew up, you know, on the same street basically and started bands before the tossers and then it evolved to become the top surface. But so pretty much everybody in the original group met through high school or friends or just basically living in the same same area just south of Chicago. And over time, you know, we’ve had a few new people. Currently, our. Don’t know. So, yeah, we’re mostly all Chicago people, and we all, uh, everybody in the current lineup basically knows each other from just playing shows on the scene.

Greylock Glass: 1993, you said, yeah, actually, that you didn’t say that. I read your mind. No, actually, I read the I read the the bio and 1993 is a long time. I was in Seattle trying to get bands going in 1993. Wow.

Mike Pawula: And a great time to be there.

Greylock Glass: It was a great time to be there. It was a hard time to to be looking to be a lead singer with no equipment looking for bands because like everybody who thought they were, could be the next Kurt Cobain was there. I showed up in like literally in 1993. That sound that everybody had from the Seattle scene hates to be called grunge was happening. And it was really tough because you’re struggling to compete with like a million other long haired sort of greasy guys like myself for for like the very few actual bands that had their shit together. And you might join bands and very shortly somebody would be in rehab and then somebody else would be in jail and it could be a very trying time and a very trying place. Yeah. And the club’s new not to put any clubs on the spot because I guess they shouldn’t, because some of them are still around. At least the owners. But the clubs knew that it was a buyer’s market and and it was almost pay to play. Yeah. So, you know, I mean, there were some clubs that were running there, you know, three bands for three bucks, you know, you don’t make any money that way. So anyway, but but those are, you know, dark times. And they gave us some great great music and and I am here podcasting. Still, I’m still in front of the mic, and so are you. So let’s talk. Let’s talk about what. A Celtic punk underground sound. Sounds like describe how you you arrived at that.

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Mike Pawula: Well, I think we we arrived at a basically. I mean, the Pogues are huge to us. But we all, you know, in the early days, most of us grew up with, you know, Irish immigrant family members, and so the music of of mostly the folk music environment was always there. And then, you know, when it hits us, we’re fans of punk rock. And so we set it up and, you know, played fast and made the kids move, I guess. I think one of the things we always liked about it, though, is you could do that. And then next song you play, you could play a nice ballad and slow things down. So it gives it a dynamic that maybe normal punk bands don’t have.

Greylock Glass: That’s a really great description. I’m guessing that you probably provided that tutorial before the Pogues were. Yeah, they were huge for a lot of folks. And, you know, obviously the the Irish sound throughout the 80s was sort of, you know, U2 sort of dominated that Irish rockers base. But but they weren’t alone. You know, I think cranberries, right? That was sort of a an Irish sound a little.

Mike Pawula: Yeah, I think there’s a band called Black 47 who was kind of not quite huge, but they got around. Hmm. What good bands like The Chieftains and a lot more of them? You know the. More folky. Sure.

Greylock Glass: Traditional instrumentals Maloney, O’Connell and Keane certainly still actually out there playing around. Yeah, and I got to see them. If you ever get a chance to see them, please do because they are amazing. They do a song called The Kill Kelly, which is an Irish ballad of of. It’s based on a series of letters that were discovered in someone’s attic. And of course, the letters are all one way they’re coming from Ireland to America. And they are. They are. The very father to a son and the father keeps asking him, So when are you going to come back to Ireland? When are you going to come back? Or at least for a visit and they talk about you, send me a photo of your family. Lovely young women and men. It’s just I mean, it is the song that that puts the truth to the Irish. All of the words of Mary and all of their songs are sad. I don’t know if you’ve heard that before, but I’ve got some I. My grandfather’s Irish, so was Irish, and I got to hear a lot of tales, tales from that side of the family. So but characterize what? It means to people because, you know, when we think about music, that’s place based, whether it’s, you know, Afro-Cuban or whether it’s, you know, South American, you know, you know, Astor Piazzolla Tango Music evokes something that is important to the people who are connected culturally, geographically, but for some reason it connects to people who are. Who are not necessarily connected by heritage? What about Irish music? Do you think resonates so strongly with so many people, whether it’s Irish punk or whether it’s folk?

