Month: November 2018

SPRINGFIELD — Justine Siegal, the first female coach in the history of Major League Baseball, will be the keynote speaker for the sixth annual Western Massachusetts Baseball Hall of Fame induction banquet to be held on Thursday, Jan. 31.

The ceremony, hosted by the Valley Blue Sox, will take place at 7 p.m. at La Quinta Inn and Suites, 100 Congress St., Springfield.

“The Blue Sox are excited to host another Hall of Fame induction banquet,” said Blue Sox President Fred Ciaglo, who is entering his second season as the head of the franchise. “There are so many people that do a great deal of work to help baseball prosper in Western Massachusetts. We hope that this event serves as an avenue to celebrate those individuals and their accomplishments.”

Siegal is the president and founder of Baseball for All, a nonprofit organization that empowers women to play, coach, and lead in baseball. She earned her doctorate in sport and exercise psychology from Springfield College, where she served as an assistant coach for the baseball team from 2008 to 2010. She also coached youth baseball. In 2009, Siegal became the first female coach of a professional men’s team when she worked as the first-base coach of the Brockton Rox in the independent Canadian American Assoc. of Professional Baseball.

In 2011, she became the first woman to throw batting practice to a big league team, the Cleveland Indians. She also has served as a batting-practice pitcher for the Oakland Athletics, Tampa Bay Rays, St. Louis Cardinals, Houston Astros, and New York Mets. In October 2015, Oakland invited her to serve a two-week stint as guest instructor in the instructional league in Arizona, making her the first female to coach in the major leagues.

Siegal will be inducted into the Hall of Fame as part of the class of 2019. Other members will be announced in the coming weeks. This year’s class is the sixth since the inaugural banquet in 2014. Since its inception, 35 individuals and four teams who have represented and served the baseball community of Western Mass. have been honored.

Tickets for the banquet are $50, or $450 for a table of 10. Dinner is included, and every guest will receive a pair of tickets to a 2019 Blue Sox home game. To purchase tickets, call (413) 533-1100 or visit valley-blue-sox.ticketleap.com/2019-hof.

Springfield College to Host ‘Immerse Yourself in Dance’ Performance

By BusinessWest Staff November 30, 2018

SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield College Department of Visual and Performing Arts will host an “Immerse Yourself in Dance” performance starting on Friday, Dec. 7 through Sunday, Dec. 9 in the Fuller Arts Center. Show times are 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 7 and 8, followed by a 2 p.m. start time on Dec. 9.

In addition, there will be free dance lessons open to the campus community and general public on Dec. 8, with a focus on building community through dance. Starting time for the free classes will be at 3:30 p.m. in the Fuller Arts Center. From 3:30 to 4:45 p.m., dancers and choreographers from the weekend performance will lead a dance class titled “Playing with Gravity,” followed by a community hip-hop class from 5 to 6:15 p.m. There will be a reception for attendees starting at 6:45 p.m. before the performance beginning at 7:30 p.m.

The weekend performances will feature Springfield College dancers performing Set and Reset/Reset by internationally renowned choreographer Trisha Brown, the creator of more than 100 choreographic works and six operas. Guest choreographer Andrea Vazquez-Aguiree will also set an original work about discovering identity.

Dance faculty member Angela Vital-Martowski, who has performed with the Boston Ballet and the American Repertory Ballet Theater, and Sarah Zehnder, director of the dance program and choreographer of New York City-based Zehnder Dance, will premier new works as well.

Suggested general admission is $5; students, senior citizens, and children are free. Tickets may be purchased at the door or reserved by calling (413) 748-3930.

Baystate Health Names Judith Ward VP of Marketing and Communications

By BusinessWest Staff November 30, 2018

SPRINGFIELD — Judith Ward, an accomplished healthcare marketing professional, has been named vice president of Marketing & Communications for Baystate Health.

In her new role, Ward will oversee marketing, digital/web, communications, public affairs, social media, creative services, loyalty programs, and special events at the Springfield-based health system, which includes hospitals in Springfield, Greenfield, Palmer, and Westfield, along with more than 100 medical practices at some 80 locations throughout Western Mass.

Among the strategic marketing executive’s past accomplishments include conceiving and executing strategies that define, differentiate, and drive increased brand recognition, preference, customer loyalty, and market share.

Ward comes to Baystate Health from Stanford Health Care in Palo Alto, Calif., where she led the organization’s strategic marketing efforts, developed award-winning advertising campaigns, and executed engaging Facebook Live strategies.

Prior to her role at Stanford, she served as vice president of Network Marketing for Danbury Hospital and Western Connecticut Health Network, where she led the brand creation and strategy for the newly formed health network. She also served as principal of Judith Ward Associates, providing consulting services centered on the development and execution of strategic digital marketing plans.

“Judith is a seasoned professional whose expertise in traditional media and public relations, as well as digital, social, web, and mobile marketing, makes her a perfect fit for this important leadership role for our health system,” said Jane Albert, senior vice president of Marketing, Communications & External Relations for Baystate Health. “We look forward to the creativity, innovation, and expertise that she will bring to our marketing and communications team and welcome her to the Baystate family.”

Ward holds an MBA with a marketing concentration from University of Connecticut and a bachelor’s degree from University of New Hampshire. She has served as an adjunct professor in the Master of Health Administration program at Western Connecticut State University and Marlboro College in Vermont. She is a member of American College of Healthcare Executives, the Society for Healthcare Strategy & Market Development, the Healthcare Executives Forum, and the California Assoc. of Healthcare Leaders.

Hazen Paper Recognized at Manufacturing Award Ceremony

HOLYOKE — The state’s third annual Manufacturing Award Ceremony, sponsored by the Legislature’s Manufacturing Caucus, was recently held at the State House in Boston. Hazen Paper was one of 58 manufacturers recognized for their success.

Hazen is known worldwide for its holographic paper and manufacturing in Holyoke. Well-known examples its work include the Stadium Edition Super Bowl Program and the Basketball Hall of Fame Enshrinement Yearbook.

“In 2009, when the world was embroiled in the Great Recession, Hazen launched a new holographic and metallizing factory in the industrial sector on Main Street in Holyoke,” said John Hazen, president of Hazen Paper. “This was bold timing, and it was an aggressive, forward-driving venture that required extreme fortitude on the part of Hazen Paper.”

Hazen started an apprentice program in 2007 to train the expert workers required for this high-tech factory. Hazen has hired and trained more than 50 apprentices in the last 10 years. In 2010, Hazen started an internship program with engineering students from Western New England University, several of whom now work full-time on the Hazen management team. Hazen has been proactive in helping to build the future workforce via the World Is Our Classroom program, whereby every fifth-grader in Holyoke public schools visits Hazen for a full day of teaching and tours. Hazen started the program in 2004, and an estimated 4,000 fifth-graders have participated since that time.

The State House ceremony honored the manufacturers and showcased their innovative and revolutionary manufacturing capabilities and products. The event included companies who make furniture, jewelry, handcrafted electric bicycles, precision-screw-machined parts, marble and granite, custom paper, flutes and piccolos, precision-machined parts for the aerospace industry, and even hummus and peanut butter.

Hazen Paper was nominated by state Rep. Aaron Vega. “Manufacturing is not only an essential component of our economy in Massachusetts, it’s in the DNA of cities like Holyoke,” he said. “We are a city born of innovation and manufacturing. Most of Western Mass. has a rich history of making things, from paper to bikes, motorcycles to parts for our military and NASA.”

Bridgestone Retail Operations Presents Boys & Girls Club of Greater Holyoke with New Van

HOLYOKE — Parents at the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Holyoke agree that having reliable transportation is the biggest challenge to their children’s participation in after-school activities in Holyoke. Lack of reliable transportation is even more of a stressor for low-income families in need.

With that in mind, Bridgestone Retail Operations (BSRO) surprised youth at the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Holyoke with a brand-new, eight-passenger Toyota Sienna van, valued at $35,000. The van was recently presented by Joe DeAngelis, New England Region manager, and Scott Zimmerman, area manager for Bridgestone Retail Operations, to Eileen Cavanaugh, president and CEO of the Boys & Girls Club.

The club will utilize the van to engage in experiential learning opportunities, take youth on field trips, visit colleges, increase volunteer opportunities for teens, and participate in more career-readiness activities. In addition to these benefits, the four satellite units located within Holyoke Housing Authority communities will now have more access to the main club. The van allows transportation to nearly 1,400 club members to and from the club.

Asnuntuck Community College Now Registering Students for Wintersession

ENFIELD, Conn. — Registration is now open for Wintersession at Asnuntuck Community College, with classes to be held Dec. 27 to Jan. 13.

Students may apply or register online 24 hours a day at www.asnuntuck.edu, or in person at the Registrar’s office Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Academic advisors are available for walk-ins on Wednesdays from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. All other times are by appointment only. E-mail [email protected] for additional information.

Students can earn three credits in three weeks at Wintersession, which is available to current students, new students, and students home on break from their four-year school. Online classes are available in art, biology, business, computer science, early childhood education, human services, psychology, and sociology.

Come Celebrate This Year’s Women of Impact on Dec. 6

SPRINGFIELD — BusinessWest, the business journal covering Western Mass., will honor its inaugural Women of Impact on Thursday, Dec. 6 from 11 a.m. to 1:45 p.m. at the Sheraton Springfield, One Monarch Place.

BusinessWest has consistently recognized the contributions of women within the business community and has now created the Women of Impact awards to honor women who have the authority and power to move the needle in their business, are respected for accomplishments within their industries, give back to the community, and are sought out as respected advisors and mentors within their field of influence.

More than 80 nominations were submitted, and candidates were scored by an esteemed panel of three judges. There are eight winners in this first class. Honorees are profiled in the Nov. 12 issue of BusinessWest and at businesswest.com. This year’s honorees are:

• Jean Canosa Albano, Assistant Director for Public Services, Springfield City Library;

• Kerry Dietz, Owner and Principal, Dietz & Company Architects Inc.;

• Denise Jordan, Executive Director, Springfield Housing Authority;

• Gina Kos, Executive Director, Sunshine Village;

• Carol Leary, President, Bay Path University;

• Colleen Loveless, President and CEO, Revitalize Community Development Corp.;

• Janis Santos, Executive Director, HCS Head Start Inc.; and

• Katie Allan Zobel, President and CEO, Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts.

The Women of Impact Awards Luncheon on Dec. 6 will begin with registration and networking at 11 a.m., with the formal program to start at noon. Tickets are $65 per person, and tables of 10 are available. Tickets may be purchased online at businesswest.com/women-of-impact, or by calling (413) 781-8600. The Women of Impact program is sponsored by Bay Path University, Comcast Business, Country Bank, Granite State Development, and WWLP 22 News.

CLICK Workspace to Host Third Annual Makers Market on Dec. 14-15

NORTHAMPTON — CLICK Workspace is set to put on its third annual Pastiche: A Makers Market. Featuring a variety of handcrafted art, goods, and gifts by local artists and companies, Pastiche is slated for Friday, Dec. 14 from 5 to 8 p.m. and Saturday, Dec. 15 from 11a.m. to 3 p.m.

This pop-up market features local artists and craftspeople without a retail or storefront presence, offering a unique shopping experience. Custom-made women’s outerwear, hand-woven textiles, and raw, handmade soap are just a few of the wide variety of offerings at this year’s market.

For a complete list of the Pastiche 2018 vendors and more information about the Makers Market, visit www.clickworkspace.org.

OMG FastenMaster Division Promotes Two into Key Sales Positions

AGAWAM — As part of a continuing effort to position the company for stronger growth and faster product innovation to better meet the changing global needs of its customers, OMG has promoted two employees into key sales positions in its FastenMaster Division.

Nikki Long has been promoted to the newly created position of director of Key Accounts, which was established to bring a strategic focus to the role that key-account management plays in FastenMaster’s growth plans. She will design and implement strategies to improve sales growth, customer relationships, customer service, and on-time product delivery at FastenMaster’s key accounts. She reports to John McMahon, vice president.

A 15-year veteran of the company, Long has held a variety of sales and marketing positions since starting in 2003. Most recently, she was the manager of Home Centers for FastenMaster, where she excelled at driving the FastenMaster brand and footprint in the home-center channel. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Smith College.

Tom Ellerbrook has been promoted to director of Sales, responsible for developing and implementing strategic plans to exceed sales targets and expand market share. In addition, he is responsible for coaching and mentoring the sales team to achieve assigned goals, and for building a bench for the future. He also reports to McMahon.

Ellerbrook has been with FastenMaster since 2011, most recently as the Northeast regional sales manager, where he was instrumental in building FastenMaster’s sales throughout the region. He holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from UMass and an MBA from Western New England University.

Visiting Students from El Salvador to Learn About Lean Manufacturing

AMHERST — A visiting group of college students from El Salvador, in a program organized by the Amherst-based Institute for Training and Development (ITD), will visit a Western Mass. manufacturer to learn about the world of lean manufacturing, and how precision and quality also lead to improved decision making and innovation.

Sanderson MacLeod is the world’s largest manufacturer of mascara brushes, plus many other uses of twisted wire brushes, in industries including medical, cosmetics, and firearms. The students are from Monica Herrera School of Communication and visit the Pioneer Valley and elsewhere for the purpose of learning about how business is done in the U.S.

This day of training, including lessons on lean manufacturing and an exercise involving Ohno Circles (developed in the early days of the Toyota Production System, by Taiichi Ohno), is organized by Ira Bryck, president of the Family Business Center of Pioneer Valley. The FBCPV and ITD have collaborated regularly over the years, as teams of business students and owners visit via ITD’s programs. ITD’s purpose is to provide inter-cultural experiences that bring together professionals and/or students from around the world to share cultures, exchange ideas, deepen understanding, and spread knowledge.

Jewish Family Services to Present ‘Unretire Yourself: Tap into Your Passion’

SPRINGFIELD — Attendees of a workshop on Thursday, Dec. 6 will learn how to tap into their passion to identify a fulfilling encore career. The event is slated for 1 to 2:30 p.m. at Jewish Family Services’ Community Room, 1160 Dickinson St., Springfield (the parking lot is on the Converse Street side).

The road to retirement is not the clear path it once was. If you’re retired or planning on being retired in the next few years, presenter Suzanne McElroy of Home Instead Senior Care will help you recognize the benefits of ‘unretiring’ or returning to the workforce; discover what you can do after retirement if you’re still working; and identify ways to stay connected if you’re not in the workforce or follow your passions to a different career.

The program is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be served. Pre-registration is requested by visiting www.jfswm.org or calling (413) 737-2601. For other upcoming events, visit www.jfswm.org.

Michael Daly Steps Down as President, CEO of Berkshire Hills Bancorp

BOSTON — Michael Daly stepped down Monday as president, CEO, and director of Berkshire Hills Bancorp, Berkshire Bank’s holding company.

Berkshire Bank President Richard Marotta has been named CEO and president of the company and CEO of the bank. Sean Gray, chief operating officer of Berkshire Bank, will replace Marotta as bank president.

The move comes a year after the financial institution moved its headquarters from Pittsfield to Boston, and the purchase of Worcester-based Commerce Bank helped grow Berkshire to its current $12 billion in assets, making it the largest independent Massachusetts-based bank.

“I am extremely proud of the accomplishments that the employees of the company have achieved during my time as CEO,” Daly said in a statement. “When I began my tenure 16 years ago, Berkshire Bank was one of the smallest banks headquartered in Massachusetts with some 300 employees, and the company is now the largest with nearly 2,000 employees. I’ve built long-lasting relationships with many employees during this time who I will continue to view as my family.”

The bank did not give a reason for Daly’s departure. In a statement, William Ryan, chairman of the bank’s board, noted that “Mike’s commitment to the bank, our customers, and our communities has been instrumental in Berkshire’s success. We thank him for his focus on creating the strong franchise we have today.”

Big Y Foods, COCC Receive 2018 Employer of Choice Recognition

AGAWAM — Big Y Foods Inc. of Springfield and COCC of Southington, Conn. have been selected by the Employers Assoc. of the NorthEast (EANE) as Employer of Choice Award recipients for 2018.

Employer of Choice awards recognize companies and organizations for developing workplaces that value employees, foster engagement, invest in employee development, and reward performance. Past winners view the award as a cornerstone of their company credentials and often highlight the award in recruiting and retention, grant and funding applications, and business development.

“We are always delighted to see the innovative programs used by our applicants to retain talent and engage employees. Our winners this year had some exceptional initiatives and formal measurement processes,” said Meredith Wise, president of EANE. “Salary increases may be more stable, but work-life balance and company culture are still seriously valued.”

Doing business for over 80 years, Big Y Foods is a family-owned supermarket chain with more than 11,000 employees throughout Massachusetts and Connecticut. The chain prides itself on a culture of caring, which manifests itself in the form of workplace ‘huddles’ to celebrate employees who have gone above and beyond, and through the organization’s strong commitment to retain employees.

Big Y stands out for its overall benefits, employee satisfaction, training and development, and recognition and rewards. One novel program, called Building Firm Foundations, is a collaboration in which employees help other employees with home-repair needs by utilizing their skills, expertise, and time. Projects have included building ramps, fixing decks and windows, landscaping, and more. Another initiative, called the 10 Foot Rule, combines a user-friendly customer-service model with a fun graphic reinforcing how to treat customers. The Big Y University and Big Y LIFE, an internal communication portal, are among the other employee-centric engagement offerings.

COCC is a client-owned technology company serving more than 200 financial institutions for more than 50 years. With more than 500 employees, the company offers profit sharing when objectives are met, a rich total rewards package, and a generous paid-time-off (PTO) plan. In fact, new employees begin with four weeks of PTO.

Employees receive continuous feedback from multiple channels, including a peer-driven acknowledgement program and regular check-ins from the management team. One of the cornerstones of its successful culture is the Peer2Peer program, which recognizes when co-workers go above and beyond and celebrates winners quarterly with recognition, gifts, and food. COCC uses regular benchmarking to assess compensation, and overall satisfaction is 89%.

Kuhn Riddle Architects Certified as a Woman Business Enterprise

AMHERST — Kuhn Riddle Architects announced that the firm was recently certified as a Women Business Enterprise (WBE). The Commonwealth of Massachusetts grants the designation of WBE to businesses that demonstrate majority ownership and control of daily management and operations by women.

Aelan Tierney, president of Kuhn Riddle Architects, sought the business designation after she became majority owner of the firm in January. She joined Jonathan Salvon and Charles Roberts, who became principals in 2010 when Chris Riddle retired. John Kuhn passed the torch of leadership and ownership to these three architects and will continue to work on selected projects at Kuhn Riddle Architects. Tierney will work on architectural project design while also focusing on new business growth and opportunities.

“I see this designation as the continuing evolution of architecture — and of our society as a whole — as professions become more diverse and inclusive,” said Tierney, who has been an architect at Kuhn Riddle since 2005. “This is also as an opportunity for further growth of our firm. We have an immensely talented and capable staff; we are interested in partnering with other firms to take on much larger projects than we have to date. I am hopeful that this designation will open doors and break ceilings for us.”

Salvon noted that “this change in designation is a natural acknowledgement of the strong leadership Aelan has demonstrated both before and since joining the firm’s ownership this year.”

Added Roberts, “Aelan is a natural leader who will do a great job carrying forward KRA’s legacy and commitments.”

TommyCar Auto Group Supports Unify Against Bullying

SOUTH DEERFIELD — TommyCar Auto Group was the official partner for Unify Against Bullying for October in support of National Bullying Prevention Month. During the entire month of October, each dealership in the group — including Country Nissan, Country Hyundai, Northampton Volkswagen, and the new Volvo Cars Pioneer Valley — donated $20 for every car sold. Thanks to customer involvement, TommyCar Auto Group was able to donate $4,200.

“Bullying happens way more than it should, but we have the power to make a difference,” said Carla Cosenzi, president of TommyCar Auto Group. “We need to continue to talk about bullying openly and freely, and not be scared to address the issues that happen to us, our family, our friends, or our co-workers. Unify is changing the culture within our communities and the way people are addressing bullying, and I knew we had to be a part of that.”

Christine Maiwald, executive director of Unify Against Bullying, added that Cosenzi’s support “means more than you might realize, especially to those families struggling with this pervasive issue. Our organization’s mission is to end bullying through the celebration of true diversity, and her generous check in the amount of $4,200 helps us get one step closer to accomplishing that mission.”

CISA Celebrates 25 Years of Sustaining Local Agriculture

By George O'Brien November 27, 2018

Cover Story

Supporting a Growth Industry

When CISA (Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture) was launched 25 years ago, this region’s agricultural community was threatened by a host of issues and societal changes. Today, those challenges remain, but CISA, through its ‘buy local’ program and other initiatives, has lived up to its name by getting the community involved in sustaining and growing this vital sector of the economy.

Margaret Christie is quick to point out that the many challenges area farmers faced a quarter century ago are still as much a part of the landscape as asparagus fields in Hadley.

These include everything from the cost of land (among the highest levels in the country), to the many pressures on that land, meaning attractive development options ranging from housing subdivisions to industrial parks, to immense competition from across the country and around the world.

And there are even some additional challenges, including an aging group of farm owners and workers — Baby Boomers are hitting retirement age — and a phrase you didn’t hear much, if at all, in 1993, but certainly heard this summer as the rain kept coming down in the 413: Climate change.

But the environment for farmers has been altered in one important respect, said Christie, and that comes in the form of an additional and quite significant support system called, appropriately enough, Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture, or CISA. Christie, now the agency’s special projects coordinator, was its first executive director, and she recalled the thought process — not to mention a $1.2 million Kellogg Foundation grant — that brought CISA into being.

“CISA grew out of an effort by a lot of people who were working on different agriculture issues in the valley, many of them associated with the colleges or existing nonprofits, who each felt they were each working on some piece related to food and agriculture, but they weren’t really talking to each other,” she explained. “And so they had a pretty simple idea, which was to have a series of brown-bag lunches, get together every month, and compare notes. And out of that experience, they began to think ‘we need to be doing something bigger and more coordinated.”

That something bigger and more coordinated was CISA, which came about a time when the region’s agricultural base was more threatened than most could have understood, said Christie, noting that in the decade prior to its creation, there was a significant erosion in the agricultural land base — a loss of 21,000 acres to be precise — and a decline in farmers income of about 3%.

“The people who were involved in CISA thought ‘we might really lose this land base, and we have great soil here — we have prime agricultural soils rivaling any place in the world,’” she recalled. “They said ‘this is important to us as a community and we don’t want to lose it.’”

Margaret Christie says CISA has made buying local front of mind for many area residents, and something very easy to do.

To the question ‘how do we avoid losing this precious commodity?’ those at CISA answered, in essence, by saying ‘get the community involved,’ said Executive Director Philip Korman, adding that the agency has done just that.

Today, though initiatives such as the ‘Be a Local Hero, Buy Locally Grown’ campaign with which the agency is synonymous, many forms of technical assistance, and an emergency loan program, CISA has not only brought more attention to local farms and farm products, it has stabilized and, in some ways, actually grown the local agriculture sector — meaning Hampden, Hampshire, and Franklin Counties.

