Senator lends ear: Kerry stops by to check out Northampton plans, projects
Kerry stops by to check out city plans, projects
Thursday, May 29, 2008
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NORTHAMPTON - U.S. Sen. John Kerry was in town Wednesday to visit the sites of three major capital projects, past and future.
The Massachusetts Democrat didn't come bearing any giant checks, but pledged to search for federal funds that could help one of the projects: a proposed adult education center on Gothic Street.
Kerry wasn't making any promises, though. Federal money for local projects is scarce these days, he said.
"We don't have a president who is committed to communities," Kerry said in an interview Wednesday. "We need to renew that commitment, in my opinion."
During his afternoon visit to Northampton, Kerry met privately with Mayor Clare Higgins, then strolled with her from City Hall to the police station on Center Street and the James House on Gothic.
Kerry was in high spirits during the three-quarters of an hour he spent out in public. Downtown, he called and waved to passers-by, some of whom quickly produced cell phones and snapped pictures. He traded jokes with Police Chief Russell Sienkiewicz, and later gave the mayor a hug before bidding her adieu.
The four-term Democratic senator and former presidential nominee is up for re-election this fall.
Kerry met briefly Wednesday afternoon with a 19-member panel of area educators who hope to make the James House a gateway to continuing education and job training for residents of Northampton and surrounding towns, to be called the Northampton Learning Center.
The meeting took place at the Northampton Senior Center on Conz Street, which opened in October. Funding for the $4 million project came from federal grants, the city's general fund and donations.
Their focus was on a much older building. Constructed in the 1840s, the James House was recently vacated by the Franklin/Hampshire Juvenile Court. Higgins said city officials briefly considered selling the building, but decided renting it would be a better plan.
"We agreed this is probably not the market to be putting it on the market," she said.
Instead, the building could be put to good use hosting local agencies focused on helping area residents better themselves, Higgins said. Such agencies, often nonprofits, are feeling the effects of gentrification in Northampton, she said, and some are at risk of being priced out of their current office and classroom spaces.
Higgins said she hopes two agencies, Center for New Americans and the Literacy Project, will become "anchor tenants" at the James House.
The Center for New Americans, now on New South Street, provides English instruction and employment-assistance services to immigrants and refugees. The Literacy Project, with an office on Brewster Court, provides adult basic education and general equivalency diploma (GED) preparation classes.
Higgins said she and others involved in the project are working to find ways to raise the $100,000 to $150,000 it will take to refurbish the building.
Hearing the dollar amount, Kerry told his assistant to make a note in his Palm Pilot.
"We'll look and see what might or might not be possible," Kerry said.
Part of the necessary renovations include demolishing the prisoner holding cells in the basement, holdovers from the building's time as a courthouse, said Teri Anderson, the city's economic development coordinator.
"You don't think cells are conducive to learning?" Kerry joked. "Maybe that could be your incentive floor."
The Northampton Community Education Consortium, the group behind the James House plans, has been meeting for about a year.
Its members come from city public schools, community and private colleges from around the Pioneer Valley, the state Department of Transitional Assistance, the Western Massachusetts Labor Council and other agencies.
Hampshire County, as Higgins often observes, is the only county in Massachusetts without a community college. While the education consortium isn't trying to create quite that type of institution, it is working to help people in the county get better access to existing colleges and careers in the area.
"What we're hoping this center becomes is a place where people can come and see the broad range of opportunities," said Daria Fisk of the University of Massachusetts Labor Management Workforce Education Program, a consortium member.
Those opportunities will include everything from English language and GED training to college preparation and job skills training.
Angel Russek, special projects coordinator for Greenfield Community College, said she hopes the center will also address some of the impediments people face in pursuing further education - lack of transportation and child care in particular.
"I think it's a great, necessary project," Kerry told consortium members as they adjourned their meeting. "It's terrific to see so many different entities coming together."
Before his stops at the James House and senior center, Kerry spent some time with Higgins at her office discussing budget and health care issues, the mayor said.
After that, Sienkiewicz led Kerry on a private tour of the police department's 1965 facility. The building is slated for demolition once a new, $12.6 million station is built next door starting next year. The project is to be funded in full by the city through long-term capital borrowing.
Before disappearing into the station with Kerry, Sienkiewicz recalled breakfasting with the senator at the Miss Florence Diner during a visit in the 1990s. Sienkiewicz said this time he planned to share with Kerry his opinions about inadequate federal funding for police departments.
Wednesday morning, Kerry was in Pittsfield to chair a field hearing of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship. After leaving Northampton, he traveled to Springfield to visit with firefighters and Democratic activists.
James F. Lowe can be reached at jlowe@gazettenet.com.
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