There’s little suspense over the mayoral contest in North Adams. Incumbent Jennifer Macksey, who made history in 2021 as the first woman to ever be elected mayor of the city, faces Aprilyn Carsno. Macksey, who narrowly beat out Lynette Bond in the last election, is expected to cruise to victory over Carsno, who rallied around 25 votes in the 2021 preliminary election.
The vote comes after a tumultuous year in North Adams. Mackey first suspended and then fired Police Chief Jason Wood after a dramatic extramarital affair seeped into his work life this spring. Wood went on to sue the city over wrongful termination and breach of contract, a matter that was settled out of court in October. Macksey has continually denied comment on the situation other than to confirm its most basic components.
Macksey did address news that the city’s fire chief, Brent Lefebvre, hospitalized a pedestrian with a city-owned vehicle while on the job this summer:
“As I said in the issue with Chief [Brent] Lefebvre, it was an unfortunate accident, and I have no further comment regarding Chief [Jason] Wood,” she told WAMC.
After WAMC broke the story, Lefebvre was placed on leave during a brief investigation that found him responsible for the collision. While the pedestrian suffered multiple cranial fractures, brain bleed, two broken ribs, a broken finger, and other maladies, the chief returned to work with just a Massachusetts Uniform Citation for failure to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk.
Heavy rains in July did upwards of $5 million worth of damage to North Adams, and Macksey pleaded with visiting Governor Maura Healey to assist the small city with the repairs.
“Governor, we just need help," she told Healey. "We need help from the state and the federal level, not only to rebuild what we see today, but also to work on long term fixes throughout our community. And it's something that we've talked about. As all of you know, North Adams has an infrastructure crisis we've talked about for a long time. And we need resources put behind us to help us with that. ARPA money was great. But that just is the tip of the iceberg for just engineering for projects like this. I really feel strongly we need like five new stormwater systems throughout our community, similar to the project that we're doing on Mass Ave. But then, with the pressure on our system and our decaying infrastructure, we worry about the water and sewer lines.”
North Adams is yet to receive state support for the storm damage.
One of Macksey’s most concrete accomplishments concerns the city’s public safety facilities. She moved the police department out of the current, decaying building it shares with the fire department, and has begun planning for what a comprehensive new facility would look like.
“We obviously moved the police into the temporary headquarters, which was a good move for them," the mayor told WAMC. "That made us ADA compliant, and it also provided a good work environment for our staff. We recently received a 911 emergency grant, and we've ordered new equipment, so we'll soon be moving dispatch over to the temporary headquarters. While all of that was going on, we conducted a needs assessment to look at what our building needs were for both police, fire, dispatch, as well as emergency planning. And we got an idea of what a building would look like, what the square footage is, what we need to have our own training ground on that facility.”
Turning to the city council, 11 candidates are running for nine seats.
Council President Lisa Hall Blackmer, Vice President Bryan Sapienza, Keith Bona, Peter Oleskiewicz, Ashley Shade, and Wayne Wilkinson are all seeking re-election. The challengers are Colin Bain, Peter Breen, Andrew Fitch, Deanna Morrow, and Robert Cardimino.
Michael Obasohan – the first Black person to be elected to the North Adams city council and also the inaugural head of Pittsfield’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Office – is not seeking a second term. Councilors Marie Harpin and Jennifer Barbeau – long at the center of accusations of toxic behavior on the body, including their involvement in the rapid resignation of a series of city clerks over the past several years – are also stepping down.
In the North Adams school committee race, Tara Jacobs – who won an upset last year to secure a seat on the Governor's Council – and Alyssa Tomkowicz are seeking re-election. In the contest for three open seats, Cody Chamberlain and Eric Wilson are also in the running.
In the race for the Northern Berkshire Vocational Regional School District Committee, the three current occupants of the body are all seeking re-election unopposed: Peter Breen, George Canales, and William Diamond.
The polls are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday.