Mike Pawula: Yeah. I mean, I think I think that the Irish experience lends itself to a punk attitude to some degree.

Greylock Glass: Exactly.

Mike Pawula: You’re you’re looking at, you know, I think having a country with Ireland is always basically under the thumb of somebody, you know, I mean, I think the Irish people always felt eclipsed by Great Britain and you know, from our experiences, I mean, we don’t by any means claim to be directly from Ireland. You know, we’re a Chicago band and the Irish and Chicago have that same kind of a little bit. I had to prove ourselves, we’ve had, you know. I mean, it doesn’t happen as much nowadays, but certainly, I mean, 50 years ago, you could be discriminated against because you’re Irish. And so I think there is a sense of a little bit of an outcast in both punk and and Irish tradition.

Greylock Glass: You know, you’re right about that. And and even, yeah, 50 years, 40 years ago. I remember because I’m from Connecticut and I grew up in little tiny WASPy town called Litchfield, which is even more conservative now than it was then. And which is hard to believe because it was pretty conservative then I didn’t realize it at the time because it was a very artsy town. And you think an artsy town is going to be kind of, you know, progressive? Not always so. But I remember going, I remember going to a store when with my mom and I guess we had an account there. It was a hardware store. My father was building a house. And so she went to tell them what the last name was. And we had this in the first run of our conversation. The audience didn’t get to hear it, but it’s Velasquez, and he hears the name Velasquez. And you think he’s going to say, Oh, you know, a bean or a wetback, whatever he’s going to think, he says, No. Oh, lord. That’s just what this town needs. Another Catholic. And we’re like, What the fuck Catholic? So, you know, the Irish did get shat upon when they got here and they continued to.

Greylock Glass: And so even even into this generation, depending on where you are, there is that legacy of discrimination. In fact, in Boston, the Irish, what is it called the Irish Historical Society, but it’s like the Irish Historical Society. Yeah, they they actually support and often do joint programs with the Hispanic-American group there because they say that their image, their their image is basically the same. It’s the same sort of same sort of perception, or at least not perception so much as the stereotypes that people slap on you when they want to put you down. And I think that’s one of the things that causes that puts that seed of angst in in general. It’s a generational one, and it does show up in in the music, what when you write, are you writing? From. Emotional places, do you think do you think you’re writing from situational? I mean, when you when you’re I mean, I don’t know if you do most of the lyric writing or not, but where does that? Where do your stories come from?

Mike Pawula: Well, I don’t I don’t do most of the lyric writing, I don’t. Well, speak,

Greylock Glass: Speak for somebody else’s. If you could just get inside their head. No, I’m kidding.

Mike Pawula: Well, yeah, I mean, I won’t speak for our writer, singer, my friend. But but I can, you know, speak from my perspective to say that I think there’s, you know, there’s I guess I have to speak with some admiration because, you know, I mean, I’ve been a band with somebody for over 20 years and and I’ve seen them grow. So I mean, I I think that Tony’s become a writer where he’s he’s very fond of becoming more efficient with the economy of words. Uh, right, but I’ve seen them, I’ve seen them do things like. You know, speak write songs from the first person perspective of an old woman. Write songs, you know, just basic love songs, songs that I think echoes relationship with his wife but aren’t too on the nose. So they’re they’re universal in that way. And you know, everybody likes a good beer drinking song.

Greylock Glass: No.

Mike Pawula: So, so, you know, I’ve seen over the years him mature in such a way that, you know, I think he can write from, from any, from, you know, daily life or from, you know, thought perspectives of other people and just become more of a storyteller and storyteller. Word gets thrown around a lot these days, and I hate to hear myself say it, but

Greylock Glass: This is this is the big shoes. We’ll never get enough of it. If you’re a storyteller, you’ve got a home here. If Chicago ever gets old for you. No, it’s. Have you been to the big? Have you ever been out this way? Um, western yes.

Mike Pawula: We didn’t do we never do a lot of time in western or central mass.

Greylock Glass: Oh my God. Yeah, I do know it is.

