Editor’s note: To mark the start of a new year, the Greenfield Recorder is publishing stories about what Franklin County residents can likely expect to see happening in their towns in 2025. Details about projects in the western part of the county were shared in two parts.

West County towns are planning for a busy year of infrastructure improvements, including upgrading roads and culverts, and hopefully finding solutions to questions pertaining to school sustainability and wastewater treatment.

Colrain

“One of our priorities in the new year is continuing the development of the Highway Department,” said Colrain Town Administrator Diana Parsons.

Over the past year, the department lost a few members, including its superintendent, Parsons said. The department has an interim superintendent, Nate Gilbert, and will be looking for a permanent one.

In the realm of highway plans for the new year, Parsons said the town expects to complete paving on Thomas Road by June and for culvert improvements on Heath Road over Taylor Brook to be finished in the spring.

With the upcoming budget season, Parsons said the town will be looking at its public safety departments, including examining whether it would be most feasibility to add more part-time police officers or a full-time one, and considering the purchase of a new fire truck.

Additionally, Parsons said she hopes 2025 will bring progress and a solution to the school districts’ sustainability questions. The 2 District, 8 Town Steering Committee, or 2D8T, is working to develop different models of what the future would look like if they restructured the Mohawk Trail and Hawlemont Regional school districts in an effort to maintain educational standards while balancing the fiscal realities of small towns. The steering committee is expected to finalize options for the towns this spring.

“That’s a project that’s been going on for decades and hopefully we’ll find a solution this year,” Parsons said.

The town will hopefully find an answer to its wastewater questions in 2025 as well. Parsons said the Colrain Sewer District launched a feasibility study in August to look at how it can service the 26 residences in the village of Griswoldville that were left without a wastewater treatment plant after the closure of Barnhardt Manufacturing Co. The study being conducted by Wright-Pierce, an environmental engineering firm, is expected to be finished by June and possible solutions will be presented to the Colrain Sewer District in the fall.

Buckland

In Buckland, Town Administrator Heather Butler said town officials will be focusing on construction and development efforts in downtown Shelburne Falls. This past year, the town completed repairs on Depot Street, with plans to continue roadwork and infrastructure improvements in the village, including looking at opportunities to redevelop the former highway garage on Conway Street.

In 2020, the town opened a new garage for the Highway Department on Sears Street. The town has previously explored options for the old space, including converting it into affordable housing or into a commercial space for shops and restaurants. However, no decisions have been made yet.

Butler said the Selectboard hopes to restart these discussions in the spring and finally choose a fate for the building that will give it a new life.

“We will be focusing on supporting our downtown shop and restaurant owners, looking at a way to create public bathrooms and other improvements that will make Buckland an even nicer place to live and visit,” Butler continued.

Butler added that the town will continue working on long-term projects, such as the municipal vulnerability study of the Clesson Brook watershed and looking for opportunities to work with property owners to help them best protect their property and homes from future storm damage.

Heath

In 2025, Heath is eyeing improvements to town-owned facilities, such as restoring windows at Community Hall on East Main Street, said Town Coordinator Hilma Sumner. The project is fully funded through a Cultural Facilities Fund grant and through community fundraisers, so the town is now seeking a contractor to do the work.

The town is also seeking a contractor to handle construction of a new salt shed. Last spring’s Town Meeting approved appropriating $100,000 for engineering and design work. Sumner said the design work is just about wrapped up and the town is finalizing details to issue a request for proposals (RFP).

Rowe

Selectboard Chair Joanne Semanie and Town Administrator Brooke Shulda said they are hoping for an “even-keeled” year without any big surprises, and they anticipate replacing an aging police cruiser and updating the town’s bylaws on accessory dwelling units (ADUs).

“Residents are really looking forward to it,” Semanie said of the state’s decision to allow construction of ADUs on residential properties that already have a principal dwelling by right.

Semanie said Rowe’s Planning Board is working diligently to review the state’s decision and how other towns are updating their bylaws to allow ADUs by right, but also reasonably contain them so as to not overwhelm town resources and staff, such as Title V septic inspectors.

Shulda added that library programs and Council on Aging programs have grown in popularity over the past year, and will likely continue to do so, especially as the newly appointed Library Feasibility Committee assesses the needs of the town and how to improve the library to fit those needs in the years to come.

Rowe will continue working with Charlemont to develop a shared fire/EMS district, similar to the Shelburne Falls Fire District shared by Buckland and Shelburne. A planning committee will be created to draft legislation to be submitted to the state for approval.

Semanie said it will be a few years before a shared fire district is up and running, but she hopes to have a strong proposal ready for voters by fiscal year 2027.

Monroe

Road upgrades are also in the works in Monroe, according to Administrative Assistant Marcella Stafford Gore. In 2025, the town will continue infrastructure improvements on Kingsley Hill Road, which began in 2018.

“We received a $1 million grant from MassWorks last year for Kingsley Hill Road,” Stafford Gore said. “We did engineering this year and we’re gonna try to get as much done as we can” in 2025.

The road serves as the town’s sole way to access the public water supply and wastewater treatment plant. Construction this year will include paving, drainage improvements and installing a guardrail for vehicular safety. Stafford Gore said the town will stretch its grant funding as far as it can go to complete the work in 2025.

Reach Madison Schofield at 413-930-4579 or mschofield@recorder.com.