Indeed, as the chart on page 10 reveals, there are now 182,428 acres of land devoted to agriculture in those three counties, compared to 165,420 acres in 1993. There are now 36 farmers’ markets across the region, compared to 10 back then; there are 51 farms offering farm shares (CSA farms) compared to 19 back then; and direct farm-to-consumer sales are nor more than $10 million, more than double the total a quarter century ago.

But despite this progress, many challenges remain and more are emerging, including the aforementioned climate change. And as it celebrates its first 25 years, CISA is also looking ahead and to ways it can be an even better stronger advocate for local agriculture.

For this issue, BusinessWest looks at how CISA has supported an important growth sector this region over the past 25 years — figuratively and quite literally — and also at how, as it celebrates this milestone, the focus remains on the present and future, not the past.

Experts in Their Field

It is with a large and easily discernable amount of pride in her voice that Meg Bantle notes that her family has been farming the same tract of land in Adams for six generations covering more than two centuries years — and that she is the sixth.

Indeed, she now operates a modest vegetable and flower operation, called Full Well Farm, on a tiny corner of the 500-acre property that was once a thriving dairy farm. Meanwhile, her mother and grandmother have been trying to figure out what to do with the rest of the property, a question that’s been challenging her family since her grandfather died in 2013, and Bantle is now playing a role in that effort as well.

“Being back on that land, in closer proximity to the family business and my mom, will help me to be involved in the decision-making in terms of what’s going to happen with the rest of the land,” she told BusinessWest. “We’ve had a number of discussions about making a succession plan for the future.”

Mantle was one of several area farmers to take part in something called ‘Field Notes — An Afternoon of Storytelling’ on Nov. 18 at the Academy of Music in Northampton. A number of farmers, chefs, and brewers took to the podium to talk of memories, challenges, opportunities lost, opportunities gained, the present, and the future.

The event was staged by CISA as part of its 25th anniversary, said Korman, noting that the agency played a least a small part in many of the stories told. Meanwhile, it exists to help script more of them in the years and decades to come, by inspiring more people like Bantle to return to the land as she did after college and to perhaps help more families devise succession plans.

It has been this way since CISA’s start in a small home office in Northampton. The agency has since relocated several times, with stints at UMass and Hampshire College, for example, and is now located in a suite of offices in the shadow of Mount Sugarloaf in South Deerfield.

From there, staff members coordinate a number of programs and initiatives, the most visible and impactful of which is the ‘Local Hero’ program and its annual publication, known as the ‘Locally Grown Farm Products Guide.’

“The people who were involved in CISA thought ‘we might really lose this land base, and we have great soil here — we have prime agricultural soils rivaling any place in the world. They said ‘this is important to us as a community and we don’t want to lose it.”

Broken down by community and individual farm, the guide captures, well, the full flavor of the region’s agro sector with colorful snapshots of each operation, usually featuring a personal touch, like this entry for the North Hadley Sugar Shack: ‘Enjoy our Sugarin’ Breakfast daily from mid-February to Mid-April. Come see how we make maple syrup, grab a maple treat, or get supplies to make your own. We serve hard ice cream and our own maple soft serve from May to October, and host lots of fun, family-friendly, and educational events all summer long. Open year-round; local seasonal produce and flowers available throughout the year.’

The annual guide is a big part of broad efforts to use the media and marketing techniques to build broad community support for local farms, said Claire Morenon, communications manager for CISA, adding that these efforts, and especially the ‘buy local’ campaign have helped changed the face of agriculture in the Pioneer Valley and beyond, as indicated in those numbers mentioned earlier.

Christie agreed, and said that, in addition to being the country’s oldest ‘buy local’ initiative, CISA’s program really facilitates the process of buying from local farms, and keeps the practice front of mind.

“We did some survey work before we launched our ‘Local Hero’ campaign, and what we found is that people in this region really understood that supporting local farmers kept their money in their local community and supported their neighbors, and that was important to them,” she said. “We didn’t have to teach people that; they understood it already.

“But I think we were one of the first places to do this at the scale we do, and also at the community level that we do,” she went on. “Certainly state departments of agriculture have promoted food grown in that state for a long time, but I don’t think, in a lot of cases, that they’ve personalized it with the farmer’s face and the story of farms, and taken it to the level we have, where we make it easy for people.

“If you were grocery shopping, and you were working all day, and you picked up the kids from wherever, and you had to go home and make dinner, and everyone’s tired … we wanted you to remember that it’s important to support local farms at that point,” she continued. “And you could, because it was salient, you had heard about it so much that you remembered it and it was easy for you because there was a logo and a label and you could see what was local.”

And by local, CISA means local, said Korman, adding that while buying products made in Massachusetts is an important goal, buying from people down the street or a town or two over is even more so.

Phil Korman says CISA’s mission hasn’t changed, but the agency has broadened its reach to include issues such as hunger in the region.

“It’s one thing to do branding at a state level, but it’s not the same thing as home — it’s your home state, but it’s not your home,” he told BusinessWest. “We elevated it to a level where people understand that it’s our neighbors who are our farmers, and that ‘I can get to know that person depending on how I buy goods, and I get to understand and taste and develop a connection to the person who’s growing food for my family.”

Yield Signs

Many of the farmers now doing business in this region have been tending the land for decades, but most have never a seen a summer like this one, said Korman.

While the seemingly incessant rain probably helped a few crops, it negatively impacted many others and, overall, it made life miserable for farm owners and their employees.

“We’ve heard from all kinds of farms — orchards, vegetable farms … it’s affected just about everyone, and if it didn’t make things terrible, it made things very unfun,” he said. “And I don’t say that lightly; it’s just been so hard to be out in the field.”

The havoc wrought by the summer of 2018 is made clear by the number of farms likely to apply for aid from CISA’s emergency farm fund, started after Hurricane Irene, Korman went on, adding that the fund is one example of how CISA’s reach has extended beyond marketing and brand awareness, if you will, with the brand being the sum of the area’s farms — and into technical and financial assistance, training, and other avenues of support, all aimed at strengthening the farming community.

And also an example of how the agency, while not changing its core mission in any real way, is broadening its focus to include different issues and challenges — for both farmers and this region.

“In recent years, as the Local Hero campaign has been so successful, and as we’ve felt our original work has been successful enough to stand on its own, we’ve been thinking more about some of the broader food-system challenges we’re facing and thinking outside of just consumers and farmers,” said Morenon. “Such as huger and our role in addressing that, the condition of farm workers and our role with that, and other issues.”

“If you were grocery shopping, and you were working all day, and you picked up the kids from wherever, and you had to go home and make dinner, and everyone’s tired … we wanted you to remember that it’s important to support local farms at that point.”

Elaborating, she and others we spoke with said the region’s farmers can’t solve the hunger issue, but they can certainly play a role in efforts to stem the tide of hunger in the region, specifically through partnerships with local, state, and even national agencies.

A prime example is the Healthy Initiatives Program (HIP). Launched in 2017 and administered by the Department of Transitional Assistance, in partnership with the Department of Agricultural resources and the Department of Public Health, HIP provides monthly incentives to SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) — $40 for families of one to two people, and $80 for families of six or more, for example — when they purchase fresh, local, healthy fruits and vegetables from Massachusetts farmers at farmers’ markets, farm stands, CSAs, and mobile markets. The money they spend at these retailers is immediately added back to their EBT cards, and can be spent at any SNAP retailers.

Since its inception, the program has meant better health outcomes for vulnerable families and better sustainability for local farms, said Korman, noting that SNAP families have purchased more than $4 million of produce from farms across the state and that SNAP sales at farm retailers increased by nearly 600% between 2016 and 2017 thanks to HIP.

“The pilot program in Hampden County showed that the incentives increased consumption of produce by 24%,” he explained, noting that the success locally led to a broadening of the program to cover the whole state.

Another example is Monte’s March, the hugely successful food drive to support the Food Bank of Western Mass., led by WHMP radio personality Monte Belmonte — or, more specifically, efforts on CISA’s part to spotlight just how much local farmers donate to that cause.

“They now add up the poundage — and its 500,000 pounds of food that gets donated by local farmers,” Korman told BusinessWest. “It isn’t that it’s the responsibility of local farmers to solve hunger, it’s more the responsibility of all of us to make sure there are local farms, because that generosity and that connection to the community will benefit us all.”

In a nutshell, this is the mindset that helped launch CISA, it’s the philosophy that has guided its first 25 years, and the thought process that will guide it in the future.

Growing the Bottom the Line

Meg Bantle has many vivid memories of life on her family’s farm. One she shared with the audience at Field Notes involved the day some cows stampeded her and other family members.

No one was seriously hurt, she said, but the memory of that day, symbolic of the difficult life farmers live, has always remained with her, like countless others.

It doesn’t say so anywhere in CISA’s official mission statement, but the agency is really all about creating such memories for several future generations of area farmers. How? As it always has, by making a solid connection between the farmers and the surrounding communities and making it very easy to buy local‚ as in local.

There’s some food for thought — in every sense of that phrase.

George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]

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Educare Draws Connections Between Home, School, and Economic Opportunities

By Joseph Bednar November 27, 2018

Education

More Than a Head Start

Architects rendering of the $14 million Educare Center now under construction in Springfield.

The new $14 million Educare Center now under construction in Springfield is focused on education, obviously, but parental involvement and workforce development are key focal points within its broad mission.

Mary Walachy calls it “Head Start on steroids.”

It’s a term she has called upon often, actually, when speaking to individuals and groups about Educare, an innovative model for high-quality early education that’s coming to Springfield next year — only the 24th such center in the country, in fact.

“You have to work with a Head Start partner. That’s a requirement in every Educare site across the country,” said Walachy, executive director of the Irene E. & George A. Davis Foundation, one of the lead partners in the effort to launch the local Educare school. “The base program meets the Head Start national requirements. But then there’s a layer of extensive higher quality. Instead of two adult teachers in the classroom, there needs to be three. Instead of a six-hour day, there needs to be eight or 10. There are higher ratios of family liaisons to families.”

Then there are the elements that Educare centers have really honed in on nationwide: Parental involvement and workforce development — and the many ways those two concepts work together.

“The research is clear — if kids get a good start, if they have a quality preschool, if they arrive at school really ready to be successful and with the skills and language development they need, they can really be quite successful,” Walachy said. “However, at the same time, it’s extremely important they go home to a strong family. One is still good, but both together are a home run.”

The takeaway? Early-education programs must engage parents in their children’s learning, which is a central tenet to Educare. But the second reality is that families often need assistance in other ways — particularly Head Start-eligible families, who tend to be in the lower economic tier.

“We must assist them to begin the trajectory toward financial security,” Walachy said, and Holyoke Chicopee Springfield (HCS) Head Start has long done this by recruiting and training parents, in a collaborative effort with Holyoke Community College, to become classroom assistants, who often move up to become teachers. In fact, some 40% to 50% of teachers in HCS Head Start are former Head Start mothers.

“So they already have a model, but after we get up and running, we want to put that on a bit of a steroid as well,” she noted. That means working with the Federal Reserve’s Working Cities program, in partnership with the Economic Development Council of Western Mass., to steer Head Start and Educare families onto a pathway to better employment opportunities. “It’s getting on a trajectory for employment and then, we hope, financial security and success for themselves and their families.”

“The research is clear — if kids get a good start, if they have a quality preschool, if they arrive at school really ready to be successful and with the skills and language development they need, they can really be quite successful. However, at the same time, it’s extremely important they go home to a strong family. One is still good, but both together are a home run.”

She noted that early education evolved decades ago as a workforce-support program, offering child care so families could go to work or go to school. “We’ve shifted in some ways — people started saying, ‘wait a minute, this isn’t just child care, this is education. We are really putting them on a pathway.’ But now we’ve got to circle back and do both. Head Start was always an anti-poverty program. More recently, it’s really started focusing on employment and financial security for families.”

SEE: List of Private Schools

By making that dual commitment to parent engagement and workforce training, she noted, the organizations supporting the Educare project in Springfield are making a commitment to economic development that lifts families — and, by extension, communities. And that makes this much more than a school.

Alone in Massachusetts

The 24th Educare school in the U.S. will be the only one in Massachusetts, and only the second in New England, when it opens next fall at 100 Hickory St., adjacent to Brookings School, on land provided by Springfield College.

The $14 million project was designed by RDg Planning & Design and is being built by Western Builders, with project management by O’Connell Development Group.

Mary Walachy says that while it’s important to educate young children, it’s equally important that they go home to strong families.

Educare started with one school in Chicago and has evolved into a national learning network of schools serving thousands of children across the country. An early-education model designed to help narrow the achievement gap for children living in poverty, Educare Springfield is being funded locally by a variety of local, state, and national sources including the Davis Foundation, the Gage Olmstead Fund and Albert Steiger Memorial Fund at the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, the MassMutual Foundation, Berkshire Bank, MassDevelopment, the MassWorks Infrastructure Program at the Massachusetts Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development, the George Kaiser Family Foundation, Florence Bank, Capital One Commercial Banking, and the Early Education and Out of School Time Capital Grant Fund through the Massachusetts Department of Early Education and Care in collaboration with the Community Economic Development Assistance Corp. and its affiliate, the Children’s Investment Fund. A number of anonymous donors have also contributed significant funding.

Educare Springfield will offer a full-day, full-year program for up to 141 children from birth to age 5, under licensure by the Department of Early Education and Care. The center will also serve as a resource in the early-education community for training and providing professional development for future teachers, social workers, evaluation, and research.

Just from the education perspective, the local need is certainly there. Three years ago, the Springfield Public Schools Kindergarten Reading Assessment scores revealed that preschool children from the Six Corners and Old Hill neighborhoods scored the lowest among city neighborhoods for kindergarten reading readiness, at 1.1% and 3%, respectively. On a broader city scale, the fall 2017 scores showed that only 7% of all city children met all five benchmarks of kindergarten reading readiness.

Research, as Walachy noted, has proven time and again that kids who aren’t kindergarten-ready are at great risk of falling further behind their peers, and these same children, if they’re not reading proficiently by the end of third grade, are significantly less likely to graduate high school, attend college, or find employment that earns them a living wage.

Breaking that cycle means engaging children and their parents — and it’s an effort that could make a multi-generational impact.

Come Together

That potential is certainly gratifying for Walachy and the other partners.

“I think we’re really fortunate that Springfield got this opportunity to bring in this nationally recognized, quality early-childhood program,” she said, adding that the Davis Foundation has been involved from the start. “There has to be a philanthropic lead partner in order to begin to explore Educare because it does require fundraising, and if you don’t have somebody already at the table, it makes it really hard to get anybody else to join the table.”

The board of Educare Springfield, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, will hold Head Start accountable for executing the expanded Educare model. Educare Springfield is also tackling enhanced programs, fundraising, and policy and advocacy work associated with the model. A $7 million endowment is also being developed, to be administered by the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, revenue from which will support operating costs.

“We did not want to develop a building that we could then not pay to operate,” Walachy noted, adding that Head Start’s federal dollars will play a significant role as well. “We want to develop a program kids in Springfield deserve. They deserve the best, and we think this is one of the best, and one this community can support.

“No one argues that kids should have a good experience, and that they begin learning at birth,” she went on. “But nothing good is cheap. And I will tell you that Educare isn’t cheap. But it sends a policy message that you’ve got to pay for good programs if you want good outcomes.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

In These Chaotic, Stressful Times, People Sometimes Just Need to Reboot

By George O'Brien November 27, 2018

Workforce Development

The Power of Pause

As was made clear in the first three installments of BusinessWest’s ‘Future Tense’ series, handling the incredibly fast pace of change while also trying to look around the corner to see what the future might bring is not only difficult but extremely stressful. And the present is no bargain, either. In response, major corporations and small businesses across the country and around the world are increasingly looking at mindfulness as a way to help employees focus their attention and stay in the moment, as attendees learned in the most recent lecture

Moira Garvey says that when a computer isn’t behaving properly — probably because it’s doing too many things at once or can’t sort out everything it’s being asked to do — its operator will reset, or reboot, that piece of equipment.

And, usually, that works; the computer functions much better than it did before.

What many people are now realizing — and more need to realize — is that they, too, need to reboot on a regular basis, and for the same reason the computer usually does: We’re trying to do too much, we can’t sort it all out, and because of that, we’re not operating as efficiently as we can.

Just like a computer, we need to reset, we need to reboot,” said Garvey, senior consultant and facilitator for the Potential Project, a global leader in providing customized, organizational effectiveness programs based on mindfulness.

Moira Garvey

“Just like a computer, we need to reset, we need to reboot.”

Garvey was joined at the podium recently by Susan O’Connor, Esq. vice president and general counsel for Health New England, as they presented the final installment (for 2018, anyway) of BusinessWest’s Future Tense series.

In the first three programs, presented by Paragus Strategic IT, The Jamrog Group, and Meyers Brothers Kalicka, respectively, presenters talked about the quickening pace of change, the challenges of predicting what will come next, and the clear need to be proactive when it comes to anticipating what might lie around the next curve and being fully prepared for it.

In the final lecture, Garvey and O’Connor talked about what all this rapid change, unpredictability, and need to be prepared is doing to people — it’s stressing them out. And it’s not just the future that’s doing this, it’s the present as well. And it’s not just work. It’s also life — family, bills, difficult conversations, health concerns … the list goes on, and on, and on.

Add it all up, said Garvey, and people can really only focus about 53% of their mind on what they’re doing at a given moment, and in most all cases, that’s not enough (we’ll elaborate on this later).

The answer to improving that number, for a growing number of companies and the individuals they employ, is mindfulness, loosely defined as paying attention to the present moment in an accepting, non-judgmental way. It’s meditation designed to help a wandering mind — and all minds are wandering these days — come back, and stay focused on the present moment. It also gives people the tools needed to be less stressed and more calm.

The list of companies incorporating mindfulness programs continues to grow and now includes virtually every sector of the economy and the likes of Google, Microsoft, Accenture, Sony, Aetna, Airbus, Heineken, Marriott, Cisco, American Express, and countless others.

Why? Garvey sums it up quickly and effectively by citing the title of Thomas Davenport’s book — The Attention Economy — and the phrase that sums it all up: “Understanding and managing attention is now the single most important determinant of business success.”

Recognizing this, Health New England recently added its name to the list of companies involving employees in mindfulness programs, said O’Connor, adding that in the four years since HNE started down this road, it has seen real results when it comes to stress reduction and getting people to better focus on what’s right in front of them instead of everything else.

Jody Gross, HNE’s interim president and CEO, agreed.

“The health insurance industry is not unique in facing the challenges of constant change and uncertainty; our fast-paced lives at home and at work mean associates are continually pushing themselves to do more, to achieve more, and to do everything faster,” he said. “Technology and instant access results in a 24/7 schedule, and creates a fragmented, over-stressed, and hectic way of life. As Health New England looked for ways to reduce stress and build mental resiliency for our workforce, we understood it was critical to go beyond encouraging physical fitness.

“We needed to invest in improving the health and well-being of the whole person,” he went on. “One way to stay centered and focused is to commit to the practice of mindfulness.”

For the issue its focus on professional development, BusnessWest talked with Garvey and O’Connor about the emergence of mindfulness and how companies are using it to help employees combat all the stress in their lives and stay in the moment.

An Attention Getter

As they addressed the audience gathered for the Future Tense lecture at Tech Foundry, Garvey and O’Connor set the tone for the discussion by putting up a PowerPoint slide with a map of the country. By clicking on a state, one could discern its ‘most googled healthcare problem in 2018.’

Clicking on Utah, for example, which owns the nation’s highest pregnancy rate, ‘morning sickness’ comes up.

Maneuvering over Massachusetts, O’Connor clicked her mouse, and the word ‘stress’ appeared in all capital letters in a red starburst, as if any additional emphasis was needed.

And while Bay State residents do indeed have a lot of stress, the condition knows no boundaries, said Garvey, adding that there are certainly lots of reasons for it. Advancing technology is part of it, as is the overall pace of change. But mostly, it’s about handling all that work and life are throwing at people, she noted.

Susan O’Connor

“We turned to mindfulness to help employees remain resilient in the face the growing amounts of stress they face.”

And, like a computer, people on overload need to reset, or reboot, she said. “To speed things up, often you need to first slow down,” she said, referring to mindfulness or what she calls ‘the power of the pause.’

As we explain how it works, we need to go back to that number 53%. As Garvey explained, that’s how much of one’s mind is ‘on task,’ as she put it. The other 47% is off task, meaning it’s focused on everything but the task.

That means that, typically, people have a 47% ‘attention deficit trait,’ as it’s called. And to illustrate, Garvey offered an example everyone can relate to: “You pick up the phone to make an appointment … you get distracted, look at some e-mails or some texts … your mind starts to wander, and you wind up never making the appointment.”

To get more of the mind on task, people need to pause and reset, said Garvey, adding that this is mindfulness, or what she and others in this emerging field call “attention training.”

These are daily exercises — 10 minutes in length is the average — during which practitioners use meditation to keep their mind from wandering, she said, and bring it back to the present moment.

Because of its ability to help people focus, be less distracted by everything else around them, and, in the end, more productive, the business community has embraced mindfulness, said Garvey, noting that today, more than 450 major corporations and more than 100,000 employees are actively involved in mindfulness programs.

As for HNE, it started what O’Connor called a “mindfulness journey” roughly four years ago.

“We turned to mindfulness to help employees remain resilient in the face the growing amounts of stress they face,” she said, adding that mindfulness is now part of the business strategy for the company, the largest health plan based in Western Massachusetts.

Elaborating, she said that HNE introduced Potential Project’s Mindful Leadership program to its leadership team, a group of about 30 people. They took in part in a three-month pilot program involving 10-minute daily mindfulness sessions.

The results, studied by researchers from the National University of Singapore, are striking. They show a 31% increase in overall job performance, a 17% reduction in work/family conflict, a 37% reduction in “emotional exhaustion,” a dramatic, 52% drop in negative moods, and a 9% increase in attention, to 62% instead of the aforementioned 53%.

Summing it all up, she said the programs, now being used by a growing number of employees at the company, are helping these individuals “rewire” their brains to be less reactive to all that’s going around them and for them to respond more thoughtfully to the specific moment.

Gross agreed.

“Our mindfulness programs teach people to learn how to respond to the complexities and pressures of the workplace,” he told BusinessWest. “Our results have been excellent, and associates report improvements in how they approach uncertainty, have deeper concentration and an increased sense of satisfaction in and out of work.”

Mind Over Matters

Returning to that loose comparison between people and computers, Garvey said, “the expectation is that we’re always on. Well, machines can do that, but people cannot; we can’t always be on.”

But the truth is, we try to be, and that’s why the reset, the reboot, is needed.

Recognition of this has made mindfulness top of mind for a growing number of companies large and small, and most all of them are seeing real results in terms of stress reduction and improved productivity.

Practitioners with a lot on their mind are able to speed up by slowing down and dealing with the moment — just that moment.

This is the power of the pause.

