Home 2020 November (Page 3)

Month: November 2020

STCC’s ‘Heart of a Father’ Virtual Event to Examine Relationships

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) will host a virtual event that explores gender stereotypes and healthy relationships on Thursday, Nov. 12 at 2 p.m. Titled “The Heart of a Father,” the Zoom event is free and open to the public. Register and find more information at stcc.io/heart.

Thursday’s event is the second in a three-part series created this fall to engage men in important conversations that impact communities of color as well as provide a space to connect male students with leaders in the community, said Vonetta Lightfoot, Multicultural Affairs operation manager at STCC.

Lightfoot and Cynthia Breunig, Violence Prevention coordinator at STCC, created the series. Thursday’s event will feature a moderated discussion with each panelist followed by a dialogue with the audience.

Some of the panelists in the series include M. Quentin Williams, author, educator, international speaker, former FBI agent, former federal prosecutor, and former NFL and NBA executive; and Kevin Powell, author, activist, writer, and entrepreneur.

The final event in the series, “Black and Blue: A Dialogue on Police Violence and Men of Color,” is scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 3 at 2 p.m.

Employer Confidence Remains Flat During October

By
Daily News

BOSTON — Massachusetts employers remained pessimistic during October amid conflicting signals from the economy and the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Associated Industries of Massachusetts (AIM) Business Confidence Index lost four-tenths of a point to 46.2 last month, up from a low of 38.4 in April but still 14.7 points lower than a year ago. The report was compiled prior to the Nov. 3 presidential election.

Overall business confidence was dampened by darkening views of both the state and national economies. The confidence reading for the Massachusetts economy has tumbled 24.9 points during the past 12 months.

The report comes a week after MassBenchmarks reported that the Massachusetts economy grew at a record 37.7% clip during the third quarter, regaining some of the ground it lost when the Commonwealth imposed a broad lockdown during the early months of the pandemic. But the specter of lockdowns also reappeared in October as the U.S. hit a daily global record with 100,000 new COVID-19 cases.

“Massachusetts companies in many sectors have continued to generate products and services through the ups and downs of the pandemic. But they realize that surging caseloads and the expiration of federal stimulus will slow the economy again as we move into the fourth quarter,” said Raymond Torto, professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and chair of the AIM Board of Economic Advisors (BEA).

One participant in the confidence survey noted that “there is a big divide between growth industries and industries such as travel and tourism, which continue to suffer.”

The AIM Index, based on a survey of more than 140 Massachusetts employers, has appeared monthly since July 1991. It is calculated on a 100-point scale, with 50 as neutral; a reading above 50 is positive, while below 50 is negative.

The constituent indicators that make up the Index were mixed during October. Employer confidence in their own companies rose slightly to 49.3, nearly 10 points lower than in October 2019. The Massachusetts Index assessing business conditions within the Commonwealth lost 1.2 points to 42.9, while the U.S. Index measuring conditions nationally declined 2.4 points to 40.2.

The Current Index, which assesses overall business conditions at the time of the survey, was essentially flat at 44.0. The Future Index, measuring expectations for six months out, fell 1.8 points to 48.4.

The Employment Index increased 0.9 points to 49.5, just short of optimistic territory. Despite the COVID-driven economic downturn, many employers continue to report challenges with hiring skilled workers.

Small companies (46.6) were slightly more bullish than medium-sized companies (46.2) and large companies (45.8). Non-manufacturers (47.0) were more bullish than manufacturing companies (45.5).

Barry Bluestone, retired professor of Public Policy and Urban Affairs at Northeastern University, noted that the economy continues to be whipsawed by seemingly contradictory trends.

“More than 60,000 renter households in Massachusetts currently face the prospect of eviction, while, at the same time, the average price of a single-family home in Massachusetts surged 19.5% during September,” Bluestone said. “It mirrors what we see in the overall economy, where there is a clear disparity by industry in the consequences of the economic downturn.”

AIM President and CEO John Regan, also a BEA member, said the ability of Massachusetts to moderate the spread of COVID without repeating the devastating spring lockdown is essential to maintaining positive economic momentum.

“Hundreds of thousands of our friends and neighbors remain out of work, staring at bleak prospects during what is shaping up to be a long winter,” he noted, adding that the employers who make up AIM’s reopening task force, many of whom have operated as essential businesses throughout the pandemic, “continue to work closely with the Baker administration to ensure that the Commonwealth is able to balance public health and safety with economic survival.”

Bacon Wilson Welcomes Joshua Woods as New Associate

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Bacon Wilson announced that attorney Joshua Woods has joined the firm. Woods is an associate and a member of the firm’s business and commercial law team, and is licensed in both Massachusetts and Connecticut.

Prior to joining Bacon Wilson, Woods practiced law in Hartford, Conn. and also in the Boston area, where he handled a wide variety of business matters including all aspects of corporate formation, franchising, joint ventures, leasing, and business and commercial litigation. He attended Western New England University School of Law, earning his juris doctor in 2017, and earned a BBA from Hofstra University in 2013. He will practice primarily from Bacon Wilson’s office in Springfield, working with clients throughout Massachusetts and Connecticut.

SkinCatering Celebrates 10th Anniversary with Expansion to New Location

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — SkinCatering, LLC, an all-natural skin-care brand, announced its 10th anniversary on Nov. 10. After catering to the health and well-being of busy clients for the past decade, the company is expanding to a new location in Tower Square and offering a VIP contest.

SkinCatering, a local, women-owned business, produces its own line of clean beauty skin care, in addition to offering a variety of high-end spa services. It uses high-quality ingredients to provide effective, cruelty-free treatments and products without the use of harmful chemicals. Everything is formulated and manufactured by the SkinCatering team to monitor every ingredient, catering to those with sensitive skin or allergies, and products are offered for retail, boutique wholesale, and private label.

Leanne Sedlak founded SkinCatering in 2010, offering mobile relaxation to busy professionals in their homes. In 2012, licensed aesthetician Kim Brunton-Auger joined the company and has played a significant role in the growth of the business, now serving as vice president of skin-care development.

They opened a space in Tower Square in downtown Springfield in November 2013 and have grown the business significantly over the years. Now in need of a larger space, they are expanding to include a salon and nail services and will be hosting a VIP grand-opening event at the end of the year. Ten winners of SkinCatering’s VIP contest will be awarded tickets to SkinCatering’s exclusive VIP grand opening of the new location inside Tower Square, on the same floor as the new White Lion Brewery & Taproom. ​Click here to enter the contest.

“We have been working on this project for almost two years, so to see it finally realized and ready to open is a great feeling of accomplishment, especially in the middle of a pandemic,” Sedlak said.

Contest winners will tour the spa, receive a goodie bag filled with SkinCatering products and discounts, and enjoy champagne, refreshments, a charcuterie board, and petit fours.

“We are so happy to be committed to my hometown — Springfield, Massachusetts — for the next 10 years,” Brunton-Auger said. “We can’t wait to gift our loyal clients and VIPs and introduce them to our new space.”

STCC Announces Virtual Open House on Dec. 8

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) will hold a virtual open house on Tuesday, Dec. 8 from 4 to 4:45 p.m., allowing anyone interested in becoming a student to meet with representatives from the college’s degree and certificate programs and departments.

To register for the Zoom virtual event, visit stcc.edu/apply/open-house.

The online event, which is free and open to the public, is an opportunity for prospective students to learn more about what the college has to offer, including the most affordable associate-degree and certificate programs in Springfield, transfer opportunities, academic advising, financial aid, online learning, and disability services.

Dean of Admissions Louisa Davis-Freeman said people can drop in for a short time or stay online for the full hour.

“We were pleased with how our first virtual open house went this fall at STCC,” she said. “It’s easy to register in advance and then log in to Zoom and join us. It’s a convenient way to get information. If you can’t make it to the Open House, but are still interested in applying for classes, visit stcc.edu/apply or give us a call at (413) 755-3333. We will be happy to answer your questions and help you apply.”

Food Bank Responds to Rising Need Fueled by the Pandemic

By
Andrew Morehouse stands in the warehouse at the Food Bank’s complex in Hatfield.
Coronavirus Features Special Coverage

Tightening the Safety Net

 

Andrew Morehouse stands in the warehouse at the Food Bank’s complex in Hatfield.

Andrew Morehouse stands in the warehouse at the Food Bank’s complex in Hatfield.

As Andrew Morehouse conducted his tour of the facilities at the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, the sights and sounds helped tell the story that is emerging at this agency — and within this region — at a critical time.

The first thing to notice was the copious amounts of food of all kinds — from sweet potatoes in huge bins to hundreds of cases of canned tuna — now stored at the complex in Hatfield and in other locations as well, destined for local meal sites and food pantries. Indeed, the Food Bank is “over capacity,” as Morehouse, its executive director, put it, because of the soaring numbers of people who are now facing food insecurity in the wake of the pandemic, and the way government agencies, businesses, and individuals have responded to those numbers.

This capacity issue was clearly in evidence, with pallets of food stacked not only on the shelves and the floor space of the warehouse, but in the hallways leading to it as well.

“The warehouse is jam-packed; we’re storing food off site, and we’re moving it faster,” he explained. “We’ve brought on additional staff, we’ve purchased another van, we’re about to purchase another truck so we can move food as quickly as possible. The pandemic has put us over the top in a big way, so we’re looking at options for expansion.”

As for the sounds … well, the Food Bank was mostly quiet at the hour of this visit — late morning, approaching noon — but the few workers on the floor were talking about what they witnessed in the parking lot of Central High School in Springfield, where a drive-thru food-distribution site, supported in part by the Food Bank, has been established. The staffers were talking about long lines of vehicles, and how this has become a constant, or a new norm, with this initiative.

“The warehouse is jam-packed; we’re storing food off site, and we’re moving it faster. We’ve brought on additional staff, we’ve purchased another van, we’re about to purchase another truck so we can move food as quickly as possible. The pandemic has put us over the top in a big way, so we’re looking at options for expansion.”

Meanwhile, fewer people are working at the Hatfield facility, with many more working remotely because of the pandemic, and a host of safety protocols in place to keep those who do come in — and the public in general — safe.

In many ways, the Food Bank — and the hundreds of sites it serves — has become one of the enduring symbols of this pandemic locally. Indeed, just as the bread lines of the mid-1930s became an indelible image that came to represent the Great Depression, the long lines of motorists picking up food — it can no longer be distributed indoors — have come to symbolize this pandemic.

And as fall continues and winter approaches, need is only expected to grow, said Morehouse, who cited projections from Feeding America showing that, by year’s end, an estimated one in six residents in Western Mass. (perhaps 127,000 people) will be experiencing food insecurity, as opposed to one in 10 before the pandemic began, and one in four children. That would be a 40% increase in the number of people overall, and a more than 60% increase in the number of children.

In many ways, such numbers help tell this story. During the fiscal year that just ended Sept. 30, the Food Bank distributed 14.8 million pounds, or the equivalent of 12 million meals — a 23% increase over the previous year, compared to an average 6% increase year over year. Meanwhile, over the past seven months, the increase has been roughly 30% (from 7.3 million pounds to 9.5 million), much higher than the annual increase, obviously, because of the direct impact of the pandemic, and the highest seven-month spike in the agency’s 38-year history.

Behind the numbers, though, is the inspiring story of how the region and its business community have responded to the crisis, said Morehouse, adding that this response was quick and profound, and it is ongoing.

Sweet potatoes from local farms

Sweet potatoes from local farms are among the many items jamming the shelves and floor space at the Food Bank, which is over capacity due to spiking need.

The biggest question concerns what comes next, and it’s one that’s hard to answer, he noted, adding that many factors will go into determining where these numbers go in the weeks and months to come.

For this issue, BusinessWest talked at length with Morehouse about the mounting problem of food insecurity in the wake of the pandemic and how his agency has responded. Overall, he said this response “is how the safety net is supposed to work.”

Elaborating, he noted that the Food Bank has been able to meet soaring need because federal and state agencies have stepped up and put more food into the system, but also because the region has stepped up as well.

 

Food for Thought

As he talked about what has transpired since March, when the pandemic arrived in Western Mass., Morehouse said it’s been a period of adjustment — for area residents, for his agency, and even for area farms.

For many, the pandemic left them unemployed or in a position where they were earning less — although generous unemployment benefits certainly helped large numbers of people impacted by the downturn in the economy. But those unemployment benefits also had the unintended consequence of leaving individuals ineligible for SNAP (Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program) benefits, creating a different kind of problem.

For the Food Bank, the first several weeks of the pandemic were chaotic, he said, as the agency mounted a response to what was happening — but had to do so in the middle of a health crisis.

“There was a lot of uncertainty about how to protect oneself from COVID-19, and suddenly, so many people lost their jobs or were furloughed,” he explained. “There was an outpouring of concern, of wanting to help, from people who don’t know that an emergency food network exists. So we were fielding calls from community groups from all across Western Massachusetts, saying, ‘we want to bring food to the Food Bank,’ or ‘how can we support you?’

“And it took a while for us to connect people to the pantries and meal sites in their communities as a way to support households that were at risk of hunger, because that’s who we work with,” he went on. “We don’t receive individuals who are in need of food assistance at our warehouse, and we don’t deliver food to households; we work through the existing network of about 165 independent pantries and meal sites, plus our own distribution programs to 51 senior centers every month, and on our mobile food bank, which has 26 distribution sites across all four counties on a biweekly or monthly basis.”

When asked how the Food Bank responded to that 30% spike over the past seven months, Morehouse replied with a quick “it wasn’t easy,” before elaborating.

Pallets of food destined for area meal sites and pantries

Pallets of food destined for area meal sites and pantries spills out into the hallways at the Food Bank, clear evidence of soaring need in the region.

“It took us a while to catch up, I’ll be honest,” he told BusinessWest, noting that there were a number of challenges to overcome, starting with disruption to what he called the “supply chain,” meaning donations of food to the agency from individuals and also, and especially, area supermarkets.

“There was a run on those supermarkets, so it was a significant hit,” he recalled, adding that roughly half the food distributed by the agency comes from the private food industry in the form of dry goods, produce, and close to 1 million pounds of meats frozen on the sell-by date.

Beyond this disruption to the supply chain, the Food Bank was impacted by shortages of staff and a loss of many of its distribution sites; several of them closed, including all brown-bag sites for elders and many mobile locations.

Slowly, over time, those sites reopened, while also changing how food was distributed, he noted, adding that as, the spring progressed, the Food Bank adapted to what became a new normal, both in terms of how it operated and with the numbers of people now facing food insecurity.

Indeed, over the period from March to August, the latest information available, the average number of individuals served each month grew to 107,000, Morehouse said, adding that 20,000 of those, or 19%, are people who have never come to a pantry or meal site.

And that percentage of new visitors was much higher, perhaps 40%, in the early weeks of the pandemic, when the layoffs and furloughs started climbing, and before those generous unemployment benefits kicked in. The numbers then leveled off for a time, but they started climbing again, he went on, adding that, when the new six-month numbers come out, the total people being served should far surpass that 107,000 figure.

 

Numbers to Chew On

Behind the numbers is the story of how this rising demand has been met with the help of a number of contributing sources — that safety net Morehouse described earlier.

These include the federal government, state agencies, area businesses, and philanthropic efforts like Jeff Bezos’ $100 million gift to Feeding America’s COVID-19 Response Fund.

“The federal government has stepped up — we’ve received considerably more federal food,” he explained, referring specifically to CARES Act appropriations that enable such agencies to buy more food. “And there was an outpouring of support from individuals, businesses, and regional and state foundations, as well as from Feeding America, the national network of food banks.”

The agency has also received more than $400,000, with another $123,000 coming, from the Massachusetts COVID Relief Fund, he went on, adding that a number of individual businesses, including Big Y and the Antonocci Family Foundation, have made sizable donations as well.

Part of the federal government’s response has come in the form of Farmers to Families Food Boxes, a new program through which the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service is partnering with national, regional, and local distributors, whose workforces have been significantly impacted by the closure of restaurants, hotels, and other food-service businesses, to purchase up to $4.5 billion in fresh produce, dairy, and meat products from American producers of all sizes.

Mapleline Farm in Hadley is one of several local farms in the region that have adjusted with the pandemic, now supplying the Food Bank with milk in family-sized packaging.

This program supplies boxes of fresh fruits and vegetables, dairy products, and meat products, which distributors package into family-sized boxes, then transport them to food banks, community and faith-based organizations, and other nonprofits serving Americans in need.

The program has benefited several area farms, said Morehouse, noting that those supplying the boxes are purchasing products from many area farmers who were severely impacted by their inability to sell to restaurants, colleges, and universities closed by the pandemic.

“It took a while for some of these farms to adapt, but many of them have,” he said, citing, as one example, Mapleline Farm in Hadley, a dairy farm whose name and logo were on countless boxes of quart containers of milk in the Food Bank’s warehouse.

As for the future, Morehouse said the contributions that have poured in from individuals and businesses have left the organization in a solid position financially for this current fiscal year, one in which overall need is expected to continue growing, while the economy is projected to continue struggling.

Meanwhile, question marks remain about the ongoing level of support from state and federal governments, as well as from individual contributors, he said, citing the potential for donor fatigue as the pandemic wears on.

“The state is operating on a month-to-month budget, so we’re not even sure if we’re going to be level-funded for a program that we’ve come to rely on for 30% of our food since 1992,” he told BusinessWest. “And the federal government has not passed another stimulus package, so we’re anticipating a decline in federal support.

“We have a jigsaw puzzle of public and private emergency food resources that rely of federal and state funding and private charitable support,” he went on. “We rely on all those sources of support to get the food we need and the resources we need to keep operations afloat.”

One of the important pieces of that puzzle is Monte’s March, the fundraising walk from Springfield to Greenfield that was launched by radio personality Monte Belmonte to benefit the Food Bank. Belmonte has seen the ranks of people joining him on his late-November trek grow steadily over the years, as well as the amount raised for the agency, but that first trend won’t continue this year, as the pandemic is forcing organizers to encourage individuals to support the march remotely — although the top-performing teams when it comes to generating donations will be able to march.

But, given the urgent need for support, they are hoping the second trend will continue. The goal for this year has been raised from the $333,000 mark set last year — each dollar donated buys three meals, so the goal was to fund 1 million meals — to $365,000, or $1,000 a day, or 4,000 meals a day (one dollar now buys four meals, due to greater efficiency).

 

Hard to Digest

Looking at the projections from Feeding America for the next several months, the ones predicting that one in six area residents will be food-insecure, Morehouse had his doubts initially about whether things would really get that bad here.

But now, he’s thinking they may be realistic — painfully realistic, to be more precise — especially when one ponders the unanswerable questions concerning when the pandemic will subside and to what degree the federal government will keep on printing money.

One thing Morehouse does know is that the Food Bank will continue to pivot and respond proactively to the ongoing crisis — right down to finding more warehouse space.

 

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

Western Mass. Offers Plenty of Gift-giving Options

By
Holiday Gift Guide Special Coverage

Shopping Local

Do you have Amazon fatigue, or just want to support some great local shops? Thankfully, Western Mass. provides myriad gift-giving options this holiday season, all of which support the region’s business owners during an especially difficult year. On the following pages are just a few suggestions. COVID-19 has altered the experience at many businesses, so check the websites for hours, operations, and how to purchase and enjoy their products and experiences. Gift cards are available from most. Happy holidays!

