The Tax Exemption certificates (approved in Executive Session) are ready to be signed. These are exemption from real estate taxes for the blind, elderly, and veterans. Apparently, there were 5 applicants. Assessor Michael Blay said more could apply.

A letter reminding nonprofit organizations to fill out the ABC forms required to qualify for tax exempt status. Some are technically late.

The Commonwealth has approved a new tax exemption (“The Heroes Act”) for wounded veterans.

Exemption from real estate and property tax bills can be approved even after taxes are paid and the amount exempt returned.

Editor’s note: “[State Tax Form ABC] must be filed each year by all charitable, benevolent, educational, literary, temperance or scientific organizations and trusts owning real or personal property in order to receive a local tax exemption on that property under G.L. c. 59, § 5 Clause 3.”

Notes from the Planning Board (PB), March 18, 2025, Hybrid meeting
 

Vice Chair called the meeting to order and the minutes were approved. Lis Wheeler, member of both the Affordable Housing Trust (AHT) and PB, reported that AHT was working on the costs of developing the Glendale Middle Road property and at the same time costs associated with developing the Pine Street property (former Berkshire Waldorf High School location).

Discussion of the Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) bylaw was postponed as well as discussion of the Master Plan until the next meeting,

It was decided that C. J. Hoss, leader of the Community Planning Program, Berkshire Regional Planning Commission (BRPC) would be invited to the next PB meeting.

Notes from the Select Board (SB), March 20, 2025, Hybrid meeting
 

Town Administrator Michael Canales brought up items related to finalizing the annual budget to be presented at Town Meeting: 

• The increase in the tax rate is 3.6%, however, that might go down if the “room and meal tax bounces back.” 
• The presentation made to the SB about the Fire/EMS merger with west Stockbridge has been made and will be made to the Finance Committee at their next meeting. 
• Will the SB vote to approve placing a warrant item before the voters as follows: shall the Town approve dipping into Other Post Employment Benefits Fund (OPEB)?
  Chair Jamie Minnaci brought up the stipend for the three Board of Assessors members and suggested they revisit the decision as it was “made in haste.”
  Chuck Cardillo agreed they needed more information.
  Patrick White said he works for the taxpayers and has kept the taxes to a 1% rise in past years by questioning every line item. He said questioning every line item was the SB’s job i.e. “to raise and appropriate” and he resented it being characterized as retaliation. He went on to question the amount paid hourly if the Board of Assessors is paid $4000 for two meetings a month which averages out to more than the Town Administrator is paid hourly. White asked the BOA to decide if that is fair. White was concerned about elected officials qualifying for health insurance but added that the solution was obvious, “raise the cap” [the qualifying amount] to $5000.
  What followed was a back and forth about the $500 stipend for each elected Board member.
  Ron Brouker, of Conservation Commission, rose to say he was opposed to the stipends – “just put in an expense report.”
  No decisions were made – OPEB, the stipends, and the cap to qualify for insurance were all continued until next SB meeting.
  Canales then introduced other items related to finalizing the budget 
• Whether a new police cruiser was a necessary purchase this year or if cruisers could be rotated 
• “Envelop” [exterior façade] repair of Town Offices building 
• Printing and mailing the annual Town Report costs $9000 – approximately $7000 to print and $2000 to mail approx. The Chair questioned if that amount can be reduced? 
• Brouker remined the SB that they were intending to decide about the Chamber of Commerce signs as long as ago as the end of last year. Many people opposed the signs as too big or unfortunately placed. The Chair responded she would put it on the next agenda. Brouker said, “I’ll be there.”

Editor’s note: 1. The 3.6% tax rate increase could be reduced if the report of the meal/room tax income bounces back in the report from the Commonwealth due this month – the two prior reports were lower than last year. 2. OPEB pays retirees for benefits other than pensions, for example, health insurance. It is funded by each municipality and placed in a custodial account. Municipalities can draw from the OPEB custodial account to pay for current expenses limited to “the costs of healthcare, life insurance…” 3. Although the SB was discussing justifying the stipends in terms of work performed, a stipend is “a predetermined sum paid in a lump sum or periodically and is not tied to hours worked or performance. Therefore, stipends are not subject to minimum wage requirements. Stipends are usually intended to help cover specific expenses, like living costs, travel, or education. They do not serve as direct compensation for work performed.”

