North Adams mayor battles for 14th term

Full of works that are fascinating, odd, and sometimes perplexing, the museum, known as MASS MoCA, was not Barrett’s idea. “But I was smart enough to realize we had to change,’’ he said. The museum - and its 150,000 annual tourists, plus spin-off restaurants, galleries, artists lofts, and inns - is a centerpiece of Barrett’s campaign this fall for a 14th two-year term, in what may be his toughest race.

After facing little or no opposition the last three elections, the state’s longest-serving mayor is admittedly in a battle to keep his job. Barrett said he understands why he makes a new enemy every time he says “no.’’

“Twenty-six years, three new enemies a week, add it up.’’

His challenger is Dick Alcombright, a city councilor, school board member, and community banker with a well-known name in North Adams politics. His late father, Danny, was a longtime councilor. But even a well-established political figure can represent change when the current ad ministration dates to 1984.

Barrett’s strong personality, which has made him a legendary figure among the state’s political junkies and in his own city, has become an issue. At least, Alcombright has tried to make it one. “When the mayor tells you ‘no,’ he does so in a way that makes you never want to go back to him with another idea,’’ he said.

The challenger is campaigning on themes of cooperation and transparency. “We are inclusive. We will listen. We will work collaboratively,’’ he said.

Alcombright acknowledges the difficulties in running against a “walking encyclopedia’’ on North Adams municipal government, but said that’s also part of the problem. “Under the mayor’s leadership the city has become a sole ownership,’’ he said.

The 55-year-old councilor is Barrett’s most credible challenger in many years, said Robert Bence, a political science professor at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams. Their battle has riveted this working-class former mill city of 14,000 people in the northwestern corner of Massachusetts, where the per capita income was more than 30 percent below the state average in 2000 Census figures. Voters will decide the race on Nov. 3.

Alcombright appears to be drawing support from labor unions and newer residents, said Bence. He sees Barrett’s base of support drawing more heavily from longtime residents and senior citizens.

“I think in terms of substantive policy issues, the candidates are close,’’ said Bence. The mayoral race is nonpartisan; both candidates are Democrats. “Every election is a referendum on the mayor. It may come down to a choice of leadership style and how people judge the mayor after 26 years in office.’’

“I didn’t think I’d have to fight this hard in my last term to stay,’’ said Barrett, 62, who has been North Adams’ mayor since President Reagan’s first term. He immediately qualifies: “I’d never say for certain it’s my last term, but I’d like it to be. I’d like to grow up and make some money some day.’’

Barrett has heard the style critics who say he’s gruff and quick-tempered. “I would call it passion,’’ he said with a smile. He maintains that “95 percent of the good ideas I’ve had came from somebody else,’’ including rebuilding downtown around the creative arts, an idea he said he swiped from Providence. “My opponent says he’s going to involve everybody in the decisions. That’s not the way it’s done. Somebody has to drive.’’

If not for the national recession, Barrett might have retired. But the poor economy threatens 20 years of progress in North Adams, the mayor said, and the city needs an experienced hand on the wheel.

The dean of Massachusetts mayors works in a drab-paneled City Hall office cluttered with knickknacks like the $1 table at a church flea market. He was a schoolteacher before he won election, having grown up working in his father’s diner in North Adams. The restaurant served breakfast to the early-shift workers at the Sprague Electric manufacturing company. More than 4,000 people worked at Sprague in the mid-1960s.

In a story repeated in manufacturing towns around the state, North Adams struggled when the main employer closed down. Sprague shut its red-brick mill complex in 1985. The next year, Thomas Krens, then the director of the Williams College Museum of Art, approached Barrett with a far-fetched idea to develop a contemporary art museum.

Barrett suggested the former Sprague site. “The way I sold it to the community was that we’re going to save the buildings where your grandparents and your parents worked,’’ said Barrett. MASS MoCA opened in 1999. “This museum is going to continue to drive our economy,’’ he said.

The mayor is a widower. He married his wife, Eileen, in 1986; she died of breast cancer in 1990. “I couldn’t even talk about it for years - on our honeymoon she says, ‘I think I have a lump.’ ’’ He probably wouldn’t have stayed so long as mayor had he not lost his wife. In his grief, he was glad to have the job to pour himself into. Barrett said he still works 75 hours a week, making $84,000 a year.

The mayor expects to spend about $60,000 on the campaign.

Alcombright said he’s approaching his campaign budget goal of $40,000.

Alcombright, who is married with four children, is vice president of retail banking at Hoosac Bank and Williamstown Savings. He has worked in banking 36 years, beginning his career as a teller. He has served 17 years on the McCann Technical School Committee and seven years on the North Adams City Council.

He supports the “creative economy’’ built around the museum, but said Barrett has neglected other possible areas for growth, such as green energy, hospitality, light manufacturing, and retail. Take away the museum-related development, “and there’s really been nothing else,’’ said Alcombright.

The city faces a possible trap, he said, if it again becomes a one-industry community. “The only way out of our problems is to grow our economy.

“It’s in many ways tough going against a 26-year incumbent. I’ll say this about the mayor, the buck does stop at his desk. But what I think we’re missing in this city is we don’t engage everyone. We don’t engage well with our neighboring communities.’’