Pittsfield Council Sees Crosby Feasibility StudyBy Brittany Polito, iBerkshires Staff
12:31PM / Thursday, June 12, 2025 | |
 A Crosby classroom during the 2024 tour |
PITTSFIELD, Mass.—Wheels are moving on the proposed Crosby Elementary School rebuild.
On Tuesday, the City Council referred an order to borrow up to $2 million for a feasibility study to the Finance Committee, which will meet on Monday. It will gauge the possibility of rebuilding Silvio O. Conte Community School and John C. Crosby Elementary on the West Street site with shared facilities.
"As you are aware, the City of Pittsfield is working with the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) on a proposal which involves the future of Crosby Elementary School and Conte Community School," Mayor Peter Marchetti wrote.
"The feasibility study will address outdated infrastructure, insufficient layouts, and significant repair needs."
When the project was proposed last year, officials and community members toured the approximately 69,000-square-foot schools that are more than 50 years old. Crosby, built as a middle school, boasts cracked windows that were repaired with duct tape, and Conte is an open-concept school that doesn't align with modern safety and educational needs.
The study, estimated to cost about $1.5 million, is a part of the 80 percent reimbursable costs from the Massachusetts School Building Authority, which accepted the project into its queue late last year.
The Crosby/Conte plan has the potential to house grades prekindergarten to first grade in one school and Grades 2 to 4 in another, with both maintaining their own identities and administrations. Running parallel to the effort is the proposed middle school restructuring, which would create an upper elementary school for grades 5-6 and a junior high school for grades 7-8 by the 2026-2027 academic year.
Marchetti explained that the MSBA Feasibility Study is a "critical component" in the process of addressing the needs of public school buildings in the state.
"The Crosby Elementary School Feasibility Study will highlight facility needs and provide a framework that aligns with education goals, is financially responsible, and ensures expectations are met," he wrote.
"The MSBA and Pittsfield Public School District will work collaboratively to determine the most
appropriate and cost-effective solution to address the challenges identified."
Also on Tuesday, under Rule 27, the council saw a petition from Ward 1 Councilor Kenneth Warren and Councilor at Large Alisa Costa requesting that the city confirm it has no authority to enact ordinances to create felonies or delineate the extent of power to criminalize through the imposition of fines was referred to the Ordinances and Rules subcommittee.
The councilors also asked that the city solicitor draft appropriate language to correct, modify, or delete the language found in:
Chapter 4 1/2. Criminal and Noncriminal Enforcement
Sec. 4 1/2-1. Enforcement-Criminal complaint.
"Whoever violates any provision of this Code may be penalized by indictment or on
complaint brought in the Pittsfield District Court or Berkshire Superior Court. Except as
may be otherwise provided by law, and if the district or superior court may see fit to
impose, the maximum penalty for each violation, or offense, brought in such manner,
shall be $300."
Costa and Warren asked that if the antiquated language is improper, it be corrected immediately.
Concerns about criminalizing homelessness were brought to the Public Health and Safety subcommittee last week when it discussed Marchetti's controversial ordinance that bans camping on public property.
It was referred back to the council with the recommendation that criminal penalties and the three-day limit on private property camping be removed, and on Tuesday, it was referred to O&R with Warren in opposition.
"It's just going to have a discriminatory impact, even if it's not the intent," said Kamaar Taliaferro, a member of the Affordable Housing Trust, at the subcommittee meeting on June 3.
"Given the racial demographics of the population of all these people, there is no way for this to not have a discriminatory impact and to not build on the instances of race-based injustice that we see in the criminal justice system."
In the 2025 Point In Time count, 95 of the 187 people surveyed identified themselves as Black, African American, or African, and 65 percent are people of color.
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