Mike Pawula: But to Boston, OK?

Greylock Glass: Mike, Mike, Mike, I got to set you straight here.

Mike Pawula: I don’t. I don’t. I’m not saying I prefer it. I’m just saying that’s, you know how it is. Well, I do.

Greylock Glass: There’s only I know there’s only so many weekends, right? And there’s only so many weekends in a touring schedule. However, yeah, however, we have the best. I don’t know if they’re the biggest. Actually, I know they’re not quite the biggest, but we have the best American roots music scene that no one knows about. We have the first of all, we got Green River Music Festival, which is not quite the Berkshires, it’s just over in Franklin County, but it’s in green field. It’s been around since well longer than your band has been around since about 1980 86 or 87. Green River, actually since the Green River Festival. We have a Hancock Shaker village, which does a barn series every summer, literally in a big old barn. We have the fresh grass festival, which is not just bluegrass, it’s all sorts of American roots and you would fit right in there.

Mike Pawula: Fred, China-South fresh breath, I’m sure when we come through, we’ll we’ll get to get a little bit of tension.

Greylock Glass: I’m going to send you, I’m going to send you some links so that you, you know, because we, you know, I’ve listened to your tunes, I’ve seen your videos. I think you look like a lot of fun. You look like a major, a lot of fun kind of band. So I think we’re going to already we’re going to watch you on the bill later, later, maybe even this year. Well, have you come back? How much do you chew or how often are you? Are you out in the road?

Mike Pawula: Well, I mean, this is, you know, doing interviews these days is me getting my toe back in the water when you think about it, I mean, we we, like everyone else, shut down and in 2020 and but normally what we were doing towards the end, there was sometimes between four and six weeks and then and then we would just, you know, we do one off shows we’ll go out and fly out for a weekend or depending on who’s asking and if we can afford it. We all love we. You know, when you say we look like a fun band, we have fun playing, so we like to do it. And usually we don’t say no that often.

Greylock Glass: If you can make it, if it if it makes it worthwhile. Yeah, no, I hear you. And yeah, I I I’m hoping that 2020 two comes back with such a roaring vengeance that I can stop doing interviews where I have to bring up the subject of. So those last two, two years and some suck, didn’t they? Oh yes, they did, j. They sure sucked and they sucked. For a lot of people, they suck for people who run news organizations that rely on advertising from places like live music venues. Yeah, yeah. So they kind of sucked all around. But but I think and and of course, I think probably everybody with a brain has mixed feelings about this. I think that and I’m knocking on particle board right here, knock, knock, knock that counts it sawdust. I think that this is going to be the year that it it recedes. Obviously, it’s not going to go away. Right. But I think it’s going to recede enough that we’re going to get to enjoy a little bit of life again. Did you do a lot of like House House, a zoomed house shows or anything like that?

Mike Pawula: Uh, we did a couple, you know? I mean, we were we were scheduled to be playing right when everybody wanted into lockdown. So we did. Do we, you know, we basically put on a show with a couple of other bands and we’d done a few things here and there we did, you know? Some some band members, you know, basically filming in their basement, you know, just playing a couple of songs here and there. So we we dipped our toe in that water too. But you know, there’s really nothing like playing in front of people and we we have played, you know, since. Since we all went home, you know, we’ve had about four or five shows, maybe. And they’re great. They’re great, but I’m with you. I think that, you know, we’re we’re going into this tour thinking either no one’s going to show up or it’s going to start to feel like that excitement is going to be turned up to 11. And people are going to be thrilled to get out of the house and ready, ready to just enjoy themselves and have a little bit more live music in their life.

Greylock Glass: Yeah. Amen. That that’s live music in our life, our lives is is kind of long overdue. There was, though, there was this this company, and they ran a service called Concert Window. I don’t know if you’d ever heard of them.

Mike Pawula: And I don’t think I have.