George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]

Ambitious Project will Address Workforce Needs, Security Issues in the Supply Chain

By George O'Brien November 27, 2018

Technology

Creating Cyber Solutions

Tom Loper says the ‘supply chain’ project will benefit the region and its manufacturing sector while also giving cybersecurity students a leg up on jobs.

A group of regional partners, led by Bay Path University, has been awarded a $250,000 grant from the Mass. Technology Collaborative for a pilot program that will address a host of identified issues — from a critical shortage of workers in the cybersecurity field to the need for smaller manufacturers to become more cyber secure if they are going to keep doing business with their customers in the defense, aerospace, and other sectors.

The project’s name is long and quite cumbersome.

‘Engaging Student Interns in Cybersecurity Audits with Smaller Supply Chain Companies to Develop Experience for Entry-level Positions While Improving the Cybersecurity Ecosystem in Massachusetts.’

Yes, that’s really what it’s called. And while that’s a mouthful — not that anyone actually recites the whole thing anyway — it really does capture the essence of an ambitious initiative spearheaded by Bay Path University and its emerging cybersecurity programs, and also involving Springfield Technical Community College, Paragus Strategic IT, the Economic Development Council of Western Mass. (EDC), and other area partners.

Breaking down that long title into its component parts certainly helps to tell the story behind the $250,000 grant awarded recently by the Mass. Technology Collaborative. The program, set to commence early next year, will indeed engage students in Bay Path’s cybersecurity programs in internships with smaller supply chain companies across the region. They will be working with employees at Paragus to undertake cybersecurity assessments of these small manufacturing firms, essentially identifying holes where intruders can penetrate and possible methods for closing them.

And the program will provide needed experience that is difficult for such students to attain, but very necessary for them to land jobs in the field. And it will put more workers in the cybersecurity pipeline at a time when there is a considerable gap between the number that are available and the number that are needed — a gap approaching 9,000 specialists in this state alone. And it will bring more women into a field that has historically been dominated by men and is struggling desperately to achieve diversity.

That’s a lot of ‘ands.’

Which helps explain why the Mass. Technology Collaborative, which was planning to divide $250,000 among several entities, gave that entire amount to Bay Path’s proposal and then found another $135,000 to award to two other projects, said Tom Loper, associate provost and dean of the School of Arts, Sciences and Management at Bay Path, who started with the small supply-chain companies, as he explained the project’s importance.

“These companies have a cyber vulnerability, in many cases, because they don’t have sophisticated systems and they don’t have sophisticated staff that can help create a cyber-safe environment,” he noted, adding that he took what he called a “Western Mass. approach” to the process of applying for the grant.

By that, he meant a focus on smaller businesses, as opposed to the larger defense contractors like Raytheon in the eastern part of the state, and also on schools like Bay Path (and its online component, The American Women’s College) and STCC that are graduating cybersecurity students but struggling to find them real-world experience to complement what they learn in the classroom.

Matthew Smith says that among the many potential benefits from the ‘supply chain’ project is much-needed gender diversity in the cybersecurity field.

Thus, the project is a potential win-win-win, with maybe a few more wins in there as well, said Rick Sullivan, president & CEO of the EDC, noting that winners include the individual students at Bay Path, the emerging cybersecurity industry, individual small manufacturing companies, and the region as a whole, which counts its precision manufacturing sector as a still-vital source of jobs and prestige.

“The large customers, the Department of Defense, the Department of Transportation … they’re really requiring, and rightfully so, very strict compliance with the highest cybersecurity techniques out there,” Sullivan said, referring to the requirements now being placed on smaller supply-chain companies. “When they go to the bigger companies, they have to certify their entire supply chains, and we have a lot of companies in this region that feed into that supply chain.”

Overall, the pilot program is a decidedly proactive initiative aimed at helping these smaller companies become aware of the requirements they will have to meet to keep doing business in such fields as defense and aerospace, and then help them meet those thresholds, starting with an assessment of their cybersecurity systems and immediate threats.

For this issue and its focus on technology, BusinessWest takes an in-depth look at the Bay Path-led project, its many goals, and how, if all goes as planned, it will close gaps in cybersecurity systems as well as gaps in that sector’s workforce, while also making the region’s manufacturing sector stronger and more resilient.

Day at the Breach

The project summary for the Bay Path initiative, as authored by Loper and others, does a very effective job of summing up both the many types of problems facing the state and its business community with regards to cybersecurity, and also how this pilot program will address several of the key concerns.

“Entry-level job postings for information security analysts and related cybersecurity positions typically require one to two years of experience in the field, making it challenging for recent college graduates with cybersecurity degrees to fill these positions,” the summary begins. “Bay Path University, a women’s university in Western Mass., will lead a project that will engage 30 undergraduate and graduate cybersecurity students, primarily women, in a full year of challenging experiences as paid interns on cybersecurity auditing teams.

Rick Sullivan

“The large customers, the Department of Defense, the Department of Transportation … they’re really requiring, and rightfully so, very strict compliance with the highest cybersecurity techniques out there.”

“Teams will provide cybersecurity audits at a lower cost for small to mid-sized companies in the region,” the proposal continues. “Undergraduate cybersecurity interns from Bay Path University and Springfield Technical Community College will be assigned to auditing teams led by a graduate intern from Bay Path’s M.S. in Cybersecurity Management Program. Teams will be supervised throughout the audit process by seasoned cybersecurity specialists from Paragus Strategic IT. Through the internship, students will gain insight into the breadth and scope of challenges to the cyber ecosystem and hands-on experience working with employers to implement options for addressing these challenges. Project research and evaluation will be undertaken to confirm that the internship will meet the needs of employers who require prior experience.”

Like we said, that pretty much sums it all up — at least from the student intern side of the equation. In addition to classroom learning, experience in the field is necessary to break into the cybersecurity sector, said Loper, and such experience is difficult to attain. This pilot program will help several dozen students get it.

Meanwhile, the program will address the other side of the equation, the needs of small manufacturers in the supply chain — and this region has dozens, if not hundreds of them, who face many challenges in their quest to become safe (or at least much safer) from security breaches, a pre-requisite for being able to do business these days.

For an explanation, we return to the project summary:

“The majority of cybersecurity breaches occur in smaller supply chain companies, threatening the entire supply chain. Yet these companies often cannot afford the staff or resources to address ongoing needs for ensuring a cyber-safe ecosystem,” the solicitation notes. “Partnering with the MassHire Hampden Workforce Board, the MassHire Franklin Hampshire Workforce Board, and the Economic Development Council of Western Massachusetts, the project will engage 45 small to mid-size supply chain companies in the advance manufacturing sector in western Massachusetts in cybersecurity audits. This strategy will be disseminated as a model for how other Massachusetts higher education institutions with cybersecurity programs can partner with employers and their regional planning teams to strengthen the cybersecurity ecosystem across the Commonwealth.”

Elaborating, Loper said the cost of a cybersecurity assessment (that term is preferred over ‘audit,’ is approximately $1,500, an amount that challenges many smaller companies and is the primary reason why relatively few are done.

The pilot program will pay roughly two-thirds the total cost of an assessment, thus bringing assessments within the reach of more companies, which need to ramp up their cybersecurity systems and methods if they are going to keep doing business with most of their clients.

“Things are starting to change,” said Sullivan. “Cybersecurity and the threats that are out there are real, and this pilot program is an attempt to get ahead of all that, to educate and assess the smaller businesses here, with the next step being to hopefully address those needs so they can stay compliant, because that’s an extremely important part of our economy here.”

Sullivan said the EDC and other agencies will work to build awareness of this program and sign on participants. There has already been interest expressed by many of these smaller manufacturers, and he expects it will only grow as awareness of the project — as well as the need to be cyber secure — grows.

What the Hack?

For the record, and as noted earlier, the Mass. Technology Collaborative came up with another $135,000 to award for other pilot projects to help prepare entry-level cybersecurity job seekers to both meet the needs of employers, and address the growing cybersecurity job crisis.

The first, a $61,178 grant, involves an entity called STEMatch, which proposed a creative collaboration between community colleges, Massachusetts-based cybersecurity service and technology providers, and end-user businesses to expand the pool of potential cybersecurity to under-represented groups and displaced workers. The other, a $74,690 award, was given to the MassHire Greater New Bedford Workforce Board to advance a public-private partnership between the regional workforce boards of Southeastern Massachusetts, Bristol Community College, and the South Coast Chamber of Commerce, and employers in that region. The pilot is designed to help address the lack of skills and work experiences affecting Massachusetts employers and will utilize best practices developed in Israel to create training and work experiences for students in grades 10-12.

“The majority of cybersecurity breaches occur in smaller supply chain companies, threatening the entire supply chain. Yet these companies often cannot afford the staff or resources to address ongoing needs for ensuring a cyber-safe ecosystem.”

Those projects, as well as the Bay Path initiative, drive home the fact that there is not just a gap, but a real crisis when it comes to filling jobs in this emerging and now all-important sector.

“Companies are craving talent,” said Matthew Smith, director of Computer Science & Cyber Security Programs at Bay Path and assistant professor of Computer Science & Cyber Security in the School of Science and Management, as he attempted to qualify a problem that’s difficult to quantify.

That’s because while there are posted positions within this sector — many of them lacking candidates — many of the jobs are not posted, increasing the size of the gap.

Closing it requires not merely people with degrees in Cybersecurity, although that’s essentially a pre-requisite, said Smith, but individuals with what could be called real-world experience on their resumes, he said.

The pilot program will allow students at Bay Path and STCC to put five cybersecurity assessments on their portfolio, which should certainly help open some doors for them.

“Our students won’t just be getting a degree, but also the necessary talent to be contributing to the workforce on day one,” Smith told BusinessWest. “Once they have these assessments and use these tools that are industry standards, they’re going to be thrown right to the top of the application pool, because most of those are search-engine driven, so once they put these key words in there, they’re going to be very marketable.”

This marketability should only help further develop the graduate and undergraduate cybersecurity programs at Bay Path (both traditional and online) that are already seeing explosive growth, said Smith, adding that the industry needs not only workers, but gender diversity as well.

“Only 11% of the jobs in the field are held by women,” he said. “The gender imbalance is very real, and it’s our main mission to provide these women the skills and get them their degrees, so they jump into the cybersecurity workforce and start taking those unfilled positions and close that gender imbalance; many companies are craving diversity in their workforce.”

Securing a Better Future

As noted earlier, the name on this project is long and cumbersome. But it breaks the problem and one possible solution into one highly efficient and effective phrase.

The pilot program will set a high bar when it comes to potential outcomes and goals for achieving progress with the many significant challenges facing the cybersecurity sector and the cyber safety of individual companies.

But a high bar is necessary because the problems are real, they are growing, and solutions are needed.

This program was conceived to not only help this region clear that bar, but provide a roadmap for other regions to follow. If it can do all that, the state’s sizable investment will yield huge dividends.

George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]

Commercial Real Estate

Commercial Real Estate

For Sale, For Lease

A listing of available commercial properties

See: List of Commercial Real Estate Brokers

The Message: This Isn’t Your Parents’ Belchertown

By Joseph Bednar November 27, 2018

Community Spotlight

Nicholas O’Connor says recent projects have created considerable momentum in Belchertown, “like a snowball rolling down a hill.”

Nicholas O’Connor says there’s a generational split in Belchertown when it comes to new amenities and development in general — but that line has become increasingly blurry.

“There’s the old guard who don’t want anything to change; they want it to be a bedroom community, and they still lament the fact that we have a Stop & Shop and a Family Dollar. There’s no changing their minds, and I get that,” said O’Connor, who chairs the town’s Board of Selectmen.

“But by the same token,” he went on, “we can’t sustain the services that we provide in a town this size, with the great schools we have, without revenue, and 93% of our revenue comes through taxation. We don’t have a big business base — so, in order to have more, you need to generate more.”

And ‘more’ is a good word to describe economic activity in town, particularly along the section of Route 202 running from the town common past the Route 21 intersection to the Eastern Hampshire District Courthouse, a mile-long stretch that has become a hub of development, from a 4,500-square-foot Pride station currently under construction to a 4,000-square-foot financial center for Alden Credit Union; from Christopher Heights, an assisted-living complex that recently opened on the former grounds of the Belchertown State School, to a planned disc-golf course.

These projects, balancing town officials’ desire for more business and recreation, have been well-received, O’Connor said.

“Even among the old guard, I sense a split. There’s a large community of longtime Belchertown residents who are yearning for these things that are finally happening. I think it’s a minority of people who wish Belchertown would be like it was in 1970. That dynamic has shifted a bit.”

That said, it takes plenty of planning to build momentum for projects — not to mention state and town funding and approvals at town meetings — but he sees the dominos falling.

“We don’t have a big business base — so, in order to have more, you need to generate more.”

“With a lot of the ideas we’ve had over the past few years, shovels are finally hitting the ground. We’re really in a year when things are starting to progress.”

The 83-unit Christopher Heights has been a notable success, growing its resident list every month and exceeding its forecasts, O’Connor noted. Nearby, Belchertown Day School and Arcpoint Brewing, a veteran-owned business run by a couple of Belchertown locals, both plan to break ground on new facilities in the spring.

At the same time, Chapter 90 money came through for the renovation of that key stretch of Route 202, a project that will include new road signaling, crosswalks, sidewalks, and bike lanes, making the area more pedestian- and bicycle-friendly. Meanwhile, Pride owner Bob Bolduc will put in a sidewalk and a pull-in as part of his new building, which will accommodate a new PVTA stop.

“People will be getting out in front of his store, and that’s a win-win for everybody,” O’Connor said. “That whole road project will certainly change things from the common down the hill, all the way to the courthouse.”

The Great Outdoors

Belchertown has plenty of potential to expand its recreational offerings, O’Connor told BusinessWest. For example, a town meeting recently appropriated funds to create an 18-hole disc-golf course in the Piper Farm Recreation Area.

Belchertown at a Glance

Year Incorporated: 1761
Population: 14,838
Area: 52.64 square miles
County: Hampshire
Residential Tax Rate: $18.19
Commercial Tax Rate: $18.19
Median Household Income: $52,467
Median Family Income: $60,830
Type of government: Open Town Meeting; Board of Selectmen
Largest Employers: Hulmes Transportation Services; Town of Belchertown/School Department; Super Stop & Shop

O’Connor said disc golf has been rapidly gaining in popularity. “We’ll be clearing in the spring, breaking ground, and hoping to be throwing discs by the fall. There’s been interest growing in town, which is good because we’re going to need public effort for the clearing. I think a lot of that’s going to be done by community members and volunteers.”

He envisions the course as another piece in a day-long outing families could have in that area of Belchertown, with attractions ranging from baseball at the town’s mini-Fenway Park to Jessica’s Boundless Playground, to a 1.3-mile walking trail behind the police station that circles Lake Wallace. Meanwhile, state Sen. Eric Lesser was instrumental in securing money to tear down some tennis courts and build a splash park.

O’Connor would also like to see ValleyBike Share make inroads into Belchertown, and he wants to revisit discussion around expansion of a regional rail trail through town.

“A lot of people in town have tried these things before. The rail trail got voted down years ago,” he said. “Belchertown hasn’t always been ready for this type of progress, but we’ve had a large influx of younger families over the past 10 years or so, and different people standing up in positions of leadership. Just in the last four years, we have a new chief of police, a new Recreation director, a new Conservation administrator, a new senior-center coordinator. Not that the leadership before wasn’t doing the job, but I see new folks stepping up, and new ideas and new interests coming to the fore. That’s not a comment on the past, but it’s progress.”

And progress takes time, O’Connor said, noting that roadwork plans for 202 have been in flux for years, while Bolduc owned the future Pride site for a long time with no shovels in the ground until the assisted-living complex and other developments began to come online.

“It takes one project, and everybody starts going, ‘oh, there might be something there,’” he said. “The governor has been out here, and we’ve seen a lot of the lieutenant governor the last couple of years. Once you start brick and mortaring, now you get money for roads, you’re awarded more money for cleanup, and people really get on board. The momentum becomes attractive, like a snowball rolling down a hill. Nobody wants to go it alone, but then they see all these ancillary businesses, and it really starts to come together.”

What’s the Attraction?

To O’Connor, it’s not hard to see why businesses would want to set up shop in Belchertown. There’s the single, low property-tax rate, for starters, the well-regarded schools, and a widening flow of road projects aimed at making the town easier to navigate.

But not simply pass through, he added.

“I grew up in Amherst, and my dad lived in Wales while I was growing up, so I drove through his stretch every weekend. Then I went to UMass, and I saw them build all the hotels on Route 9,” he recalled.

“Now, I certainly don’t want to be Hadley — we want to keep our business within the character of the town; no one’s interested in a dynamic change to the town. But I thought to myself, a lot of these parents are driving home to Boston after parents’ weekend — maybe they don’t have to stay on Route 9; maybe they can stay here and take a walk on the Quabbin and hit an antique store and whatever else gets developed. I think there’s a lot to be said for us being a main thoroughfare between Boston and Western Massachusetts. Everybody gets off exit 7 and 8 to drive through here. We see a lot of cars, and it would be nice to get them to stop.”

Of course, for business owners, a lot of cars is a good thing, and the impending development of sidewalks, bike lanes, and bus routes will continue to drive traffic into what has really become the heart of activity in Belchertown.

“We love our town common, but in terms of a business center, an economic center, that’s moving down the hill. And a lot of the businesses there will benefit from the infrastructure upgrades.”

O’Connor told BusinessWest he can envision a future where Belchertown can be both the scenic, classic New England town of the past and a bustling destination. Illustrating that picture for other people can be a challenge, but he keeps trying.

“We need patience to get these things moving,” he said. “There’s definitely investment that needs to be made by business owners — not just in money, but in belief.” u

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Climber, Motivational Speaker to Set Tone for ‘Women of Impact’

Bay Path University; Comcast Business; Country Bank; Granite State Development

Women of Impact 2018

Leaders Who Have Been to the Top

BusinessWest’s chosen Women of Impact for 2018 know what it’s like to surmount challenges, tackle huge obstacles, and clear bars they’ve set very high.

As they receive their awards on Dec. 6, they and a gathered audience of friends, family, and colleagues will hear some motivational words from someone who’s done all those things in a very literal sense.

Indeed, the keynote speaker for the Inaugural Women of Impact Awards will be Lei Wang, the first Asian woman to climb the highest mountain on every continent and to ski to both the North and South Poles.

Wang, who earned a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Tsinghua University in Beijing, an M.S. degree in Computer Science from University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, and an MBA in Finance and Marketing from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, was on track for a promising career in information technology — until she discovered her passion for mountaineering in 2004 and set her dream on reaching the peak of the world’s highest mountains on seven continents and skiing to the North and South poles.

With no previous athletic training, she started with running, from one mile to a marathon. She built her basic fitness foundation and learned the craft of climbing from scratch. She gave up a normal life to dedicate herself to this undertaking and overcame many physical and ideological challenges with her commitment and determination. Her remarkable journey culminated at the top of Mount Everest on May 24, 2010. With that climb, she became the first Asian Woman to successfully reach the world’s seven summits and two poles.

Wang now shares her reflections and experiences in front of a wide range of audiences as a motivational speaker. At the Dec. 6 event at the Sheraton in Springfield, she’ll be sharing the day with eight women who have reached the pinnacle of their chosen profession, but who have also devoted their lives and their careers to finding ways to give back to the community.

That’s why they’ve been chosen as Women of Impact, with the emphasis on both women and impact.

The Women of Impact for 2018 are:

• Jean Canosa Albano, assistant director of Public Services, Springfield City Library;

• Kerry Dietz, principal, Dietz Architects;

• Denise Jordan, executive director, Springfield Housing Authority;

• Gina Kos, executive director, Sunshine Village;

• Carol Leary, president, Bay Path University;

• Colleen Loveless, president and CEO, Revitalize Community Development Corp.;

• Janis Santos, executive director, HCS Head Start; and

• Katie Allan Zobel, president and CEO, Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts.

The awards luncheon will begin at 11 a.m. with registration and networking. Lunch will begin at noon, followed by the program and introduction of the Women of Impact by Kate Campiti, associate publisher of BusinessWest and Healthcare News and Tamara Sacharczyk, news anchor and I-Team reporter for WWLP-22 News.

The Inaugural Women of Impact is sponsored by Bay Path University, Comcast Business, Country Bank, and Granite State Development Corp, with media sponsor WWLP-22.

For more information or to purchase tickets, call (413) 781-8600, or go HERE.

Thank you to our sponsors:

Sponsors:

Exclusive Media Sponsor:

Springfield 22 News The CW

Photography by Dani Fine Photography

Holyoke Community College Opens New Center for Life Sciences

By Joseph Bednar November 27, 2018

Education

Culture Shock

Emily Rabinsky guides two HCC students in a lab project.

As she walked BusinessWest through one of the brand-new labs in Holyoke Community College’s Center for Life Sciences, Professor Emily Rabinsky said there’s plenty for students to appreciate.

“Our old lab space was very outdated and not very conducive to learning,” said Rabinsky, who coordinates the Biotechnology program at HCC. “There were two long bays with a tall shelf in between that made it very difficult for the students to see what the lecturer was referring to, and the equipment was very outdated.”

Not so today.

“At our recent open house, some students happened to walk by, peeked in, and said, ‘wow, this is amazing,’” she said. “I think this facility could rival many of the four-year colleges.”

Take, for example, the only certified cleanroom at any Massachusetts community college, and one of very few at any college or university in Western Mass.

Once it’s fully operational, the cleanroom will have a certification rating of ISO 8, which means air quality of no more than 100,000 particles per cubic foot. Inside the cleanroom, there will be a hooded biosafety cabinet where the sterility will increase to ISO 7, or no more than 10,000 particles per cubic foot.

“It’s pretty unique at the community-college level,” Rabinsky told BusinessWest. “It’s something commonly used in many of the life-science research areas. Students will learn how to minimize contamination and keep the space sterile for any kinds of cells they’re working with.”

Take, for example, a class she’s currently developing called “Cell Culture and Protein Purification,” which will make copious use of the cleanroom.

“We’ll be training students in the cell-culture class in how to maintain mammalian cell cultures, because they can be easily contaminated with bacteria or other microbes that are in the air,” she explained. “Mammalian cell cultures are commonly used in any kind of research studying cancer, or studying new drug therapies, so it’s a good skill to know.”

The cleanroom will also be utilized as a training facility for area professionals — for instance, in how to monitor the air for microbial content, commonly known as particle count.

“In a cleanroom, there should be fewer particles in the air because we have a special kind of filtration. So it has to constantly be monitored and verified,” she said. “Any cleanroom at UMass or any kind of industry has that monitoring done for them, so if someone wants to go into that kind of field, they could get that training here.”

So, while students are being trained in laboratory settings similar to what they will experience in industry, making them more competitive for the biotech job market, Rabinsky said, HCC serves a local workforce-development mission by training non-students as well.

“A lot of these local biotech companies that do this kind of work, they find it can be very costly for them to train new employees at their facility, and at the same time, they’re risking contaminating their facilities with these new workers that are just learning the technique, so why not do it here where it’s not such a high risk?”