 

The Artisan Gallery

162 Main St., Northampton

(413) 586-1942; www.theartisangallery.com

After 36 years in business, the Artisan Gallery is closing in January, but should have plenty of eclectic items in stock before the holidays. Its collection includes handmade ceramics, creative clothing, a fun children’s section, unique accessories, and jewelry, and features artists who reside and work in the Pioneer Valley and the hills that surround it.

Black Birch Vineyard

155 Glendale Road, Southampton

(413) 527-0164; blackbirchvineyard.com

One of several wineries in Western Mass. that offer vineyard tours, Black Birch — whose owners call the vineyard “a family that moves wine and the nuanced process of creating it” — provides a number of gift-giving opportunities, from wine-tasting events to enrollment in a wine club that includes 12 seasonal bottles throughout the year at a 15% discount.

 

Catamount Mountain Resort

78 Catamount Road, Hillsdale, N.Y.

(518) 325-3200; www.catamountski.com

Catamount offers some of the most varied ski terrain in Southern New England. Family-oriented, close to both Great Barrington and the Hudson Valley, Catamount is oriented towards all skier types, and has expanded its menu of year-round offerings with the 2019 addition of the Catamount Zip Tour, featuring the longest zipline in the U.S. at 5,523 feet.

 

Cooper’s Gifts

161 Main St., Agawam

(413) 786-7760; coopersgifts.com

Cooper’s is not just a store — it’s a destination,” shopkeeper Kate Gourde has said, calling her facility a shopper’s oasis featuring trendy clothing, window fashions, distinctive home furnishings, and exquisite gifts. “We are serious about style, yet you will find this shop unpredictable, quirky, and alluring. We want to be something exciting and new every time you visit.”

 

Front Porch Charcuterie

29 Evergreen Road, Vernon, Conn.

(860) 916-1658; www.frontporchcharcuterie.com

Front Porch gathers cheeses, produce, and honey from local farms, farmers’ markets and shops to provide customers with fresh local specialties, including charcuterie boards, trays, and boxes of different sizes for myriad occasions. “I hope we take what we have learned from this pandemic and make family and friends our priority,” its owner, Michele Martinez, says. “I am here to help you make your gatherings special.”

 

Granny’s Baking Table

309 Bridge St., Springfield

(413) 333-4828; www.grannysbakingtable.com

Proprietors Sonya Yelder and Todd Crosset say their mission is to create a space and products that harken to simpler times, when baking was from scratch and the table was for gathering and conversation. The bakery combines two baking traditions: American South and Northen European, with a singular commitment to authentic small-batch baking.

 

Hope & Olive

44 Hope St., Greenfield

(413) 774-3150; hopeandolive.com

Hope & Olive’s owners, siblings Jim and Maggie Zaccara and Evelyn Wulfkuhle, call their establishment an “everyday-special restaurant” that sources much of its menu with nearby farm products. “We serve inspired cocktails, have an eclectic by-the-glass wine menu, and 12 great beers on tap. We invite you to come and have lunch, brunch, dinner, or maybe just drinks, snacks, or a housemade dessert.”

 

Michael Szwed Jewelers

807 Williams St., Longmeadow

(413) 567-7977; michaelszwedjewelers.com

As a master IJO (Independent Jewelers Organization) jeweler, Michael Szwed Jewelers keeps up with the latest fashions and trends in fine jewelry and every other aspect of the industry, including innovative technologies. As a result, the owner notes, “we are able to offer the finest diamonds in the world at the best value.” The website features a searchable catalog.

 

Jackson & Connor

150 Main St., Northampton

(413) 586-4636; www.jacksonandconnor.com

This small, unique menswear specialty shop offers a selection of eye-catching goods, from stylish suits to cozy sweatpants, ties, T-shirts, socks, vests, sport coats, accessories, shoes, hats, jewelry, care products, colognes, and more. The store also provides full tailoring services, and frequently tracks down hard-to-find items for customers through special and custom orders.

 

Odyssey Bookshop

9 College St, South Hadley

(413) 534-7307; odysseybks.com

Over its 57-year history, Odyssey Bookshop has earned a reputation as an eclectic spot to look for books, and also also features a full-service website for ordering. In addition, according to its website, “we strive to provide a hospitable and nurturing environment to encourage the healthy exchange of ideas by hosting numerous readings, book groups, panel presentations, and online discussions.”

 

Off the Beam Woodworking

www.offthebeamwoodworking.com

Local artist (and full-time nurse) Sheri Lee handcrafts unique woodworking pieces, including cheese and serving boards, picture frames, cribbage boards, knife racks, and lanterns from domestic and exotic woods — and all proceeds are donated to a number of nonprofit organizations on Cape Cod that work to preserve, educate, and foster conservation.

 

Pioneer Valley Food Tours

www.pioneervalleyfoodtours.com

This enterprise creates walking food tours that explore local flavors from Northampton and around the region. It also creates gift boxes sourced from the unique natural resources of the region’s fields and farms, as well as Pioneer Valley picnic baskets of selections ready to bring on an outdoor adventure. Choose a pre-set tour itinerary, or create a custom tour to suit your tastes.

 

Pioneer Valley Indoor Karting

10 West St., West Hatfield

(413) 446-7845; pioneervalleykarting.com

The 1,000-foot track at Pioneer Valley Indoor Karting is capable of racing up to eight karts at once, with the fastest on-track speeds in Massachusetts, featuring a combination of straightaways designed for speed and sweeping corners for technical driving that will challenge everyone from beginners to experts. The track is equipped with a state-of-the-art timing system to record the individual lap times of each kart.

 

Renew.Calm

160 Baldwin St., West Springfield

(413) 737-6223; renewcalm.com

For the past two decades, Renew.Calm has offered an array of both medically based and luxurious spa treatments, with services including skin care, therapeutic massage, nail care, body treatments, yoga, hair removal, makeup, and lashes. The 4,000-square-foot facility also hosts educational events, fitness classes, and more. Multi-treatment packages make great gifts.

 

Ski Butternut

380 State Road, Great Barrington

(413) 528-2000; www.skibutternut.com

Skiing and snowboarding definitely make those New England winters more tolerable. This family-oriented ski area in Great Barrington provides 110 acres of skiing spread across 22 trails. If you are shopping for someone who loves the outdoors, a gift certificate to Ski Butternut may open the doors to a new passion. If they’re already hooked on skiing, a lift ticket may be most appreciated.

 

SkinCatering

1500 Main St., Suite 220, Springfield

(413) 282-8772; skincatering.com

SkinCatering offers a release from the hectic holidays — and, let’s be honest, from the stress of 2020 in general — so an extra-special, very personal gift may be just what the doctor ordered. Pamper someone special with a massage, facial treatment, spa and sauna package, or any number of other options. Membership packages are available at several different levels.

 

Tea Guys

110 Christian Lane, Whately

(413) 303-0137; www.teaguys.com

It all begins with hand-blended tea recipes, crafted in small batches daily in the humble tea factory built out of an old train station in Whately. This local success story offers loose tea, 100% plant-based tea bags, matcha (both pure and flavored, mixed in house), tea concentrates, and now sparkling teas — more than 100 tea varieties in all.

 

The Toy Box

201 North Pleasant St., Amherst

(413) 256-8697; www.facebook.com/thetoyboxamherst

The Toy Box is “the family fun store of Amherst,” encouraging kids and adults to play and explore. “Parents are being required to stay home and work and be parents at the same time,” owner Liz Rosenberg recently said about doing business during a pandemic. “That’s a challenge beyond all challenges. To be able to assist with that … that’s my job. I’m lucky to be in a position where I can bring some joy.”

 

WEBS

75 Service Center Road, Northampton

(800) 367-9327; yarn.com

A second-generation, family-owned business, WEBS, has been a destination for knitters, weavers, and spinners for more than 40 years. This Western Mass. mainstay with a national reach is known as America’s Yarn Store for a reason, with a 21,000-square-foot retail store, a robust online presence, as well as comprehensive classes and events for all skill levels.

 

Westfield Homeless Cat Project

1124 East Mountain Road, Westfield

(413) 568-6964; www.facebook.com/westfieldhomelesscatprojectadoptions

The Foundation for TJO Animals

66 Industry Ave., Suite 3, Springfield, MA 01104

(413) 306-5161; www.tjofoundation.org

 

Instead of buying someone a gift, why not make a donation in their name to an animal-welfare nonprofit? The Westfield Homeless Cat Project is a no-kill cat rescue completely staffed by volunteers. It does not discriminate against age or illness provided that vet care is manageable. Meanwhile, the Foundation for TJO Animals provides financial assistance and veterinary care for the animals at the Thomas J. O’Connor Animal Control and Adoption Center, which serves the cities of Springfield, Holyoke, and Chicopee.

Even Amid a Pandemic, Healthcare Continues to Evolve

By
Coronavirus Health Care Special Coverage

Forward Thinking

A rundown of the big issues facing healthcare 20 years ago would, in some ways, be similar to the same list today, encompassing persistent challenges like hospital finances, staffing shortages in certain specialties, strategies to tackle substance abuse, and diseases like cancer and Alzheimer’s.

Yet, the solutions to those issues have certainly evolved. For example, hospitals have seen a dramatic shift to accountable care, a model in which disparate providers work together and are paid for patient outcomes, not how many procedures they order up. And patients are increasingly active participants in their own care, as are senior-living residents and their families.

Technology has exploded as well over the past two decades, from robotic and minimally invasive surgery to increasingly targeted cancer treatments and rapid advances in prosthetics — not to mention the IT revolution, and the shift to electronic health records, patient portals, and, of course, everyone’s favorite pandemic-driven technology, telemedicine, which, most doctors agree, will continue to play a key role post-COVID-19.

Education has expanded as well. Stroke survival rates are higher these days, partly because people better understand the signs, and so are cancer survival rates, with the public more aware of the importance of screening. In fact, one huge story over the past 20 years has been the rise of preventive wellness and patient education — and keeping people out of the hospital as much as possible.

So, yes, many decades-old concerns of patients remain key concerns in 2020 (along with that whole pandemic thing that has dominated this unusual year). But the way we tackle those issues — with new ideas, new technology, and new facilities — is dramatically different.

To better paint that picture, we asked area health leaders what the next 20 years might hold in the areas of hospital administration, behavioral health, cancer care, and health education. On the following pages are their intriguing perspectives.

What’s Next for Hospitals

What’s Next in Behavioral Health

What’s Next in Cancer Care

What’s Next in Health Education

Writer’s Novels Will Chronicle Generations of Service in the Marines

By
Tom Hebert says his second novel is almost fully researched and one-quarter written
Features Special Coverage

A ‘Family Business’

Tom Hebert says his novels are a way of paying back the Marine Corps for all it has given him.

Tom Hebert says his novels are a way of paying back the Marine Corps for all it has given him.

The story sounds like some of the fiction that Tom Hebert now devotes much of his non-working time to writing.

But it’s not.

Flashing back to when he was in high school, Hebert said he and his father, William, were having a talk about what he might do with his life, career-wise. The elder Hebert had just used his last match to light a cigarette, and after doing so, he noticed the ad on the back of the matchbook: ‘Become a CPA.’

“He handed me the matchbook cover, and I said, ‘OK, I’ll look into it,’ said Hebert, who would earn a degree in accounting at American International College. Eventually, he would join what was then one of the ‘Big 8’ accounting firms, Lybrand, Ross Bros. & Montgomery, and subsequently work in a number of other settings in Connecticut and Massachusetts, including Cambridge Credit Counseling, which he currently serves as chief financial officer.

“Discipline and leadership … that’s what I took away from the Marines. It shows in the respect I have for people, including the people who work for me — treating them well, treating them with respect.”

But while the saga of how he wound up in financial services is intriguing and makes for good reading, Herbert’s story is largely about what else he’s done with his life, starting with his time in the Marine Corps, which included a stint in Vietnam in 1970, as that conflict was beginning to wind down in many ways (much more on that later).

More recently, a second career has emerged: writing fiction, specifically about Marines. His first book, The Remains of the Corps, Volume I: Ivy & the Crossing, which he authored under the pseudonym Will Remain (with Remain being an anagram of Marine), came out early this year.

Covering the period from 1899 to 1917, several months before the U.S. entered World War I, it tells the story of Kenneth Remain (Will’s grandfather, who was born in Worcester and educated at Harvard), and the love triangle he enters along with Harvard classmate Lawrence Blakeslee and the “beautiful KatyKay Mulcahy.” The reader is also introduced to the 57 enlisted men of the fictional Fourth Platoon of the 87th Company of the true-to-life Third Battalion of the Sixth Marine Regiment.

“These gentlemen would have used a very large vocabulary, and I had to develop my vocabulary tremendously to have it fit for these two gentlemen .”

“When Kenneth takes KatyKay away from Lawrence, it creates problems between the two families that last for decades,” Hebert said, describing the plotline for the first book and those that will follow. “There’s this interaction between the two families that will last right up ’til the Vietnam War.”

The book is selling fairly well, but Hebert admits to not yet reaching the ‘break-even’ point that all self-publishers aspire to. Originally in hardcover, there’s now a paperback version of Remains of the Corps, as well as an e-book, and an audiobook will soon follow.

A second book is in progress, one that will take the story into the battlefields of France in World War I, with subsequent volumes covering the 1920s and ’30s. Eventually, his fictional characters will fight in World War II, which his father did, having taken part in the epic battle on Iwo Jima.

His father’s service — and his own — helped inspire the books, said Hebert, who told BusinessWest his writing is a way to give back to the Marine Corps, which he said gave him so much.

When asked what, specifically, he said the Corps gave him discipline, something he’s called on in all facets of his intriguing life, as well as some moments he won’t forget.

“Discipline and leadership … that’s what I took away from the Marines,” he explained. “It shows in the respect I have for people, including the people who work for me — treating them well, treating them with respect.”

Thus, Hebert’s saga represents the perfect Veteran’s Day story for this business publication: it’s a tale of military service and a family’s devotion to the Marine Corps, but also one about business — the one Hebert joined with some help from that matchbook cover, as well as the one he’s in now — and the challenging world of publishing.

 

The Write Stuff

“That’s the final straw!” Kenneth Remain said angrily, as he sat down heavily at a table in Jimmy’s Lunch. The melting snow on the brim of his boater and the shoulders of his benny testified to the fact that a sockdologer of a storm had clobbered Boston, an affront to the spring solstice of two days hence; though waning, the storm had not breathed its last.

Those are the first lines of The Remains of the Corps, Volume I: Ivy & the Crossing, and they provide not only a glimpse of Hebert’s mostly self-taught writing style, but also the immense amount of research that goes into writing a book set more than a century ago.

Tom Hebert says his second novel is almost fully researched and one-quarter written

Tom Hebert says his second novel is almost fully researched and one-quarter written. He plans six volumes in all to tell the story of the Remains.

Indeed, before he could pen a story set in 1917, Hebert said he needed to know the vocabulary of 1917 — specifically the vocabulary used by people attending Harvard, hence words like ‘boater,’ a type of straw hat; ‘benny,’ a greatcoat; and ‘sockdologer,’ a synonym for any word connoting ‘whopper’ or ‘defining.’

“People talked much more formally back then — they used the king’s English,” he explained. “These gentlemen would have used a very large vocabulary, and I had to develop my vocabulary tremendously to have it fit for these two gentlemen.

“Any time my wife and I were out at bookstores and flea markets, I would pick up books on vocabulary, idioms, and more,” he went on. “And as part of my training, I went through those books and selected words, phrases, thoughts, and philosophies, and I would say, ‘I could use this in one of my books.’”

Several years of research and work learning how to write fiction went into The Remains of the Corps, Volume 1, said Herbert, noting, again, that his decision to dive into what he expects will become a six-book set was inspired by the service of his own family and a firm desire to give something back to the Corps.

With that, we’ll do what fiction writers often do: we’ll flash back — first to 1945, when William Hebert was ending his lengthy tour of duty with the Marines. He enlisted just after Pearl Harbor and served throughout the war — and even after it ended, as part of the peacekeeping force in Japan. Upon returning home, he built a house in Chicopee and went to work as a pressman for Springfield Newspapers, retiring at age 62.

“I work partly because I enjoy working — I thoroughly enjoy my position here. But also because it enables me to fund the things that I want to do in life — one of which is writing.”

Hebert said his father, like many who fought in World War II, didn’t talk much about his service. “But he was always singing the Marine Corps hymn when I was a boy,” Tom recalled, adding that, while his father never pushed him to join the service or that specific branch, he found himself signing up.

That was in May 1968, just a few months after the Tet Offensive, when the Vietnam War was in some ways at its height. Hebert had just earned that accounting degree at AIC, and attended Office Training School for 10 weeks, and then another five months at a specialty school for officers.

His military occupational specialty was to be a tank officer, so he then went to Camp Pendleton in California for two months. Around that same time, he got married and was told he could spend another 18 months in California.

Tom Hebert began his service in Vietnam a few months after the Tet Offensive

Tom Hebert began his service in Vietnam a few months after the Tet Offensive in 1968, when the conflict was at its height.

But there was a quick change in plans, as he and several other tank officers were told there was an urgent need for their services in Vietnam.

“When we arrived at First Marine Division and met with the personnel officer, he said, ‘I don’t know why they sent you all here — I have three times as many tank officers as I need,’” he recalled. “That’s typical of the military, and my father had warned me about the bureaucratic aspects of being in the service.”

With his background in accounting, Hebert was eventually sent to the Central Service Agency, essentially a supply position — and wasn’t too happy with that assignment.

“After being there a short time, I went to the personnel officer and said, ‘I can’t do this — my father was in the Marines, he served at Iwo Jima … this is not why I joined,” he recalled. “He kicked me out of his office and said, ‘you’ll go where you’re told.’”

So he spent a year in Da Nang as — in the language of that time — an REMF, which stands for rear echelon mother… well, you can fill in the rest. Or, as they also said, ‘in the rear with the gear.’

Still, that time gave him a deep appreciation of the Corps and some valuable life lessons about leadership and teamwork.

When he came back home, he had a case of what was and still is known as ‘survivor guilt,’ which prompted him to publish a Vietnam War newsletter and also sell books through what was known as the Vietnam Book Store, a mostly mail-order operation.

 

Turning the Page

Longing to do more, Hebert eventually settled on the idea of writing about fictional Marines, but with art imitating life in many ways, especially when it comes to the Marine Corps being a generational phenomenon, or what Hebert calls a “family business.” It was that way for his family, and for the one he’s writing about as well, in stories told by the youngest generation.

That would be Will Remain, whose background is similar to Hebert’s, but with some important differences. Remain graduated from Harvard, not AIC, and upon graduation enlisted in the Marines and attended Officer Candidates School and Basic School in Quantico, Va. Instead of serving in the rear with the gear, he fought at Khe Sanh in 1967 and the Battle of Hue City during the Tet Offensive of 1968.

Hebert said he was inspired in many ways by the war novel Once an Eagle, written by Anton Meyer. A New York Times bestseller, it has been a favorite of American military men and women since it was penned in 1968, he noted.

“That book just fascinated me,” he told BusinessWest. “It was about the Army, and it covered several decades of one officer’s time. That book really inspired me to write.” Indeed, Hebert’s first forays into writing were non-fiction works about Meyer and his books.

