Speaker numbers apply only to this recording.
The Great Barrington Select Board met on September 28, 2026, to discuss a regional EMS study, an update from the Housatonic Improvement Committee, several licensing matters, and a show cause hearing for All Star Salvage. The meeting also included votes on a fence special permit, a transit nondiscrimination policy, a new liquor license, and a town meeting warrant article.
The meeting adjourned at approximately 8:40 PM.
Calling the meeting to order. Pursuing down jail 7C38, 20F, and for notifying the chair of a public body. Any person may make a video or audio recording of an open session of a meeting of a public body. Or maybe the meeting for any meeting. Beginning of the meeting, the chair shall inform other attendees of any such recordings. This meeting is being reported by the countering CTSB and the Bruchire Ed. Any member of the public wishing to speak at the meeting wants to receive permission of the chair. Listing of other of agenda items are those reasonably anticipated by the chair, which may be discussed at the meeting. Not all items listed maybe discussed and other items not listed, may be brought for discussion. Do they extend permitted by law? We'll start with select boards announcements, statements. No, nothing. Thank you. Ben, yeah, I just want to take a moment to uh just uh respond to there's an article in the Eagle about the uh license plate cameras um in Great Barrington. Um I hope everyone gets a chance to read the article. I want to thank Chief Carlotta uh for in the article we mentioned the policies that he put in place for being proactive with the policies restricting the use uh of the cameras um to make sure that both a limited amount of people have access to them and that it's always logged. So it's there's a clear uh trail of exactly how they've been used. Um and I'm even though that this uh was grant funded and this program will be sunsetting later this year, right? Um, I think unfortunately we see stories from across the country of just how even good policies might not be enough. Um I think just again, I wanted to use this opportunity to say that this board I think needs to take up uh AI and data policy for the whole town. It's not gonna be the only instance where we're going to see one of our departments looking to use a product like this, where as you mentioned in the article, we don't fully know where the data of our citizens is going when it goes into a system like this. Um so understanding exactly how these systems work, where our data is going, and having pauses in place before our departments sign up for these kind of programs. I think it's just really imperative. So we take that up later this year. Um, and then a completely different car-related story. I just wanted to give a shout out to Michelle Kaplan for putting together the second annual uh I'm gonna get the order of words right here. Orange Subaru Cross Track Meetup and Parade, um, which took place yesterday. Uh they met down at Big Y and drove through town. If you got a chance to see it, it was fantastic. Um, very just full of life and these kind of things are I think what makes this town great. So it was weird, it was fun, and it was just a great way. Brought people from there from Wisconsin, from New Hampshire, New Jersey came far and wide to be a part of this. Um that's just a cool thing to see our town doing. So nothing's good. The only thing I have is I had said it every meeting, regular meeting. We just go over the list of public records requests just so everyone understands the magnitude, what staff has to go through. So there are 13 active ones right now. These are not from what I can see, uh, any of the same ones that we had two weeks ago. Uh there are, there's only one or two. So topics are uh Surral School, uh Marijuana uh tax and uh false real estate and the retail tax, Ramsdale Library, uh motor vehicle crashes, police department purchase of products by a certain company, police reports, fire incidents report, um, uh request for 347 main streets of information from there, information on a mass works grant, uh information on a phase one uh environmental site at the Session for property 29 of a Savannah, uh something on the South County Connector, and a second one on the South County Connector.