Posted 6/5/2025
Pittsfield, Ma Mayor Peter Marchetti’s proposed encampment ban will move forward to the Ordinance and Rules Committee
PITTSFIELD — When Alex Reczkowski stood in front of the Public Health and Safety Committee on Tuesday night he welcomed the councilors into an ongoing community conversation.
“When I first started having this conversation, I was like, ‘What is wrong with ServiceNet? There are homeless people. You are the shelter; why are you not helping them?” said Reczkowski, who directs the Berkshire Athenaeum. “I lashed out because I wasn’t seeing how much work everyone was doing.”
That conversation — which has been a running dialogue between providers, community organizers, concerned residents and homeless people for years — has gained new attention after Mayor Peter Marchetti proposed an ordinance that would ban homeless people from sleeping or creating temporary shelter on public property.
During Tuesday’s meeting to discuss the ordinance, Marchetti thanked Councilor Alisa Costa for slowing down the process, but urged the committee to take some form of action.
“This ordinance never has to see the [light of day] if we come up with a solution,” he said. “If we can’t come up with a solution, we have to keep pushing for something that protects everyone.”
But community partners that spoke during the meeting said it’s not that simple. Homelessness is a multifaceted issue, they said; a visible face of poverty and other systemic inequities that will not be solved quickly.
“There is not an easy fix, and we all know that, but sometimes we’re looking for it,” said Julie MacDonald, director of Living in Recovery. “But the issue is we keep having the same problems.”
Ultimately, the committee voted Tuesday to “continue the conversation” by referring the ordinance to the city’s Ordinance and Rules Comittee. Members proposed two changes — the removal of a provision that would allow violators to be charged with a criminal penalty, and the removal of a stipulation that would limit the number of days people could camp on private property with the owner’s permission.
The Homelessness Advisory Committee seconded that vote on Wednesday.
“I don’t want to see this [abandoned]. I want to see the communication continue,” said City Council President Peter White. “We usually get one or two speakers who speak in favor of the ordinance, yet primarily the people I’m running into outside … are the ones saying, ‘Pass the ordinance; do something now.’ We have to come up with something in the middle.”
HEARING FROM EXPERTS
While organizations like ServiceNet and the Brien Center, community organizers and homeless people themselves are experts on the challenges homeless people face, their insights are not reflected in the existence or current language of the ordinance.
Marchetti has said he did not consult community partners while drafting the ordinance, although it did circulate within city departments six weeks before it was shared with the public, said Justine Dodds, director of community development.
In an effort to learn from those experts, Costa invited a host of community partners to share their reactions, concerns and insights regarding the ordinance. The list of speakers included representatives from the Health Department, ServiceNet, the Pittsfield Police Department and the Brien Center.
DIANA KNAEBE
“The enforcement of this ordinance would likely have significant unintended consequences on the health and safety of homeless individuals,” Brien Center President and CEO Diana Knaebe told the committee.
If the ordinance were passed, homeless people would be forcibly displaced from the only places they can currently find some semblance of safety and shelter — beneath the eaves of the library, in public parks or in a doorway on North Street.
Such displacement would disrupt care and drive individuals further away from the critical physical and mental health services they may need, Knaebe said.
“Our outreach teams often locate and engage clients where they are, including in encampments,” she said. “If those locations are dispersed or criminalized it will become more difficult to maintain contact to build trust and to ensure continuity of care.”
Without consistent access to care, people’s health would suffer and the likelihood of increased substance use, the spread of disease and death would rise, Knaebe said.
Most concerning, she said, is the “punitive framing” of the ordinance, particularly the inclusion of penalties for those who support people who are experiencing homelessness, which could deter outreach workers and community members from providing aid.
Possible solutions she would like to see? Designated safety zones with access to sanitation and basic shelter, hygiene stations and continued investment in transitional and permanent supportive housing.
LT. CHERYL CALLAHAN AND CHIEF THOMAS SAMMONS
Cheryl Callahan, a lieutenant with the Pittsfield Police Department, told the committee that the department is already burdened by calls from people who are concerned that people are camping on public or vacant properties.
“[The ordinance] would produce an unnecessary increase in call volume that is not police related,” she said. “And we see that now.”
Callahan said when it comes to public safety, the department is well aware of which people pose a risk, and they are not the people who are sleeping in tents anywhere in the city. She also told the committee that people who sleep in doorways on North Street or outside the library often do so to be visible, which they hope offers them greater safety through the night
To those who raised questions about public health and safety, Callahan answered, “Whose health and whose safety?”
“Everyone’s concept of it is different. If we’re talking about the safety of people who might be walking through the woods, they’re probably not at risk, it’s just hard for them to see that,” Callahan said. “The people who are in the woods are really more at risk of something happening to them.”
Thomas Sammons, chief of the Pittsfield Fire Department, said that between January 2024 and this week, the department has only been called to respond to fires involving homeless people three times.
ERIN FORBUSH AND JULIE MACDONALD
For the people she works with daily, the “camping” ordinance sends a message that they are not worthy of being seen or heard, said Erin Forbush, who directs housing and services at ServiceNet.
“The intent of this ordinance was not to disrespect anybody, but the message is disrespectful,” Forbush said. “These are folks that have endured generational trauma and poverty, and this just adds to that piece.”
Forbush said she does not want to see people left with no other option than to create temporary shelter outside.
“But at the same time, I don’t have housing,” she said. “We know all the housing programs. We have landlord connections. But the amount of money that it’s costing to get housing today, for any of us not just the folks I’m serving, is not in line with what people can make.”
While the ordinance would not stop ServiceNet from providing services, it could make it harder for the organization to reach people in need — especially if homeless people think ServiceNet supports the ordinance, Forbush said.
“If we keep pushing them to be invisible, we can’t help those individuals,” she said.
Forbush also pushed back against a common misconception that most people who are experiencing homelessness in Pittsfield are not from the Berkshires.
“There is this illusion that people are being brought here en masse. I have not experienced that in the 10-plus years that I’ve been doing this work with shelters and outreach,” Forbush said. “People come to the Berkshires in the same ways that we all come to the Berkshires.”
MacDonald challenged the committee to think beyond whether they support or oppose the ordinance.
“Sometimes we think, let’s at least let people have a tent. From my perspective, they deserve more than a tent,” she said. “They deserve to be able to have a better life. So we have to begin looking at not just do we need more apartments, but do we need different types of services.”
Claire O’Callahan reports on housing in Berkshire County. She can be reached at cocallahan@berkshireeagle.com.
BPRRS NOTES: also many people who have been in corrections are also a part of this homeless groups