He then embarked on the first installment of his novel, which wound up taking him a decade or so to write and prepare for publication. It includes dozens of illustrations by Tara Kaz that help bring the individual stories to life.

As for those stories, or the elements of his novels, he said the process of weaving them together is very much like that of putting together a jigsaw puzzle — which happens to be another of his hobbies; he said he’s put together more than 75 of them, with his favorite (unsurprisingly) being an image of the Iwo Jima Memorial in Washington.

“I have tons and tons of research material, and it’s all in pieces,” he went on, adding that, as he read books on history and vocabulary, for example, he would tear out the pages and keep them for future reference. “I take all those pieces — and we’re talking about an incredible amount of information — and put it together in a book.”

His second book is 95% researched and about 25% written, he said, adding that this segment details the battles in France during World War I. Book three, meanwhile, covers the period between the wars, and book four will likely take place on a fictional island in the Pacific during World War II.

Hebert writes when he’s not working, which means nights and weekends, and at age 73, he intends to keep on working — for several reasons.

“I work partly because I enjoy working — I thoroughly enjoy my position here,” he explained. “But also because it enables me to fund the things that I want to do in life — one of which is writing.”

As noted, his first book is off to a decent start, with about 300 copies sold and a far less expensive paperback now available. He’s optimistic, and excited, about the audiobook version, which will be read by noted narrator Grover Gardner, who, coincidentally (or not), has also read Once an Eagle.

“My hope, with the audiobook being read by someone so well-known, is that this will bring some attention to it and sell more books in print — that’s my goal, anyway,” he said, adding that this is far more an enjoyable hobby than a money-making enterprise. “I work to write.”

 

The Last Word

Hebert’s life has taken a number of twists and turns since his father glanced down at that matchbook cover and eventually handed it to him.

As noted at the top, some of it, including that episode, does sound like fiction, which is appropriate, said Hebert, because life really does imitate art in many ways.

His art certainly does. It’s a collection of tales about people. But it’s also about a business — a family business.

That’s what the Marine Corps became for him — and for those in the Remain family — and it’s a success story on a number of levels.

 

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

Northampton’s Downtown Faces New Reality

By
Amy Cahillane says the DNA’s advocacy work has surpassed its events programming this year
Community Spotlight

Community Spotlight

Amy Cahillane says the DNA’s advocacy work has surpassed its events programming this year

Amy Cahillane says the DNA’s advocacy work has surpassed its events programming this year — because advocacy is needed, and events are few.

For the past four years, Amy Cahillane has led the Downtown Northampton Assoc. (DNA) in its many efforts to boost vibrancy in the city’s center.

The DNA typically handles such things as city plantings and holiday lights, and sponsors events that bring visitors to downtown, like Summer Stroll and Holiday Stroll, Arts Night Out, and sidewalk sales.

Note that word ‘typically.’ Because this hasn’t been a typical year.

“The pandemic changed it completely,” said Cahillane, the DNA’s executive director. “We usually focus heavily on events — it’s sort of our centerpiece. In light of COVID, I’d say 98% of our events were unable to happen. Arts Night Out is a monthly gathering where we invite lots of people into a small space to share food and drinks. That was one of our first COVID casualties — there’s no way to do that safely.”

But the DNA’s second major role is advocacy, making sure the downtown community has a voice at City Hall and that people feel their voice is heard, through public meetings and community forums on issues that impact businesses. That function was magnified in this unusual year.

“As everything changed, we were forced to change our focus because our small-business community is in desperate need of help, as is every other downtown in this area,” she told BusinessWest. “Even had our events not been canceled, it became clear pretty quickly we’d have to change our focus to advocacy at both the state and local levels, just to keep businesses afloat.”

Much of that advocacy came in the form of pushing for state and local aid, while other efforts were narrowly targeted, like making sure downtown parking was altered so restaurants could expand outdoor seating — “anything we could think of that could help them carry on through this trying to time, until we see some light at the end of the tunnel.”

And the city’s leaders have been responsive, Cahillane said, from a round of direct emergency grants to the business community to making the changes needed to bolster restaurants.

“They stepped up right away to work with our organization and downtown restaurants to make it possible to have outdoor seating, and make it last as long as possible. They got that up and running pretty quickly, and the License Commission was very fast turning around approvals for those who wanted to serve liquor outside.”

Debra Flynn, who owns Eastside Grill, was among the first downtown restaurateurs to pivot to curbside takeout and delivery once eateries were forced to shut down in early spring. “We had no idea how to do it,” she said, adding that it was important to buy the right containers to keep food warm and make sure meals were presented with care, even in the boxes.

“I can’t complain right now; we’ve had such wonderful support from our community,” she said, noting that she was able to set about 30 seats outside and eventually bring patrons back inside as well. “But I’m nervous going forward.”

“It’s definitely remained slower than the pre-COVID days, but each month, we have been seeing a smaller margin in the percentage we were down from last year. That’s helped me stay optimistic.”

That’s because the weather is getting colder, and while regulars are comfortable with the safety protocols being taken inside, she worries that folks who haven’t visited recently might not want to do so during flu season. And while the governor’s new mandate that businesses need to close by 9:30 p.m. doesn’t affect Eastside, it does impact the operations of other downtown restaurants. “They’re very nervous and upset about this whole thing,” she noted.

 

Shifting Winds

Alana Traub, who owns Honey & Wine, a clothing shop in Thornes Marketplace, has had a worrisome time this year, too.

“Everything changed for my business with the pandemic, when all businesses closed for quite a while,” she told BusinessWest. “When it finally did reopen in June, it was extremely slow going; I think people were really nervous to go out, and maybe they didn’t even know if we were open or not.

“Since then, it’s definitely remained slower than the pre-COVID days, but each month, we have been seeing a smaller margin in the percentage we were down from last year. That’s helped me stay optimistic.”

If there’s a downtown that’s well-positioned to rebound after the pandemic, Cahillane said, it’s Northampton.

“Even among my circle of friends, we are dying to go back out to restaurants, go bar hopping,” she said. “I think these businesses downtown are doing everything they can to hang on.”

Perhaps the economic shakeup — and some business closures that have followed in its wake — will present opportunities for some new faces to enter the downtown scene, she added. “A pandemic seems an odd time to start a business, but we’ve seen several open up; we might see a new round of creative, exciting businesses downtown.”

Lindsay Pope made the jump over the summer, purchasing Yoga Sanctuary, also at Thornes, from former owner Sara Rose Page on Aug. 1. A former member at the studio, Pope said she decided to become a business owner in this uncertain time because she feared Page may not have found another buyer.

“I feel like this time is incredibly liberating,” Pope said. “What do I have to lose? The alternate was that we could have lost this space, and instead, we’re going to give it another shot.”

With the times in mind, she launched not only reinvigorated studio programming in September, but also new online programming and an online video-library platform. “We’re going to try to evolve to meet the needs of the times and the next generation. That’s what we’re all being called to do right now in the chaos that’s happening.”

Cahillane said many other businesses have pivoted as well — although she admitted she’s a little sick of that word.

“Restaurants that never did curbside were nervous to try it, but our community showed up and started ordering curbside. Stores that never did local deliveries wondered if people would take advantage of it, but they did. People definitely have been incredibly supportive of downtown — the question is whether that’s enough.”

 

Holding Pattern

Before the pandemic struck, the DNA — which cites beautification among its top goals, along with programming and advocacy — was coming off a couple of years that saw a series of major projects on the Pleasant Street corridor, from a $2.9 million infrastructure upgrade to make the street safer and more navigable for motorists, bicyclists, and pedestrians to the completion of the roundabout at Pleasant and Conz streets and a number of residential and mixed-use developments along the thoroughfare.

To say 2020 has been a different sort of year is an understatement, although traffic has returned to some degree in recent months, and many businesses, including those in the retail marijuana trade, continue to do well. But anxiety lingers for many.

“I think everyone is concerned,” Cahillane said. “There is certainly more traffic than there was in March, April, or May, for sure. But winter is coming. It’s easy right now to park your car and walk outside, or enjoy some coffee on the sidewalk, when it’s sunny and pretty and the leaves are changing.

“But I think the first sign of snowfall will change that picture pretty dramatically,” she went on. “Are people going to be comfortable shopping indoors in the winter? I don’t know. Or sit inside a restaurant in the winter? I don’t know. And because so much is unknown about COVID, are people going to be extra anxious during flu season, when they don’t know if the person next to them has a cold or something more? There are so many unknowns. People are definitely concerned.”

Yet, Traub senses optimism from other business owners in Thornes and downtown in general, not because the pandemic is close to ending, but because Northampton is a strong enough business community to fully rebound once it does.

“That’s the general consensus,” she said. “I think everyone is also being realistic because no one knows what’s ahead. This is so unprecedented.”

Still, she moved her five-year-old business here from Franklin County for a reason. “I would call this the shopping destination in Western Mass. It’s definitely been a lot of fun, and I’ve been happy with my move to Northampton.”

And waiting for a time when the city is truly on the move again.

 

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Editorial

By
Opinion

A Chain Reaction of Impact

Back in 2007, BusinessWest launched its 40 Under Forty recognition program to celebrate the achievements of the region’s rising stars. A couple years later, it created Difference Makers, which recognizes individuals who are, well, making a difference in their communities. The Healthcare Heroes awards followed three years ago, recognizing high achievers in that important sector.

Clearly, we love identifying and writing about people and organizations that deserve the attention; we’re as inspired writing those stories as you (hopefully) are when you read them.

Plenty of women have been honored by all three programs — in many years, in fact, women comprise a majority of winners. So why did we launch the Women of Impact program in 2018? Is it really necessary?

In a word, yes. First of all, while there are many women of achievement in this region — and have been for a long time — not enough of them have received the recognition they are due.

But another reason, one that has become more clear over the first three cohorts of Women of Impact, is that this program spotlights ways in which honorees not only shine on their own, but help other women do the same.

In this year’s class alone, you can read about Carol Campbell, president of Chicopee Industrial Contractors, who has not only personally mentored many women over the years, but cultivated a management team entirely made up of women — in an industry still dominated by men.

And Pattie Hallberg, CEO of the Girl Scouts of Central & Western Massachusetts, who has devoted her professional life to understanding the issues and challenges facing women and girls, and finding proactive ways to address them.

And Christina Royal, president of Holyoke Community College, who understands how critical an affordable college education is to women, including low-income women, women of color, and working mothers, many of whom have been thrown for a loop by the pandemic and recession, and rely on HCC’s support to stay on their degree path.

The stories go on, in many cases echoing the honorees’ desire not only to succeed in life, but to make sure women following behind them have the tools they need to do the same and, in turn, inspire the next generation.

This is not the easiest time for women in the workforce. In fact, in September, about 617,000 women stopped working — about eight women for every man who dropped out, in fact — partly due to competing demands from home, especially young kids who need support with remote learning.

Even during more, well, normal times, BusinessWest has long told the stories of not only women who are helping their peers navigate challenges, but organizations like the Women’s Fund of Western Massachusetts, Dress for Success Western Massachusetts, Girls Inc. of the Valley, and so many more who’ve made it their mission to help women succeed, now and in the future.

In short, women in this region are making an impact every day. We’re honored to be able to tell some of their stories.

 

Opinion

By Contributor
Opinion

How to Handle Unemployment Fraud

By Chris Geehern

State officials and Massachusetts employers continue to deal with a surge of fraudulent unemployment-insurance claims generated as part of a national scheme using stolen personal information to attempt to access jobless benefits.

Criminal enterprises with access to stolen personal information from prior national data breaches have been taking advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic by attempting to file large numbers of unemployment-benefit claims through the Massachusetts Department of Unemployment Assistance (DUA) system.

DUA revealed in July that 58,000 fraudulent claims had been detected, preventing the loss of $158 million. At the time, the Department of Labor said it was working with the state and federal law enforcement to investigate the fraud and hired a private accounting firm to perform a forensic audit. Now, fake unemployment claims are on the rise once again as scammers appear to be targeting public employees.

Associated Industries of Massachusetts (AIM) has also continued to receive reports from member companies about fraudulent unemployment claims. Companies report in some cases that employees have been unaware that a fraudulent claim has been filed in their names and are thus unable to bring the scam to the attention of their employers.

Employees and employers should work together to address the scam by reviewing a set of online identity-fraud tools developed by DUA. Meanwhile, state officials are providing guidance to employers on how each of the following situations where there is a questionable claim should be handled.

If an employer has received a ‘Confirmation of Employment’ letter, complete the form online. If the person still works for you, select ‘still employed part-time,’ even if the person is a full-time employee. If the person never worked for you, select ‘The claimant did not work for me during the time period stated.” The employer should encourage the employee to file a fraud report and follow the guidance at www.mass.gov/info-details/report-unemployment-benefits-fraud.

If an employer has received a ‘Lack of Work’ letter for an employee who either has never worked for the company or is employed by the company without any break in service for the past year, follow the same instructions as for a ‘Confirmation of Employment’ letter.

If the employer or employee is responding to a ‘Fact Finding Letter,’ complete the form as provided. Employers should inform employees who had a claim filed without their permission to visit the website noted above to report the fraudulent claim and find information and advice on other things they should do to protect their identity.

If an employer has received a ‘Monetary Determination’ with which they disagree, encourage the employee to file a fraud report and follow the guidance at the website.

If an employer is protesting a claim a result of a ‘Benefit Charge Statement’ they are in disagreement with, protests can only be filed online and not by any other mechanisms. On the online form, enter a comment saying ‘fraudulent claim’ and then provide information why you believe the claim was fraudulent (for example, the claimant still works for our company, and when we spoke to the claimant, they said they never filed a claim).

In a case where both the employer and the employee acknowledge the claim was not filed by the employee, the employer should fill in the protest form using their UI Online account, and the employee should file a fraud report and follow the guidance at the website noted above.

 

Chris Geehern is executive vice president of Associated Industries of Massachusetts.

 

Carol Campbell

By
Women of Impact 2020

President, Chicopee Industrial Contractors

She Leads by Example and Shows Women How to Use Their Voice

Carol Campbell

Carol Campbell

Carol Campbell says she’s been heavily involved in the community for as long as she’s been a business owner — nearly 30 years now.

And she’s long believed it’s the responsibility of anyone in business to lend their time, energy, and talents to efforts and agencies focused on improving quality of life in a given region or specific community. She has backed up this belief with involvement in groups ranging from Rotary International to WestMass Development Corp. to Associated Industries of Massachusetts.

But Campbell, owner and president of Chicopee Industrial Contractors (CIC), a firm that specializes in rigging, millwrighting, machine and plant relocation, and structural steel installation, acknowledged that the nature of her giving back has changed somewhat over the past several years — and specifically since her first grandchild, Julia, was born.

“I held that child up and said, ‘you can be anything you want — a ballerina or the CEO of a rigging company,’” she recalled. “And when the words came out of my mouth, at that exact moment, I thought that I needed to be doing things a little differently — I need to be concentrating on what women and girls can do, today, tomorrow, and in the future.”

So, while Campbell is still active with WestMass, AIM, and other business organizations, over the past several years she has become more involved with groups whose missions involve the growth and development of women and girls — agencies ranging from the Women’s Fund to Dress for Success to Girls Inc.

“I held that child up and said, ‘you can be anything you want — a ballerina or the CEO of a rigging company.’ And when the words came out of my mouth, at that exact moment, I thought that I needed to be doing things a little differently — I need to be concentrating on what women and girls can do, today, tomorrow, and in the future.”

Meanwhile, she has also become a role model and mentor for many women, although she’s far more comfortable with the latter role than the former, as we’ll see. And at her own business — one that was and, in many ways, still is dominated by men — she has made it her mission to change that equation.

In fact, with the recent promotion of Deborah Dart, one of those Campbell has mentored, officially and unofficially, to operations manager, she now has a management team made up entirely of women.

“That was a goal I had, and it’s a goal I’ve achieved,” she said with discernable pride. “This company was all men at the start — we probably had women as file clerks — and now, the entire leadership team is women.”

Speaking of Dart, she nominated Campbell to be a Woman of Impact, and we’ll let her words drive home why she is now a member of the class of 2020.

“Carol’s success at CIC has paved the road and broken down barriers for other women in the industry,” she wrote. “She is now not the only woman in the board room or at the table. Her success at CIC has not come easy, but it has allowed her to pay it forward. Carol is known for sharing her thoughts and opinions, and she has used her voice to help her company, her community, and her friends.”

Indeed she has, and this notion of using one’s voice is something that Campbell stresses often when mentoring others, a sentiment passed down by her mother, and now passed on by her.

It’s just one of reasons why she lives up the name of this BusinessWest recognition program — she continues to have an impact — a deep impact — here in Western Mass.

 

Showing Her Metal

By now, most people know the story of how Campbell came to enter that male-dominated world of rigging and machine relocation. She was working as director of Marketing and Development for the UMass Fine Arts Center in the early ’90s, but looking for an entrepreneurial challenge.

Three area rigging plants had been shut down in the wake of the recession of the early ’90s, and Campbell started CIC as a way to rescue many of those workers, including her now-ex-husband.

Over the past 27 years, she has steered the company through a number of economic ups and downs — the Great Recession hit this company later than most, but very hard — including this latest downturn brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.

For example, when things got slow earlier this year, as manufacturing and other sectors were put in a wait-and-see mode by the pandemic, Campbell used a Paycheck Protection Act loan to keep her people employed, and used the time for training and professional development.

“We didn’t have enough projects to keep everyone working, so we decided to do training,” she recalled. “We did in-house and online training — on our hard skills, our soft skills, and technical skills — and we did that through March, April, and May.”

Those training sessions speak to Campbell’s approach to business and management, one that is employee-focused and perhaps best explained with more commentary from Deb Dart:

“Carol’s core values would not allow her to lead without respect and equality for all, and using the principles of W. Edward Demming and Stephen Covey, she worked to create a paradigm shift in the industry, or at least at CIC, to create a work environment that is more linear, but, most important, a workplace without fear.”

Still, her leadership, entrepreneurial daring, and management philosophies are only some of the reasons why Campbell is being honored as a Woman of Impact. As noted earlier, she has, throughout her career, been very active within the community and, more specifically, with groups and agencies ranging from the Chicopee Chamber of Commerce and that’s city’s Rotary Club; from AIM and WestMass to Health New England, which she continues to serve as a board member.

The management team at Chicopee Industrial Contractors is now all women: from left, Anne Golden, director of Finance; Carol Campbell, president and CEO; Liz Sauer, project manager; and Deb Dart, director of Operations.

The management team at Chicopee Industrial Contractors is now all women: from left, Anne Golden, director of Finance; Carol Campbell, president and CEO; Liz Sauer, project manager; and Deb Dart, director of Operations.

More recently, she has devoted much of her time and energy to groups involved with women and children, and also to some women she is mentoring, with the accent on the present tense. It’s a role she has grown into and is now comfortable with because of what she can share.

“I like the fact that’s it’s an exchange — it’s not teaching,” she told BusinessWest. “It’s working to help individuals determine what their goals are, and then helping them find a path to accomplishing those goals. I’m not an executive coach, by any means, but if they’re on a path that’s similar to mine, which is to be a leader within an organization, I’ve dealt with something similar to what they’re going through.