Greylock Glass: They they announced the end of twenty eighteen beginning of twenty nineteen that doing a remote online concerts just wasn’t profitable and that they were shutting the company down. And thank you to everybody for their there. I’m thinking you poor bloody bastards. If you could have just held out another because they own the space, they literally owned the space. Nobody else was doing it and all you had to do is just, you know, throwing your, your camera and they took care of the rest. It was it was a great service and they they shut down, they went bankrupt or whatever they did. I don’t know if they went bankrupt, but they shut down like, you know, six months before news of of the pandemic hit. So tragic. So the was going to go somewhere, well, somewhere else with this. Oh. Talking about talking about. Issues the the other thing that folk music of all kinds and punk is is really good at is talking in a raw way. And I should I’m going to interrupt myself to say I was I was working as a barista some years ago, and there was this sort of a few that went on between some of us baristas about what’s going to be on the radio.

Greylock Glass: You know that feud? Oh, yeah, yeah. And I listen to most anything I do like punk, although it is not my forte. Folk folk is actually, you know, more my my, my thing. And this woman came in and said, Oh, thank God. Punk. And I said, punk. She goes anything but anyway. She said anything other than folk. And so I applaud you for realizing that there is that intersection. And but the the thing about both folk and punk is that it does a great job in a very raw way, emotionally raw way of singing about issues. Do you? Now, of course, nobody likes to sing about issues now because, well, not nobody, but it’s hard to get people to to give a shit, I guess about things. Do you find yourselves? I mean, I don’t know your your catalog as well as I should. Do you have a lot of issue related songs?

Mike Pawula: Well, you know, it’s funny, and this is being the second lyrics type kind of question. It’s funny that that is we’ve been practicing to get ready for this, this tour. I’ve had a lot of conversations about lyrics with with with our singer Tony and his writing. And I think if you were to go back and through the catalog and I understand that, you know, it’s six records or seven records or something, it’s not anything maybe anybody would do normally but to prepare for an interview. But like if you were to go back to the catalog, I mean, the second record into the third record was very topical about issues of the day. There was a lot of I mean, there’s a sense of protest in some of the songs.

Greylock Glass: I’m guessing that was like the early bush years, maybe.

Mike Pawula: Uh, yeah, yeah, I mean, we’re talking right at that cusp, I think the second record came out in 2000 and the third in 2003. Um, and I’m not even sure that they were all a reaction to that, but maybe a little bit. And I think over time. I’m not going to say for, you know, part of our conversations flesh this out, but I think over time when I go back to saying that he was, he’s become more economical with his lyric writing, I think that some of that protest, some of that anger is gone. So I don’t think, you know, over the last couple of records, we don’t really have a lot of issue songs that are looking out at the world, they’re more, I guess, micro sure songs, songs about interpersonal things and, you know, even if it’s, you know, songs about getting in fights.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, I get that. I do get that. And you know, I. I’m not any sort of spring chicken myself, as you probably might guess from some of the dates I’ve dropped. Yeah, but you’re probably right.

Mike Pawula: There we were. We were on the coast, probably. Yeah, that’s same thing.

Greylock Glass: I’m guessing that’s about, yeah, it’s about the same. And although, like I said, your voice is much more well preserved than mine. I my voice, my voice is showing its age. The the thing. The thing that I find myself trying to avoid, but I slip into is the sort of wise old, curmudgeonly sage that just doesn’t have the emotional firepower that I used to have as a young man that I’m just sort of I’m seeing the world from this, this sort of seasoned perspective, the jaded and getting really angry. It’s hard to do. Now that’s not to say that I can’t get angry safe for my kid’s future, and I and I do. I think it’s a shit show that they’re going to be inheriting because we’re we’re not going to get the climate crisis under control. It’s just as you can see, it is not happening. We are not doing a goddamn thing to to bring it to heel. And now I’m looking at what’s going on over there in, you know, on the border, but not on the border. Screw it. It’s it’s right there in Kiev, in Ukraine. I’m looking at I’m saying, what the hell kind of world is this? What is this? We’re sitting here. This was supposed to be so 20th century. This is passé. This shit. Mm hmm. And of course, you know, you talked about, you know, Ireland being under the under the the boot, the well-polished boot of Empire, Ukraine must be feeling a little bit of that themselves. Imagine some of the punk that’s going to be coming out of there over the next couple of decades.