On the Cutting Edge

HCC recently staged a grand-opening ceremony for the 13,000-square-foot, $4.55 million Center for Life Sciences, located on the lower level of HCC’s Marieb Building. The Massachusetts Life Sciences Center awarded HCC a $3.8 million grant for the project, which was supplemented by $750,000 from the HCC Foundation’s Building Healthy Communities Campaign, which also paid for the construction of the college’s new Center for Health Education on Jarvis Avenue in Holyoke.

“Those grants outfitted the biotechnology program but also all of the programs that fit in around it, including microbiology, general biology, and genetics,” Rabinsky said, noting that the new space includes two labs, the cleanroom, a prep room, and a lecture area.

Grant funds and donations also paid for new equipment, including a high-end, research-grade fluorescent microscope, like those used in the pharmaceutical industry; a micro volume spectrophotometer, used to measure small amounts of genetic material; and an electroporator, for genetic engineering. Meanwhile, a cutting-edge thermocycler can take a small sample of DNA and make billions of copies in an hour.

About half of Rabinsky’s students are interested in going into biotechnology, with most of those specifically interested in medical biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, as well as medical devices, an industry with strong roots in Western Mass. and the Boston area.

“I also have students who are just interested in the life sciences, interested in research, and just want to be exposed to all the different areas of biotechnology,” she went on. “A lot of these skills can be applied to many different fields. They may be interested in going into genetics, for example. I would say one of the challenges is drawing in the kids in who may not have thought about biotechnology or biology.”

To that end, in her introductory biotechnology course, she incorporates activities that students can relate to their everyday lives.

“Last week, we did a fun lab where he tested for the presence of genetic modification in things like cheese fries and Cheetos,” she explained. “Food producers aren’t required to list the presence of GMOs unless it’s above a certain percentage. So they’ll grind it up, extract the DNA, and test for the presence of GMOs. That was fun — they could have a hands-on experience and test for something that is very commonplace that we’re all aware of.”

Important Evolution

Rabinsky admitted some might not see the new center as a necessity since HCC already had a functioning facility upstairs, but said it was important to keep the college on the cutting edge and attract more students to give the life sciences a look.

“This makes them excited about the field, and it’s more a conducive space for learning, with these small tables that make working in groups much easier. Then we have newer technologies and new equipment to train students on, which are very similar to what they’ll in the field.”

Of course, it all starts with the instruction, and on that front, Rabinsky said the Center for Life Sciences will continue to prepare students to enter what is certainly a growing field from a jobs perspective.

“I’ve had students that have gone on to UMass and said that they learned things here they haven’t learned there, and that our equipment properly prepared them for graduate research,” she said. “That’s really nice to hear.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Those Staff Meetings Matter More Than You Might Think

By Columnist November 27, 2018

Workforce Development

The Overlooked Management Tool

By Kate Zabriskie

‘I sit right next them. We don’t need to have a staff meeting.’

‘I used to have staff meetings, but we stopped having them. Nobody had anything to talk about.’

‘We have enough meetings. We certainly don’t need another.’

For a myriad of reasons, many managers don’t hold regular staff meetings. Furthermore, most who do don’t get the most they could from them, and that’s too bad. Good staff meetings can focus a team, energize employees, and engage them in ways ad-hoc interactions don’t.

So how do you turn a halted or ho-hum approach to staff meetings into a high-functioning management tool?

STEP ONE: Connect Daily Work with Your Organization’s Purpose

In addition to distributing information, staff meetings present an opportunity to connect your team’s daily work to your organization’s purpose. If you’re thinking, ‘My people know how their work fits into our overall goal,’ you would be wrong. In fact, if you ask your group what your organization’s purpose or your department’s purpose are, don’t be surprised when you get as many answers as there are people in the room. (And you thought you had nothing to talk about in a staff meeting. A discussion about purpose is a good one to have.)

Purpose is why you do what you do. You connect the work to it by explaining how what people did aligns with the greater goal. For example, the head of housekeeping at a busy hotel might hold a meeting with the cleaning staff. In that meeting, the managers might recognize a team that received a perfect room score from all guests who took a survey and then talk about purpose.

The purpose of the hotel is to provide people a safe and comfortable place to spend the night. Having a clean, welcoming, and functioning room is one of the ways a cleaning staff achieves that goal.

“Purpose is why you do what you do. You connect the work to it by explaining how what people did aligns with the greater goal.”

By regularly connecting such activities as cleaning toilets, making beds, and folding towels to the guest experience, the manager highlights why each of those activities is important.

No matter what they do, employees usually enjoy their jobs more when their organization’s leaders talk about the importance of their work. They also tend to make better choices if they receive frequent reminders about purpose and what types of activities support it.

STEP TWO: Highlight Relevant Metrics

Connecting work to purpose usually works best when a team focuses on both anecdotal and analytical information. If you don’t currently track statistics, start. What you track will depend on your industry. However, whatever you decide should have a clear line of sight to the larger goal.

For instance, a museum that holds events to attract new members might track the number of events held, contact information collected, memberships sold, and the percentage of new memberships that come as a result of attending the free event. With regular attention placed on the right metrics, the team is far more likely to make good choices as to where it should focus its efforts.

STEP THREE: Follow a Formula and Rotate Responsibility

Successful staff meetings usually follow a pattern, such as looking at weekly metrics, sharing information from the top, highlighting success, a team-building activity, and so forth. By creating and sticking with a formula, managers help their employees know what to expect.

Once employees know the pattern of the meeting, many are capable of running it because they’ve learned by watching. Managers then have a natural opportunity to rotate the responsibility of the meeting to different people. By delegating, the manager is able to free up his or her time and provide employees with a chance to develop their skills.

STEP FOUR: Celebrate Successes

In many organizations, there is a huge appreciation shortage. Staff meetings provide managers and employees with regular intervals to practice gratitude.

“I’d like to thank Tom for staying late last night. Because he did, I was able to attend a parent-teacher conference.”

“Maryann’s work on the PowerPoint presentation was superb. I want to thank her for preparing me with the best slides shown at the conference. The stunning photos outshined the graphics others used. Maryann’s work really made our company look good.”

A steady drip of sincere gratitude can drive engagement. Note the word: sincerity. Most people have an amazing capacity to identify a false compliment. Real praise is specific. Well-delivered praise also ties the action to the outcome. Whether it’s being able to attend a conference, looking good in front of others, or some other result, people appreciate praise more when they understand how their actions delivered results. A praise segment in your staff meetings ensures you routinely take the time to recognize efforts.

STEP FIVE: Focus on Lessons Learned and Continuous Improvement

Staff meetings that include an opportunity to share lessons learned help drive continuous improvement. At first, people may be reluctant to share shortcomings. However, if you follow step four, you should begin to develop better communication and a sense of trust with your team. Modeling the process is a good place to start.

“I learned something this week I want to share with you. I had a call with a client that could have gone better. I’m going to tell you what happened and then I’ll discuss some ideas about how I would handle something similar in the future.”

The more you practice this exercise, the greater the gains you should experience.

STEP SIX: Develop a Schedule and Stick with It

Almost anyone can follow the first five steps some of the time, but those who get the most out of staff meetings hold them consistently. They publish a meeting schedule, and they stick with it. They may shorten a meeting from time to time or reschedule, but they don’t treat their chance to gather the team as the least important priority.

Good staff meetings aren’t perfunctory activities that add little value. On the contrary, when used to their full capacity, they are a dynamic management tool. Now what are you going to do about yours? u

Kate Zabriskie is the president of Business Training Works Inc., a Maryland-based talent development firm. She and her team help businesses establish customer service strategies and train their people to live up to what’s promised; www.businesstrainingworks.com.

One Key to Improvement Is Focusing on Culture, Not Individuals

By Columnist November 27, 2018

Workforce Development

The Truth About Employee Disengagement

By Brad Wolff

Most companies struggle with employee disengagement. It’s costly in productivity, profitability, and stress. Gallup’s engagement survey data published in 2017 found that two thirds of U.S. workers are not engaged.

American companies have invested billions of dollars per year for many years to solve this problem. The results? The needle still hasn’t moved. How much has your experience been similar? Could this data simply reveal a general misunderstanding of the true causes of disengagement?

The Acme Corporation was suffering a 41% turnover rate. A recent survey showed that 85% of their workforce was disengaged. The general attitude of apathy, complaining, and cynicism permeated the culture. This was puzzling to management since they attempted multiple efforts to improve engagement.

These were well-planned and executed programs such as team-building exercises, social events, and pay raises. All showed early enthusiasm and positive survey results that generated optimism. Unfortunately, the magic always wore off within a few weeks. In despair, Acme engaged a firm with a very different philosophy than their other advisors. This firm focused on helping executive leadership understand the root causes and solutions. Within nine months, disengagement improved from 71% to 26% and turnover dropped to 19%.

The door to solving this dilemma opened when Acme management acknowledged that since their previous solution attempts were ineffective, their current way of seeing the problem must be flawed. This wisdom, humility, and openness paved the way to learn the true root causes of their disengagement. Once root causes are clearly understood, the solutions usually become obvious.

Fixing engagement issues: What works?

The first step is for the company leaders to take an honest, objective view of the company culture (beliefs and behaviors that determine how people interact and do their work) that impacts and drives the way people think and behave.

That’s why lasting change occurs when focusing at the culture level rather than specific individuals. Below are the relevant human psychological needs that are the actual root causes of people’s engagement level. Examples of mindsets/philosophies that effectively address these needs follows each need. Engagement will improve when management’s actions align with people’s psychological needs.

• To feel valued and understood. Management earnestly listens to employees’ concerns, opinions, and ideas with the intent to understand and consider their merits before responding. This replaces the common responses of defending positions or punishing employees for expressing contrary viewpoints. Management isn’t required to agree with the employees. What’s important is the sincere effort to listen, understand and consider their inputs.

• To express our gifts and talents. Management puts a focus on aligning roles and responsibilities with the gifts and talents of the individuals. We all bring a substantially higher energy and engagement (and productivity) when we do work that we like and are good at. As legendary management consultant Peter Drucker said, “A manager’s task is to make the strengths of people effective and their weaknesses irrelevant.”

• Meaning/purpose in what we do. This means that employees have a clear understanding of how their work impacts the mission and vision of the organization. Don’t expect them to figure this out on their own. People are much more motivated when they realize that their efforts truly matter.

• Internal drive for progress or development. Employees are at their best when there is “healthy tension” (not too low, not too high) to meet clear and reasonable standards. This means fair and consistent accountability and consequences based on performance relative to agreed-upon standards. Being too nice and lax harms engagement since people inherently desire growth and realize that standards and consequence help them do this. People are motivated when they focus on: “What did I achieve today?” What did I learn today?” How did I grow?”

What doesn’t work:

In short, anything that doesn’t authentically address the root causes of disengagement is doomed to fail. If the message is ‘look at this nice thing we just did for you’ rather than ‘this is how we value you as human being,’ it’s highly likely to fail.

Examples of the ‘nice thing we just did for you’ include most team-building events, social mixers, company newsletters, upgraded office environments, etc. Even pay and benefit increases have an initial rush soon followed by the familiar “right back where we were” rebound effect. That’s not to say companies should not do these things. They’re nice add-ons after the day to day essentials of human psychology are authentically addressed.

In summary, it’s understandable that we gravitate toward easy, quick-fix solutions to our problems. There are plenty of people to make these suggestions and sell them to us. They also don’t require us to identify our own personal contributions to the problems which we’d prefer to avoid. However, as in most things in life, there is no substitute for working at the cause-level and creating new habits of thinking and behavior.

If you’re serious about creating the high engagement level lead to more profits with greater ease and personal satisfaction, this is what it takes. As a bonus, openly addressing personal challenges that make you human will increase your effectiveness and fulfillment in every area of your life.

Brad Wolff specializes in workforce and personal optimization. He’s a speaker and author of, People Problems? How to Create People Solutions for a Competitive Advantage. As the managing partner for Atlanta-based PeopleMax, he specializes in helping companies maximize the potential and results of their people to make more money with less stress; www.PeopleMaximizers.com.

Picture This

Picture This

A photo essay of recent business events in Western Massachusetts November 2018

Email ‘Picture This’ photos with a caption and contact information to [email protected]

Food Drive

The Springfield College Student Athlete Leadership Team partnered with the Department of Public Safety recently to lead a food drive in support of the Foodbank of Western Massachusetts. The campus community helped donate more than 1,698 pounds of nonperishable food items to the Foodbank. Students and staff delivered the food items on Nov. 15.

Andrus Award Winner

On Nov. 8, AARP Massachusetts presented its prestigious Andrus Award to Susan Jaye Kaplan, co-founder of Link to Libraries and founder of GoFIT. The award is given out annually to a volunteer in the state. Named after the organization’s founder, Dr. Ethel Percy Andrus, it recognizes outstanding individuals who are sharing their experience, talents, and skills to enrich the lives of others.

Kaplan with her husband, Steve, left, and Matt Bannister, first vice president of Marketing and Innovation with PeoplesBank. All three are members of the Link to Libraries Board of Directors

Awards Breakfast

Viability Inc. recently staged its annual Employer Recognition and Awards Breakfast at Springfield Country Club. Employer partners that were recognized include The Short Stop Bar & Grill for the Rookie Employer Award; Deerfield Packaging for Employer of the Year; and Walgreens for the National Employer Award. Also recognized was Joseph Wendover for the Armand Tourangeau Volunteer of the Year

Jeff Bowers and Kyle Hahn from Walgreens accept the National Employer Award, presented by Viability Senior Vice President of Corporate Inclusion Solutions, Carla Gaouette.

Viability Board Chair Timothy Marini, left, of Hub International New England, and Viability CEO Dick Venne.

New Bay Path Trustees

Bay Path University recently welcomed seven new members to its Board of Trustees.

From left: Michelle Wirth, co-owner of Mercedes Benz of Springfield; Laura Grondin, president and CEO of Virginia Industries Inc.; Wayne Webster, vice president of Commercial Lending for Westfield Bank; Andrea Hill-Cataldo, founder and president of Johnson & Hill Staffing; Kirk Arnold, technology executive; Lamont Clemons, senior vice president, Proton Energy, and executive vice president, S-Cel-O Painting; and Stefano Martini, chief information officer for MassMutual Financial Group.

Court Dockets

Court Dockets

The following is a compilation of recent lawsuits involving area businesses and organizations. These are strictly allegations that have yet to be proven in a court of law. Readers are advised to contact the parties listed, or the court, for more information concerning the individual claims.

HAMPDEN DISTRICT COURT

Brenda Rosario v. Holyoke Housing Authority
Allegation: Failure to pay for hours worked, unjust enrichment: $8,852.06
Filed: 10/22/18

HAMPDEN SUPERIOR COURT

John Decker v. Maple Leaf Bar & Grill Inc.
Allegation: Negligence causing personal injury and property damage: $28,714.56+
Filed: 10/1/18

Mark Pessolano v. Staples Inc.
Allegation: Negligence; signage fell on plaintiff’s head causing personal injury: $15,990
Filed: 10/9/18

David Banas v. Fletcher Sewer and Drain Inc.
Allegation: Negligence causing personal injury: $250,000
Filed: 10/11/18

Carol Meacham v. Crocker Building Supply Inc., Amusement Consultants Ltd., Route 20-21 Associates Inc., and Ludlow Construction Inc.
Allegation: Negligence; slip and fall causing pesonal injury: $25,993.84
Filed: 10/15/18

Charlotte Provost v. Big Y Foods Inc.
Allegation: Negligence; slip and fall causing personal injury: $167,820
Filed: 10/18/18

HAMPSHIRE DISTRICT COURT

Franklin County Community Development Corp. v. Zononi Enterprises, LLC and Charles Zononi
Allegation: Breach of contract: $9,854.10+
Filed: 10/19/18

HAMPSHIRE SUPERIOR COURT

Noah Reese Shaw v. McCray’s Country Creamery Inc. d/b/a McCray’s Farm
Allegation: Negligence; plaintiff’s arm pinned between trailer and tree during haunted hayride, causing personal injury
Filed: 10/30/18

PALMER DISTRICT COURT

Ashley Cook v. Touched by an Angel Inc., Helena Stephens, and Adam Camp
Allegation: Non-payment of wages, unjust enrichment: $1,365
Filed: 10/11/18

WESTFIELD DISTRICT COURT

Johnnie Torres v. Chalmers Enterprises, LLC and Chestnut Realty Management, LLC
Allegation: Negligence; stairs collapsed, causing personal injury
Filed: 10/29/18

Chamber Corners: Upcoming Events

www.easthamptonchamber.org

Chamber Corners

1BERKSHIRE

www.1berkshire.com

(413) 499-1600

• Dec. 6: 1Berkshire Annual Meeting 2018, 5:30-8:30 p.m., hosted by Greylock WORKS, 508 State Road, North Adams. Make connections and find new ways to collaborate during the exhibitor marketplace, then learn about what has happened in fiscal year 2018 and what is in store for 2019.

GREATER CHICOPEE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

www.chicopeechamber.org

(413) 594-2101

• Dec. 6: CEO Luncheon, 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m., hosted by Collegian Court, 89 Park St., Chicopee. Sponsored by Polish National Credit Union. Featuring Tricia Canavan of United Personnel. Cost: $30 for members, $35 for non-members. Sign up online at chicopeechamber.org/events.

• Dec. 13: Holiday Party, 4:30-7 p.m., hosted by Collegian Court, 89 Park St., Chicopee. Sponsored by PeoplesBank. A free event as a special thank you to members.

• Dec. 19: Salute Breakfast, 7:15-9 a.m., hosted by the Log Cabin, 500 Easthampton Road, Holyoke. Sponsored by United Personnel, Westfield Bank, Holyoke Medical Center, Polish National Credit Union, Gaudreau Group, Spherion Staffing Services, PeoplesBank, Valley Communications, Sunshine Village, White Birch Insurance, and River Valley Counseling Center. Holiday with Mimosa Toast courtesy of Westfield Bank. Chief greeter: Peter Rosskothen, Delaney House and Log Cabin. Keynote speakers: Angela Callahan, River Valley Counseling Center; and Nate Costa, Springfield Thunderbirds. Cost: $23 for members, $28 for non-members. Sign up online at chicopeechamber.org/events.

GREATER EASTHAMPTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

(413) 527-9414

• Dec. 7: Snow Ball, 6-11 p.m., hosted by the Boylston Rooms, 122 Pleasant St., Easthampton. A buffet will be served curtesy of Meyers Catering, and DJ Lori Bolanger will provide music for dancing. This event, sponsored by bankESB, Cooley Dickinson Health Care, Finck & Perras, Richards Fuel & Heating Inc., Taylor Real Estate, and Freedom Credit Union, is an ideal opportunity for an office holiday party. Cost: $75 per person. Pre-registration is required. For more information and to register, visit www.easthamptonchamber.org or call the chamber at (413) 527-9414.

GREATER HOLYOKE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

www.holyokechamber.com

(413) 534-3376

• Nov. 30: Holiday Brunch, 10:30 a.m., hosted by the Delaney House, 3 Country Club Road, Holyoke. Previously known as the Holiday Business Breakfast, the first annual Holiday Brunch is an opportunity to relax and get connected over a brunch buffet, cocktails, live music, and lots of holiday cheer, accompanied by a live jazz quartet. Who will be this year’s Ambassador of the Year? Come find out. Cost: $30 for members, $45 for non-members.

• Dec. 12: Holiday After Hours, 5-7 p.m., hosted by Jay’s Bed and Breakfast, 1109 Dwight St., Holyoke. People do business with people they know. Get connected with an evening of food, drink, and friends. Stop by and soak in the holiday spirit. Sponsored by Resnic, Beaureguard, Waite and Driscoll. Cost: $10 for members, $25 for non-members.

GREATER NORTHAMPTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

www.explorenorthampton.com

(413) 584-1900

• Dec. 5: December Arrive @ 5, 5-7 p.m., hosted by Thornes Marketplace, downtown Northampton. Sponsors: Christopher Heights of Northampton, Keiter Builders Inc., and the Lusteg Wealth Management Group – Merrill Lynch. Cost: $10 for members.

GREATER WESTFIELD CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

www.westfieldbiz.org

(413) 568-1618

• Nov. 28: November Annual Meeting & Awards Dinner, 5:30-8:30 p.m., hosted by Tekoa Country Club, 459 Russell Road, Westfield. Join us as we gather to celebrate our 2018 award winners, including Business of the Year: Armbrook Village; Nonprofit of the Year: the Westfield Athenaeum; and Lifetime Achievement Award: Ann Lentini of Domus Inc. Sponsored by Westfield Bank. Dinner tickets cost $45 for members, $60 for non-members. Sign up online at www.westfieldbiz.org/events. For sponsorships or more information, call the chamber at (413) 568-1618.

• Dec. 3: December Mayor’s Coffee Hour, 8-9 a.m., hosted by Witalisz & Associates Inc., 5 Noble Ave., Westfield. Join us for our monthly Mayor’s Coffee Hour with Westfield Mayor Brian Sullivan. Free and open to the public. Sign up online at www.westfieldbiz.org/events or call the chamber at (413) 568-1618 to register so we may give our host a head count.

• Dec. 7: Holiday Breakfast, 7-9 a.m., hosted by East Mountain Country Club, 1458 East Mountain Road, Westfield. Featuring the Westfield High School Show Choir. Platinum sponsor: Staples; silver sponsors: Easthampton Savings Bank and ProAmpac; bronze sponsors: Boston Medical Center, PeoplesBank, the Westfield Home Depot, and Westfield Center – Genesis Health Care. Cost: $25 for members, $40 for non-members. Sign up online at www.westfieldbiz.org/events. For sponsorships or more information, call the chamber at (413) 568-1618.

• Dec. 12: December After 5 Connection, 5-7 p.m., hosted by Rosewood Home & Gifts, 34 Elm St., Westfield. Refreshments will be served. A 50/50 raffle will benefit the chamber’s scholarship fund. Bring your business cards and make connections. Cost: free for members, $10 for non-members. Sign up online at www.westfieldbiz.org/events. For sponsorships or more information, call the chamber at (413) 568-1618.

PROFESSIONAL WOMEN’S CHAMBER

www.springfieldregionalchamber.com

(413) 787-1555

• Dec. 6: PWC Holiday Ladies Networking Night, 5-7 p.m., hosted by Cooper’s Gifts, 161 Main St., Agawam. Complimentary hors d’oeuvres and refreshments. This event is free. Register by e-mailing [email protected].

SOUTH HADLEY & GRANBY CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

www.shgchamber.com

(413) 532-6451

• Dec. 7: The 30th annual Holiday Stroll at the Town Green. Sponsored by SHELD, Easthampton Savings Bank, Florence Bank, Jubinville Insurance, PeoplesBank, the town of South Hadley and the Select Board, the Village Commons, and Westfield Bank. The holiday lights on the green will be lit for the season that evening, thanks to the generosity of SHELD. There will be musical entertainment at the bandstand from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., Santa will arrive escorted by the South Hadley High School Marching Band and a contingent of elves at 6 p.m., and there will be activities for the children throughout the evening, including decorating their own gingerbread men and making a holiday card while they wait their turn to visit with Santa. Hot chocolate will be available for all.