“For me, it’s an opportunity to show them they’re not alone in this and that it’s not smooth sailing,” she went on. “We’ve all had ups and downs in business, and I’ve seen a number of them myself. The goal is to learn from each other.”

And while successes in business are important, one thing she’s learned — and also tells those she mentors — is that people can learn more from their mistakes, and usually do.

“Some of my worst management experiences have been my biggest assets for learning about who I want to be and how I want to lead,” she explained, adding that this is one of the insights she shares with mentees she’s matched with the WIT (Women Innovators and Trailblazers) program and other initiatives.

As for that phrase ‘role model,’ she is, as noted, less comfortable with it.

Carol Campbell has balanced work in her adopted field with mentoring efforts and contributions of time and energy to many area nonprofits.

Carol Campbell has balanced work in her adopted field with mentoring efforts and contributions of time and energy to many area nonprofits.

“I don’t think I would call myself a role model — when a reference is made, even about my leadership, I’m pretty humble about it, because I’ve always just done what I feel is right,” she explained. “I’ve always thought that, if I could help anyone in any way, I would do it — I always want to give someone a hand up.”

 

Doing the Heavy Work

There’s a pillow on a bookshelf in Campbell’s office with an embroidered message that says simply: “Behind Every Successful Women is … Herself.”

She is living proof of that, obviously, and that’s one of the reasons she’s a Woman of Impact. The other, perhaps even bigger reason is the hard work she’s put into convincing others of that. Her management team is a perfect example of this, but she believes it’s just one.

She intends to keep using her voice to create many more of them.

 

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

 

People on the Move

By
People on the Move

Attorney Meaghan Murphy recently joined Skoler, Abbott & Presser, P.C., a labor and employment law firm serving employers in Massachusetts and Connecticut. Murphy has more than six years of experience in general litigation and labor and employment law. She will advise clients regarding all employment-related matters, including, but not limited to, compliance with state, federal, and local laws, and discipline of employees. She will also create workplace policies for clients and represent them in various forums, including at the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, government agencies, and in state and federal court. Murphy is a graduate of Amherst College and received her law degree from Western New England University School of Law. She was named to the Super Lawyers Rising Star list in 2018 and 2019. She has also been an active volunteer with Hampden County Big Brothers Big Sisters since 2018.

•••••

Peter DePergola II

Peter DePergola II

Elms College announced the appointment of Peter DePergola II, associate professor of Bioethics and Medical Humanities, as executive director of the newly created St. John Paul II Center for Ethics, Religion, and Culture (CERC). DePergola is also associate professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies and the director of the Bioethics and Medical Humanities program at Elms. CERC was launched on Oct. 13 to increase engagement and discourse on the most pressing and complex questions related to ethics, religion, and culture in today’s society, and to lead the regional community in thoughtful, engaging dialogue. A $1 million naming gift from an anonymous donor and two six-figure contributions from Carolyn Jacobs, and B. John (Jack) and Colette Dill and family helped the college establish the center. In addition to his appointment as CERC executive director, DePergola has been named the Shaughness Family Chair for the Study of the Humanities, which is the college’s only endowed chair. The Shaughness Family Chair was funded in 1994 by the late L. Stella Shaughness, and the endowment income is to be used to promote academic excellence by supporting teaching, publishing, and/or research in the humanities. At Baystate Health, DePergola serves as chief ethics officer, senior director of Clinical Ethics, chief of the Ethics Consultation Service, and chair of the ethics advisory committee. He also holds secondary academic and research appointments at UMass Medical School, Sacred Heart University, the American Academy of Neurology, and TEDMED. A professional member of several international academic societies and associations, DePergola earned his bachelor’s degree in philosophy and religious studies at Elms College, his MTS in ethics at Boston College, and his Ph.D. in healthcare ethics at Duquesne University. He completed his residency in neuroethics at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, his fellowship in neuropsychiatric ethics at Tufts University School of Medicine, and his advanced training in neurothanatological ethics at Harvard Medical School.

•••••

Nikki Burnett

Nikki Burnett

Nikki Burnett, executive director of Educare Springfield, the nation’s 24th Educare early-education center, has been appointed to a number of national Educare-related boards, including the Educare Learning Network (ELN) collaborative fundraising advisory board, which finds opportunities for greater financial sustainability of the ELN through enhanced fundraising programming. Burnett, the first executive director of Educare Springfield, has also joined the Red Nose Day advisory board, which provides guidance over the grant from Comic Relief’s Red Nose Day Fund on behalf of the ELN. Burnett has also joined the Educare Policy Work Group, which guides and supports the collective network’s engagement in early-childhood policy and advocacy, and the Educare Learning Network steering committee, which informs the direction of the annual meeting. Locally, Burnett has also joined a number of local serving boards, including the board of trustees of the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, as well as the boards of Holyoke Community College Foundation and Dress for Success. Burnett earned her undergraduate degree in leadership and organizational science from Bay Path University. She will be completing her master’s degree in leadership and negotiation from Bay Path in 2020. Before joining Educare, she served as regional vice president of Multicultural Initiatives for the American Heart Assoc., where she worked throughout the New England region to build capacity and support revenue generation around community health and education initiatives. She has more than a decade of leadership experience and, prior to her position with the American Heart Assoc., worked at Baystate Health as education coordinator of Cardiopulmonary Services. At Baystate, she managed three cardiology fellowship programs. Burnett also has been actively involved in other community organizations in Springfield and in the region, having served on the board of the Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts, the Baystate Health community benefits advisory board, and Live Well Springfield, an organization that promotes a culture of health in Springfield.

•••••

For the second time in the award’s history, the Advertising Club of Western Massachusetts’ trustees of the Order of William Pynchon have Pynchon Medal recipients amidst a global pandemic. Slated to receive the Advertising Club’s Pynchon Medal at an October 2021 event are two local residents. Elizabeth Wills-O’Gilvie is a longtime community activist for good nutrition and healthy eating, and a tireless advocate for Gardening the Community and the Springfield Food Policy Council, to name just a few initiatives she supports. Janine Fondon serves as co-founder of Unity First, a distributor of diversity-related e-news, chair of the undergraduate Communications department at Bay Path University, and a writer, communicator, and professor focused on amplifying the diverse voices throughout the Pioneer Valley and around the U.S. through inclusion and equity initiatives. This year’s recipients were chosen from a pool of nominations for the award received earlier this year by the Advertising Club. All nominees are researched by the trustees, who then deliberate before selecting final recipients. All Pynchon medalists are chosen by unanimous decision of the Pynchon trustees, who are the current and five past presidents of the Advertising Club. Pynchon trustees for 2020 are Jillian Gould, Teresa Utt, David Cecchi, Mary Shea, Scott Whitney, and current Advertising Club President Brenda McGiverin. The official presentation of the Pynchon Medal and celebration will take place in the fall of 2021 in concert with the following year’s recipients. When confirmed, event details and ticket information will be available at adclubwm.org or by calling (413) 342-0533.

•••••

Jean Deliso

Jean Deliso

Jean Deliso, CFP has been named a member of the 2020 Chairman’s Council of New York Life. Members of the Chairman’s Council rank in the top 3% of New York Life’s sales force of more than 12,000 licensed agents in sales achievement. She has accomplished this level of achievement for nine consecutive years. Deliso has been a New York Life agent since 1995 and is associated with New York Life’s Connecticut Valley General Office in Windsor, Conn. She is a member of the Nautilus Group, an exclusive, advanced planning resource for estate-conservation and business-continuation strategies. She is president and owner of Deliso Financial and Insurance Services, a firm focusing on comprehensive financial strategies that help position clients for a solid financial future. She has worked in the financial field for more than 30 years, her first seven in public accounting and the balance working in the financial-services industry. Deliso has developed an expertise assisting business owners and individuals protecting and securing their and their family’s future. Her extensive experience has led to a focus in certain fields, such as cash and risk management, investment, retirement, and estate planning. She is fully committed to educating individuals regarding their finances and frequently conducts workshops advocating financial empowerment. She currently serves on and has held chairman of the board positions at Baystate Health Foundation and the Community Music School of Springfield. She is also a former board member of the YMCA of Greater Springfield and Pioneer Valley Refrigerated Warehouse, a former trustee of the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, and a former member of the Bay Path University advisory board.

•••••

MassDevelopment announced that, after three years as president and CEO, Lauren Liss will step down from this position at the end of the calendar year. Housing and Economic Development Secretary Mike Kennealy, who serves as chairman of the board of directors of MassDevelopment, will lead the search for the next head of the state’s finance and development agency. Before taking the reins at MassDevelopment in 2017, Liss held leadership positions in both the private and public sectors, including commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection and a partner in a Boston law firm. In fiscal year 2020, MassDevelopment financed or managed 341 projects, generating investment of more than $2.69 billion in the Massachusetts economy. These projects are estimated to create or support 10,871 jobs and build or preserve 1,787 housing units. As president and CEO, Liss expanded its work in gateway cities through an array of finance programs and real-estate services, such as the Transformative Development Initiative (TDI) and Commonwealth Places program, and oversaw tremendous growth at Devens, MassDevelpment’s iconic mixed-use redevelopment of the former Fort Devens. This year, under Liss’ leadership and in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, MassDevelopment pivoted programs and tools to support small businesses in some of the state’s hardest-hit communities and aid in economic recovery. These efforts helped to stabilize businesses in TDI districts and created crowdfunding opportunities for community partners to prepare public spaces and commercial districts to safely serve residents and visitors. MassDevelopment, the state’s finance and development agency, works with businesses, nonprofits, banks, and communities to stimulate economic growth across the Commonwealth.

Company Notebook

By
Company Notebook

UMass Donahue Institute Receives $32.5 Million from Head Start

HADLEY — The UMass Donahue Institute has been awarded a new five-year, $6.5 million per year cooperative agreement to direct the Head Start National Center on Program Management and Fiscal Operations (NCPMFO), a role it has filled for the past five years under an earlier award. Under the new cooperative agreement, the institute will continue to work in collaboration with its partners: Family Health International 360, Zero to Three, and the UCLA Anderson School of Management. NCPMFO will continue to disseminate clear, consistent guidance, materials, and trainings on Office of Head Start priorities for the development and implementation of sound management systems and strong internal controls in Head Start programs across the country. NCPMFO’s work addresses topics such as risk management, governance, data collection and analysis, budgeting, management of multiple funding sources, and leadership, including the annual Head Start Management Fellows Program conducted at UCLA. NCPMFO’s work reaches approximately 1,700 grantees of Early Head Start and Head Start programs located in all states, including those programs serving American Indian and Alaska Native tribes and migrant and seasonal workers. NCPMFO is one of four national center cooperative agreements recently awarded. The others address early childhood development, teaching, and learning; early childhood health; behavioral health and safety; and parent, family, and community engagement.

 

Thunderbirds Foundation Donates $15,000 to Rays of Hope

SPRINGFIELD — Springfield Thunderbirds President Nathan Costa presented a check for $15,000 to the Baystate Health Foundation for Rays of Hope from proceeds raised by the sale of specialty pink jerseys worn at the 2020 Pink in the Rink night in March. Each year since the team’s inception, the Thunderbirds have held a Pink in the Rink night to benefit Rays of Hope, complete with participation by breast-cancer survivors, pink ice, and pink specialty jerseys. The event has sold out each of the past four seasons, and has become a signature event in the area to raise awareness. This past season’s event took place on March 7, and was again sold out, with a capacity crowd of 6,793. The Thunderbirds Foundation has contributed more than $80,000 to the Baystate Health Foundation and the Rays of Hope through the proceeds of specialty jersey auctions from the annual Pink in the Rink night.

 

Davis Family Establishes New Scholarship Fund in Honor of Mary Walachy

SPRINGFIELD — The Davis family has established the Joseph F. and Helen C. McGovern Scholarship Fund at the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts in honor of the Irene E. & George A Davis Foundation’s recently retired Executive Director Mary Walachy. Walachy retired in June after serving 23 years as executive director of the family foundation, and the fund is named after Walachy’s parents, both strong advocates for education. Walachy’s father, Joseph McGovern, was an entrepreneur who owned and operated Notion Thread, a manufacturing company in West Springfield. Walachy’s mother, Helen, also worked with her husband at the company. The scholarship fund will provide resources for successful applicants studying education or social work. It will be awarded through the Community Foundation’s scholarship program, which awards approximately 1,000 scholarships to 800 students annually. The program considers academic merit and financial need in its applicant reviews. Walachy earned a master’s degree in social work and, prior to joining the Davis Foundation, served as CEO of the Mental Health Assoc. Walachy was hired in 1997 as the first executive director of the foundation. Under her leadership, the foundation created several signature programs, including Cherish Every Child, the nationally-recognized Reading Success by 4th Grade initiative, and the Funder Collaborative for Reading Success, as well as the establishment of Springfield Business Leaders for Education and the launch of Educare Springfield.

 

Berkshire Theatre Group Awarded $1 Million Gift

PITTSFIELD — Berkshire Theatre Group and Artistic Director and CEO Kate Maguire announced a generous gift of just over $1 million from the family of the late Mary Anne Gross in honor of her lifetime love of both theatre and the Berkshires. This award also recognizes the tireless efforts of Berkshire Theatre Group in producing the first live Actors’ Equity-approved musical in the U.S. this past summer, following the shutdown of live performing arts due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in March. The Gross family will also award just over $1 million to Pittsfield’s Barrington Stage Company. The Gross family gift will support payroll and basic operating costs for the next six months in order to ensure there are no furloughs or layoffs while the theater continues to raise funds in support of future artistic programming. A portion of the gift is structured as a matching grant to leverage additional donations for 2021. In July, Berkshire Theatre Group’s musical, Godspell, the first musical in the U.S. approved by the Actors’ Equity Assoc. (AEA) during the COVID-19 pandemic, opened a five-week run under a tent outside of the Colonial Theatre. Due to popular demand and critical acclaim, the run was extended for two weeks. The musical ran from Aug. 6 to Sept. 20. Berkshire Theatre Group has just been approved once again by AEA and will present Truman Capote’s Holiday Memories outdoors at its Stockbridge campus from Nov. 20 to Dec. 20.

 

Home City Development Wins Funding for Elias Brookings Apartments

SPRINGFIELD — Home City Development Inc. (HCDI), a Springfield-based affordable-housing development organization, was awarded resources from the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) to adapt and rehabilitate the former Elias Brookings School into 42 affordable rental housing units, to be known as Elias Brookings Apartments. The award includes $1 million in low-income housing tax credits (to generate more than $9 million in equity), $4.4 million of soft debt, and project-based rental vouchers. Other funds for the project include state and federal historic tax credits, city of Springfield HOME and Community Preservation Act funds, and construction and permanent loans. MassHousing will provide the permanent first mortgage loan and a subordinate workforce-housing loan. HCDI plans to begin construction in early 2021 and complete the work in 12 months. The project will serve a range of incomes, including extremely low-income households, low-income households, and workforce housing. Select apartments are reserved for clients of the Department of Mental Health, people with disabilities, and homeless households. HCDI will offer a variety of supportive services to all residents. The property will be managed by Housing Management Resources, an organization with extensive experience managing comparable properties. Built as the Elias Brookings School in 1925, the building was severely damaged in the June 2011 tornado and was closed. This redevelopment aims to contribute significantly to the revitalization of the of the Maple Hill, Six Corners, and Old Hill neighborhoods, which were heavily impacted by the tornado. HCDI is working with Davis Square Architects, development consultant Gerry Joseph, Allegrone Construction, Klein-Hornig LLP, and Shatz, Schwartz, and Fentin, P.C., as well as many other partners on this project.

 

Mercedes-Benz of Springfield Wins Community Service Award

CHICOPEE — The Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce announced that Mercedes-Benz of Springfield was chosen as its Community Service Award recipient. This award honors a business, nonprofit, or individual which has benefited the lives of the Amherst-area community through their work and outreach. The Driven by Community platform officially launched in March, although it has been implemented at the dealership since the doors opened three years ago. Since then, Mercedes-Benz of Springfield has partnered with more than 250 local organizations, raised more than $20,000 when COVID-19 impacted local businesses, and hosted numerous fundraising and charity events at the dealership — most recently, a drive-in movie night with proceeds donated to the Urban League of Springfield to support its mission. The virtual A+ Awards Show will be livestreamed from Hadley Farms Meeting House on Thursday, Nov. 12.

 

Wellfleet Partners with binx health to Keep College Students Safe

SPRINGFIELD — Wellfleet Insurance has teamed up with binx health to offer college clients access to easy at-home/in-dorm sample collection for COVID-19 testing using binx’s enterprise solutions for population health screening. The ‘binx boxes’ are showing up in dorm rooms of thousands of students on Wellfleet’s college client campuses, offering school officials a quick, easy way to test a campus population, with oversight and test ordering by on-site university clinicians. The model amplifies the power and reach of university administration in their efforts to test, track, and trace the COVID-19 infection status among students, faculty, staff, and vendors. Students ‘activate’ binx boxes online, complete sample collection in their dorms or at home, then drop off completed kits at centralized locations for lab processing. Results are rapid, often under 24 hours from sample receipt. Wellfleet, one of the nation’s leading student health-insurance carriers, worked with binx on behalf of client colleges and universities to deliver a first-of-its-kind platform that makes population testing a reality for the nation’s college campuses. The testing platform offers a unique, modular approach enabling tailored rollout and customized deployment based on university population needs. Serving as a ‘digital hub,’ binx enables seamless linking of patients to university administration via clinician ordering tools, global logistics, at-home/in-dorm sample collection, viral trend analysis and reporting, rapid lab testing, contact tracing, and live customer service and support, all offered at an affordable, per-test fee by university. In addition to introducing clients to tailored COVID-19 testing solutions, Wellfleet has also adapted policies to help members, including helping to ensure student members aren’t saddled with out-of-pocket costs related to COVID-19, and enhanced coverage for telemedicine visits.

 

Bradley Recognized by Condé Nast Traveler Readers as Eighth-best U.S. Airport

WINDSOR LOCKS, Conn. — The Connecticut Airport Authority (CAA) announced that Condé Nast Traveler released the results of its annual Readers’ Choice Awards, with Bradley International Airport recognized as the eighth-best airport in the U.S. The awards are the longest-running and most prestigious recognition of excellence in the travel industry. Bradley International Airport was recognized as a top-10 airport for the fourth consecutive year. “This award is a tremendous honor during a challenging year for the travel industry, and we are proud to once again be recognized among our nation’s best airports,” said Kevin Dillon, executive director of the Connecticut Airport Authority. “We thank the travel community for their continued vote of confidence in Bradley International Airport and for underscoring the value of traveling through a smaller airport. Now more than ever, Bradley Airport stands out by always offering a clean, safe, and convenient travel experience.”

 

MCLA Adopts Test-blind Policy Through Fall 2022

NORTH ADAMS — In support of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts’ ongoing commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion, and in recognition of the public health crisis brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, the MCLA Office of Admission will be waiving the SAT/ACT testing requirement for students who apply for fall 2021 and fall 2022. MCLA will also pilot a test-blind/test-free policy for fall 2021 applicants. National and institutional data point to high-school work being indicative of student success in college and a more equitable means of assessment than standardized-test scores. For many years, research studies have found that wealthy students have significant advantages through the college-application process. A 2013 study from researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and University of Southern California, for example, found that the difference in SAT scores between high- and low-income students was twice as large among black students compared to white students. MCLA’s application is free, and students are considered for merit-based scholarships at the same time as they submit their application. MCLA has an early-action deadline of Dec. 1. Those who apply must submit their official high-school transcript, including first-quarter senior grades and any transcripts for college-level courses taken, as well as a personal statement/essay. To find out more, visit mcla.edu/apply.

