WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Citing politics and personal agendas that hamper the work of the Mount Greylock Regional School Committee, Lanesborough resident Regina DiLego has announced she is stepping down from the panel.

 

At its meeting at the middle-high school on Thursday, the committee will hear about DiLego's letter of resignation in an update from Chair Christina Conry.

 

On Wednesday afternoon, DiLego confirmed that she is the letter writer, unnamed on the meeting's agenda.

 

"I find that I am just not in alignment with the direction of the School Committee or the district, and it is in my soul's best interest to walk away," DiLego wrote in reply to an email seeking comment. "It is a decision with which I have struggled for some time now. I ran for School Committee for the first time in 1993 and again in 2008 and stayed because I am passionate about education, care about children and am committed to volunteering within my town.

 

"I find that the regional school committee is about politics, personal agendas, placating certain groups of people and ego stroking -- none of which conforms to my soul's reasons for being on the school committee. I am at peace with my decision."

 

She is the third member of the seven--person School Committee to resign since it was elected in November 2018.

 

The first was Joe Bergeron, who left the panel in June 2019 to relocate to the West Coast. He has since returned to the area and currently is employed by the district as its business manager. The second was Dan Caplinger, who resigned without explanation in February 2020.

 

DiLego has served on local school committees for more than two decades, first on the Lanesborough Elementary School Committee, then on the "Transition Committee" that helped guide the nascent Mount Greylock Regional School District after it regionalized to include both town's elementary schools and the middle-high school. In 2018, she was one of the first seven people elected to the newly formed School Committee.

 

During her years of service to the Lanesborough schools, DiLego also served on the Superintendency Union 71 Committee, a precursor to regionalization which allowed the Lanesborough and Williamstown elementary schools to share a superintendent -- first with one another and then with Mount Greylock in what was called the Tri-District.

 

DiLego also represented the Lanesborough school on Berkshire County Education Task Force.

 

In her letter of resignation, she mentioned to her long tenure and alluded to some of the same themes found in her Wednesday email.

 

"I honored my commitment to see through Regionalization, work towards the blending of the District, negotiating the many contracts into unified documents, continuing the Mount Greylock building project and working to get appropriate workspace for our administration," DiLego wrote. "The time commitment has been phenomenal, but the end results were worth the investment.

 

"I now find that is no longer the case for me, and the commitment is not balanced out. For me it is no longer a positive experience nor is it sufficiently about children and education. It is time for me to walk away."

 

DiLego was elected to one of four four-year seats on the School Committee in November 2018, a year after Lanesborough and Williamstown voters approved regionalization. The other three seats on the first iteration of the PreK-12 School Committee were two-year spots. Going forward, all seats will be for four years.

 

Per the regional agreement, Lanesborough residents interested in filling the remainder of DiLego's term can apply to the district. The successful applicant will be chosen by a joint meeting of the remaining six School Committee members, the Lanesborough Board of Selectmen and the Williamstown Select Board.

 

The agreement specifies the district has 30 days from receipt of the resignation to fill the vacant seat.

 

DiLego's departure ensures that the School Committee will have at least four and as many as five new faces in November.

 

Three current members (Lanesborough's Al Terranova and Williamstown's Jamie Art and Alison Carter) are not seeking another term in the Nov. 3 election. Another Williamstown member, Carolyn Greene, is being challenged by Elisabeth Beck for the seat Greene assumed in place of Caplinger.

 

Only Conry of Lanesborough and Vice Chair Steven Miller of Williamstown are assured of continuing on the committee after Nov. 3.

 

In addition to welcoming a new superintendent to the district, the new School Committee will need to deal with the continuing educational and budgetary issues arising from the COVID-19 pandemic and, in all likelihood, resolve a long-simmering debate in the district about whether to build an artificial turf playing field at the middle-high school.