WEST OF THE RIVER CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

www.ourwrc.com

(413) 426-3880

• Dec. 13: Networking Lunch, noon to 1:30 p.m., hosted by Trinity Pub/Irish House Restaurant, 429 Morgan Road, West Springfield. You must be a member or guest of a member to attend. Enjoy a sit-down lunch while networking with fellow chamber members. Each attendee will get a chance to offer a brief intro and company overview. The only cost to attend for members is the cost of lunch. Attendees will order off the menu and pay separately that day. Please note, we cannot invoice you for these events. Register online at www.westoftheriverchamber.com.

YOUNG PROFESSIONAL SOCIETY OF GREATER SPRINGFIELD

springfieldyps.com

• Dec. 8: Springfield Santacon 2019. Join YPS and the Springfield Thunderbirds for the second annual Springfield Santacon. Each ticket includes entry to the Springfield Thunderbirds game and a donation to charity. Dress festively. No specific costume is necessary; please be appropriate and have fun. Event details and registration information are available at springfieldyps.com.

People on the Move

People on the Move

Terry Maxey

Terry Maxey, former interim director of Open Pantry Community Services Inc., has been selected to permanently lead the agency as director. He has served as interim director of Open Pantry since November 2017, and has been with organization since February 2016. As director, Maxey will be responsible for managing all aspects of Open Pantry, which serves more than 18,000 low-income and disadvantaged people annually, with an approximately $3 million annual budget and 40 staff members. Before joining Open Pantry, Maxey served as director of Operations and project manager at Martin Luther King Jr. Family Services in Springfield. There, he helped lead the multi-cultural, multi-service agency dedicated to empowering individuals and families in need. He also held a number of leadership positions within the private sector. He has been recognized for his leadership skills, receiving the 2017 SMOC Housing Team of the Year Award and the MLK Jr. Family Services Employee of the Quarter Award for outstanding performance and leadership. Maxey is invested in the Springfield community and serves with a variety of organizations, including the executive and operational committees of the city of Springfield Health and Human Services, Springfield-Hampden County Continuum of Care board of directors. He holds a bachelor’s degree in marketing from Virginia State University and a certificate from Leadership of Pioneer Valley.

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Christine Pollender

Sunshine Village recently welcomed Christine Pollender as the new director of Human Resources. With the organization serving more than 500 individuals, Pollender will oversee employee relations, benefits administration, and procedural compliance for over 260 employees at nine sites across the Pioneer Valley. With an extensive background in human resources in retail and hospital settings, she brings subject-matter expertise to navigate the recent changes to state and federal laws for employers. Pollender received both a bachelor’s degree in business and a master’s degree in business administration from Western New England University. She holds a Senior Professional in Human Resources certification from the Human Resources Certification Institute and is a Society for Human Resource Management Senior Certified Professional. She is a member of the Society for Human Resource Management, including the local chapter, the Human Resources Management Assoc. of Western New England, where she serves on its diversity and inclusion committee.

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Cheryl Sheils

Bay Path University announced that Cheryl Sheils has been named program director for its new doctor of nursing practice (DNP) degree program. Sheils comes to the university from Elms College, where she taught in the Nursing program for nearly 30 years at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. She was a founding member and nurse manager for 20 years at Pioneer Valley Free Health Service in East Longmeadow. She has also been project director for an HRSA Health Workforce Diversity Grant and has travelled to Jamaica with nursing students on medical missions for the past several years. She has presented at numerous conferences, and her articles have been published in industry journals and other publications. The DNP program, set to begin in spring 2019, will be offered 100% online, ensuring flexibility for nurses who wish to obtain the skills to become advanced nurse practitioners with a specialization in family practice (FNP).

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Matthew Sosik, president and CEO of bankESB, announced that Michael T. Oleksak has been hired as vice president of Commercial Lending. Oleksak brings more than 15 years of experience in banking, most recently serving as the vice president of Commercial Lending for Westfield Bank, managing a portfolio of more than $25 million. Before Westfield Bank, Oleksak was the assistant vice president, Business Banking officer at United Bank. In his new role, Oleksak’s main objective will be to originate and develop commercial-lending relationships involving construction projects, business-acquisition financing, investment real estate, equipment financials, business lines of credit, and lending relationships for the bank. Oleksak holds master’s and bachelor’s degrees in business administration from Southern New Hampshire University. He has a strong commitment to serving the surrounding communities, currently serving on the board of directors for the West Springfield Boys & Girls Club.

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Kelly Bowman

Kelly Bowman was elected to be the 2019 president of the Realtor Assoc. of Pioneer Valley (RAPV), a nonprofit trade association with 1,800 members. A general membership meeting was held on Nov. 8 at the Delaney House in Holyoke for the purpose of electing the RAPV 2019 leadership team. Bowman is the broker/owner of Trademark Real Estate, LLC which has offices in South Deerfield and Greenfield. She has been active in real estate since 1997. As a former co-owner of Upton Enterprises Inc., a custom home-building company, she brings practical building knowledge to transactions with clients. She has served on the RAPV board of directors for four consecutive years and was involved in several committees, including the grievance committee, professional standards committee, and professional development committee.

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Jessica Chapin, American International College’s (AIC) associate athletic director/compliance senior woman administrator/deputy Title IX coordinator, is one of 18 individuals recently inducted into the Section V Basketball Hall of Fame in New York. She played with Honeoye Falls-Lima Central School District. Chapin was a member of the first-team All-State in 2005 with the Class A state champion Cougars. She finished second all-time in Section V girls’ basketball in three-point field goals, with 207. In addition to her success playing for Honeoye Falls, Chapin graduated with a bachelor’s degree in psychology and health, science, and social policy from Brandeis University in 2010. While at Brandeis, Chapin was an All-American women’s basketball player. She earned her master’s degree in athletic administration from Springfield College in 2013. Chapin joined the AIC athletic department in 2014 and works directly with all 22 NCAA varsity programs, as well as men’s and women’s rugby, to ensure that the college is in compliance with all NCAA, Northeast-10, and Atlantic Hockey rules, bylaws and regulations. In 2017, she was appointed to a four-year term with the NCAA Division II Management Council. As part of her commitment, she serves on two committees: the NCAA legislation committee and the Olympic sport committee.

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Jeffrey Adams

Robinson Donovan, P.C. announced that Associate Jeffrey Adams recently received two prominent appointments. He became a fellow of the Massachusetts Bar Assoc. (MBA) Leadership Academy and accepted a position on the board of directors at Dakin Humane Society. The MBA Leadership Academy works to develop and nurture future leaders of the bar by teaching fellows how to be compassionate, open-minded, and thoughtful leaders. At Dakin Humane Society, Adams will act as part of the governing body that is responsible for overseeing the organization’s activities. Dakin is a community-supported animal-welfare organization that provides shelter, medical care, spay-and-neuter services, and behavioral rehabilitation for more than 20,000 animals each year.

•••••

Bob Pura, former president of Greenfield Community College (GCC) for more than 17 years, has joined the all-volunteer board of directors of the International Language Institute of Massachusetts (ILI) in Northampton. During his tenure at GCC, Pura oversaw creation of the college’s testing, wellness, advising, and veteran’s centers as well as the GCC Food Pantry and senior symposia. He worked with former U.S. Rep. John Olver and community leaders to develop sustainable-energy, creative-economy, healthcare, and manufacturing initiatives at GCC and oversaw extensive building renovations to the campus. He also worked with the leadership of the Opioid Task Force and the Franklin County Jail and Courthouse to elevate the role education plays in the lives of those in recovery. Under Pura’s leadership, the GCC Foundation raised $14 million and has awarded hundreds of scholarships over several years. The college’s endowment also rose to more than $5 million. Pura has chaired the Massachusetts President’s Council and served on its executive committee. He sits on the Baystate Health board of trustees and was a commissioner on the New England Assoc. of Schools and Colleges Higher Education Commission.

•••••

Shatz, Schwartz and Fentin announced that eight attorneys from the firm were selected to the 2018 Massachusetts Super Lawyers List and three attorneys were selected to the 2018 Massachusetts Rising Stars List. Super Lawyers, a Thomson Reuters business, is a rating service of outstanding lawyers from more than 70 practice areas who have attained a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. The annual selections are made using a multi-phase process that includes a statewide survey of lawyers, an independent research evaluation of candidates, and peer reviews by practice area.

• Shareholder Michele Feinstein was recognized for the 12th year in the fields of estate planning and probate;

• Shareholder Gary Fentin was selected for the 13th year in the field of government finance;

• Shareholder Carol Cioe Klyman was recognized for the 14th year in the field of elder law;

• Managing Partner Timothy Mulhern was selected in the field of tax law for the 11th consecutive year;

• Shareholder Steven Schwartz was selected for the 13th time in the field of business and corporate law;

• Shareholder James Sheils was selected for the fourth consecutive year in the field of banking law;

• Shareholder Ann (Ami) Weber was selected for the 15th consecutive year in the field of elder law; and

• Shareholder Steven Weiss was selected in the field of business bankruptcy for the 12th consecutive year.

Additionally, three attorneys have been selected to the 2018 Massachusetts Rising Stars list. To be eligible for inclusion in Rising Stars, a candidate must be either 40 years old or younger or in practice for 10 years or less.

• Attorney Mark Esposito was recognized in the field of general litigation;

• Attorney Michael Fenton was selected for the fifth consecutive year in the fields of business and corporate law; and

• Shareholder David Webber was honored in the field of closely held business for the seventh consecutive year.

•••••

Florence Bank President and CEO John Heaps Jr. announced the bank has hired three well-known and banking professionals with long-term industry experience in the Springfield area. They will be charged with helping to grow the bank’s Hampden County presence as it expands in that region. Michael Moriarty will serve as senior vice president/commercial team leader, Joseph Kulig will serve as vice president/commercial loan officer, and Candace Pereira will be assistant vice president/commercial portfolio manager. Moriarty, Kulig, and Pereira previously worked at Farmington Bank, a $3 billion commercial bank whose assets were recently purchased by Peoples United Bank. At Farmington, Moriarty was senior vice president and regional commercial team leader, Kulig was a relationship manager, and Pereira was assistant vice president. All three previously worked with United Bank.

•••••

The United Way of Pioneer Valley (UWPV) introduced its new president and CEO, Paul Mina, to the community at a public event on Nov. 9. Mina brings more than 30 years of United Way experience to the Pioneer Valley and has already stepped into his new role. The UWPV board of directors has entered into a management agreement with the United Way of Tri-County, based in Framingham. Both organizations’ boards voted to approve the two-and-a-half-year management agreement, under which two organizations will share a CEO and other management operations, while UWPV still remains under local board oversight. “This is not a merger, but a way to gain efficiencies in the back-end management,” said Steve Lowell, chairman of the UWPV board and president of Monson Savings Bank. “Plus we’ll get some much-needed stability in leadership and the value of Paul’s experience and energy. It’s a great opportunity for us.”

•••••

The board of trustees at Elms College have appointed a number of notable figures to be new members of the board. The new trustees are Beth Anderson, founder and CEO of Phoenix Charter Academy Network; Pascale Desir, chief legal officer of Way Finders; Dr. Jose Fernandez, co-owner of Sunrise Behavioral Health Clinic; Mark Fulco, president of Mercy Medical Center; Steven Gobel, first vice president of Morgan Stanley; Fawwaz Habbal, executive dean for Education and Research and senior lecturer at the Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University; and Richard Sullivan Jr., president and CEO of the Western Massachusetts Economic Development Council.

Company Notebook

Company Notebook

Big Y Works to Sack Hunger

SPRINGFIELD — For the ninth year, all Big Y supermarkets are working to help feed the hungry within their local communities through Care to Share Sack Hunger, a large, reusable grocery bag filled with staple non-perishable food items for local food banks. Customers purchase a Sack Hunger bag of groceries for $10, and Big Y distributes the food to that region’s local food bank. In turn, the food banks distribute the filled sacks to area soup kitchens, food pantries, senior food programs, day-care centers, as well as many of its other member agencies. All of the donated sacks are distributed within the supermarket’s marketing area, so every donation stays within the local community. Since its inception nine years ago, more than 133,000 bags of food have been donated to area needy via Big Y’s Care to Share Sack Hunger Program. This year’s campaign runs through Wednesday, Dec. 26. As an additional option, customers may choose to purchase and donate a $10 ‘virtual bag’ at the register that will be used by the agencies to purchase turkeys or whatever is most needed. Online donations will also be accepted. Visit www.bigy.com/rs/giftcards for more information. As an added bonus, any customer donations made on Saturday, Nov. 17 will be matched by Big Y. All five food banks within Big Y’s marketing area are participating in Sack Hunger. These food banks, representing more than 2,100 member agencies throughout the region, include the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, the Greater Boston Food Bank, the Worcester County Food Bank, Foodshare of Greater Hartford, and the Connecticut Food Bank. Last year, Big Y customers donated nearly 22,000 bags of food to those in need, and the company hopes to beat that figure this year.

American Women’s College at Bay Path University Named Among Best Online Colleges

LONGMEADOW — Women have been completing their bachelor’s degrees at rates significantly higher than the national average since the inception of the American Women’s College at Bay Path University in 2013, thanks to its digitally enhanced learning model, SOUL (Social Online Universal Learning). This innovative approach to education has earned it recognition among the 2019 Best Online Colleges in America, as ranked by Niche.com, which ranked colleges based on the following categories: academic excellence, overall value, strength of faculty scholarship, campus quality, diversity, student life, student surveys on overall experience, safety, and location. The university placed 20th on a list of nearly 500 colleges and universities, and is the only New England-based institution to place in the top 20. The SOUL model uses data-driven intervention strategies to help mitigate achievement gaps, and has been recognized with more than $5 million in support from industry thought leaders and organizations. SOUL was developed after the American Women’s College was awarded a grant through the First in the World competition administered through the U.S. Department of Education’s Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education. The four-year, $3.5 million award was used to develop and continually hone the program by improving educator access to learning data, allowing for targeted feedback and personalized guidance. SOUL has been recognized with several other grants and awards from national foundations, the federal government, and awarding agencies.

Bay Path Recognized Among Top MS in Accounting Programs

LONGMEADOW — Bay Path University’s master of science (MS) in accounting program has been named seventh on a list of the top 50 best in the nation, as ranked by OnlineMasters.com. In addition to this placement, Bay Path’s program was also recognized as the “Most Accelerated Program.” This is the program’s second placement on a national best-of list this year alone. According to the site, the review assessed academic quality, student success, and affordability. Researchers devoted more than 90 hours to analyzing every online master’s in accounting program in the U.S., and consulted 35 industry experts, hiring managers, current students, and alumni.

Veterans at Corps Logistics Build, Maintain ValleyBike Share System

SPRINGFIELD — As ValleyBike Share started taking shape in several municipalities in the Pioneer Valley this year, veteran-owned and operated service contractor Corps Logistics was tasked with building and maintaining the 48 stations and more than 200 bikes. Corps Logistics provides a military-grade approach to bike-share system implementation and operations. It works to find talented veterans that care about their community and the mission at hand. Many of its veteran employees come home with physical and emotional limitations, and Corps Logistics offers them the opportunity to continue the utilization of their talents and skills to better the lives of the community around them. Launched this past June, the ValleyBike Share system offers electric-assist bicycles to users. The service is available 24/7 and is ideal for errands, commuting, or recreation.

Ten Practice Areas at Bulkley Richardson Ranked Among ‘Best Law Firms’

SPRINGFIELD — Best Lawyers, in partnership with U.S. News and World Report, has included Bulkley Richardson in its 2019 “Best Law Firms” list, ranking the firm in the top tier for 10 practice areas, the most of any Springfield law firm. They include bankruptcy and creditor-debtor rights/insolvency and reorganization law, commercial litigation, corporate law, criminal defense: general practice, criminal defense: white-collar, litigation: labor and employment, medical-malpractice law: defendants, personal-injury litigation: defendants, tax law, and trusts and estates law. To be eligible for a ranking, a law firm must have at least one lawyer who is included in Best Lawyers. Bulkley Richardson has 13 of its lawyers included on the 2019 Best Lawyers list, the most from any Springfield law firm. Two of the firm’s partners, John Pucci and Liz Sillin, were also named 2019 Springfield Lawyer of the Year. The rankings are based on a rigorous evaluation process that includes the collection of client and lawyer evaluations and peer reviews from leading attorneys in their field.

CBS Xerox Supports MHA’s Good to Go Program

SPRINGFIELD — CBS Xerox, an integrated provider of office-productivity systems, organized a donation drive to benefit Good to Go, a new initiative of MHA to supply every individual who arrives for emergency respite care with basic personal-care items, such as soap, shampoo, a toothbrush, toothpaste, undergarments, and socks. According to Patrick Roberts, nonprofit specialist and GEM representative for CBS Xerox, his company had been working with MHA as a business partner for about a year when the opportunity to do more presented itself. “We handle their printers and copiers and developed a way to manage that part of their business,” Roberts explained. “In coming up with the solution, we met a lot of their staff, and every time we had an interaction with someone at MHA, it was so positive. They invited us to their annual meeting, and I heard this incredible story from a client who at one time felt suicidal, but through counseling and the efforts of MHA, this person now feels like they are worth something. Now this person is doing so well. What a story. The experience cemented our desire to do more for MHA, and organizing a Good to Go drive was a good place to start.” The 25 staff members at the CBS Xerox office in West Springfield were joined by 100 staff at the company’s headquarters in Wethersfield, Conn., to collect donations. A truck with donations from Wethersfield drove to West Springfield to pick up donations collected there, then delivered it all to MHA in Springfield.

DiGrigoli School Honored by Bilingual Veterans Outreach Center

SPRINGFIELD — On the morning of Oct. 5, during the Western Mass Stand Down at the Greek Culture Center in Springfield, Paul DiGrigoli accepted an award from the Western Mass. Bilingual Veterans Outreach Center on behalf of DiGrigoli School of Cosmetology for its continued support of homeless and needy veterans in the community. The school, located on Riverdale Street in West Springfield, offers free haircuts to all veterans and active service members year-round, and has participated in several veteran-honoring events since opening its doors in 2002. The Western Mass. Bilingual Veterans Outreach Center, headquartered on Franklin Street in Springfield, operates with the mission of serving veterans once out of uniform, regardless of race, gender, or nationality. Most recently, it built 20 apartments for homeless veterans in Springfield and has continually offered financial and job services, healthcare, clothing, and other support.

Briefcase

Briefcase

Gaming Commission Releases October Revenue Figures for MGM Springfield, Plainridge

BOSTON — The Massachusetts Gaming Commission reported that the month of October at Plainridge Park Casino (PPC) and MGM Springfield generated approximately $35.8 million in gross gaming revenue (GGR). MGM Springfield generated $14.623 million in revenue from slots and $7.6 million from table games. PPC, an all-slots facility, generated $13.5 million in revenue. MGM Springfield paid a total of $5.56 million in taxes on that revenue, while PPC paid $6.6 million, for a total of more than $12.2 million. PPC, a category-2 slots facility, is taxed on 49% of GGR. Of that total taxed amount, 82% is paid to local aid, and 18% is allotted to the Race Horse Development Fund. MGM Springfield, a category-1 resort casino, is taxed on 25% of GGR; those monies are allocated to several specific state funds as determined by the gaming statute. To date, the Commonwealth has collected approximately $285.5 million in total taxes and assessments from PPC and MGM since the respective openings of each gaming facility, the commission said.

Employer Confidence Drops During October

BOSTON — Business confidence in Massachusetts declined to its lowest level in 17 months during October as the uncertainties that roiled global financial markets seeped into employer outlooks. The Associated Industries of Massachusetts (AIM) Business Confidence Index lost 1.6 points to 61.0 last month, the fourth decline in the last five months. The reading remains well within optimistic territory, but the BCI now sits 1.7 points lower than its level of a year ago and at its lowest point since May 2017. Raymond Torto, chair of AIM’s Board of Economic Advisors (BEA) and lecturer at Harvard Graduate School of Design, said the October decline is noteworthy because of large declines in employer confidence in their own operations, and among manufacturers. “Fears about slowing growth, trade wars, and rising interest rates buffeted financial markets this month, and some of those same fears, combined with an increasingly acrimonious midterm election, affected employers as well,” Torto said. “The good news is that the fundamentals of the economy remain strong. MassBenchmarks reports that the Massachusetts economy grew at a 3.3% annual rate during the third quarter, and the national economy added 250,000 jobs last month.” The constituent indicators that make up the overall Business Confidence Index were almost all lower during October. The one exception was the Massachusetts Index assessing business conditions within the Commonwealth, which rose 0.2 points to 64.7. Confidence in the state economy has declined 0.4 points since October 2017. The U.S. Index lost 2.0 points to 61.6, leaving it 0.9 points lower than a year ago. The Company Index, measuring employer assessments of their own operations, dropped 2.0 points to 59.6, down 2.4 points year-to-year. The Employment Index lost 0.3 points during October, while the Sales Index tumbled 3.1 points to 57.4. The Current Index, which assesses overall business conditions at the time of the survey, fell 1.0 point last month to 63.3 and 0.3 points for the year. The Future Index, measuring expectations for six months out, lost 2.1 points for the month and 3.2 points for the year. AIM President and CEO Richard Lord, also a BEA member, agreed that international trade friction and uncertainty about the duration and scope of new tariffs are clouding employer views of an otherwise solid economy. “Concerns about trade and tariffs are likely to influence employer decisions as we move toward the end of 2018 and into the New Year. Hopefully, the results of the midterm elections will shed some light on the direction of trade policy moving forward.”

UMass Study: Pedal Desks Could Improve Health of Workplace

AMHERST — A recent pilot study by kinesiologists at UMass Amherst found that pedaling while conducting work tasks improved insulin responses to a test meal. Investigators led by Dr. Stuart Chipkin found that insulin levels following the meal were lower when sedentary workers used a pedal desk compared to a standard desk. In addition, work skills were not decreased in the pedaling condition. Chipkin and colleagues concluded that pedal desks “could have the potential to achieve public and occupational health goals in sedentary work environments.” They pointed out that physical inactivity and sedentary work environments have been linked to higher rates of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease through insulin resistance and other mechanisms. Results appear in the October issue of Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. Chipkin, an endocrinologist who studies the impact of physical activity and medications on insulin sensitivity and skeletal muscle metabolism at UMass Amherst’s School of Public Health and Health Sciences, explained that, instead of approaching the problem by trying to squeeze intermittent activity into a largely sedentary work routine, “we chose to consider integrating physical activity into the workday.” He and colleagues felt that the alternatives now available for office workers — standing desks and treadmill desks — are not feasible to use for whole shifts and may even pose some barriers, such as standing too long. By contrast, a pedal desk can be used in a seated position at the user’s own pace for as little or as much time as the worker chooses. Though there are currently no commercial pedal desks on the market, Chipkin and colleagues were able to use a prototype Pennington Pedal Desk co-invented by UMass Amherst kinesiology researcher Catrine Tudor-Locke, a co-author who did not determine study design or have any contact with participants or study data. For this work, the researchers recruited 12 overweight or obese full-time sedentary office workers — six men and six women — and tested them in two conditions, pedaling at self-selected light-intensity pace for two hours, and working while seated for two hours at a conventional desk. In both conditions, participants performed computer-based tasks and were tested on mouse proficiency, typing speed and accuracy, reading comprehension, and concentration/attention. The participants also provided blood samples after eating a light meal for analysis of metabolic responses of glucose, insulin, and free fatty acids, a link between obesity, insulin resistance, and type 2 diabetes. Chipkin and colleagues reported that pedal-desk use required significantly less insulin to maintain glucose concentrations compared with using the standard desk.