 

AIC Hosts Mural Honoring Mason Square Resident

SPRINGFIELD — American International College (AIC) recently honored a Springfield individual known to residents in Mason Square as Preacherman with a mural on the college’s maintenance building located at the corner of State and Reed streets. Born Randolph Lester, he was a well-known community member who was given the Preacherman moniker as he was often seen walking around the Mason Square area carrying a Bible. Collaborating on the construction of the mural was Britt Ruhe, the founder of Fresh Paint Springfield, a creative initiative in 2019 that invited artists to paint building walls downtown. Ruhe is the director of Commonwealth Murals and manages the Community Muralist Institute, featuring individual mural installations that meaningfully engage and uplift communities. AIC alumnus Andrew Cade, president of the Springfield Cultural Council and senior vice president of the Urban League of Springfield, supported the project with a grant from the Springfield Cultural Council and other resources to assist with the mural. The artist, Greta McLain, has has extensive mural-making experience and created the “Home, Here” mural on the Chestnut Towers parking garage on Dwight Street.

 

Summerlin Floors Awarded Woman-owned Business Certificate

AMHERST — Summerlin Floors has been awarded the official woman-owned business certificate from the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC), the largest certifier of women-owned businesses in the U.S. and a leading advocate for women business owners and entrepreneurs. Summerlin Floors has been busy during the COVID-19 pandemic, completing the certification process and reaching its goal of achieving the woman-owned business certificate, along with announcing a new scholarship that will be awarded to a woman of color. To achieve WBENC certification, woman-owned businesses complete a formal documentation and site-visit process administered by one of WBENC’s 14 regional partner organizations. The WBENC certification gives woman-owned businesses the ability to compete for real-time business opportunities provided by WBENC corporate members and government agencies. To give back to the community and future generations, the company launched a new scholarship last month, awarding a $2,500 scholarship to a woman of color pursuing a degree in business at Greenfield Community College (GCC). For more information and to apply for this scholarship, contact the GCC Admissions Office at www.gcc.mass.edu/admissions or (413) 775-1801.

 

Excel Dryer Supports Square One’s Adopt-a-Classroom Initiative

SPRINGFIELD — For the fourth consecutive year, Excel Dryer has committed an annual gift of $5,000 to support Square One’s Adopt-a-Classroom initiative. The gift comes at a critical time as Square One recently expanded its early-education program to include full-day remote learning support for children in kindergarten through grade 5, in addition to its traditional preschool classrooms and family childcare offerings. The funds will be used to offset expenses associated with classroom supplies, meals, and professional development. Square One’s Adopt-a-Classroom program is part of the agency’s Campaign for Healthy Kids, a multi-year fund-development initiative focused on the agency’s commitment to providing healthy meals, physical fitness, social-emotional well-being, and a healthy learning environment. Square One currently provides early-learning services to more than 500 infants, toddlers, and school-age children each day, and family support services to 1,500 families each year, as they work to overcome the significant challenges in their lives.

 

Incorporations

By
Incorporations

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

BRIMFIELD

Infinite Granite Inc., 116 Little Alum Road, Brimfield, MA 01010. Cody Langlitz, same. Granite construction.

CHICOPEE

Save Our Youth, Inc., 6 Ralph Circle, Chicopee, MA 01020. Luiz Nevarez, same. Said organization is organized exclusively for charitable, religious, educational, and scientific purposed, including, for such purposes, the making of distributions to organizations that qualify as exempt organizations under 50 1(C)(3) of the internal revenue code, or corresponding section of any future federal tax code. Specific purpose is to provide assistance and resources to inner city/underprivileged youth, so they have a safe after-school program and better opportunities for the future.

YAAD Food Bar and Grill Inc., 66 Cabot St., Chicopee, MA 01013. Orlando Roberts, 199 Fargo St. Springfield, MA 01119. Restaurant and bar business.

EAST LONGMEADOW

Visit Madhesh Nepal, Inc., 7 High Meadow Circle, East Longmeadow, MA 01028. Pramod Sarraf, same. Travel and business promotion.

GRANBY

Mandolin New England, Inc., 117 Amherst St., Granby, MA 01033. Adam Sweet, same. We are a musical organization that puts on free concerts for the needy throughout New England, but specifically in Western Massachusetts and Rhode Island where our principals are based.

GILL

Renaissance Repair Inc., 390 Main Road, Gill, MA 01354. Douglas A. Edson, same. Maintenance/repair of commercial vehicles and equip.

HOLYOKE

Crossover Corporation, 522 Maple St. Holyoke, MA 01040. Elisandro Cuevas, same. Holding company.

LONGMEADOW

Nubeco, Corp., 82 Canterbury Lane, Longmeadow, MA 01106. Brian Newburn, same. Restoration.

Trusted Caregivers Inc., 123 Dwight Road, Longmeadow, MA 01106. Tonia Giggs, 931 North St. Suffield, CT 06078. Home care.

NORTHAMPTON

Organization of Biological Field Stations, 5 Chapin Dr., Northampton, MA 01063. Christopher N. Lorentz, Ohio River Biology Field Station 8309 Mary Ingles High California, KY 41007. The purposes of Organization of Biological Field Stations Inc. include the following: to facilitate the highest quality environment for scientists, students, teachers and the public to pursue research and education, and to enhance biological and environmental understanding.

PALMER

Lowmat, Inc., 3012 Thorndike St., Palmer, MA 01069. Gary Buelow, same. Develop and operate software app.

San Mac Medical Inc., 1199 South Main St., Palmer, MA 01069. Mark Borsari, 2 Sutton Place East Granby, CT 06026. Manufacturing of medical supplies.

PITTSFIELD

Kanoa, Inc., 11 Westview Circle, Pittsfield, MA 01201. Cristina Oncken Cook Dubin, same. Consulting services.

SPRINGFIELD

Ekmalian Tools Inc., 355 Trafton Road, Springfield, MA 01108. James G. Ekmalian Jr., same. Retail sale of tools and equipment.

Ken G Transport Inc., 37 Tiffany St. Springfield, MA 01108. Edith Nunez, same. Transport.

WESTFIELD

McCabe and Son Home Improvement Inc., 15 May St., Westfield, MA 01085. Samantha Galvin, same. Home remodeling.

WEST SPRINGFIELD

Blackhorse Transportation Inc., 425 Union St., Room 16 West Springfield, MA 01089. Ruvim Rakhubenko, 41 Irving St. West Springfield, MA 01089. Trucking.

Doing Business As Certificates

By
DBA Certificates

The following business certificates and/or trade names were issued or renewed during the month of October 2020. (Filings are limited due to closures or reduced staffing hours at municipal offices due to COVID-19 restrictions).

DEERFIELD

Fiddlehead Farm
717 Greenfield Road
Danielle Marie

Green Insurance
55 North Main St.
Rick Green

Penelope Tarasuk, Ph.D. Psychoanalyst
8 Mountain Road
Penelope Tarasuk

HADLEY

Five College Farms
319 River Dr.
Ted Crooker

Sweet Meadow Farm
319 River Dr.
Ted Crooker

Trans World Food Market
50 Russell St.
David Tran

LONGMEADOW

Arch Promotions
60 Tecumseh Dr.
Donna Fein

Jane E. Crosby, Attorney at Law
734 Longmeadow St., Suite 301
Jane Crosby

Longmeadow High School Class of 2020
36 Brittany Road
Eleni Kollias

A Mold Man, LLC
785 Williams St., #175
Michael Guardione

Platinum Consulting
52 Laurel Lane
Philip Frogameni

SOUTHWICK

Kim Hartman House Cleaning
26 Fernwood Road
Kim Hartman

Thompson Transportation
719 College Highway
Shane Thompson

WESTFIELD

A.R. Deliveries
49 Klondike Ave.
Anatolie Reznicenco

Complete Lawn & Landscape
273 Prospect St. Ext.
Kyle Patrick

Fox Eye Photography
1925 East Mountain Road
Jessica Beaupre

GTK Sales
26 Lady Slipper Circle
Telman Galustov

Javo Publication
125 Ridgecrest Dr.
Jeff Vanoudenhove

Maura Bonavita Skin Care
154 Wild Flower Circle
Maura Bonavita

Sabai Jai Market
32 Jessie Lane
Jeffrey Rusin

Westfield Big Y Express #122
330 East Main St.
Big Y Express

WEST SPRINGFIELD

Business Solutions Inc.
64 Bacon Ave.
Taveon Crump

Cardinal Classics NE/AR
33 Heywood Ave.
Fran Cardinal

The Crest Room
706 Westfield St.
Kenneth Maryea

Dixon Orthodontics
232 Park St.
Jeffrey Dixon

Elegant Décor and Rental
189 Dewey St.
Anna Aseyeva

JX Hair
33 Westfield St.
Julia Mailloux

Keltic Fire
70 Windsor St.
John Crean

Kidwell Electric
100 Front St.
Dirk Kidwell

Krizvnu
257 River St.
Krizia Valentino

Schandorf Enterprise
12 Royce Court
Donald Schandorf

Sherwin-Williams Automotive Finishes
47 Roanoke Ave.
Daniel Clark

Bankruptcies

By
Bankruptcies

The following bankruptcy petitions were recently filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court. Readers should confirm all information with the court.

Baez, Marilyn
14 Pembroke Circle
Springfield, MA 01104
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/06/2020

Baez, Martha
62 Waverly St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/06/2020

Chapin, David S
Chapin, Hillary K.
a/k/a King, Hillary
P.O. Box 264
Wales, MA 01081
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/13/2020

Cheney, Anthony W.
46 Ludlow Road
South Hadley, MA 01075
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/09/2020

Cipolla, Charles Anthony
93 Pine Grove St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/08/2020

Citlak, Ahmet
81 Bluebird Circle
Ludlow, MA 01056
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/08/2020

Cusson, Jody L.
100 North St.
Granby, MA 01033
Chapter: 7
Date: 09/30/2020

Drihmi, Abdel Jalil
170 Mayflower Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/08/2020

Fernet, Shirley Ann
PO Box 965
Orange, MA 01364
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/07/2020

Henry-Smith, Hyacinth C.
62 Olmsted Dr.
Springfield, MA 01108
Chapter: 7
Date: 09/30/2020

Johnson, Christine G.
a/k/a Labonte, Christine
5 Converse St.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Chapter: 7
Date: 09/30/2020

Kibodya, Issihaka A.
50 Middlesex St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/08/2020

LeFebvre, Robert S.
43 Laurel St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/08/2020

Mancini, Gina A.
2 Still Brook Lane
Feeding Hills, MA 01030
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/07/2020

Marshall, Michael C.
84 Byers St., Apt. 101
Springfield, MA 01105
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/08/2020

McPherson, Bruce A.
135 Polaski Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/01/2020

Pringle, Joyce A.
67 Edgewood St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/08/2020

Rickett, Amy Leigh
163 Stafford Hollow Road
Monson, MA 01057
Chapter: 7
Date: 09/30/2020

Rivas, Jose
62 Craig Dr., Apt 2A
West Springfield, MA 01089
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/07/2020

Scibelli, Jordan P.
48 Rutledge Ave., 3rd Fl.
Springfield, MA 01105
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/01/2020

Tarquini, Adam M.
52 Castle St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/13/2020

Torres, Carlos M.
382 Allen Park Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/05/2020

Trapanese III, Francis P.
40 Stetson Dr.
Greenfield, MA 01301-9726
Chapter: 7
Date: 10/05/2020

Real Estate Transactions

By
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

222 Brattleboro Road
Bernardston, MA 01337
Amount: $260,555
Buyer: Steven A. Barscz
Seller: Don J. Powell
Date: 10/09/20

120 Northfield Road
Bernardston, MA 01337
Amount: $192,800
Buyer: Jack E. Wilder
Seller: Eugene A. Dwight
Date: 10/08/20

BUCKLAND

26 Conway St.
Buckland, MA 01338
Amount: $236,000
Buyer: Brian Koshinsky
Seller: Conway Street Realty LLC
Date: 10/09/20

CHARLEMONT

55 Burrington Road
Charlemont, MA 01339
Amount: $203,000
Buyer: Alexandra N. Kamyk
Seller: Martha R. Roman
Date: 10/14/20

COLRAIN

13 Church St.
Colrain, MA 01340
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Andrew Lincoln
Seller: Deerfield Avenue Realty Inc.
Date: 10/16/20

135 East Colrain Road
Colrain, MA 01340
Amount: $227,000
Buyer: Zoe Lindstom-Ruhf
Seller: Chris P. Trewhella
Date: 10/09/20

GILL

179 Main Road
Gill, MA 01354
Amount: $242,000
Buyer: Timothy P. Meyer
Seller: Gary E. Parzych
Date: 10/09/20

GREENFIELD

1357 Bernardston Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Alysandra Zagame
Seller: Fernand A. Zagame
Date: 10/15/20

37 Brookside Ave.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: Louisa J. Edwards
Seller: Patrick J. Merrigan
Date: 10/13/20

216 Green River Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $350,000
Buyer: Patrick J. Merrigan
Seller: Carole A. Lemay
Date: 10/13/20

36 Leyden Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $280,000
Buyer: Adom C. Balcom
Seller: Jaimye S. Ingraham
Date: 10/07/20

130 Leyden Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Samuel D. Howe
Seller: Matthew Brown
Date: 10/15/20

114 Lovers Lane
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $265,000
Buyer: Jo-Ann A. Helbig
Seller: Alfred W. Myslicki
Date: 10/16/20

33 Newell Pond Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Devon Lucier
Seller: Glen A. Stratton
Date: 10/07/20

6-8 Park Ave.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $288,500
Buyer: Brady P. McCloud
Seller: Mihail Iavorschi
Date: 10/07/20

119 Shelburne Road
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Shawn S. Fitzherbert
Seller: Matthew McCarthy
Date: 10/15/20

9 Sunset Square
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $267,000
Buyer: Robert Murray
Seller: Alexander V. Siano
Date: 10/14/20

107 Verde Dr.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $395,000
Buyer: Alexander V. Siano
Seller: Greenfield KMW LLC
Date: 10/14/20

LEYDEN

60 Glen Road
Leyden, MA 01301
Amount: $429,000
Buyer: Joshua Ziter
Seller: John W. Helbig
Date: 10/16/20

MONTAGUE

74 Dry Hill Road
Montague, MA 01351
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Tegin L. Teich
Seller: Bryna R. Ziobro
Date: 10/08/20

90 Turners Falls Road
Montague, MA 01376
Amount: $306,000
Buyer: Alan P. Meyer
Seller: Layne V. Floyd
Date: 10/16/20

71 Turnpike Road
Montague, MA 01376
Amount: $375,000
Buyer: Amie M. Keddy
Seller: Abdias Garcia
Date: 10/09/20

NORTHFIELD

177 Main St.
Northfield, MA 01360
Amount: $327,500
Buyer: Jill Price-Marshall
Seller: Amy K. Hildenbrand
Date: 10/09/20

ORANGE

681 East Main St.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $218,000
Buyer: Jorge L. Nieves
Seller: Orange Properties LLC
Date: 10/16/20

340 Holtshire Road
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $242,000
Buyer: Lisa A. Korpiewski
Seller: Normand R. Poirier
Date: 10/14/20

225 Walnut Hill Road
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Nancy J. Cody
Seller: Patrick J. Cody
Date: 10/09/20

171 West River St.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Christopher J. Garcia
Seller: Aaron J. Thibeault
Date: 10/09/20

123 Winter St.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $191,000
Buyer: Derek P. Dirienzo
Seller: Wetherby, Carol A., (Estate)
Date: 10/15/20

SHUTESBURY

15 Hawks View Road
Shutesbury, MA 01072
Amount: $649,000
Buyer: Elena M. Vazey
Seller: Cynthia Gerstl-Pepin
Date: 10/16/20

SUNDERLAND

180 Hadley Road
Sunderland, MA 01375
Amount: $342,500
Buyer: Todd E. Fruth
Seller: Kevin B. Kohler
Date: 10/09/20

491 Hadley Road
Sunderland, MA 01375
Amount: $437,500
Buyer: Michael A. Case
Seller: Timothy F. Markowski
Date: 10/13/20

369 Montague Road
Sunderland, MA 01375
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Thomas Adair
Seller: Boulden, Gilbert A., (Estate)
Date: 10/15/20

248 South Silver Lane
Sunderland, MA 01375
Amount: $220,000
Buyer: Daniel Salls
Seller: James J. Toth
Date: 10/08/20

WARWICK

40 Dusty Lane
Warwick, MA 01364
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Stephen A. Martin
Seller: Mary J. Fay
Date: 10/16/20

 

HAMPDEN COUNTY

AGAWAM

201 Adams St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $293,000
Buyer: Adam Vanbuskirk
Seller: Nicholas R. Jerard
Date: 10/07/20

82 Albert St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Michael G. Piccin
Seller: Michael E. Piccin
Date: 10/09/20

471 Barry St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Denis E. Doroshenko
Seller: Marilyn Foley
Date: 10/16/20

33 Dartmouth St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $219,900
Buyer: Ardian Ademi
Seller: Thomas K. Dickinson
Date: 10/09/20

19 Highland Ave.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Thong Nguyen
Seller: Guerrin, Susan G., (Estate)
Date: 10/16/20

50 Kensington St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: John P. Elias
Seller: Sara E. Chaffee
Date: 10/06/20

54 Kensington St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Cennet M. Kilic
Seller: William R. Lyne
Date: 10/09/20

274 Meadow St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Thomas E. Cascio
Seller: Blackak, Lucille H., (Estate)
Date: 10/07/20

472 Meadow St.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $223,000
Buyer: Shorty Billups
Seller: Sergey Abramov
Date: 10/14/20

90 North Alhambra Circle
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $209,000
Buyer: Brenda L. Parent
Seller: Michael J. Wood
Date: 10/05/20

62 Northwood St.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $317,500
Buyer: Timothy A. Potito
Seller: Alex Vilkhovoy
Date: 10/05/20

27 Pheasant Run Court
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $249,900
Buyer: Nicholas E. Clark
Seller: Richard S. Jackson
Date: 10/08/20

150 Pineview Circle
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $325,000
Buyer: Richard C. Messenger
Seller: Peter T. Lepper
Date: 10/13/20

74 Ramah Circle South
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: CHG Realty LLC
Seller: Chlastawa LLC
Date: 10/15/20

South Bridge Dr.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $1,200,000
Buyer: JPGCO LLC
Seller: Garra LLC
Date: 10/14/20

102 White Fox Road
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $330,000
Buyer: Thomas Dickinson
Seller: Bryan Cote
Date: 10/09/20

BRIMFIELD

3 Shaw Road
Brimfield, MA 01010
Amount: $705,000
Buyer: Glenn S. Welch
Seller: James M. Hurley
Date: 10/08/20

CHICOPEE

186 Arcade St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $320,000
Buyer: Damaris Carmona
Seller: Luz A. Eichstaedt
Date: 10/16/20