Coming to Stockbridge

By Joe Shapiro

Part Two

I had somehow convinced my trusting wife, a Los Angeles native never fond of the cold, to move to this place, a place she had been to only once years earlier. My reasoning was that since we were being forced into isolation anyway, we might as well live somewhere beautiful. I knew it was a flimsy argument, but everything we had previously known had taken on a flimsiness by virtue of the unusual times in which we were living. She claims she came here “kicking and screaming” but I only recall the screaming. Then again, my memory of those pandemic days is sometimes a little cloudy.

I didn’t know anyone in Stockbridge, or the Berkshires for that matter, although some friends from New York City did migrate to the area within a few months. The first person I met was our next door neighbor Denny. I spied him through the ancient hemlock trees that separated our respective properties hauling a log with an equally ancient tractor. After waving hello, I cautiously approached him and we cautiously made our introductions. I marveled at his tractor and he eagerly told me of how he had purchased it new as a young man and had dutifully maintained it over the years. Both he and it struck me as quintessentially Stockbridge. He still does.

I soon met his wife Nina, a Stockbridge native herself, and I can still recall her smile and astonishment that not only were we not second homeowners but had a young child and intended to raise him here. We soon met our neighbors Matt and Catherine and then Jane and then others. By the time the ground had thawed, we had a fledgling social circle despite the constraints of the ever-evolving virus.

Since that time, our circle has grown exponentially. A couple of years ago I began volunteering at the Stockbridge Fire Department and met a new group of people who have dedicated a good portion of their lives to serving this community. And I have gone on calls and met people on some of the worst days of their lives. It has been an unexpectedly rewarding experience, unlike any I have ever had and one I’m not sure I would have had if not for my love of this community and its people.

Our son is now five, the same age as I was in those old photographs taken at Tanglewood some 45 years ago. My wife is on her way to completing her RN degree at Berkshire Community College and has learned to drive and walk on ice albeit with an appropriate degree of trepidation. She too has fallen in love with Stockbridge.

Our experience of moving to Stockbridge is both atypical and not. It is unusual in that it took place during a unique time in our country’s history, but in other ways it is an experience shared by many not native to this town: That it may take time but, in due course, you will come to know almost everyone in this town or, at the very least, be one degree removed.

When I was asked to write this piece for Stockbridge Updates, I asked Nina how Carole Owens knew who I was in the first place. She very quickly reminded me that, “It’s because everyone knows everyone here!” Of course, Nina is right and it’s just another reason we love living here.

Mozart’s Requiem

By Tracy Wilson

From its commission by Count Franz von Walsegg, the requiem is a masterpiece cloaked in mystery. There is even a question about who actually completed the Requiem.

It was in July 1791 that Mozart was visited by a stranger, representing a man desiring a Requiem for his recently deceased wife, and provided a 50 percent deposit with the final payment upon delivery of the completed piece. As Mozart was already suffering ill health, he believed he was writing his own Requiem. He died December 5, 1791 at age 35 with some of the movements incomplete.

Mozart’s wife, Constanze, was concerned that she would not receive the final payment if the work were submitted incomplete, and she was in desperate need of money. She set out to find another composer to complete the work and pass off the commission as completed by Mozart. Eventually the piece was given to Franz Xaver Süssmayr, one of Mozart’s students and a friend of Mozart, completed the unfinished sections of the Requiem. Süssmayr used Mozart’s existing sketches and drafts, and also added some of his own compositions, particularly in the Sanctus, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei movements.

Süssmayr later claimed that he composed the Sanctus, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei movements entirely himself, though this has been disputed by some musicologists.

There have been other attempts to complete the Requiem, but Süssmayr’s version is the most widely performed and accepted.

familiar with Mozart’s intention for the composition.

In the Darkest Hour by David Stone was composed in 2015 after the loss of his nephew who was stillborn. In the face of significant physical challenges living a life in a wheelchair following a spinal cord injury, his composition is full of strength and encouragement to his grieving brother. David passed in January 2024 at age 53; he was the son of Susan and Fran Stone, both members of the Festival Chorus.

The Stockbridge Festival Chorus is conducted by Tracy Wilson. Ed Lawrence will be the concert organist for the Requiem, Samantha Talora, soprano, David Friedman, as the principal singer, Mary Verdi alto, Richard Geiler tenor, and John Demler, bass-baritone.