Mike Pawula: Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, you’d hope, you’d hope. I mean, the one strange thing that I see is that I saw it would happen would be when when Donald Trump was elected. Uh, I thought there would be a lot more reactionary music. And I didn’t see as much that I thought I would know now.

Greylock Glass: I don’t know what happened. I mean, like we have, we have we have the Berkshires, right? And everybody thinks that were very liberal. I guess we’re liberal, but sort of like in a neoliberal kind of way, in a in a very, you know, like it’s a well-heeled, very, very diplomatic, very sophisticated. You know, we don’t get too angry about anything. We have this group that stands out. It’s an antiwar group. They’ve been standing outside for 17 years or something. And I think since the since the Gulf War, and they’re all like seventy five years old.

Mike Pawula: Oh wow.

Greylock Glass: They’re all there’s just like no young people and they stand out every Thursday night and wave their, you know, their signs at the cars going by. And and I just I don’t know. I think I think the Patriot Act scared the shit out of people. And I think that I think that Edward Snowden’s revelations that we are yes, we’re actually really all being watched all the freaking time. I think that maybe scared people and I think that that’s a stupid reaction to be scared. But but, you know, I can’t really blame anybody because let’s face it, I mean, I know I know that as a as a self-described alternative independent media source, you know, I’m, you know, painting a target on my own forehead. Not every not everybody wants to do that. I’m like, fucking, you know what I can do to me? I’m already poor. So the all they could do is take my life and my freedom or, you know, put me and put me in room one on one. I don’t know why people are not upset. I think it’s because we’ve had years of relative comfort and our toys have gotten really good. Yeah, I think our toys and our comforts have gotten really, really sophisticated, and I think it will be an event that takes shit away from us that sort of wakes us up again. That’s my my take.

Mike Pawula: Yeah, I can see that, I mean. And don’t get me wrong, I should also go back and footnote that comment and by saying, I’m also. An old man in some ways, and so for, you know, to say I could have missed movements and music that somebody who’s you know, 18 to 30 was was making that, you know, if I were exposed to it would blow my mind. It’s quite possible that I that I have. And of course, you know, there is just the way the landscape has changed over time and the emergence of hip hop is just a monster part of the music industry. I’m sure there could be songs and artists there right again, right? Maybe are are carrying the torch for a lot of the things that maybe punk did in the old days.

Greylock Glass: I think, yeah, I think you are correct and you are acting responsibly. You’re acting responsibly in front of the microphone. And I’m not. I’m being reckless with my generalizations. You’re right. And and I was doing I was doing a podcast back in 2005. It was back when, well, back when everybody assumed we were going to be staying in her mother’s basement forever. No, podcasting wasn’t getting a lot of love, but I had one called the mongrels howl and there was an alternative strictly Boston area music scene because Boston has enough that you can you can do a show on that pretty much forever. But there were a couple of bands, but I just feel like the you know who who were. They had some, some strong messages, but they always ended up seeing sort of fading into the fringe. And and I don’t know, hip hop, it’s like, that is my weakness right there. And so and I know that there’s there are songs of protest in it. I just don’t I don’t know the genre and that’s that’s my bad. But I think that I think that you’re going to start seeing more. More. Socially, politically conscious tunes coming up because we have no other choice. We have to get the word out there and we have the tools, right? I mean, we have tools today, Mike, that you did not have in 1993 when you were starting out in shit to get the tell me how what what is your your your strategy in getting the music out? I’d love to hear this. What’s sort of how do you how do you get your your sound out there?

Mike Pawula: You know, I mean, we. Having been around as long as we have, you’d think we’d be better. But luckily, you know, over the time we’ve had, we we worked with several record labels and that’s been great. But this is, you know, we’re finding ourselves at a point now over the last couple of years where it’s the first time since since 2000 where we didn’t have any kind of record label and no press apparatus. And and so, you know, we’re relying on social media a lot and trying to keep interacting with people who like us. And, you know, I don’t want to say we’re resting on our laurels, but you know, we’re we’re we’re trying to, you know, keep engaged with our fans. I think the idea of making new fans is fantastic. We’d love to do it. We love to get more exposure and, you know, we just keep on grinding it out. You know, every fan, anybody who wants to hear us, enjoy us, come to a live show we welcome with open arms.