6 Barbara St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $267,000
Buyer: Mariana Acosta
Seller: Douglas P. Allard
Date: 10/09/20

32 Boutin St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $226,000
Buyer: Michael P. Michon
Seller: Juan F. Monsalve
Date: 10/08/20

66 Bray St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $282,500
Buyer: Tara M. Muhlhausen
Seller: John W. Walz
Date: 10/15/20

115 Broadway St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Gary Lopuk
Seller: Thomas R. Nowak
Date: 10/05/20

75 Catherine St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $368,000
Buyer: Hector F. Torres-Alvarado
Seller: Ganna Boyko
Date: 10/14/20

93 Clairmont Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $227,000
Buyer: Aaron Beaulieu
Seller: Brianna L. Kring
Date: 10/16/20

24 Cyran St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Roland G. Provost
Seller: Clayton, Sandra J., (Estate)
Date: 10/14/20

322 Dale St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $320,000
Buyer: Daniel Burgos
Seller: MA Home Buyers LLC
Date: 10/07/20

105 Fairview Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $220,000
Buyer: Lymari Albelo
Seller: Sisters Of Saint Joseph
Date: 10/07/20

11 Hearthstone Ter.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Ryan F. Nelson
Seller: Robert D. Yergeau 2018 RET
Date: 10/09/20

36 Irene St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Colleen A. Larochelle
Seller: Anthony J. Zepko
Date: 10/06/20

49 Irene St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Kassandra M. Pedraza
Seller: Richard Ethier
Date: 10/15/20

160 Jacob St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $271,000
Buyer: Suzanne Valcheva
Seller: Stephen G. Young
Date: 10/09/20

15 Leonard St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Ryan J. Manning
Seller: Ashley M. Gallagher
Date: 10/07/20

29 Linden St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Michael C. Sugrue
Seller: James Despres
Date: 10/07/20

115 Ludlow Road
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $340,600
Buyer: Angela M. Perez
Seller: Premier Home Builders Inc.
Date: 10/13/20

56 Marble Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Caitlyn A. McGibbon
Seller: Seamus P. Cullen
Date: 10/09/20

23 Marten St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Milton C. Bird
Seller: Jerod R. Laflamme
Date: 10/13/20

68 Mary St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $525,000
Buyer: MDDO LLC
Seller: Margaret M. Twarowski
Date: 10/07/20

72 Mary St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $525,000
Buyer: MDDO LLC
Seller: Margaret M. Twarowski
Date: 10/07/20

29 Narragansett Blvd.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Charles F. Bisson
Seller: Nubile, Rosalia, (Estate)
Date: 10/09/20

45 Narragansett Blvd.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $237,000
Buyer: Jacob Colon
Seller: Westside Housing Inc.
Date: 10/05/20

49 Prospect St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $525,000
Buyer: MDDO LLC
Seller: Margaret M. Twarowski
Date: 10/07/20

147 School St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Zahraa Abdullah
Seller: Joel I. Roach
Date: 10/16/20

36 Schorr St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Angel Rivera
Seller: Dennis J. Stoltz
Date: 10/13/20

73 Stedman St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $185,500
Buyer: Spencer Lockhart
Seller: Jean G. Ouimette
Date: 10/09/20

97 Szetela Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Brian H. Jones
Seller: Matthew G. Costa
Date: 10/05/20

185 Szetela Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $286,500
Buyer: Matthew A. Jayko
Seller: Brian H. Jones
Date: 10/05/20

71 Wilson Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Travis A. Brooks
Seller: Madeline Cornwell
Date: 10/07/20

34 Windsor St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Theodore Chagnon
Seller: Joseph C. Nowak
Date: 10/15/20

EAST LONGMEADOW

170 Canterbury Circle
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $504,900
Buyer: Robert T. Whiteley
Seller: David M. Fugler
Date: 10/16/20

41 Helen Circle
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $130,000
Buyer: David Chapdelaine
Seller: Clifford P. Ahern
Date: 10/07/20

230 Kibbe Road
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $314,000
Buyer: Denise M. Moore
Seller: Brian McClelland
Date: 10/05/20

58 Mapleshade Ave.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $257,000
Buyer: Alicia A. Laterreur
Seller: Deborah A. Elgers
Date: 10/13/20

159 North Main St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $239,900
Buyer: Megan E. Popp
Seller: Salvatore Napolitano
Date: 10/06/20

140 Patterson Ave.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $372,000
Buyer: Jeremy J. Kele
Seller: Heather R. Magnus
Date: 10/09/20

94 Porter Road
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Patriot Living LLC
Seller: O’Neill, Thomas N., (Estate)
Date: 10/08/20

18 Redstone Dr.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $279,000
Buyer: Jose A. Santiago
Seller: Osvaldo Almodovar
Date: 10/05/20

109 Vineland Ave.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $333,000
Buyer: Przemyslaw P. Szura
Seller: Anthony M. Neffinger
Date: 10/08/20

203 Westwood Ave.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $339,900
Buyer: Cheng-Hao Shih
Seller: Martin J. Manning
Date: 10/13/20

320 Westwood Ave.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Hajar R. Aldouri
Seller: Edward J. Buckley
Date: 10/15/20

GRANVILLE

521 South Lane
Granville, MA 01034
Amount: $345,000
Buyer: Justin Monfette
Seller: Donald F. Canfield
Date: 10/05/20

HAMPDEN

521-525 Main St.
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $249,000
Buyer: Norman Charest
Seller: Raymond C. Bartolucci
Date: 10/07/20

40-A Oak Knoll Dr.
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $271,000
Buyer: Robert W. Feliton
Seller: Bruce J. Strange
Date: 10/08/20

25 Potash Hill Lane
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Deon Smith
Seller: Ana M. Dagostino
Date: 10/15/20

92 Raymond Dr.
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $256,000
Buyer: KC 290 Main Street LLC
Seller: Fortier, Robert B., (Estate)
Date: 10/08/20

67 Stony Hill Road
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $209,000
Buyer: Katherine L. Eliza
Seller: Nicholas Torretti
Date: 10/09/20

HOLLAND

227 Brimfield Road
Holland, MA 01521
Amount: $277,000
Buyer: Shaina C. Kolakowski
Seller: John P. Galarneau
Date: 10/09/20

HOLYOKE

18 Bray Park Dr.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: James M. Hogan
Seller: Mark R. Collins
Date: 10/15/20

14 Francis Ave.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Israel Blanco
Seller: Luis E. Roldan
Date: 10/14/20

1155 Hampden St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $280,000
Buyer: George Oquendo
Seller: Amer F. Ahmed
Date: 10/08/20

16 Hitchcock St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $223,900
Buyer: Joshua Jimenez
Seller: Brian J. Lepine
Date: 10/16/20

877 Homestead Ave.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $242,400
Buyer: Robert Fisette
Seller: Fisette Realty Corp.
Date: 10/16/20

10 Laurel St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Arelis Diaz
Seller: Fernando Aponte
Date: 10/14/20

227 Michigan Ave.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Andrew J. Herbert
Seller: Eric H. & Frances R. Dugroo TR
Date: 10/16/20

111 Mosher St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $3,000,000
Buyer: EGH W. LLC
Seller: Sonoco Products Co.
Date: 10/16/20

70 Pinehurst Road
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $287,500
Buyer: Nadia Tafreshi
Seller: Sydney A. Plum
Date: 10/07/20

58 Waldo St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Jonathan Mills
Seller: Jessica L. Appleby
Date: 10/13/20

187 Walnut St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Reina L. Cruz
Seller: Federico A. Taveras
Date: 10/09/20

661 West Cherry St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $500,000
Buyer: Timothy R. Deshaies
Seller: Bellamy H. Schmidt
Date: 10/14/20

348 West Franklin St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $144,000
Buyer: US Bank
Seller: Martin J. Contant
Date: 10/15/20

LONGMEADOW

103 Birchwood Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $295,000
Buyer: Jeremy Desjardins-Smith
Seller: Therese Tjimis
Date: 10/09/20

198 Burbank Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Noreen Greenman
Seller: Thomas R. Aylesbury
Date: 10/16/20

141 Cedar Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $316,000
Buyer: Angelina K. Rinaldi
Seller: Frank A. Amato
Date: 10/15/20

90 Colony Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $467,000
Buyer: Jonathan A. Goldman
Seller: Mark R. Wojcik
Date: 10/15/20

117 Crescent Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $380,000
Buyer: Stanislav Rukhman
Seller: Heidi D. Davis
Date: 10/05/20

49 Drury Lane
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $390,000
Buyer: Rose A. Hill
Seller: Stephen D. Hoyt
Date: 10/14/20

176 Dunn Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $580,000
Buyer: Kately Smithling-Kopcsay
Seller: Joanne Hetherington
Date: 10/09/20

28 Edgemont St.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Linda B. Edelson-Slocum
Seller: Andrew D. Appleby
Date: 10/16/20

69 Edgewood Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $424,900
Buyer: Vera M. Denyko
Seller: Paul Huijing
Date: 10/06/20

178 Edgewood Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $299,500
Buyer: David S. Hutchins
Seller: Lisa Dailey
Date: 10/05/20

29 Elmwood Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Sophie Stevenson
Seller: Lori A. Snyder
Date: 10/08/20

17 Glenwood Circle
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Nola Management LLC
Seller: Stephen G. Haramut
Date: 10/05/20

12 Hillcrest Ave.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $465,000
Buyer: Joseph R. Dion
Seller: Brian R. Curran
Date: 10/05/20

671 Maple Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $263,000
Buyer: Kevin J. Quinn
Seller: Debra A. Judson
Date: 10/16/20

568 Pinewood Dr.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $505,000
Buyer: Oswald J. Obando
Seller: Helen E. Santaniello
Date: 10/09/20

41 Shaker Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: Nathan A. Nadeau
Seller: Diane B. Nadeau
Date: 10/15/20

LUDLOW

209 Autumn Ridge Road
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $498,000
Buyer: Derek Chandonnet
Seller: Hemlock Ridge LLC
Date: 10/14/20

49 Crest St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $199,000
Buyer: Trevor J. Lewicki
Seller: Craig J. McKay
Date: 10/15/20

299 Fuller St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $265,000
Buyer: Joseph M. Scurti
Seller: Source 9 Development LLC
Date: 10/05/20

186 Highland Ave.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Dominic L. Seguro
Seller: Domingos A. Seguro
Date: 10/05/20

6 Miller St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $1,002,186
Buyer: Hopkinton LNG Corp.
Seller: Bay State Gas Co.
Date: 10/16/20

27 Stanley St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Ryan D. Boucher
Seller: Roger W. Boucher
Date: 10/16/20

24 Voltage Ave.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $226,000
Buyer: Fallon M. St.Aubin
Seller: Philip M. Harrington
Date: 10/09/20

MONSON

13 Green St.
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $199,900
Buyer: Luke Paull
Seller: Ruby Realty LLC
Date: 10/16/20

4 Hampden Court
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $171,000
Buyer: Timothy West
Seller: Bruce D. Murphy
Date: 10/15/20

156 Hovey Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $479,000
Buyer: James Talbot
Seller: Gary A. Wandmacher
Date: 10/09/20

MONTGOMERY

332 Main Road
Montgomery, MA 01085
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Taylor Derrig
Seller: Denis G. Senecal
Date: 10/08/20

PALMER

2055 Main St.
Palmer, MA 01080
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Juan Larronde
Seller: Daniel H. Roy
Date: 10/14/20

1010 Park St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $615,000
Buyer: VPR Cap Partners 2 LLC
Seller: Bank Of America
Date: 10/15/20

SPRINGFIELD

14 Adams St.
Springfield, MA 01105
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Shkeya Brittle
Seller: Amaan Realty LLC
Date: 10/09/20

Adams St.
Springfield, MA 01101
Amount: $207,000
Buyer: Greg Gardener
Seller: Amat Victoria Curam LLC
Date: 10/07/20

78 Agnes St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $191,000
Buyer: Kircys E. Canela-Santos
Seller: Darlene A. Tait
Date: 10/09/20

49 Albemarle St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Tyrah R. Browne
Seller: Value Properties LLC
Date: 10/16/20

173 Albemarle St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $217,000
Buyer: Johanne Theodat
Seller: Bretta Construction LLC
Date: 10/06/20

69-71 Alden St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Charlie Vargas
Seller: R. M. Blerman LLC
Date: 10/06/20

54 Aldrew Ter.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $133,400
Buyer: Short4u RT
Seller: Roundpoint Mortgage Servicing
Date: 10/13/20

30 Armory St.
Springfield, MA 01105
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Jose R. Vargas-Gonzalez
Seller: Luz P. Rios-Garcia
Date: 10/14/20

33 Ashley St.
Springfield, MA 01105
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Belgica Cordero
Seller: Carlos M. Alicea
Date: 10/16/20

122 Barrington Dr.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $405,000
Buyer: Marvin M. Sinzore
Seller: Bretta Construction LLC
Date: 10/16/20

156 Barrington Dr.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $450,000
Buyer: Dwayne Early
Seller: Bretta Construction LLC
Date: 10/06/20

11-13 Baywood St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $222,000
Buyer: Francheska M. Melendez
Seller: Olmsted Realty LLC
Date: 10/09/20

43 Berard Circle
Springfield, MA 01128
Amount: $224,000
Buyer: Pedro Montanez-Charriez
Seller: IB Investments
Date: 10/07/20

24 Bissell St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $222,500
Buyer: Bretta Construction LLC
Seller: Dwayne Early
Date: 10/06/20

114 Briggs St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $285,000
Buyer: John B. Borrero
Seller: Diana R. Bannon
Date: 10/16/20

25 Burke St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $258,000
Buyer: Veronica M. Reyes
Seller: Ruby Realty LLC
Date: 10/14/20

125 Cambridge St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $222,000
Buyer: Shaundell Diaz
Seller: Alycar Investments LLC
Date: 10/15/20

31 Canterbury Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $180,000
Buyer: Venia Noel
Seller: Michelle L. Somerville
Date: 10/15/20

399 Central St.
Springfield, MA 01105
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Chantal Louis
Seller: Danichia J. Vega
Date: 10/05/20

64 Chilson St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Isiz V. Rivas
Seller: Michael L. O’Connor
Date: 10/14/20

40 Connecticut Ave.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $156,000
Buyer: John P. Sullivan RET
Seller: Mary A. Dean
Date: 10/15/20

40 Cooper St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $212,000
Buyer: Gina Mickiewicz
Seller: Daniel J. Fenton
Date: 10/06/20

56 Copeland St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $201,000
Buyer: Jennifer Goodyear
Seller: Paige N. Derry
Date: 10/09/20

19 Craig St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Stacia C. Bryant
Seller: Brian W. Vaudrin
Date: 10/07/20

34 Croyden St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Gabriela Aviles-Sanchez
Seller: Marisol Guevara
Date: 10/14/20

24 Delaware Ave.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $330,000
Buyer: Ramon Burgos
Seller: Bretta Construction LLC
Date: 10/09/20

296 Dickinson St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Omar Abeed
Seller: US Bank
Date: 10/05/20

28 Drury St.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $234,900
Buyer: Christopher Kochanek
Seller: Yvonne Grondin
Date: 10/09/20

80 East St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Dana Mitchell-Peterson
Seller: Rose A. Hill
Date: 10/14/20

176 Eddy St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Keysha Burgos
Seller: Elizabeth Lopez
Date: 10/09/20

100 Edgemont St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $166,000
Buyer: Alfonso Jimenez-Jimenez
Seller: Dorothy Smith
Date: 10/09/20

133 Ellsworth Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $172,500
Buyer: Charlotte E. Hines
Seller: Jamianne Turner
Date: 10/16/20

7 Fordham St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $168,000
Buyer: Yesseni Irizarry-Morales
Seller: Michael E. Rogers
Date: 10/09/20

17 Frontenac St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Orlando A. Lopez
Seller: Property Keys LLC
Date: 10/09/20

19 Fullerton St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Helen J. Pino
Seller: Anthony Bourget
Date: 10/13/20

75 Garland St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Nicholas Stahovish
Seller: Michael Tranghese
Date: 10/14/20

25 George St.
Springfield, MA 01105
Amount: $280,000
Buyer: Xiaomao B. Wang
Seller: KPD Properties LLC
Date: 10/15/20

526 Gifford St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $191,000
Buyer: Juan Caraballo
Seller: Kelnate Realty LLC
Date: 10/14/20

210 Gresham St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $330,000
Buyer: Treyvontae R. Goodman
Seller: Bretta Construction LLC
Date: 10/16/20

33 Greenwich St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Wytas Properties LLC
Seller: Peter E. Sares
Date: 10/09/20

132 Grover St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Sullane LLC
Seller: Carol M. Tamkovich
Date: 10/15/20

123 Hadley St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Tesia M. Pollock
Seller: Megliola, Elizabeth A., (Estate)
Date: 10/15/20

38 Hatch St.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Reyes M. Vazquez
Seller: Deena A. Polom
Date: 10/14/20

14 Irvington St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: Abdikadir S. Mohamed
Seller: Mashawn Jones
Date: 10/15/20

92 Jardine St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $188,000
Buyer: G. M. Paneto-Almodovar
Seller: CIG 4 LLC
Date: 10/09/20

79 Jeffrey Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $219,000
Buyer: Ricky E. Bowens
Seller: Laurence A. Trupe
Date: 10/15/20

61 Johnson St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $277,000
Buyer: Anthony F. Almodovar
Seller: Jaime J. Melendez
Date: 10/08/20

89 Juniper Dr.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $236,000
Buyer: A. R. Dones-Schipper
Seller: Brital 1987 LLC
Date: 10/16/20

69 Keddy St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $180,000
Buyer: Preciouse Oise
Seller: Cornelius Brouder
Date: 10/14/20

20 Labelle Dr.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Anthony Girard
Seller: John F. Long
Date: 10/14/20

33 Littleton St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Erica Pagan
Seller: Jonathan Ortiz
Date: 10/09/20

283 Longhill St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $475,000
Buyer: Johnnie Asencio
Seller: Michael A. Gulish
Date: 10/09/20

146 Lumae St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Amaralyss L. Negron
Seller: Equity Trust Co.
Date: 10/05/20

145-151 Main St.
Springfield, MA 01105
Amount: $730,000
Buyer: Lachenauer LLC
Seller: BP LLC
Date: 10/09/20

31 Manchester Ter.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Maria C. Salmeron
Seller: Filomena M. Vivenzio
Date: 10/09/20

128 Newfield Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $171,500
Buyer: Amanda C. Mills
Seller: Janisette Silveira
Date: 10/15/20

38-40 Oak St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $730,000
Buyer: Lachenauer LLC
Seller: BP LLC
Date: 10/09/20

60 Old Brook Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Jaimarie G. Ely
Seller: Kelly A. Partridge
Date: 10/14/20

72 Old Farm Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $201,000
Buyer: Ter.esa A. Wesley
Seller: Randy D. Degray
Date: 10/07/20

115 Packard Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $292,000
Buyer: Michael Tranghese
Seller: Robert J. Gossman
Date: 10/14/20

66 Palo Alto Road
Springfield, MA 01128
Amount: $315,000
Buyer: Carmen Rivera
Seller: John E. Balesky
Date: 10/13/20

104-106 Pasadena St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $149,200
Buyer: AAD LLC
Seller: K&S Holdings LLC
Date: 10/08/20