Travelers Aid Begins Service at Bradley International Airport

WINDSOR LOCKS, Conn. — The Connecticut Airport Authority (CAA) and Travelers Aid announced that Travelers Aid International has begun serving the passengers of Bradley International Airport as the operator of the guest-service volunteer program at the airport. Travelers Aid now operates the Information Center in Terminal A on the lower level, which is the baggage-claim level. There are currently 45 volunteers, and Travelers Aid will be recruiting additional volunteers in order to better serve the airport’s passengers. The center’s current hours are from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., seven days a week. Mary Kate Doherty, an experienced volunteer manager, has been retained by Travelers Aid to manage and expand the program. Bradley International Airport will be the 18th airport in the Travelers Aid Transportation Network, which also includes four North American railroad stations and a cruise terminal. In the coming months, Travelers Aid will be reaching out to the residents of the region seeking additional volunteers. Doherty said Travelers Aid will be seeking anyone, both students and adults, interested in assisting a traveler with their questions. Anyone interested in learning more about volunteer opportunities should contact Doherty at (860) 500-8582 or [email protected].

Incorporations

Incorporations

The following business incorporations were recorded in Hampden, Hampshire, and Franklin counties and are the latest available. They are listed by community.

AGAWAM

Colin’s Cruisers Inc., 216 Lancaster Dr., Agawam, MA 01001. Devin Jorgensen, same. Supports children with epilepsy and their families by providing education and promoting active and healthy lifestyles.

BELCHERTOWN

Freckled Fox Cafe Inc., 343 State St., Belchertown, MA 01007. Kathryn M. Johndrow, same. Own and operate a café.

CHICOPEE

FUP Inc., 135 Slate Road, Chicopee, MA 01020. Marcus Bouchard, 354 Bliss Road, Longmeadow, MA 01106. Home improvement.

EAST LONGMEADOW

GHS Fairmass Inc., 119 Industrial Ave., #833, East Longmeadow, MA 01028. Michael R. Sacenti, 24 Crescent Hill, East Longmeadow, MA 01028. Mold remediation.

HOLYOKE

Friends of the Holyoke War Memorial Inc., 310 Appleton St., Holyoke, MA 01040. Stephen P. Riffenburg, 84 Woodland St., Holyoke, MA 01040. Organization dedicated to maintaining, protecting and improving the war memorial building and all veteran memorials in the City of Holyoke.

GREAT BARRINGTON

GBT Management Inc., 974 Main St., Suite 2, Great Barrington, MA 01230. Linda A. Calero, same. Services — billing, marketing, communication.

LEVERETT

Dog Star Genetics Inc., 4 Jackson Hill Road, Leverett, MA 01054. Owen Emmanual Wormser, same. Plant breeding and cultivation.

SOUTH HADLEY

Diamond Tools & Equipment Inc., 95 Richview Ave., South Hadley, MA 01075. David F. Isakson, same. Sales of tools and equipment.

SPRINGFIELD

City Jewelry Corp., 1319 Main St., Springfield, MA 01103. Dae S. Jang, 24 Barberry Lane, Feeding Hills, MA 01030. Retail-jewelry store.

WESTFIELD

Datamerj Inc., 988-D Southampton Road, Westfield, MA 01085. Eric Wartel, 5 Spring Meadows, South Hadley, MA 01075. Digitization and scanning services.

WILLIAMSTOWN

Film Odysseys, Ltd., 42 Cold Spring Road, Williamstown, MA 01267. Ralph Hammann, same. Film making.

Doing Business as Certificates

DBA Certificates

The following business certificates and trade names were issued or renewed during the month of November 2018.

AMHERST

Horizon Paint Union
170 East Hadley Road, #129
Alvaro Jaoo

New Market Dentistry
28 University Dr.
Gordon Freed, Barbara Freed

Porta
51 East Pleasant Dt.
Rich Annunziata

CHICOPEE

Alansari Auto Sales & Repair, LLC
926 Front St.
Abdullwhab Mustafa

Signature Barber Shop
1889 Memorial Dr.
William Younes

EASTHAMPTON

Blue Feather Sanctuary
123 Union St., Suite 101
Jessica Harvey

Carla Oleska and Co.
359 Main St., Unit 16B
Carla Oleska

EAST LONGMEADOW

Atrium Dental Group
100 Shaker Road
Tomasz Chrsan

Baumshells
634 North Main St.
Carey Walas

Elizabeth Porter
37 Maple St.
Elizabeth Porter

Gutter Protection Systems Inc.
123 Melwood Ave.
Michael Gregory

Main Street Tattoo Co.
176 North Main St.
James Fortier

HADLEY

Nature’s Finest Creations
31 Huntington Road
Helen Rodak

VentureWell
100 Venture Way
NCI & IA Inc.

Waxele
138 Russell St.
Purele Salon and Spa

HOLYOKE

Hidden Tradition Distilling
120 Front St.
Michael Styckiewicz

Murry’s Duct-work
2103 Northampton St.
Matthew McNee

Reyes Auto Sales
100 Main St.
Oscar Reyes

Xfinity
50 Holyoke St.
Comcast of Massachusetts II Inc.

LUDLOW

The Luxy
200 Center St., Unit 4
Lisa Tereso

The Property Shop Real Estate
329 East St.
Tony Bernardes

NORTHAMPTON

D3 for Change
15 Ryan Road
Kayla Boisvert

Luke’s Bees
125 Barrett St.
Lucas Sillars

Nancy Adams, LICSW
24 North Maple St., Suite 6
Nancy Adams

Red Barn Honey Co.
43 Fort Hill Terr.
Richard Conner

W. J. Turomsha Design & Construction
58 Front St.
William Turomsha

PALMER

Lena’s Salon & Day Spa
1581 North Main St.
Helena Rua

O’Connor Auto Body
45 Commercial St.
Deb O’Connor

R&MP, LLC
6 Hickory Lane
John Theofane III

Subway
1049 Thorndike St.
Rohit Tedi

Unified Property Services
P.O. Box 717
Lori Walder

William A. Vigneux, DMD
2025 Main St.
William Vigneux

SOUTHWICK

Queen of Clubs
24 Rails End Road
Deborah Torgersen

SPRINGFIELD

Dollar Tree #3541
1101 Boston Road
Dollar Tree Inc.

Dream Cutz
302 Allen St.
Emmanuel Roman

Eldorado
817 State St.
Suk Hui Forrester

Field Engineering Service
1260 Bay St.
Garry Dumas

J & A Families Home Improvement
91 Woodside Terr., #3C
Adilenia Ramos

Joseph Trucking, LLC
53 Stephanie Circle
Jean Joseph

Kelly Construction
788 Belmont Ave.
Rosa Torres

La Isla Restaurant
1135 State St.
Juan Rodriguez

Lavish Home Décor
1859 Roosevelt Ave.
Joshua Manuel

Maria’s Botanica
2633 Main St.
Maria Bonilla

Mundo’s Barber Shop
85 Oakland St.
Edmundo Rivera

NCTI – Springfield
595 Cottage St.
American Medical

Pet Friendly Housekeeping
276 Nassau Dr.
Melissa Arnold

Sapphire’s Salon
160 Oklahoma St.
Sapphire Arlene

Store Three Seventy Nine
971 East Columbus Ave.
Joron Stimage-Norwood

T-Mobile
800 Boston Road
T-Mobile Northeast, LLC

Tammie’s Bags & Things
65 Dickinson St.
Tammie Marieann

Winters Painting
53A Gail St.
Corey Winters

WARE

Lost Towns Media
1 Doane Road, Apt. C
Keith Abbott

Monika Normand Photography
184 Greenwich Plains Road
Monika Normand

Scott’s Auto Body
118 West Main St.
Scott Pisarski

ZM Painting
44 Greenwich Plains Road
Zachary Martowski

WESTFIELD

Baystate Land Clearing
135 Susan Dr.
Brian D’Agostino

Bein Custom Woodworking
316 Birch Bluffs Dr.
Michael Bein

Boneafide Bond
7 Tow Path Lane
Brian Velazquez

Deb’s Housecleaning Service
18 Perkins St.
Deborah Proulx

Devopsystems
18 Whispering Wind Road
Jack Clemente

Travel Now with Judy
7 Mockingbird Lane
Judy Brodowski

WEST SPRINGFIELD

Bazukin Electric
53 Hill St.
Dennis Bazukin

Creative Alteration
70 Worthen St.
Diana Kovaliuk

Dedicated Drywall
75 North Blvd.
David Whitlock

Frasco Fuel Oil
2383 Westfield St.
David Frasco

Khan Heating Oil
2383 Westfield St.
David Frasco

Roasted Mobile Coffee Services
1334 Memorial Ave.
Benjamin Rose

T-Mobile Northeast, LLC
935 Riverdale St.
Chris Miller

West Side Signs
442 Main St.
Noemi Souza

WILBRAHAM

Eady Brothers Commercial Snow Services
13 Wellfleet Dr.
Elliott Eady

Image ’n Ink
P.O. Box 55
Barbara Christie

Bankruptcies

Bankruptcies

Bankruptcies were not available for this issue and will appear in the next issue of BusinessWest

Real Estate Transactions

Real Estate

The following real estate transactions (latest available) were compiled by Banker & Tradesman and are published as they were received. Only transactions exceeding $115,000 are listed. Buyer and seller fields contain only the first name listed on the deed.

FRANKLIN COUNTY

BERNARDSTON

7 Library St.
Bernardston, MA 01337
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Rocco W. Libertine
Seller: Maddox J. Sprengel
Date: 10/31/18

115 Merrifield Road
Bernardston, MA 01337
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Michael Cohen
Seller: Barnes, William L., (Estate)
Date: 10/26/18

64 South St.
Bernardston, MA 01337
Amount: $195,000
Buyer: Jennifer L. Woods
Seller: Charles R. Deane
Date: 10/26/18

BUCKLAND

39 Green St.
Buckland, MA 01338
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Christopher Williams
Seller: David S. Weiland
Date: 10/29/18

70 Upper St.
Buckland, MA 01338
Amount: $295,000
Buyer: Annakathryn A. Benoit
Seller: Barry L. Delcastilho
Date: 10/26/18

CONWAY

87 Ashfield Road
Conway, MA 01341
Amount: $126,000
Buyer: Derek Dove
Seller: Dove, Donna J., (Estate)
Date: 10/25/18

443 Hoosac Road
Conway, MA 01341
Amount: $162,000
Buyer: James M. Elwell
Seller: Daniel S. Graves
Date: 10/25/18

394 Mathews Road
Conway, MA 01341
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Joseph E. Friedrichs
Seller: Anthony H. Spencer
Date: 11/02/18

DEERFIELD

15 Pleasant Ave.
Deerfield, MA 01342
Amount: $199,900
Buyer: Jeffery A. Hamilton
Seller: Rocco W. Libertine
Date: 10/31/18

ERVING

72 Mountain Road
Erving, MA 01344
Amount: $226,000
Buyer: Garry W. Wing
Seller: Sambra D. Redick
Date: 10/24/18

GREENFIELD

365 Adams Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Cody R. Pease
Seller: Linda L. Swallow
Date: 10/31/18

345 Barton Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $485,000
Buyer: Brian D. Hoffman
Seller: Richard D. White
Date: 10/26/18

375 Barton Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $342,500
Buyer: David H. Schirm
Seller: James P. McHugh
Date: 10/31/18

462 Bernardston Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $224,400
Buyer: Jane A. Bowie
Seller: Audrey L. Reum RET
Date: 10/23/18

18 Church St.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Leslie J. Johnston
Seller: Patrick L&C M. Cadam FT
Date: 10/31/18

55 Ferrante Ave.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Eugene J. Wapner
Seller: Betty F. Hodas TR
Date: 10/31/18

63 Fort Square
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $241,737
Buyer: Brian J. Derry
Seller: Michael J. Egan
Date: 10/24/18

67 Fort Square
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $241,737
Buyer: Brian J. Derry
Seller: Michael J. Egan
Date: 10/24/18

4 Lincoln St.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Brian S. Dannemiller
Seller: Paul J. Boudreau
Date: 10/26/18

5 Marshall St.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $152,000
Buyer: Daniel P. Dempsey
Seller: Karen M. White
Date: 10/31/18

541 Mohawk Trail
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $249,000
Buyer: Heidi Wheeler-Corona
Seller: Steven J. Andrews
Date: 10/22/18

79 Montague City Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $172,000
Buyer: Scott A. Callahan
Seller: Shane D. Wells
Date: 11/01/18

22 Woodleigh Ave.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $120,000
Buyer: Ted Strzelecki
Seller: David A. Dewinter
Date: 10/30/18

HAWLEY

26 East Road
Hawley, MA 01339
Amount: $124,000
Buyer: MTGLQ Investors LP
Seller: Michael J. Churchill
Date: 10/31/18

HEATH

177 Number 9 Road
Heath, MA 01346
Amount: $181,000
Buyer: Timothy L. Eastman
Seller: Augustine Almeida
Date: 10/23/18

LEVERETT

131 Shutesbury Road
Leverett, MA 01054
Amount: $440,000
Buyer: Molly A. Daniell
Seller: Jeffrey C. McQueen
Date: 10/26/18

LEYDEN

66 Mid County Road
Leyden, MA 01301
Amount: $278,500
Buyer: Gregory S. Lueders
Seller: D. Atta Kurzmann
Date: 10/25/18

MONTAGUE

7 Highland Circle
Montague, MA 01376
Amount: $222,500
Buyer: Shane D. Wells
Seller: Heidi M. Graves
Date: 11/01/18

20 K St.
Montague, MA 01376
Amount: $130,000
Buyer: Jonnie V. Arabia
Seller: Michael T. Coffey
Date: 10/23/18

140 L St.
Montague, MA 01376
Amount: $249,000
Buyer: James G. Martineau
Seller: Leslie A. Lapointe
Date: 10/29/18

389 Montague City Road
Montague, MA 01376
Amount: $134,900
Buyer: Mach 1 Properties LLC
Seller: Ruby Realty LLC
Date: 10/26/18

67 Oakman St.
Montague, MA 01376
Amount: $276,000
Buyer: Scott D. Minckler
Seller: Nicole J. Fahey
Date: 11/01/18

NEW SALEM

21 Lovers Lane
New Salem, MA 01355
Amount: $380,000
Buyer: Christopher E. Salem
Seller: Mark F. Leboeuf TR
Date: 10/26/18

NORTHFIELD

235 West Northfield Road
Northfield, MA 01360
Amount: $147,000
Buyer: Eugene R. Oakes
Seller: FNMA
Date: 10/22/18

ORANGE

171 Chase St.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $229,999
Buyer: Alex D. Wiltz
Seller: James A. Laflamme
Date: 11/01/18

24 Mechanic St.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $129,000
Buyer: Mary A. Jablonsky
Seller: Scott Lemieux
Date: 10/26/18

87 Mechanic St.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $169,900
Buyer: Tama J. Vincent
Seller: Ranlyn Property Investments LLC
Date: 10/26/18

12 Smith Ave.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Laura P. Lafountain
Seller: Matthew D. Tarlin
Date: 10/22/18

SHELBURNE

10 Hope St.
Shelburne, MA 01370
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Alison Clark
Seller: James R. Young LT
Date: 10/23/18

1449 Mohawk Trail
Shelburne, MA 01370
Amount: $118,125
Buyer: Christopher A. Moes
Seller: USA HUD
Date: 11/02/18

SHUTESBURY

27 South Laurel Dr.
Shutesbury, MA 01072
Amount: $366,000
Buyer: Thomas R. Siefert
Seller: Patricia A. Alves
Date: 10/30/18

SUNDERLAND

28 Plumtree Road
Sunderland, MA 01375
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Joseph Czajkowski
Seller: Wasilauski, Stanley J.,
Date: 10/22/18

HAMPDEN COUNTY

AGAWAM

186 Barry St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $291,000
Buyer: Luke Consolini
Seller: Mark J. Hensel
Date: 10/26/18

750 Barry St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $223,400
Buyer: Michael R. Welch
Seller: Stefan J. Gadecki
Date: 10/29/18

545 Cooper St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $290,000
Buyer: Jeremy E. Musa
Seller: Nicholas J. Lapointe
Date: 10/31/18

58 Elbert Road
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $227,000
Buyer: Barbara L. Wood
Seller: Jonathan L. Watson
Date: 10/22/18

83 Fairview St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $249,900
Buyer: Kailin M. Szymanski
Seller: Justin J. Mercieri
Date: 10/26/18

17 Independence Road
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: David T. Pleshaw
Seller: Robin M. Pleshaw
Date: 10/30/18

29 Kathy Terrace
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Erhan Turkyilmaz
Seller: Paul H. Wedge
Date: 11/02/18

200 Leonard St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $199,000
Buyer: Viktor Reznichenko
Seller: US Bank
Date: 10/31/18

19-21 River St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Tatum S. Calabrese
Seller: Walnut Street HTA LLC
Date: 10/31/18

595 South West St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $490,000
Buyer: Mark C. Watson
Seller: Diane D. Jeserski
Date: 10/22/18

36 Spring St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $178,400
Buyer: Carmelo Mendrell
Seller: Lucas J. Giusto
Date: 10/23/18

109 Wagon Wheel Dr.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $424,900
Buyer: Sean Hoffman
Seller: Thomas Murphy
Date: 10/31/18

21 Willow Brook Dr.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $267,000
Buyer: Isabel M. Ablianitis
Seller: Robert R. Koziol
Date: 10/30/18

124 Witheridge St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $415,000
Buyer: Inna Suprunchuk
Seller: Beth W. Kanjau
Date: 11/02/18

BRIMFIELD

91 Cubles Dr.
Brimfield, MA 01010
Amount: $335,000
Buyer: Stephen G. Holt
Seller: Joy D. Lucciarini
Date: 11/01/18

185 Wales Road
Brimfield, MA 01010
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Louis J. Jacque
Seller: John S. Croke
Date: 10/24/18

CHESTER

192 Abbott Hill Road
Chester, MA 01011
Amount: $205,082
Buyer: Lakeview Loan Servicing
Seller: Karl H. Stiles
Date: 10/31/18

CHICOPEE

69 Bell St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $164,900
Buyer: Ruben Rivera
Seller: Henry J. Desellier
Date: 11/01/18

25 Carter Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $197,500
Buyer: Jade Laizer
Seller: Phillip Vivenzio
Date: 10/31/18

541 Chicopee St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Lisa Tavernier
Seller: Van T. Ho
Date: 10/31/18

Clifton St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $229,900
Buyer: Dorothy Stewart
Seller: Matthew A. Zordani
Date: 11/01/18

24 Como Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Tracy A. Breton
Seller: Ludden, Helen, (Estate)
Date: 10/26/18

150 Deslauriers St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Ileana Mejia
Seller: Christopher Maschi
Date: 10/31/18

35 Edbert St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $168,900
Buyer: Mark W. Avery
Seller: Timothy S. Geary
Date: 10/26/18

20 Ellerton St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Reatrey S. Chen
Seller: Richard K. Chagnon
Date: 10/31/18

89 Jacob St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $237,000
Buyer: Sergey V. Vasilevich
Seller: Robert Opsitnick
Date: 10/31/18

51 Keddy Blvd.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $184,000
Buyer: Jason Tardy
Seller: Timothy D. Skwira
Date: 10/31/18

232 Lafayette St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: 1066 Granby Road LLC
Seller: Kassem Z. Kabbout
Date: 10/30/18

21 Loomis Court
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Gerald J. Blake
Seller: Randy S. Manseau
Date: 10/22/18

206 Loomis Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $217,500
Buyer: Lemuel O. Ayala-Santos
Seller: Stanley J. Wojnar
Date: 10/31/18

59 Maplewood Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $272,000
Buyer: Robert J. Weller
Seller: DGL Properties LLC
Date: 11/02/18

106 Muzzy St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: Blue Sky Investment Group
Seller: Carlos L. Figueiredo
Date: 10/29/18

211 Nelson St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $325,000
Buyer: Robert Opsitnick
Seller: Marc D. Rogers
Date: 10/25/18

36 Pondview Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Nicole R. Talaia
Seller: Taylor, Widelo Maria, (Estate)
Date: 10/22/18

461 Prospect St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $117,600
Buyer: Deutsche Bank
Seller: Robert W. Dusza
Date: 11/02/18

166 Shepherd St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Heather J. Jendrysik
Seller: Scott T. Duncan
Date: 10/22/18

510 Sheridan St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $269,000
Buyer: Peter A. Lemelin
Seller: Jan Chudzinski
Date: 10/31/18

629 Sheridan St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $238,000
Buyer: Steven Ribeiro
Seller: Charles Richard
Date: 11/02/18

29 Silvin Road
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Andrew J. Segarra
Seller: DCL General Construction
Date: 11/02/18

67 Streiber Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $304,000
Buyer: Samuel Gomez-Gonzalez
Seller: Short 4u RT
Date: 10/31/18

321 Tolpa Circle
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Wendryn R. Case
Seller: Bonnie Johnson
Date: 10/26/18

92 Walter St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Leiannie Sanchez-Perez
Seller: Stephen E. Senecal
Date: 10/22/18

19 Warren St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Rory J. Garrity
Seller: Robert R. Vielleux
Date: 10/31/18

38 Wells Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: Shaneika Hunt
Seller: Michele English-Connolly
Date: 10/26/18

16 Willette St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Gilbert Torres-Rodriguez
Seller: Robert J. Weller
Date: 11/02/18

EAST LONGMEADOW

34 Brynmawr Dr.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $188,800
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: John L. Devenitch
Date: 10/22/18

101 Dearborn St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $299,900
Buyer: Trevor Devine
Seller: Donald R. Moriarty
Date: 10/26/18

116 Elm St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $130,000
Buyer: Patricia A. Aleks
Seller: US Bank
Date: 10/22/18

95 Lasalle St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $237,631
Buyer: Deutsche Bank
Seller: Nanvy Cole
Date: 11/02/18

29 Lessard Circle
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $340,000
Buyer: Shaun J. McGrady
Seller: Marc A. Maccarini
Date: 11/01/18

10 Murray Court
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $139,600
Buyer: Seth Metcalf
Seller: Bouchard, Rita B., (Estate)
Date: 10/23/18