Greylock Glass: Well, I have a I have good. Good.

Mike Pawula: I was going to say, but but certainly we are. We’re not pros at this kind of thing. And I think, you know, our generation was like, maybe the one that that just passed some of the social media sense where we were just a couple of years. I was just talking to family members the other day about how few people I grew up with her on social media. And it’s just, you know, our age group, we’re really not great with it, I think we need an intern or something.

Greylock Glass: I think we need an intern. Well, I’ve had to be because of what I do, but honestly, I I don’t I don’t appreciate the fact that I’m forced to go there. I guess it’s how I’d want to. I’d want to put it. I’d want to put it that because like, even when I want people to sign up for the newsletter like and I assume you’ve got like a newsletter of some kind, or maybe I shouldn’t assume if you don’t get a newsletter. But to be to have to go and rely on Mark Zuckerberg to put the invitation out there for one out of every thousand people who might stumble across my page. It’s yeah, really. It’s like, you know, it used to be in the early days. Facebook, you know, if you were running a business and you were using Facebook, you could get some real engagement, some interaction. Yeah. Today, it’s it’s pay to play and it’s so hard because if you’re not paying for the ads, the algorithm decides, well, we’ll show this to like I said, like one out of a thousand people, one out of ten thousand people, whatever, whatever their secret number is. Did you say you have a newsletter?

Mike Pawula: No, no, we don’t.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, I would definitely start with that because that a newsletter means that you’re keeping people engaged and you can.

Mike Pawula: I like that. I like that idea. I think the thing that gets us is that, you know, you’re trying to make art and. There’s in a modern world, you don’t you can’t just make the art, you’ve got to sell the art, you’ve got to brand your image, you’ve got there’s a 360 degree look you’ve got to do where, you know, I think we grew up in a time where maybe you could you could make your art and as long as you didn’t. You know. Drowned babies or do something awful like that, you could potentially, you know, have a career working with other people.

Greylock Glass: Yeah, and like the the most branding you were going to do is you’re going to be walking around town with a stack of of handbills and a staple gun, and you’re going to be stapling them to to telephone poles, you know, tonight, eight p.m. or whatever. And that was your marketing, right? There was, you know, getting high and and putting your your handbills all over town. And that was, you know, that was the 90s, the 80s going way back. Now you’re right, you do have to be slick as hell with your marketing if you want to grow. The thing that I like about the here’s what I like about the newsletter, though, is, you know, you can have if you have a website, you can have people signing up a little pop up or whatever, even just some on the side people will. If they like your music, they’re going to want to know when the next thing is coming out, or they’re going to want to know when you are doing a little a little, you know, live talkback or whatever and and you own that. You own those that audience, you know, own them. But you know, you you you’re not relying on on Twitter or Facebook. Right, right. You want to communicate. You can communicate directly.

Mike Pawula: So that’s more like the idea.

Greylock Glass: That’s my and you can, you know, it shows you just put out a clipboard and people will sign up and they will sign up. So anyway, I forget where I was going with this and why I was talking about social media, but I guess it was just the idea that we are in a different era. And that and I do like to ask different bands how they get their their their art out there. I have another opportunity to get to get your art out there. I have another or two other. I have two shows. This is a local news show because you’re coming here. We want people to buy tickets, see the show at the Flat Berger Society. And and that’s great. But I also have these two other shows. One of them is called Indecent Exposure, and it’s indie music and eclectic indie music podcast. And the other one is the Cornbread Café, which is American roots music. And I don’t do punk in there. But then again, I’ve never had the tossers on the line to talk to you about that. And these are internationally heard shows. So if you would like your tunes to be heard by people from everywhere from Australia, Italy, Germany, South America, Malaysia, I have listeners in Malaysia. How they find me. Fuck if I know. But they do find me. So the. So we’ll talk about that. Maybe off after we say goodbye. Yeah, that’s you know, we’ll talk about that there. Tell me something. I love this video and of course, I’m going to embed this in the show notes to this episode of Good Morning DA. It’s it’s a it’s a great video, and I’m not going to spoil it, but it’s it has a. Huh. It’s like if the it’s like the commitments meets Clockwork Orange. It’s a it’s funny, but I can’t embed that and also have it in the podcast because that’d be a little redundant there. You don’t have a label right now to sue me. Is there a song that that we should play on this podcast to get people, you know, jazzed, psyched about buying tickets?