120 Patricia Circle
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $227,000
Buyer: Joseph T. Cardaropoli
Seller: Rehab Home Buyers LLC
Date: 10/07/20

343 Plumtree Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $227,000
Buyer: Timothy Riordan
Seller: Clifford P. Jensen
Date: 10/09/20

173 Powell Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Michael A. Bartolo
Seller: Ute A. Schmidt
Date: 10/06/20

104 Rollins St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $162,000
Buyer: Lisa A. Kirby
Seller: Ryan F. Nelson
Date: 10/09/20

735 Saint James Ave.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Andrew A. Lopriore
Seller: John H. Fortune
Date: 10/16/20

53 Silver St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Erykya Rivera
Seller: Juan Santana
Date: 10/13/20

100 South Branch Pkwy.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $320,000
Buyer: Guidewire Inc.
Seller: Sheila A. Gilligan
Date: 10/09/20

138 Spear Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Jose A. Muniz
Seller: Andy W. Pacheco
Date: 10/16/20

27 Stocker St.
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Anne F. Brady
Seller: Charlene Bermudez
Date: 10/16/20

999 Sumner Ave.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $249,000
Buyer: Dia L. Green
Seller: Joseph Sullivan
Date: 10/05/20

33 Surrey Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $202,000
Buyer: Gloria Jimenez
Seller: Springhouse Properties LLC
Date: 10/08/20

146 Talmadge Dr.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $183,500
Buyer: Jennifer R. Small
Seller: Eunice W. Wegge
Date: 10/07/20

438 Tinkham Road
Springfield, MA 01129
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Cornerstone Homebuying LLC
Seller: Woodworth, David A., (Estate)
Date: 10/16/20

35 Trillium St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Jessica J. Jenkins
Seller: Tamara Cruz
Date: 10/16/20

52 Undine Circle
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $262,000
Buyer: Natalie Dunn
Seller: Michele Giles-Romero
Date: 10/06/20

52 Walsh St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $192,500
Buyer: Tia A. Brown
Seller: Brown, Evelyn, (Estate)
Date: 10/13/20

65 Washburn St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Alex X. Pirela
Seller: Franklin Housey
Date: 10/15/20

15 Welcome Place
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $229,900
Buyer: Michelle Melendez
Seller: Valley Castle Holding LLC
Date: 10/06/20

Wexford St.
Springfield, MA 01101
Amount: $146,000
Buyer: William Raleigh
Seller: Ulrick, Linda I., (Estate)
Date: 10/15/20

108 Wilber St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $135,200
Buyer: Kiomarie Santiago
Seller: Patrick L. Plourde
Date: 10/06/20

26 Winding Lane
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $177,500
Buyer: Justin Preman
Seller: Mark A. Kornacki
Date: 10/16/20

18 Yamaska Road
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $320,000
Buyer: Katherine Carrasquillo
Seller: Kirk Weingarten
Date: 10/08/20

SOUTHWICK

14 Bungalow St.
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Stephen M. Gelgut
Seller: Douglas W. Bradshaw
Date: 10/06/20

325 College Hwy.
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $335,500
Buyer: Christin E. Gingras
Seller: Daniel Warriner
Date: 10/07/20

473 College Hwy.
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $195,000
Buyer: Jacob D. Parker
Seller: Norman H. Storey
Date: 10/16/20

140 Feeding Hills Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Christopher Lapan
Seller: Susan R. Laroche
Date: 10/08/20

162 Feeding Hills Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Christian Prosper
Seller: Tomas Kielasinski
Date: 10/14/20

155 Fred Jackson Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $475,000
Buyer: Albert J. Rusilowicz
Seller: Michele V. Urban
Date: 10/09/20

24 Knollwood Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $181,000
Buyer: Anthony Gaudino
Seller: Russell J. Mercier
Date: 10/09/20

Overlook Lane #34
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Todd Richards
Seller: Joseph F. Baltronis
Date: 10/15/20

WALES

41 Stafford Road
Wales, MA 01081
Amount: $390,000
Buyer: Alan J. Towle
Seller: Serge P. Arel
Date: 10/06/20

37 Union Road
Wales, MA 01081
Amount: $325,000
Buyer: Brian K. Potter
Seller: William J. Matchett
Date: 10/07/20

7 Woodland Heights
Wales, MA 01081
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Bonnie Kerness
Seller: Cornerstone Homebuying LLC
Date: 10/13/20

WEST SPRINGFIELD

65 Althea St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $217,000
Buyer: Susan Vecchio
Seller: Joyce T. Manchino
Date: 10/13/20

70 Armstrong St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $200,500
Buyer: Joshua L. Lane
Seller: Keith Ondras
Date: 10/14/20

204 Ashley St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $234,000
Buyer: Ter.rell Williams
Seller: Sally S. Amaral
Date: 10/09/20

20 Brightwater St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Jami D. Filiault
Seller: Cynthia M. Depalma
Date: 10/16/20

38 Cass Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $220,000
Buyer: Vincent Costanzi
Seller: Patrick J. Hourihan
Date: 10/16/20

33 Chapin St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $193,000
Buyer: Jorym Millete-Mercedes
Seller: Liliya Petrovna-Anipko
Date: 10/06/20

208 City View Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $310,000
Buyer: Daniel W. Adams
Seller: Joseph M. Messer
Date: 10/07/20

74-80 Doty Circle
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: John & Lorraine LLC
Seller: Ralph D. Cleveland
Date: 10/09/20

16 Exposition Ter.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: 1312 Memorial Avenue LLC
Seller: Expo Realty LLC
Date: 10/07/20

47 Hampden St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $178,000
Buyer: Anthony M. Podmore
Seller: Shauna N. Seligman
Date: 10/09/20

97 Hampden St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $265,000
Buyer: William A. Ulasewich
Seller: Linda M. Page
Date: 10/09/20

7 High Meadow Dr.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $330,000
Buyer: Jaclyn Magee
Seller: Mark A. Tokarz
Date: 10/16/20

175 Jeffrey Lane
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $455,000
Buyer: Marco G. Amato
Seller: Ronald P. Campurciani
Date: 10/16/20

107 Lancaster Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Ricardo T. Wright
Seller: Nancy E. Lane
Date: 10/13/20

88 Old Barn Road
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Jeanne S. Goodsell
Seller: James J. Flowers
Date: 10/16/20

88 Partridge Lane
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $400,000
Buyer: Maksim Loboda
Seller: Andrey Korniyenko
Date: 10/16/20

118 Pease Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $276,000
Buyer: Emma C. Lewin-Opitz
Seller: Donald B. Berry
Date: 10/09/20

125 South Blvd.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $139,000
Buyer: Ievgenii Gusiev
Seller: John P. Targonski
Date: 10/05/20

WESTFIELD

32 Allen Ave.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $173,400
Buyer: James Jylkka
Seller: McConnell, Constance M., (Estate)
Date: 10/06/20

188 Apple Blossom Lane
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $188,500
Buyer: Jeffrey Keating
Seller: Deutsche Bank
Date: 10/05/20

8 Birch Bluffs Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $220,000
Buyer: Charles N. Parker
Seller: Roman Radetskyi
Date: 10/16/20

62 Birch Bluffs Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Daniel H. Estee
Seller: Glenn P. Duperrault
Date: 10/05/20

110 Christopher Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $445,000
Buyer: Bryan Cote
Seller: Christopher Robare
Date: 10/09/20

38 Church St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Morizio Brothers Mgmt. LLC
Seller: Richard K. Adams
Date: 10/05/20

286 Falley Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $157,183
Buyer: William C. Butcher
Seller: Butcher, Richard H. Sr., (Estate)
Date: 10/06/20

5 Franklin Ave.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Carlos E. Batlle
Seller: David F. Kellner
Date: 10/07/20

12 Mallard Lane
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $400,000
Buyer: Bento Fernandes
Seller: MaryMargaret Burke
Date: 10/09/20

154 Glenwood Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $600,000
Buyer: Andrey Korniyenko
Seller: Cui X. Lin
Date: 10/15/20

4 King St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $175,000
Buyer: Kelnate Realty LLC
Seller: Assemblies Of God
Date: 10/16/20

85 Larchly Ave.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $236,500
Buyer: Holly Goulet
Seller: Arena, Mary C., (Estate)
Date: 10/13/20

16 Lozier Ave.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Konstantin A. Belyakov
Seller: Gennadiy A. Lisitsin
Date: 10/16/20

410 Montgomery Road
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $477,000
Buyer: Mary M. Burke
Seller: Andrey Rudin
Date: 10/09/20

46 Mountain View St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $305,000
Buyer: Jared M. Hague
Seller: Laurence D. Hunt
Date: 10/05/20

259 Notre Dame St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $217,000
Buyer: Alan Powers
Seller: David M. O’Connell
Date: 10/15/20

48 Orange St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $143,500
Buyer: Backlot Industries LLC
Seller: Mark Sears
Date: 10/08/20

35 Skyline Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $391,000
Buyer: Ronald D. Mack
Seller: Yevgeniy Yunikov
Date: 10/16/20

13 West School St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $219,000
Buyer: Jada M. Wiggins
Seller: Barbara A. Soto
Date: 10/16/20

39 West School St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $320,000
Buyer: Daniel Malancea
Seller: Mohammad Saleem
Date: 10/16/20

WILBRAHAM

35 Brookside Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $439,900
Buyer: Kerryann M. Serju
Seller: Wendy S. Coffey
Date: 10/16/20

30 Delmor Ave.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $259,000
Buyer: John E. Cutler
Seller: Plumtree Real Estate LLC
Date: 10/06/20

159 Main St.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $217,000
Buyer: Shauneen Coutu
Seller: Jason A. Grondin
Date: 10/16/20

2 Merrill Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $290,000
Buyer: Francis Federico
Seller: Lori A. Tetrault
Date: 10/09/20

102 Mountain Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $213,000
Buyer: Joshua R. Blanchard
Seller: Ferne Andre
Date: 10/05/20

12 Ruth Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $380,000
Buyer: Kevin T. Burke
Seller: Lawrence M. Borysyk
Date: 10/16/20

408 Springfield St.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $273,000
Buyer: Joseph E. Selva
Seller: Scott A. Richard
Date: 10/09/20

648 Stony Hill Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Karisa N. Syner
Seller: Chase, Dorothy M., (Estate)
Date: 10/14/20

903 Stony Hill Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Hilario G. Tucker
Seller: Robert L. Page
Date: 10/06/20

1022 Stony Hill Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $375,000
Buyer: Clifford Jensen
Seller: Rebecca S. Hurt
Date: 10/09/20

2 Vista Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $370,000
Buyer: Daniel Fenton
Seller: James Henriques
Date: 10/06/20

7 Whitford Place
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $550,000
Buyer: Darrin Dwight-Ray
Seller: John Barghout
Date: 10/13/20

9 Woodsley Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $521,000
Buyer: Michael R. Chechile
Seller: Jeanne M. Schmidt
Date: 10/15/20

HAMPSHIRE COUNTY

AMHERST

104 Belchertown Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $367,000
Buyer: Nora Junaid
Seller: Dana Corson
Date: 10/16/20

99 Chestnut St.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $420,000
Buyer: Jessica J. Somers
Seller: Owen Shufeldt
Date: 10/16/20

156 Columbia Dr.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $422,000
Buyer: Raj K. Shahi
Seller: Ranju Shahi
Date: 10/06/20

50 East Leverett Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $335,700
Buyer: Mehran Pouresmail
Seller: Patricia A. Leitch
Date: 10/15/20

19 Glendale Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $285,000
Buyer: Lori S. Colliander
Seller: Nghia H. Le
Date: 10/13/20

87 Harlow Dr.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Mariano C. Carmona
Seller: David D. Hixon
Date: 10/14/20

18 Hickory Lane
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $395,000
Buyer: Daniel Lawren
Seller: Nina C. Bonazzi
Date: 10/15/20

590 Middle St.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $465,000
Buyer: Julian M. Marinus
Seller: Richard L. Last
Date: 10/15/20

169 Northampton Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $350,000
Buyer: Michael M. MacDonald
Seller: Whaples, Miriam K., (Estate)
Date: 10/05/20

826 South East St.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $434,000
Buyer: Abraham Marder
Seller: Jie Liang
Date: 10/15/20

Trillium Way
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $151,000
Buyer: Amir Mikhchi
Seller: Marion A. Waskiewicz RET
Date: 10/07/20

BELCHERTOWN

310 Bardwell St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $385,000
Buyer: Jacob W. Walker
Seller: Gary A. Bosselait
Date: 10/15/20

301 Boardman St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $385,000
Buyer: Geremias P. Encarnacion
Seller: Sergey Savonin
Date: 10/06/20

4 Daniel Square Ext.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Timothy Merchant
Seller: Nepus, Paul James, (Estate)
Date: 10/06/20

81 Gulf Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $424,000
Buyer: Khiran M. Raj
Seller: Leslie J. Franks
Date: 10/07/20

170 Jackson St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $435,000
Buyer: Carmen S. Wallace
Seller: David M. Clegg
Date: 10/16/20

491 Michael Sears Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Benjamin S. Duby
Seller: Richard E. Duby
Date: 10/13/20

115 North Main St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $195,000
Buyer: James Bachand
Seller: Barbara W. Freed RET
Date: 10/07/20

19 Robin Lane
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $328,500
Buyer: Richard S. Ethier
Seller: Joydell Cebula
Date: 10/15/20

24 Rockrimmon St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $570,000
Buyer: Nicholas J. Moynihan
Seller: Jeffrey D. Odom
Date: 10/15/20

442 Warren Wright Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Sara E. Laplante
Seller: G. E&M N. Lobenstine LT
Date: 10/16/20

CUMMINGTON

17 West Main St.
Cummington, MA 01026
Amount: $208,200
Buyer: Chelsea A. Lepak
Seller: Kaitlyn M. Myers
Date: 10/16/20

EASTHAMPTON

Colonial Ave.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: W. Marek Inc.
Seller: Donna L. Wain
Date: 10/09/20

27 Drury Lane
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Elizabeth Jackson
Seller: Cheryle A. Campbell
Date: 10/05/20

204 Loudville Road
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $315,000
Buyer: Alice Lee
Seller: Erin Wheeler-Zimbler
Date: 10/15/20

420 Main St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $270,000
Buyer: Brahm Alaaiod
Seller: Steven J. Fickert
Date: 10/15/20

24 Morin Dr.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $273,000
Buyer: Jacquelyn Claver
Seller: Mark A. Dean
Date: 10/13/20

GRANBY

17 Easton St.
Granby, MA 01033
Amount: $277,000
Buyer: Robert W. Driscoll
Seller: Susan T. Pratt
Date: 10/06/20

65 West St.
Granby, MA 01033
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Benjamin A. Surner
Seller: Barbara A. Laramie
Date: 10/16/20

HADLEY

198 River Dr.
Hadley, MA 01035
Amount: $218,000
Buyer: Matthew D. Kushi
Seller: Mary R. Kushi
Date: 10/05/20

Stockbridge St.
Hadley, MA 01035
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Walter J. Czajkowski
Seller: Henry & Linda Fil LT
Date: 10/13/20

5 Sunrise Dr.
Hadley, MA 01035
Amount: $405,000
Buyer: Maiya L. Otsuka
Seller: Jody E. Devine
Date: 10/15/20

HUNTINGTON

24 Allen Coit Road
Huntington, MA 01050
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Andrea A. Jordan-Amberg
Seller: USA HUD
Date: 10/05/20

253 Goss Hill Road
Huntington, MA 01050
Amount: $136,000
Buyer: Sue A. Fopiano
Seller: Frederick R. Fopiano
Date: 10/06/20

NORTHAMPTON

115 Audubon Road
Northampton, MA 01053
Amount: $675,000
Buyer: Rachel M. Koppelman
Seller: Dikinson, Nancy W., (Estate)
Date: 10/14/20

42 Bliss St.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $258,000
Buyer: Michele L. Ruschhaupt
Seller: Bliss Hampshire TR
Date: 10/06/20

174 Bridge Road
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $325,000
Buyer: Angela M. Ditaranto
Seller: Kathleen Poklewski
Date: 10/07/20

294 Cardinal Way
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $535,000
Buyer: Andrea Agliati
Seller: Thomas A. Miranda
Date: 10/09/20

226 Emerson Way
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $739,077
Buyer: Richard L. Last
Seller: Sunwood Development Corp.
Date: 10/15/20

238 Emerson Way
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $147,000
Buyer: Ann-Marie Starck
Seller: Rosemund LLC
Date: 10/09/20

526 Florence Road
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $607,000
Buyer: Suri B. Roth-Katz
Seller: Darien Mcfadden
Date: 10/14/20

717 Florence Road
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $228,965
Buyer: Great Barrington Sunoco
Seller: David S. Smokler
Date: 10/15/20

Hockanum Road
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $605,000
Buyer: Steven J. Niedbala
Seller: Grygorcewicz, Joseph P., (Estate)
Date: 10/16/20

59 Ice Pond Dr.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $579,000
Buyer: Elizabeth D. Simpson
Seller: Nu-Way Homes Inc.
Date: 10/16/20

20 Pine St.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $400,000
Buyer: Jane E. Dalton
Seller: James J. Cronin
Date: 10/05/20

398 Pleasant St.
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $605,000
Buyer: Steven J. Niedbala
Seller: Grygorcewicz, Joseph P., (Estate)
Date: 10/16/20

408 Pleasant St.
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $605,000
Buyer: Steven J. Niedbala
Seller: Grygorcewicz, Joseph P., (Estate)
Date: 10/16/20

91 Round Hill Road
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $1,372,500
Buyer: Shanthi Thomas
Seller: A. Kim Saal
Date: 10/09/20

129 Sandy Hill Road
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $261,000
Buyer: Jennifer Brunton
Seller: Peter J. Clogston
Date: 10/07/20

112 Washington Ave.
Northampton, MA 01060
Amount: $1,110,000
Buyer: D. A&J Westcott 2012 FT
Seller: Sanford Bloomberg RET
Date: 10/14/20

PLAINFIELD

1 Pleasant St.
Plainfield, MA 01070
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Jamie M. Wooldridge
Seller: Thatcher, Arthur C., (Estate)
Date: 10/09/20

63 South Central St.
Plainfield, MA 01070
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Samantha J. Tomao
Seller: Jamie M. Wooldridge
Date: 10/07/20

SOUTH HADLEY

19 Foch Ave.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $240,000
Buyer: Joseph A. Roxo
Seller: Robert J. Poirier
Date: 10/09/20

36 Lathrop St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $243,000
Buyer: Brittany L. Caouette
Seller: Robert A. Methot
Date: 10/16/20

11 Laurie Ave.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $259,000
Buyer: Kyle J. Callahan
Seller: Marissa Montemagni
Date: 10/08/20

298 Newton St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $790,000
Buyer: Joseph A. Marois
Seller: Careys Flowers Inc.
Date: 10/09/20

300 Newton St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $790,000
Buyer: Joseph A. Marois
Seller: Careys Flowers Inc.
Date: 10/09/20

302 Newton St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $790,000
Buyer: Joseph A. Marois
Seller: Careys Flowers Inc.
Date: 10/09/20

33 North Main St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $290,000
Buyer: Linda Taylor
Seller: Michal P. Kosciolek
Date: 10/09/20

50 Prospect St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $316,000
Buyer: Samuel T. Clarke
Seller: Scot M. Duguay
Date: 10/15/20

11 Queen Circle
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $177,500
Buyer: Laurabeth Parent
Seller: Consolini, Laura P., (Estate)
Date: 10/16/20

11 Saybrook Circle
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $263,000
Buyer: Frederick C. Kielbasa
Seller: Robert C. Wallace
Date: 10/15/20

15 Sycamore Knolls
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $290,000
Buyer: Alexandria Moriarty
Seller: June M. Beattie
Date: 10/16/20

SOUTHAMPTON

45 Gilbert Road
Southampton, MA 01073
Amount: $449,900
Buyer: Jacob E. Gold
Seller: Michael J. Trusas
Date: 10/16/20

62 Gilbert Road
Southampton, MA 01073
Amount: $350,000
Buyer: Peter M. Gregg
Seller: Mary A. Jasinski
Date: 10/06/20

Quigley Road
Southampton, MA 01073
Amount: $120,000
Buyer: Harold A. Butson
Seller: Pellegrini Development LLC
Date: 10/08/20

WARE

4 Crescent St.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $219,000
Buyer: Wendy Howes
Seller: Judy A. Cerrone
Date: 10/09/20

5-A&B Mirabile Dr.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $299,900
Buyer: Sultana Anton
Seller: Carrie A. Alley
Date: 10/06/20

256 Greenwich Road
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $375,000
Buyer: Jonathan T. Orzech
Seller: Douglas R. Koczur
Date: 10/15/20

24 Pleasant St.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $218,000
Buyer: Steven A. Click
Seller: Rafael Capellan-Polanco
Date: 10/16/20

23 Shoreline Dr.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Jeremiah Blankenbaker
Seller: Rebecca A. Berg
Date: 10/15/20

WESTHAMPTON

Blueberry Hill Road #7
Westhampton, MA 01027
Amount: $122,500
Buyer: Martin M. Downey
Seller: Patrick Properties LLC
Date: 10/14/20

WILLIAMSBURG

5 Deer Haven Dr.
Williamsburg, MA 01039
Amount: $675,900
Buyer: Peter F. Falco
Seller: Jihong Tang
Date: 10/05/20

WORTHINGTON

23 Sam Hill Road
Worthington, MA 01098
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: Seamus P. Cullen
Seller: Dustin Donovan
Date: 10/09/20

Building Permits

By
Building Permits

The following building permits were issued during the month of October 2020. (Filings are limited due to closures or reduced staffing hours at municipal offices due to COVID-19 restrictions).