3 North St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $226,900
Buyer: Roy M. Syriac
Seller: Marc Magnani
Date: 10/29/18

630 Parker St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $229,502
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Adam M. Hart
Date: 10/24/18

135 Sanford St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $386,000
Buyer: Thomas D. Christensen
Seller: John P. Croci
Date: 10/30/18

20 School St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $169,900
Buyer: William G. Leahy
Seller: Deborah Caronna
Date: 10/31/18

14 Van Dyke Road
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $227,000
Buyer: Erica Trombly
Seller: Irene DelViscio
Date: 10/31/18

147 Vineland Ave.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Lauren A. Garcia
Seller: Jennifer L. Frangiamore
Date: 10/26/18

GRANVILLE

88 Crest Lane
Granville, MA 01034
Amount: $194,000
Buyer: Jessica A. York
Seller: Wells Fargo Bank
Date: 11/01/18

HAMPDEN

235 Bennett Road
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $408,000
Buyer: Nicole A. Brault
Seller: Gregory J. Falcone
Date: 10/26/18

261 Chapin Road
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $142,000
Buyer: Alphonse Mercurio
Seller: Ober, Robert D., (Estate)
Date: 11/01/18

35 Charles St.
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $137,000
Buyer: JJB Builders Corp.
Seller: FNMA
Date: 11/02/18

HOLLAND

1 Big Tree Lane
Holland, MA 01521
Amount: $248,000
Buyer: Theresa M. Patterson
Seller: Gayle A. Smith
Date: 10/22/18

19 Heritage Dr.
Holland, MA 01521
Amount: $179,000
Buyer: Daniel Cahill
Seller: Darleen Griffin
Date: 10/30/18

74 Vinton Road
Holland, MA 01521
Amount: $142,400
Buyer: JP Morgan Chase Bank
Seller: Matthew W. Hilton
Date: 11/02/18

HOLYOKE

55 Allyn St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $194,000
Buyer: Andrea A. Napiorkowski
Seller: Noelle M. Bonnevie
Date: 10/23/18

203 Apremont Hwy.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $132,000
Buyer: Veronica M. Burroughs
Seller: FNMA
Date: 10/26/18

4 Arden St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $229,900
Buyer: Kyle M. Anderson
Seller: Paul A. Leveille
Date: 10/31/18

16 Cherry St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Andrew E. Gaines
Seller: Lisa W. Morin
Date: 10/30/18

11 Ernest Lane
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Nicholas J. Barbieri
Seller: Joanne Burgess-Jeannenot
Date: 10/26/18

9 Gordon Dr.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Cindy Pena
Seller: Jacob C. Lauzier
Date: 10/26/18

1022-1024 Hampden St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: AMM Rentals LLC
Seller: Raymond F. Turgeon
Date: 10/31/18

21 Hampton Knolls Road
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Thomas N. Wilson
Seller: Brosnan, Patrick E., (Estate)
Date: 10/31/18

126-130 High St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: KHS Enterprises LLC
Seller: Suk-Cha J. Bergeron
Date: 10/31/18

20 Holly Meadow Road
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $299,900
Buyer: Ruth A. Baraniuk
Seller: Raymond L. Gagnon
Date: 10/26/18

145 Jackson St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Jesenia Dejesus
Seller: Holyoke Housing Authority
Date: 10/30/18

59 Mueller Road
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Frederico Fernandes
Seller: Thomas M. Rice
Date: 10/31/18

105-107 Nonotuck St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $174,000
Buyer: Brooke G. Schnabel
Seller: Coakley Corp.
Date: 11/01/18

23 O’Connor Ave.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Jill M. Labeau
Seller: Rypec LLC
Date: 10/31/18

135 Pearl St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Angel Maldonado
Seller: Angel A. Maldonado
Date: 10/29/18

320 Pleasant St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $174,900
Buyer: Drew W. Lydecker
Seller: Timothy E. Petrowicz
Date: 10/26/18

44 Ridgeway St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $199,999
Buyer: Maria A. Abad
Seller: Witman Properties Inc.
Date: 11/02/18

14 Shepard Dr.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $294,900
Buyer: Dean M. Powers
Seller: Mary A. Sokop
Date: 10/25/18

221 Walnut St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $130,596
Buyer: NRZ REO 6B LLC
Seller: David L. Richard
Date: 10/23/18

323 Walnut St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $163,000
Buyer: Joy Meredith
Seller: Mabeline Arzola
Date: 10/30/18

16 Willow St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $129,900
Buyer: G&H Homes LLC
Seller: Ruby Realty LLC
Date: 11/02/18

30 Willow St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $198,000
Buyer: Katherine J. Moonan
Seller: Leonard J. Abbisso
Date: 11/02/18

110-116 Winter St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $299,000
Buyer: High End Management Co.
Seller: APH Realty LLC
Date: 11/01/18

LONGMEADOW

15 Bellevue Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $149,000
Buyer: Home Rehabit LLC
Seller: HSBC Bank
Date: 10/26/18

205 Colony Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $640,000
Buyer: Mark R. Wojcik
Seller: Morton D. Lynn
Date: 11/01/18

132 Converse St.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $244,900
Buyer: Sean Goodwin
Seller: Diane L. Dematteo
Date: 10/24/18

7 Elmwood Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $360,000
Buyer: Daniel T. Bishop
Seller: Bruce A. Bromley
Date: 11/01/18

163 Greenacre Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Douglas Mentuck
Seller: Marciane T. Kelly
Date: 10/30/18

30 Lynnwood Dr.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $370,000
Buyer: Craig E. Collins
Seller: Eileen Castellanos
Date: 10/26/18

338 Maple Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Sara Sarno
Seller: Dzwilewski, Romualda M., (Estate)
Date: 10/26/18

87 Oakwood Dr.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $148,000
Buyer: Etabav RT
Seller: Wells Fargo Bank
Date: 10/22/18

618 Pinewood Dr.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $440,000
Buyer: Nicholas Lapointe
Seller: Eyal Markman
Date: 10/31/18

52 Pinewood Hills
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $499,000
Buyer: Laura A. Stevens
Seller: Lewis H. Gordon
Date: 10/29/18

134 Primrose Dr.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $522,000
Buyer: Daniel W. Bagdorf
Seller: Andrea S. Martin
Date: 10/26/18

32 Villa St.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Craig L. Robbins
Seller: Craig L. Robbins
Date: 11/02/18

LUDLOW

37 Americo St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $286,000
Buyer: Alexa R. Tereso
Seller: Matthew Condon
Date: 10/31/18

42 Berkshire St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $119,900
Buyer: Kelly Booth
Seller: Wells Fargo Bank
Date: 10/23/18

11 Chmura St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: WMass. Residential LLC
Seller: Charles R. Afonso
Date: 10/23/18

17 Chmura St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $220,000
Buyer: WMass Residential LLC
Seller: Charles R. Afonso
Date: 10/23/18

30 Clark St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $198,000
Buyer: Dominik A. Dasilva
Seller: Sean P. Zdanis
Date: 10/26/18

334-336 East St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $239,000
Buyer: Joseph D. Burns
Seller: Guilherme F. Rodrigues
Date: 10/31/18

895 East St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Mahmoud Falahatian
Seller: Moraes, Manuel Jr., (Estate)
Date: 10/29/18

87 Haviland St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $195,500
Buyer: Antonio Patullo
Seller: Jeremy M. Soja
Date: 10/24/18

66-68 Highland Ave.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Delos Real Estate LLC
Seller: Isabel G. Martins
Date: 10/30/18

16 Holy Cross Circle
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Pamela S. Pagan
Seller: Elizabeth G. Tereso
Date: 11/02/18

215 Holyoke St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Stephanie Provo
Seller: Doreen J. Nelson
Date: 10/26/18

311-313 Howard St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $202,100
Buyer: Michael Rodrigues
Seller: Frank A. Silva
Date: 10/29/18

100 Hubbard St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $237,500
Buyer: William H. Kemple
Seller: Nelson S. Goncalves
Date: 10/30/18

Kendall St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Thomas S. Stepanian
Seller: Dickran S. Stepanian
Date: 10/24/18

117 Overlook Dr.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $290,000
Buyer: James A. Laflamme
Seller: Michael E. Kane
Date: 11/02/18

Sunset Dr. #2
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $213,000
Buyer: Luis F. Pedro
Seller: Baystate Developers Inc.
Date: 11/02/18

94 Valley View Dr.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $400,000
Buyer: Kristen M. Procon
Seller: James J. Cokkinias
Date: 10/24/18

10 Warren St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Stephen J. Pare
Seller: Neal J. Bournique
Date: 11/01/18

MONSON

152 East Hill Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Bernard J. Riley
Seller: John V. Kelley
Date: 10/24/18

62 May Hill Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: Erwin C. Markham
Seller: USA HUD
Date: 10/25/18

151 Palmer Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $475,000
Buyer: Palmer Road LLC
Seller: Robert N. Brazas
Date: 10/31/18

16 Pease Ave.
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Aaryn Jones
Seller: Ross C. Flowers
Date: 10/31/18

44 Stebbins Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: Matthew Tortoriello
Seller: Michael Beder
Date: 11/02/18

111 Upper Hampden Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $233,000
Buyer: Barbara A. Faust
Seller: Wayne H. Belmer
Date: 10/26/18

MONTGOMERY

71 New State Road
Montgomery, MA 01085
Amount: $223,860
Buyer: Freedom Mortgage Corp.
Seller: Jonathan J. Lorenzatti
Date: 10/24/18

PALMER

9 2nd St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $1,500,000
Buyer: Double R. Enterprises LLC
Seller: T-Branch LLC
Date: 10/31/18

2085 Baptist Hill Road
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $330,000
Buyer: Miguel E. Ocasio
Seller: Steven A. Lamothe
Date: 10/26/18

113 Belchertown St.
Palmer, MA 01080
Amount: $207,000
Buyer: Mary B. Tripp
Seller: Robert A. Beaulieu
Date: 10/31/18

113 Bourne St.
Palmer, MA 01080
Amount: $184,500
Buyer: Amber L. Boots
Seller: FNMA
Date: 10/23/18

38 Charles St.
Palmer, MA 01080
Amount: $227,000
Buyer: Joshua D. Mansfield
Seller: Kevin Czaplicki
Date: 10/26/18

185 Chudy St.
Palmer, MA 01080
Amount: $180,000
Buyer: Kelly R. Wilson
Seller: Chevalier, Marjorie A., (Estate)
Date: 11/02/18

61 East Palmer Park Dr.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $137,514
Buyer: Anthony Bourget
Seller: HSBC Bank
Date: 10/26/18

2 Elizabeth St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $189,000
Buyer: Kenneth S. Longtin
Seller: Johanna M. Scott
Date: 10/25/18

324 Old Warren Road
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Raymond L. Glick
Seller: Councilman, Lewis P., (Estate)
Date: 10/30/18

12 Paul St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $217,000
Buyer: Christopher McGivney
Seller: Gerald J. Madigan
Date: 10/25/18

1422-R Park St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Anthony Nadeau
Seller: Melissa M. Hamilton
Date: 10/30/18

749 River St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Ruby Realty LLC
Seller: John T. Innarelli
Date: 10/30/18

169 Ware St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: 5 Star Landscapes Inc.
Seller: Kenneth F. Lolos
Date: 11/01/18

234 Ware St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $189,000
Buyer: Jonathan Armida
Seller: David Haley
Date: 10/24/18

18 Wright St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $167,260
Buyer: US Bank
Seller: Robert J. Sheldon
Date: 10/26/18

SOUTHWICK

18 Eagle St.
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $115,000
Buyer: JMN LLC
Seller: S&C Homebuyers LLC
Date: 10/23/18

133 Feeding Hills Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $228,000
Buyer: Deniss Muravskis
Seller: Christa M. Smith
Date: 10/26/18

9 Foster Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Marissa M. Cannon
Seller: Wilmington Savings
Date: 10/31/18

13 Overlook Lane
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $169,900
Buyer: Michael S. Martin
Seller: Pinnacle Estates At the Ranch
Date: 10/29/18

SPRINGFIELD

49 Abbott St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $156,500
Buyer: Ruby Realty LLC
Seller: Louis F. Graham
Date: 11/02/18

94 Acrebrook Road
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $259,000
Buyer: Joseph Langone
Seller: Paul H. Litalien
Date: 11/02/18

582-584 Armory St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $183,000
Buyer: Edward Reyes
Seller: Reynaldo D. Rodriguez
Date: 10/22/18

298 Arnold Ave.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Jorge E. Burgos
Seller: James McKinnies
Date: 10/29/18

19-23 Baldwin St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $228,000
Buyer: Tyrone L. Sanders
Seller: Rachel Thomas
Date: 10/30/18

11 Balfour Dr.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Lisa Jablonski
Seller: Meaghan R. Matthews
Date: 10/22/18

104 Bancroft St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Brian Leong
Seller: Debra H. Katz
Date: 10/25/18

27-29 Beauregard St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $161,300
Buyer: Makensy Nicolas
Seller: Mary T. Popko
Date: 10/29/18

125 Belmont Ave.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $2,756,000
Buyer: Belmont Gardens Holdings LLC
Seller: Springfield CV 1 LLC
Date: 10/30/18

135 Belmont Ave.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $2,756,000
Buyer: Belmont Gardens Holdings LLC
Seller: Springfield CV 1 LLC
Date: 10/30/18

857-859 Belmont Ave.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Bryan Stewart
Seller: Anthony M. Santaniello
Date: 10/26/18

95 Belvidere St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $192,000
Buyer: Paul R. Campbell
Seller: Joseph S. Malmborg
Date: 11/02/18

16 Bissell St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $213,900
Buyer: Frantzso Denize
Seller: Anthony Bourget
Date: 10/26/18

78 Bowdoin St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Dametrice D. Brown
Seller: James R. Johnson
Date: 10/31/18

197 Bowles Park
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Virgilio Cruz
Seller: Amanda C. Ortega
Date: 10/31/18

795 Bradley Road
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $121,000
Buyer: Lucas R. Manzi
Seller: Frank M. Manzi
Date: 11/01/18

53 California Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $169,900
Buyer: Carmen D. Reyes
Seller: Amy M. Langdon
Date: 10/25/18

151 Canterbury Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $173,000
Buyer: Dylan R. Fontaine
Seller: Michael J. Streit
Date: 10/26/18

62-64 Cherrelyn St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $163,000
Buyer: Hector N. Ortiz
Seller: Luis Martinez
Date: 10/29/18

31 Colonial Ave.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Chad Lynch
Seller: WN Management LLC
Date: 10/30/18

220-222 Connecticut Ave.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $156,700
Buyer: Orlando Rivera
Seller: Maria Frantzeskakis
Date: 10/26/18

33 Druid Hill Road
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $202,000
Buyer: Thomas R. Ohno
Seller: Scott A. Mulvey
Date: 10/29/18

187 Edendale St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Diane Spagnolo
Seller: Geoff Lamoureaux
Date: 11/02/18

227 Edendale St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $123,600
Buyer: Leah M. Belisle
Seller: Nancy J. Rawle
Date: 10/29/18

267 Edendale St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $163,000
Buyer: Xiadamir A. Morales
Seller: Amy F. Broderick
Date: 10/22/18

64 Eleanor Road
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Nilsa I. Vazquez
Seller: Jamie Butler
Date: 10/31/18

24 Emerson St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $182,000
Buyer: Ramesh Adhikari
Seller: Daniel J. Garcia
Date: 10/23/18

93 Fernwold St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $228,000
Buyer: Tyrone L. Sanders
Seller: Rachel Thomas
Date: 10/30/18

33 Ferris St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $222,000
Buyer: Leejay N. Moore
Seller: Kerry-Ann N. Redman
Date: 10/30/18

36 Fisher St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $115,000
Buyer: John A. Brosseau
Seller: Timothy C. Smith
Date: 10/25/18

11 Fordham St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Kristal S. Burgos
Seller: Jessica Cintron
Date: 10/31/18

54 Fox Hill Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Joan M. Clowes
Seller: James A. Pieterse
Date: 10/26/18

114-116 Garfield St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $162,000
Buyer: Bryant Serna
Seller: Gonzo Aguilar
Date: 10/23/18

39 Groton St.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Davies Rodriguez
Seller: Maria E. Sanchez
Date: 10/26/18

48 Hamilton St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $125,561
Buyer: Deborah A. Solomon
Seller: NSP Residential LLC
Date: 10/31/18

59 Harkness Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $157,400
Buyer: Miriam Figueroa
Seller: Sheila M. Harjula
Date: 10/26/18

141 Harkness Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $132,500
Buyer: Lisa E. Haluck
Seller: Carole J. St.Marie
Date: 10/31/18

91 Jardine St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $173,000
Buyer: Edwin A. Arroyo-Melendez
Seller: Ting Chang
Date: 10/31/18

132 Jasper St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $152,500
Buyer: Dyonna M. Ortiz
Seller: Nasser K. Zebian
Date: 10/31/18

68 King St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $145,000
Buyer: J&W Feng LLC
Seller: Ismael Rivera
Date: 10/29/18

91-93 Knollwood St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $229,900
Buyer: Argeli D. Rosario
Seller: MS Homes LLC
Date: 10/31/18

16 Laurel St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $159,500
Buyer: Carmelo Vega-Hernandez
Seller: Lachenauer LLC
Date: 10/26/18

50 Lavender Lane
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $145,000
Buyer: Lisa Sears
Seller: William F. Wemyss
Date: 10/26/18

34-36 Leete St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Luis Galarza
Seller: Julio G. Ayala
Date: 10/31/18

25 Lloyd Ave.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $195,000
Buyer: Deborah A. Harris
Seller: David Schmidt
Date: 10/31/18

100 Loretta St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $131,000
Buyer: Damian Jemison
Seller: Andrea Perez
Date: 10/31/18

28-30 Malden St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Luis M. Terrero-Calderon
Seller: Kelnate Realty LLC
Date: 10/31/18

25 Mandalay Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $229,900
Buyer: Ramon L. Franco
Seller: William J. Randall
Date: 10/30/18

43 Meadowbrook Road
Springfield, MA 01128
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: High Ridge Real Estate
Seller: Judith Raleigh-Rossini
Date: 10/23/18

28 Melville St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $129,900
Buyer: Susangely Diaz
Seller: Abbie M. McKee
Date: 10/31/18

91 Merrill Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Sarah M. Barnett
Seller: Salvatore Pafumi
Date: 10/29/18

55 Mooreland St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $152,500
Buyer: Jomary Morales
Seller: Olatomide Ogunfeibo
Date: 11/02/18

53 Moss Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $149,500
Buyer: Aerial Funding LLC
Seller: Joann Smith
Date: 10/31/18

34-36 Moulton St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Robin Clyne
Seller: Junior Properties LLC
Date: 11/02/18

60-62 Newfield Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $259,000
Buyer: Emmanuel Osei
Seller: Moses T. Kinuthia
Date: 10/23/18

11 Newton Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Dorian V. Blanks
Seller: Gertrude M. Ryzewicz
Date: 11/01/18

43-49 Oak St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $179,000
Buyer: Hedge Hog Industries Corp.
Seller: Valley Castle Holdings
Date: 10/26/18

136 Oregon St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Patricia Carr
Seller: Shaun J. McGrady
Date: 11/01/18

214 Pasco Road
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $144,500
Buyer: Benito S. Ramos
Seller: Joseph B. Bastos
Date: 10/22/18

71-73 Price St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Kristen Fiore
Seller: Diplomat Property
Date: 10/24/18

67 Pembroke St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $172,000
Buyer: Carmen Reyes
Seller: Armando N. Ortega
Date: 10/29/18

59-61 Pendleton Ave.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Ebony S. Wright
Seller: Insight Homes LLC
Date: 10/31/18

132 Pilgrim Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Wilfredo Ramos
Seller: Antonio Montefusco
Date: 10/30/18

24 Porter St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $220,000
Buyer: Jessica Cintron
Seller: Hedge Hog Industries Corp.
Date: 10/31/18

34 Portulaca Dr.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $145,500
Buyer: Anthony F. Geary
Seller: USA HUD
Date: 11/02/18

195 Riverton Road
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $137,000
Buyer: Thomas W. Sacco
Seller: Joseph P. Harty
Date: 11/01/18

41 Riverview St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $174,900
Buyer: Robert G. Torkington
Seller: Darin S. Klaesges
Date: 10/26/18

80 Rochelle St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $120,000
Buyer: Bank New York Mellon
Seller: Mary A. Moye
Date: 10/22/18

34 Saffron Circle
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $130,851
Buyer: Liberty Onyx LLC
Seller: HSBC Bank USA
Date: 10/24/18

864 Saint James Ave.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $155,900
Buyer: Pedro J. Scroggin
Seller: RBT Enterprise LLC
Date: 10/31/18

9 Shamrock St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Chad Lynch
Seller: Wei Q. Ni
Date: 10/30/18

120-122 Slater Ave.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $161,300
Buyer: Makensy Nicholas
Seller: Mary T. Popko
Date: 10/29/18

86 Springfield St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Gary D. Musial
Seller: Lynne Visneau
Date: 10/24/18

237 Stapleton Road
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Benjamin M. Pieciak
Seller: Karen D. Wallace
Date: 10/25/18

1179 Sumner Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $117,000
Buyer: Abdul-Ghani Mourand
Seller: Wilmington Savings
Date: 10/31/18

54 Thyme Lane
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $237,000
Buyer: Ashley D. Lee
Seller: Nancy E. Vega
Date: 10/26/18

71 Treetop Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $133,900
Buyer: Amy Miklasiewicz
Seller: Samantha Carey
Date: 10/22/18

70 Wayside St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $201,000
Buyer: Ariana Liquori
Seller: Seth Y. Flagg
Date: 10/29/18

15 Welcome Place
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $1,240,000
Buyer: Valley Castle Holdings
Seller: Melwood Realty LLC
Date: 11/02/18

30 Wareham St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Michael T. Payne
Seller: London Realty LLC
Date: 10/26/18

24 West Hill Road
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Jasmin Garcia-Valladolid
Seller: Fumi Realty Inc.
Date: 10/22/18

179 Westminster St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Roberto Figueroa
Seller: JJS Capital Investment
Date: 11/02/18

60-62 Windsor St.
Springfield, MA 01105
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Samuel Feliciano
Seller: Mary B. Oakley
Date: 10/25/18

239 Winton St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: William L. Collins
Seller: Kris D. Wise
Date: 10/29/18

16 Woodside Terrace
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $222,000
Buyer: Amanda Heard
Seller: SAW Construction LLC
Date: 10/26/18

85-91 Woodside Terrace
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $2,756,000
Buyer: Belmont Gardens Holdings LLC
Seller: Springfield CV 1 LLC
Date: 10/30/18

1242-1244 Worcester St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $174,000
Buyer: Jessica M. Nogueira
Seller: Adelino D. Palatino
Date: 10/29/18

WALES

22 Holland Road
Wales, MA 01081
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: David W. Foote
Seller: Southbridge RE LLC
Date: 10/30/18

80 Monson Road
Wales, MA 01081
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: John Croke
Seller: Jason J. Beaulieu
Date: 11/01/18