Mike Pawula: I think, yeah, I mean, I think you can probably get away with with the last, some of the last, the last record we made. It’s called Smash the Windows and we put out a video for Smash two into the song. You probably get away with it. I mean, at this point, our label sold their stake and the records to a big conglomerate, so I think we’re going to get away with it.

Greylock Glass: Hmm, let me think about that, do you think? Well, if the big conglomerate. Are they going to care?

Mike Pawula: You know, maybe I maybe I can just shoot you the email off line. Yeah, and you can make the call on your own.

Greylock Glass: We’ll do it offline. Well, the thing is, I have I go with Blueberry podcast hosting and and I’m not like an affiliate or anything, but but in case anyone is wondering, the great, it’s blueberry pie. No. No ease. But I had this conversation with the owner of that company, and he said eight years ago, almost eight, you know, seven and a half years ago. You know what? You do a music podcast. I’m just telling you right now you’re going to get takedown notices and I’m going to have to pull it. I’m going to have to pull those episodes. Maybe the whole podcast, if you get sued, it’s not my thing. Well, in seven and a half years, I’ve never gotten a takedown notice. And and I don’t want to prove him right. Sure. So I mean, it’s not like a big deal. They just tell you, take the frickin music down and you take it down. But you know, I don’t like losing arguments like that.

Mike Pawula: No, no, no. I tell you, yeah, well, what? You are flying and we can get get this straight.

Greylock Glass: Yeah. Well, whatever the case is for now, ladies and gentlemen, rockers of all ages at the very minimum, make sure if you’re listening to this on your iPod podcast catcher like you know, on your iPhone or whatever. Go when you get a chance to the show, notes Greylock Glassdoor.com. You’ll see it right there on the home page. The link to this episode, as long as it’s within the next couple of weeks because it’s obviously not going to be there in two years, but so many caveats with podcasting because it’s not live at the very minimum. Check out the embedded video. Good morning, doc! I think. Because I think we’re I don’t know, are we I guess we’re probably about done here, I mean, I I think I’ve milked you, I’ve milked you dry. Mike, what else do we need to know about the tossers? How should people get in touch with you?

Mike Pawula: You know, we do have Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and we do. We do respond. I mean, we have I think we have a pretty good relationship, you know, with with fans that we’re trying to, you know, keep going. We do respond to DMs and whatnot. So I think that’s the first place to go. You’re going to find all our tour dates and all those social media locations. And so start there. And and, you know, if you want to, we’re going to go out starting on the 2nd of March for about two and a half weeks. We’ll be touring towards the East Coast and we love to see people come out.

Greylock Glass: All right. Well, do that. Ladies and gentlemen, find out more about the tossers and then be sure that you go. It’ll be a link in the show notes to get tickets to the tossers with guests crazy in the brains. Tuesday, March 8th at eight p.m. at the Flat Berger Society in Pittsfield. All the links in the show notes I will leave you with everything you need to immerse yourself in this experience. That is what we do here at the Gorilla Glass. That is why the top left corner exists to make sure you are connected. Your main line mainlining your right into your veins. The kind of culture that keeps you going. Mike, let’s talk offline. But for now, thanks for coming on the top left corner and I bid you safe travels.

Mike Pawula: Thanks, Jay. Thanks for having me and great show. Thanks.

The post Top Left Corner #152 — NTRVW: Mike Pawula of The Tossers, playing Flat Burger Society 3/8 appeared first on The Greylock Glass.