209 Union Road
Wales, MA 01081
Amount: $350,000
Buyer: David J. Mullins
Seller: Dorothy G. Davies
Date: 11/02/18

WEST SPRINGFIELD

67 Abigaile Lane
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $437,500
Buyer: Erica M. Summers
Seller: Karl D. Cowden
Date: 11/01/18

10 Advent Dr.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $387,000
Buyer: Nicole A. Mason
Seller: David J. Visconti
Date: 10/30/18

176 Ely Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $206,000
Buyer: Matthew T. Labak
Seller: Michael Nihill
Date: 11/02/18

186 Harwich Road
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Michael J. Crean
Seller: Michael Bonfitto
Date: 10/24/18

11 Interstate Dr.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $1,610,000
Buyer: Klondike Investment Group
Seller: Wells Fargo Bank
Date: 10/24/18

35 Lower Beverly Hills
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $176,000
Buyer: Sam Hassan
Seller: Marilyn A. Nowak
Date: 10/22/18

333 Ohio Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $367,000
Buyer: Wayne D. Fuller
Seller: West Co. Investments LLC
Date: 10/29/18

35 Plateau Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $276,488
Buyer: Wilmington Savings
Seller: William T. Tourville
Date: 11/02/18

6 Saint Andrews Way
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $344,900
Buyer: Mark F. Connor
Seller: Country Club Partners LLC
Date: 10/26/18

141 Sweetfern Dr.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $415,000
Buyer: William B. Morris
Seller: Bassam Mawla
Date: 10/26/18

16 West School St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Jean M. Obedi
Seller: Marco V. Carrillo
Date: 10/31/18

54 Wellfleet Dr.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $130,000
Buyer: West Co. Investments LLC
Seller: Edward E. Johnson
Date: 10/31/18

WESTFIELD

36 Bowdoin St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $234,900
Buyer: Cara A. Merriam
Seller: Brian Boglisch
Date: 10/29/18

9 Breighly Way
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Liliya Yurtuc
Seller: DDLP Development LLC
Date: 10/26/18

15 Brimfield Way
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $515,000
Buyer: Safeguard Credit Counseling
Seller: Christopher A. Viale
Date: 10/31/18

6 Christopher Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $280,000
Buyer: C. U. Bermejo-Arcentales
Seller: Henry G. Tucker
Date: 10/29/18

51 Crescent Circle
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $362,000
Buyer: Thomas M. Bregoli
Seller: Abel M. Soares
Date: 11/02/18

116 Farnham Lane
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: William D. Crawford
Seller: Christine O. Crawford
Date: 10/26/18

8 Foss St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Zachary Howell
Seller: Shaun M. Hedges
Date: 10/31/18

35 Gary Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $405,000
Buyer: Peter J. Fiore
Seller: David B. Novotney
Date: 10/26/18

54 Gladwin Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $254,000
Buyer: Alexandra A. Grzybowski
Seller: Steven A. Brochetti
Date: 10/31/18

73 Llewellyn Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $296,500
Buyer: Jordan Phillips
Seller: Casey, Claire M., (Estate)
Date: 11/01/18

162 Meadow St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $157,500
Buyer: Jason Valles
Seller: Robert Bonneau
Date: 10/31/18

19 Meadowbrook Lane
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $174,824
Buyer: Lakeview Loan Servicing
Seller: James Reagan
Date: 11/01/18

415 North Road
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $900,000
Buyer: 415 North Road LLC
Seller: REG Enterprises Inc.
Date: 11/02/18

87 Old Farm Road
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Jennifer N. Guay
Seller: John McCaughey
Date: 10/25/18

104 Park River Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: David A. Olszewski
Seller: Thelma A. Wilmot
Date: 10/23/18

100 Pequot Point Road
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $159,900
Buyer: James T. Lyle
Seller: Mary D. Johnson
Date: 10/29/18

201 Plum St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $234,000
Buyer: Jillian E. Geer
Seller: Vera Merkulov
Date: 10/22/18

31 Radisson Lane
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $434,000
Buyer: Angelo F. Roselli
Seller: Jeffrey C. Cloud
Date: 11/01/18

6 Saint Paul St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $179,900
Buyer: Heather L. Kane
Seller: Michael R. Wohlers
Date: 10/24/18

32 Simmons Brook Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Jose S. Marquez
Seller: David D. Grenier
Date: 10/26/18

44 Stuart Place
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Susan A. Leavitt
Seller: 44 Stuart Place Land TR
Date: 10/26/18

200 Tannery Road
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $400,000
Buyer: Loren M. Cowhey
Seller: Richard M. Lefebvre
Date: 10/31/18

17 Vincent Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $198,500
Buyer: Michael Lapointe
Seller: Susan M. Pollard
Date: 10/24/18

29 Whispering Wind Road
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $480,000
Buyer: Christopher M. Sarat
Seller: Hairong Wang
Date: 10/30/18

WILBRAHAM

24 Briar Cliff Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $570,000
Buyer: Maria J. Serra
Seller: James H. Pollard
Date: 11/01/18

7 Bungalow Point
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $324,800
Buyer: Justine M. Gliesman
Seller: Richard M. Nunes
Date: 10/31/18

2 Carla Lane
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $415,000
Buyer: Greg W. Lesniak
Seller: Patrick D. Meffen
Date: 11/02/18

14 Decorie Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: Joseph M. Hegarty
Seller: Candy M. Branco
Date: 10/22/18

1 Fairview Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $394,000
Buyer: David H. Geld
Seller: Marc R. Murphy
Date: 10/26/18

30 Glenn Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $241,000
Buyer: Riaz J. Dini
Seller: Said Dini
Date: 11/02/18

593 Main St.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $267,000
Buyer: Matthew D. Wrisley
Seller: Fumi Realty Inc.
Date: 11/02/18

97 Manchonis Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Jin Gao
Seller: Jaime Masse
Date: 11/02/18

3 McIntosh Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $395,000
Buyer: Tanya Vital-Basile
Seller: Michael J. Trimboli
Date: 10/30/18

14 Old Orchard Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $166,000
Buyer: Donald J. Donahue
Seller: Debra L. Tobias
Date: 10/25/18

5 Oldwood Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $287,000
Buyer: Bryant A. Chouinard
Seller: Kathryn O’Connor
Date: 10/25/18

5 Ruth Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $256,000
Buyer: Michael W. Trujillo
Seller: Kathleen Trujillo
Date: 11/01/18

31 Soule Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: Megan L. Brooks
Seller: Jorge F. Teixeira
Date: 10/29/18

396 Stony Hill Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Paul W. Bahlin
Seller: Luke E. Rottman
Date: 10/30/18

820 Tinkham Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $115,000
Buyer: Anuj Dhamija
Seller: US Bank
Date: 11/02/18

HAMPSHIRE COUNTY

AMHERST

120 Blackberry Lane
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $436,000
Buyer: William F. Lindsey
Seller: Carl Mailler
Date: 10/22/18

200-202 College St.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $400,000
Buyer: Bouledogue LLC
Seller: Mill River Fields LLC
Date: 10/22/18

40 Flat Hills Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $280,000
Buyer: Dennis H. Palmer
Seller: William J. Leonard
Date: 10/31/18

90 Glendale Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $335,000
Buyer: G. Srimathveeravalli
Seller: Christina G. Salgo
Date: 10/23/18

334 Lincoln Ave.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $625,000
Buyer: MEK Realty LLC
Seller: Steps LLC
Date: 10/29/18

378 Old Montague Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: Gerald G. Guidera
Seller: Reverse Mortgage Solution
Date: 10/26/18

559 South Pleasant St.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $282,520
Buyer: Phoenix For G. LLC
Seller: Virginia A. Brewer
Date: 10/30/18

266 West Pomeroy Lane
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $435,000
Buyer: Joe Deng
Seller: Richard M. Green
Date: 10/26/18

BELCHERTOWN

295 Bay Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Martin G. Marrero
Seller: George C. Beaver
Date: 10/26/18

74 Clark St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $283,000
Buyer: Megan McPhail
Seller: Jeffrey M. Matthews
Date: 10/31/18

74 Daniel Shays Hwy.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $204,000
Buyer: Dana E. Burton
Seller: Robert L. Hollis
Date: 10/26/18

63 Gold St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Myra A. Iozzo
Seller: Nathaniel W. Roberts
Date: 10/31/18

93 Goodell St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $345,000
Buyer: Eyal Markman
Seller: Cathy A. Belanger
Date: 10/31/18

31 Ludlow St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $497,000
Buyer: Michael Dowling
Seller: Dean A. Mendes
Date: 10/24/18

38 Maplecrest Dr.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $202,000
Buyer: Cody Hancock
Seller: Thomas A. Miranda
Date: 10/26/18

401 Mill Valley Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $449,300
Buyer: Falcon Valley Cold LLC
Seller: Mill Valley Assocs. LLC
Date: 10/24/18

240 Old Enfield Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $310,000
Buyer: Jonathan L. Miller
Seller: Cheryl A. Dowling
Date: 10/24/18

47 Poole Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: Deutsche Bank
Seller: Andres Juarez
Date: 10/30/18

310 State St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Brett M. Brown
Seller: Joseph J. Hanecak
Date: 10/30/18

CHESTERFIELD

89 Bryant St.
Chesterfield, MA 01012
Amount: $180,000
Buyer: Maya T. Greene
Seller: Marra FT
Date: 10/26/18

EASTHAMPTON

59 Campbell Dr.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $375,000
Buyer: Marni R. Treitman
Seller: Leah A. Evans
Date: 10/25/18

20 Center St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $320,000
Buyer: Andrea Moore
Seller: William G. Bradley
Date: 11/01/18

40 Chapin St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $180,000
Buyer: Brooke W. Matuszko
Seller: Donna M. Gulow
Date: 10/31/18

35 Clark St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $289,000
Buyer: Rebecca E. Groveman
Seller: Stacy Waldman
Date: 10/26/18

268 East St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Tobacco Barn LLC
Seller: R. Gene Duda
Date: 10/31/18

15 Ely Ave.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $238,750
Buyer: Dustin R. Christensen
Seller: Eileen J. Demers
Date: 10/23/18

17 Fairfield Ave.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Christopher Thompson
Seller: Richard T. Durant
Date: 10/30/18

60 Highland Ave.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Corey R. Boyle
Seller: David R. Boyle
Date: 10/30/18

58 Holyoke St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $207,000
Buyer: Audrey E. Maney
Seller: Sheila Prosterman RET
Date: 10/29/18

72 Mount Tom Ave.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Leo Ioannou
Seller: Brooke Matuszko
Date: 10/31/18

155 Northampton St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $900,000
Buyer: 155 Northampton Acquisition Partnership
Seller: Peter T. Boruchowski
Date: 10/30/18

54 Oliver St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Richard J. McNeil
Seller: William F. Ziemek
Date: 10/23/18

119 Plain St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Nicole Jeffords
Seller: Laura D. Majowicz
Date: 10/30/18

60 Pomeroy St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $435,000
Buyer: Kathrine I. Nowill TR
Seller: Tim Seney Contracting Inc.
Date: 11/01/18

GOSHEN

34 Fuller Road
Goshen, MA 01032
Amount: $319,000
Buyer: William L. Rowan
Seller: 74 Chestnut St RT
Date: 10/24/18

GRANBY

5 Center St.
Granby, MA 01033
Amount: $404,900
Buyer: Jonathan Ziv
Seller: Jill M. Jarvis-Cloutier
Date: 10/29/18

101 East St.
Granby, MA 01033
Amount: $150,938
Buyer: Citimortgage Inc.
Seller: Christopher M. Mackechnie
Date: 10/25/18

176 Taylor St.
Granby, MA 01033
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Dawn L. Hill
Seller: Kevin P. Godbout
Date: 10/23/18

HADLEY

9 Chmura Road
Hadley, MA 01035
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Lisa L. West
Seller: Sobasko, Robert A., (Estate)
Date: 10/31/18

16 East Commons Dr.
Hadley, MA 01035
Amount: $416,650
Buyer: Juliana T. Kwolek
Seller: East Street Commons LLC
Date: 10/24/18

HATFIELD

176 Linseed Road
Hatfield, MA 01088
Amount: $229,000
Buyer: Benjamin S. Bennett
Seller: MTGLQ Investors LP
Date: 10/30/18

48 Main St.
Hatfield, MA 01038
Amount: $493,214
Buyer: Kathryn M. Chiavaroli
Seller: Peter P. Grandonico
Date: 11/02/18

204-B Straits Road
Hatfield, MA 01038
Amount: $142,500
Buyer: Don E. Matus
Seller: Stephen F. Bruscoe
Date: 10/25/18

HUNTINGTON

50 Littleville Road
Huntington, MA 01050
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Jason Stover
Seller: Raymond Glick
Date: 10/25/18

NORTHAMPTON

33 Avis Circle
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $391,000
Buyer: Lisa Barondes
Seller: Tammy R. Suprenant
Date: 10/26/18

66 Bancroft Road
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $950,000
Buyer: James R. Welch
Seller: John T. Chiavaroli
Date: 10/30/18

69 Chestnut Ave.
Northampton, MA 01053
Amount: $138,000
Buyer: Rebecca L. Shaw
Seller: Beaver Brook NT
Date: 11/02/18

63 Drewsen Dr.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Tammy R. Suprenant
Seller: Helen I. Batura
Date: 10/26/18

25 Gregory Lane
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $271,900
Buyer: Sean P. Leahy
Seller: Karl R. Kowitz
Date: 10/31/18

23 Lexington Ave.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $465,000
Buyer: Hannah Karpman
Seller: Nu-Way Homes Inc.
Date: 11/02/18

47-49 Market St.
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $560,000
Buyer: Market St Northampton
Seller: Northeast Enterprises RLT
Date: 10/25/18

45 Meadow St.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Elizabeth A. Lierman
Seller: Christopher A. Marvelli
Date: 10/30/18

73 Mountain St.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: William A. Carey
Seller: Alice A. Munson LT
Date: 11/01/18

225 State St.
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $360,000
Buyer: State St. Northampton Properties
Seller: Northeast Enterprises RLT
Date: 10/25/18

50 State St.
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $360,000
Buyer: State St. Northampton Properties
Seller: Northeast Enterprises RLT
Date: 10/25/18

67 Water St.
Northampton, MA 01053
Amount: $254,500
Buyer: Anna M. Dolan
Seller: Marguerite Tuperkeizsis
Date: 11/02/18

SOUTH HADLEY

524 Amherst Road
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Emma R. Hartley
Seller: David Sullivan
Date: 11/02/18

34 Ferry St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $330,000
Buyer: Marc D. Rogers
Seller: Scott R. Brough
Date: 10/25/18

152 Ferry St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: Lisa M. Desjarlais
Seller: Raymond F. Blasko
Date: 11/02/18

24-28 Gaylord St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $3,900,000
Buyer: WBCMT 2007-C33 Gaylord St.
Seller: US Industrial Gaylord LP
Date: 10/25/18

28 Judd Ave.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $264,900
Buyer: Charles D. McGrevy
Seller: Patricia M. Dawley
Date: 10/22/18

60 Judd Ave.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $130,000
Buyer: Jason Balut
Seller: Rose M. Manarite
Date: 10/29/18

5 Lamb St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Samuel C. Bernash
Seller: Rui Baltazar
Date: 10/30/18

3 Maple St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $279,900
Buyer: David J. Sullivan
Seller: Pamela I. Strom
Date: 11/02/18

Prospect St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $3,900,000
Buyer: WBCMT 2007-C33 Gaylord St.
Seller: US Industrial Gaylord LP
Date: 10/25/18

94 Richview Ave.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $195,000
Buyer: Suzanne P. Gallagher
Seller: Willie Kangela
Date: 10/22/18

5 Tampa St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Hannah Buckley
Seller: James W. Buckley
Date: 10/23/18

14 Titan Pier Road
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $340,000
Buyer: Kevin Godbout
Seller: Tammi J. Adair
Date: 10/24/18

SOUTHAMPTON

18 Hillside Meadows Dr.
Southampton, MA 01073
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Cornelius J. Shea
Seller: Robbin J. Holt
Date: 10/22/18

107 Pleasant St.
Southampton, MA 01073
Amount: $542,000
Buyer: Philip A. Restaino
Seller: Wayne D. Tangel
Date: 10/29/18

WARE

20 Benham Ave.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $126,000
Buyer: Felicia Demore
Seller: James L. Demore
Date: 10/31/18

24 Berkshire Circle
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $259,900
Buyer: John Wellman
Seller: Corey Tavernier
Date: 10/22/18

132-134 Fisherdick Road
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $119,000
Buyer: Marc A. Courchesne
Seller: Irene Eskett
Date: 10/29/18

123 Glendale Circle
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Darin M. Snow
Seller: Donna Chiarvalle
Date: 11/01/18

41-49 Main St.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: Nath & Karu Enterprises LLC
Seller: Finikas RT
Date: 10/31/18

1 Mechanic St.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $385,000
Buyer: 1 Mechanic LLC
Seller: Patricia Knapp
Date: 10/29/18

28 Mountainview Dr.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Darren H. Palmer
Seller: Kathleen E. Hogan-Soltys
Date: 10/31/18

WILLIAMSBURG

36 Main St.
Williamsburg, MA 01096
Amount: $162,000
Buyer: William R. Graham
Seller: Christopher M. George
Date: 10/23/18

5 North Kellogg Road
Williamsburg, MA 01039
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Jason C. Harder
Seller: Marjorie A. Warriner FT
Date: 11/01/18

WESTHAMPTON

36 Kings Hwy.
Westhampton, MA 01027
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: Kaila L. Snape
Seller: Susan M. Sicard
Date: 10/26/18

105 Main Road
Westhampton, MA 01027
Amount: $374,900
Buyer: Maria T. O’Brien
Seller: Lorna Joly
Date: 10/25/18

56 Southampton Road
Westhampton, MA 01027
Amount: $370,000
Buyer: Thomas Rice
Seller: Mark T. Conroy
Date: 10/31/18

WORTHINGTON

266 Thayer Hill Road
Worthington, MA 01098
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Melissa Thomas
Seller: John Thomas
Date: 10/31/18

Building Permits

Building Permits

The following building permits were issued during the month of November 2018.

CHICOPEE

Mary House of Prayer
200 East Main St.
$9,800 — Install fire-alarm system

U.S. Tsubaki Inc.
106 Lonczak Dr.
$20,000 — Revise existing bathroom to comply with ADA accessibility requirements

DEERFIELD

Arthur Breue
711 Greenfield Road
$51,000 — New framework on top of building and new roof

EASTHAMPTON

F & G, LLC
301 East St.
$1,089 — Seal coat foundation walls

F & G, LLC
385 East St.
$1,159 — Seal coat foundation walls

Kheper, LLC
142 Pleasant St.
$25,890 — Install doors, windows, insulation, drywall, and trim to Suite 103B for Abandoned Building Brewery expansion

EAST LONGMEADOW

International Faith Outreach
93 Meadowbrook Road
$15,850 — Roofing

Secure Energy
515 Shaker Road
$42,000 — Second-floor renovation

Shaker Bowl
168 Shaker Road
$6,000 — Sheet metal

GREENFIELD

Baystate Franklin Medical Center
57 Beacon St.
$8,600 — Roofing

Baystate Franklin Medical Center
164 High St.
$32,073 — Reconstruct exterior of east wall of old surgery building, construct new roof surface over existing air-intake structure

Baystate Franklin Medical Center
164 High St.
$29,222 — Replace existing automatic main entry door

Greenfield Savings Bank
400 Main St.
$75,000 — Supply and install new fire escape

Mackin Construction
37 Butternut St.
$10,000 — Pour concrete pad and place backup generator

Rosenberg Property, LLC
311 Wells St.
$19,000 — Install solar hot-water panels

Stoneleigh-Burnham School
574 Bernardston Road
$6,695 — Strip shingles on horse stable; install synthetic underlayment, shingles, and ridge vent

HADLEY

200 Russell Realty Management, LLC
200 Russell St.
$1,098,824 — Construct dental office building for the Valley Dentist

303 Russell Street, LLC
303 Russell St.
$680,000 — New retail space for Harbor Freight

Michael Horwich
31 East Hadley Road
$33,768 — Install solar panels on roof

W/S Hadley Properties II, LLC
353 Russell St., Building B
$1,734,295 — New construction for mixed retail use

NORTHAMPTON

Atwood Drive, LLC
23 Atwood Dr.
$700,000 — Interior fit-out for Northampton Family Probate Court

Castle Pines, LLC
344 King St.
$365,000 — Renovate exterior, relocate restrooms, and renovate dining area at Burger King

Matt & Nick, LLC
199 Pine St.
$455,017 — Install steel plates to underside of existing main beams, install new channel girts between existing girts

Smith College
7 Neilson Dr.
$47,451,295 — Construct new building for Neilson Library

Trumbull Partners, LLC
6 Trumbull Road
$20,000 — Miscellaneous non-structural repair and maintenance

Village Hill, LLC
11 Village Hill Road
$92,500 — Renovate office space for Hampshire County Sheriff’s Office

SPRINGFIELD

Damascus Holdings, LLC
557 Worthington St.
$327,000 — Alter space on first floor to create four commercial tenant spaces, install fire-protection sprinkler

NHP Springfield Business Trust
215 Bicentennial Highway
$20,000 — Remove three roof-mounted antennas and three remote radio units and install three new antennas, three remote radio units, and two hybrid cables for T-Mobile

WEST SPRINGFIELD

C’Jack Realty Associates, LLP
1127 Riverdale St.
$50,000 — Light gauge framing of new sign backing area and related work

Louis Feliciano
28 New Bridge St.
$24,000 — Repair and rebuild block walls, install roof trusses and roof sheeting

Riverdale Realty
2001 Riverdale St.
$65,340 — Roofing

World Wide Travel
1446 Riverdale St.
$22,975 — Roofing

WILBRAHAM

Association Properties Group
44 East Longmeadow Road
$220,100 — Demolish existing addition, construct new additions

CIL Realty of MA
949 Stony Hill Road
$650,000 — Construct new group home

Melanson Heath Announces Donna Yetter as New Principal

By BusinessWest Staff November 26, 2018

GREENFIELD — Melanson Heath announced the admittance of its new principal, Donna Yetter, CPA, CES. She has been working in public accounting for more than 30 years and is a part of the Commercial Services team out of the Greenfield office.

Yetter joined the Melanson Heath team in 2007 and advises businesses and individuals on tax, management, and other accounting matters. She prepares corporate, partnership, individual, trust, and estate-tax returns; consults on business acquisitions and sales; and performs compilation and review services for financial reporting.

Yetter received her bachelor’s degree in business administration with a concentration in accounting from Salem State University in 1985 and has been a certified public accountant licensed in Massachusetts since 1991. In 2016, she received her CES, (certified estate and trust specialist) designation, which expands her range of services to include estate planning and asset repositioning on behalf of financial-planning clients. She is a member of the Massachusetts Society of CPAs and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

Country Bank Gives Back to Local Veterans

By BusinessWest Staff November 26, 2018