AMHERST

Arbors at Amherst, LP
130 University Dr.
$172,500 — Roofing

Winter Light Properties, LLC
264 North Pleasant St.
$5,000 — Repairs to cupola

CHICOPEE

1890 Chicopee, LLC
154 School St.
$8,000 — Roofing

Chicopee Provision Co.
19 Sitarz Ave.
$93,200 — Roofing

Dhanya Real Estate Holdings, LLC
21 Bay State Road
$100,000 — Finish previously started elevator shaft and finish second-floor office space

Zhen Yun Dong
108 West St.
$65,000 — Remodel retail space for new restaurant, remodel women’s restroom, install new fixtures, sushi bar, update plumbing and electrical

Dorothy Krawiec
2 Valier Ave.
$25,000 — Remove and replace three antennas and six remote radio heads

Mike Laser Enterprises, LLC
675 Fuller Road
$11,200 — Install fire alarm

LEE

Town of Lee
385 Pleasant St.
$48,500 — Roofing on salt shed

LENOX

Boston Symphony Orchestra
30 Richmond Mountain Road
$40,000 — Replace north foundation wall

GL&V USA Inc.
175 Crystal St.
$48,000 — Roof repair

Craig Switzer
2 Holmes Road
$12,500 — Roofing

NORTHAMPTON

Cosenzi Automotive Realty, LP
48 Damon Road
$1,500 — Non-illuminated front wall sign

City of Northampton
33 Hockanum Road
Upgrades and repairs to multiple wastewater-treatment plant systems

City of Northampton
212 Main St.
$3,682 — Form alcove for bottle-filling station

Maura Glennon
17 Main St.
$4,300 — Add service/pickup window with overhanging room and steps

Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield
99 King St.
$275,000 — Add parking lot, replace concrete stairs and ramp, and add lighting

PITTSFIELD

195 South St.
Edwin Helitzer
$81,178 — Roofing

395 North, LLC
391 North St.
$2,500 — Spot repoint mortar on building exterior as needed

Cafua Realty Trust CXXVI, LLC
18 First St.
$5,500 — Remove and replace drive-thru menu-board footing

Four Industrial Drive, LLC
4 Industrial Dr.
$152,254 — Add paint booth and paint-mixing room to interior of building

Macfarlane Family Partners, LP
190 South St.
$66,113 — Remodel interior finishes

One Hundred One South Street
101 South St.
$227,132 — Demolish existing first-floor HVAC system, install new HVAC system

SPRINGFIELD

401 Liberty Street, LLC
10 Heywood St.
$41,800 — Alter space for new Friends of the Homeless emergency shelter for men, alter another space for supervision area and two toilets

1780 HCHQ Inc.
1780 Main St.
$175,000 — Install fire-alarm system at Way Finders

Gogri Inc.
740 Boston Road
$225,000 — Repair fire-damaged gas station, build addition, install new roof system

Francisco Gonzalez
2924 Main St.
$3,500 — Repair block wall

MGM Springfield Redevelopment, LLC
1028 Main St.
$354,917 — Install fire-alarm system for Walhburgers

Northgate Center, LLC
1985 Main St.
$150,000 — Alter tenant space for Center for Human Development training center

Miguel Pedrosa
2530 Main St.
$15,000 — Roofing

Solutia Inc.
730 Worcester St.
$1,110,000 — Repair commercial roof covering on Building 89, Eastman Co.

WILBRAHAM

2034-2040 Boston Road, LLP
2034 Boston Road
$3,845 — Sign for Garvey’s Nutrition, Energy, Lifestyle

Stony Hill Road Realty, LLC
805 Stony Hill Road
$20,000 — Remove and replace six antennas, remove additional three antennas

Sue Stubbs

By
Women of Impact 2020

President and CEO, ServiceNet

She’s Grown Her Agency by Recognizing Needs and Welcoming New Ideas

Sue Stubbs

Sue Stubbs

Sue Stubbs has always thought like an entrepreneur.

“Even as a kid, I was thinking about business opportunities,” she said, recalling that, during her studies at Northeastern University, she’d walk through Boston’s Back Bay — which was littered with dilapidated buildings back then — between her train stop and the campus.

“I tried to convince may parents to buy a brownstone in the Back Bay, and they thought I was nuts. Now, look what’s happened in that neighborhood. It would have been a good idea.”

Fortunately, Stubbs has been able to shepherd myriad good ideas into practice as president and CEO of ServiceNet, which she has led since 1980. Actually, she worked for Valley Programs back then, and later oversaw its merger with Northampton Area Mental Health Services and Franklin Hampshire Community Mental Health Center; the new organization became ServiceNet in 1995.

Through those years and well beyond, she has grown the agency from 25 employees to 1,750 and its annual budget from $500,000 to $70 million. From its origins running a few group homes, ServiceNet’s range of services has expanded to include residential and day programs for people with mental illness, developmental disability, autism, and brain injury; outpatient behavioral health clinics in five communities; addiction services; vocational services; shelter and housing programs for people working their way out of homelessness; children’s services; and more.

“We’ve been open to new opportunities, always looking at the next thing coming down the pike and asking, ‘how can we meet a need or take advantage of an opportunity?’”

“It’s very gratifying,” she said of that growth and her 40 years of, well, impact. “Not just in terms of staff and money, but in terms of the people we’re serving. And it’s not just due to me — it’s due to a lot of people, and a lot of collaboration with the state. We pride ourselves on being a good partner with the state.”

Among its many innovations over the years, ServiceNet:

• Established Prospect Meadow Farm in Hatfield, a working farm — staffed by individuals with developmental disabilities or autism — that has become one of the largest producers of log-grown shiitake mushrooms in Western Mass.;

• Created two multi-faceted enrichment centers for people with brain injury, which provide intensive rehabilitation services in partnership with area universities’ training programs, as well as social networking, programming in fitness and the arts, and opportunities for community service — a model that has become a standard across Massachusetts;
• Has become the first mental-health agency in Massachusetts to adopt an integrated electronic medical record, using aggregated data to track the impact of various outpatient clinical services over time;

• Partnered with academic leaders at area universities on applied research projects with ServiceNet’s own research team;

• Launched the Western Massachusetts PREP (Prevention and Recovery in Early Psychosis) program, an intensive, evidence-based day program for young people, designed to speed recovery and help prevent long-term, chronic mental illness; and

• Developed intensive residential programming for individuals with developmental disability who have also been diagnosed with mental illness.

“Some agencies keep doing the same thing for years and years, and they have one mission, and it’s narrow, and that’s all good,” Stubbs told BusinessWest. “When someone comes to me with an idea or a need that’s been identified and nobody else is stepping up, we’ve had a tendency to try to problem-solve and step up.

“That’s how we’ve grown,” she continued. “We’ve been open to new opportunities, always looking at the next thing coming down the pike and asking, ‘how can we meet a need or take advantage of an opportunity?’”

 

Calculated Risks

She’s always done so with an entrepreneurial mindset, thinking like a for-profit business might, with an eye toward calculated risk taking and a willingness to seize opportunities for growth and diversification when they come into view rather than remaining on the sidelines and playing it safe.

Sue Stubbs, pictured with Allie LeClair, assistant director of Prospect Meadow Farm in North Hatfield

Sue Stubbs, pictured with Allie LeClair, assistant director of Prospect Meadow Farm in North Hatfield, says the farm and its store have been revenue generators in addition to the farm’s therapeutic benefits.

Take, for example, day programs for people with acquired brain injuries. There were no such facilities in the region, said Stubbs, before ServiceNet began developing its own — and the state changed its outlook on the need for such programs. While services existed for people with developmental disabilities, she noted, “brain-injury patients usually ended up in nursing homes, where they weren’t getting the help they needed. The state now funds those services.”

Another example is Prospect Meadow Farm, which was developed around the value of connecting with living things, both animals and plants, for many clients with intellectual disabilities, autism, or brain injury. While it indeed serves that purpose — Stubbs tells of clients who have opened up like never before — its shiitake production and a café produce revenue that supports other ServiceNet programs.

That entrepreneurial mindset isn’t shared by every social-service organization, she noted.

“I guess some people are more risk-averse and worry more about bad outcomes. My feeling is, if something doesn’t work out, you have to be prepared to admit you’re wrong and you have to be prepared to fail fast,” she said, adding that ServiceNet has done exactly that on occasion.

“You can’t hold on to a project when you find fatal flaws or it’s too much of a struggle and it diverts energy from other things. You have to be willing to say, ‘this is not a project we should be doing,’ and be willing to cut your losses.”

She admits she may be more cautious these days — “I took more risks when I was younger, and didn’t think as much about contingency plans” — but one thing hasn’t changed, and that’s a focus on hiring people with both good business sense and “fire in the belly” when it comes to helping people, two traits that go hand in hand, she said.

“People ask, ‘how does an organization get its culture or its outlook, and how does the CEO make people feel the same way she does? How does it happen?’ It’s kind of an organic process, where people tend to hire and promote people who fit in with how they think.”

So, even though the management team at ServiceNet is diverse when it comes to age, gender, and nationality, “they’re people who have that entrepreneurial spirit, or step-up kind of spirit, that I have, and they end up being people who resonate with my way of thinking, so I promote them.”

That team has had a difficult year for sure, especially challenging the group homes, which obviously couldn’t close when much of the economy shut down in March; some managers worked extra hours, while temporary staff were brought in to cover those who were unable to work due to COVID-19 concerns.

The outpatient clinics had a different challenge, but ramped up virtual appointments quickly once the state made them billable.

“That allowed therapists to work at home, and we hardly skipped a beat in seeing our clients. It’s amazing how quickly therapists and clients adapted to it and liked it,” Stubbs said, adding that, while it can never replace all in-person visits, the remote model does have a future; for one thing, it has decreased the no-show rate.

“For some people, it may be a better option,” she said, adding that ServiceNet has also been able to expand its workforce pool by allowing employees to work at home. “Sometimes, out of adversity come good discoveries. We hope we can keep billing for remote forever.”

 

Making Things Happen

In her Women of Impact nomination form, Amy Swisher, ServiceNet’s vice president of Community Relations, called Stubbs “a visionary leader, insightful therapist, and restless entrepreneur who never stops innovating. Sue understood the power of possibility thinking long before this concept hit the mainstream.”

That remains true today for someone who has never been afraid of new ideas, and always encouraged her team to think outside the box.

“If we’re sitting around with our management team and somebody says, ‘hey, I have this idea, but it may sound crazy,’ everyone goes, ‘no, it doesn’t sound crazy. Maybe we can make that happen,’” Stubbs said. “People fill out each other’s ideas — and we’ve made a lot of things happen that way.”

 

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

 

Christina Royal

By
Women of Impact 2020

President, Holyoke Community College

The Pandemic Provides a Lens Through Which to View Her Leadership Skills

Christina Royal

Christina Royal

As she talked about the COVID-19 pandemic and her administration’s multi-leveled response to it, Christina Royal related a story that speaks volumes about both the impact of the crisis on every aspect of the higher-education experience at Holyoke Community College (HCC) and her own efforts to lead this institution through it — and beyond it.

It also helps explain why she’s been named a Woman of Impact for 2020.

This story is about a student, one of the many who needed some help with learning virtually from home — help that went beyond providing a laptop and internet connectivity.

“Through our student emergency fund, this student put in a request and said, ‘I’m so grateful for the college to provide a laptop for me … but I don’t have a desk,’” she recalled, adding that there were several people in this household suddenly faced with the challenge of trying to learn and work from home. “And that’s just one example of how we had to think about support at a deeper level, really dive into the individual needs of each of our students to support them during this time, and address the inequities that exist in the communities we serve.”

The college would go on to fund a desk for this individual, she went on, adding that this piece of furniture is symbolic of how the school has indeed expanded its view of student emergency needs during this pandemic — but also in general.

“One of the questions I bring up to employees of the college is, ‘what do we want to look like on the other side of this pandemic?’ Because I don’t want to be a person who just felt like I was trying to weather the storm. I want us to emerge stronger from this.”

Royal arrived on campus roughly five years ago with a mindset to do what was needed to address the many needs of students and help enable them to not only grasp the opportunity for a two-year college education, but to open many other doors as well. As a first-generation, low-income, biracial college student herself, she understands the challenges many of HCC’s students face — from food insecurity to lack of adequate housing and transportation — and she commits many of her waking hours thinking about how to help students overcome such barriers and achieve success, however that might be defined.

Meanwhile, as an administrator, she he has put the emphasis on long-term planning and leading for today, as well as tomorrow. This is evidenced by her push for a new strategic plan for the school — the first in its existence — but also the manner in which she is addressing this pandemic.

Instead of something to be merely survived, although that is certainly important enough, she views it as a learning experience and, in many respects, an opportunity.

“One of the questions I bring up to employees of the college is, ‘what do we want to look like on the other side of this pandemic?’” she explained. “Because I don’t want to be a person who just felt like I was trying to weather the storm. I want us to emerge stronger from this, and the work we have to do is so absolutely critical to this community, and we have an opportunity to continually strengthen ourselves.

Christina Royal meets with students at the HCC MGM Culinary Arts Institute, which opened its doors in 2019.

Christina Royal meets with students at the HCC MGM Culinary Arts Institute, which opened its doors in 2019.

“Just like education is a journey, so is continuous improvement,” she went on, adding that this process can — and must — continue, even in the middle of a global pandemic.

Her commitment to this process, and her ability to effectively keep one eye on the present and the other on the future, certainly makes her a Women of Impact.

 

Course of Action

Royal calls them ‘town meetings.’

These are Zoom sessions that she conducts with various audiences — students, faculty, members of the community — to keep them abreast of new developments and initiatives in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, and with the college in general. She’s staged 19 of them since March, including one just a few weeks ago in which the topic of conversation among faculty and staff was the ongoing accreditation process and the comments offered by the team at the New England Commission of Higher Education.

“I really prioritized this as part of our crisis-management plan — we really had to increase communication at the college,” she told BusinessWest. “When people are feeling isolated in their homes, and they’re uncertain about this thing called COVID, and they’re uncertain about their own health and safety, and they’re concerned about the college, I felt it was really important to come together.

“And while it’s really nice when we can come together in the same room, community is community, and we need to bring people together to feel a sense of community through this,” she said, adding that another initiative she’s implemented is the formation of a volunteer team of students and staff tasked with calling every student enrolled at the school every week “just to check in and see how they’re doing.”

These town meetings and weekly check-ins are just some of the ways Royal is providing both stewardship and forward thinking at a time when every college administrator’s abilities are being sternly tested. And the pandemic provides a lens through which her leadership skills and ability to build partnerships and create collaborative initiatives can be seen.

But first, we need to talk about life before anyone had ever heard the phrase COVID-19.

Royal became just the fourth president in HCC’s history in early 2017 after a stint as provost and vice president of Academic Affairs.

In an interview with BusinessWest soon after taking the helm, she provided some clear evidence of both her empathy for students and commitment to creating ever-stronger ties between the school and the communites it serves.

“I have a phrase that I’ve used often during my career — that ‘it takes a village to raise a student,’” she noted at the time. “And I really believe that having partnerships with business and industry and the community is essential for an institution of higher education to thrive. Likewise, for a community with a community college to thrive, it needs to have a strong community college. I look at it as a bi-directional relationship and partnership.”

Since her arrival, there have been a number of significant developments at the school, including a $44 million project to modernize and revitalize an antiquated Campus Center, the so-called ‘heart’ of the college, a new Center for Life Sciences, and the creation of the HCC MGM Culinary Arts Institute in the Cubit building, which opened its doors to considerable fanfare in early 2019.

Christina Royal leads Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker on a tour of HCC

Christina Royal leads Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker on a tour of HCC’s new, $44 million Campus Center earlier this year.

Ironically, the new campus center staged its elaborate grand opening just a few weeks before the pandemic shut down college campuses across the Commonwealth. Meanwhile, the Culinary Arts Institute, while still operating on some levels, has seen a dramatic decrease in interest among prospective students as the pandemic has devastated the hospitality industry.

But while those new facilities are in many ways quiet, they form some of the building blocks that will support continued growth for decades to come.

No one can say with any degree of certainly when a sense of ‘normal’ will return to college campuses — HCC has already announced that most all classes will be taught remotely next spring — but Royal, as noted, is working to have her school ready for that day.

“I want us to look at this moment in time as an opportunity, and focus not just on the things that are outside of our control, but the things that we do have the ability to control,” she explained, noting that the questions and comments offered by students during those aforementioned check-ins are certainly helping in this process of continuous improvement and readying for life after COVID-19.

“When that day arrives, there will be a much-anticipated return to the classroom,” she noted, adding quickly, however, that the pandemic has proven there is certainly a place for remote learning and that it will be a big part of the equation moving forward.

“Distance learning is here to stay. And even if we have a smaller number of students on one end of the spectrum, wanting to take everything online, we have a lot of opportunity in that middle space of how we blend our in-person courses with hybrid learning.

“What’s so great about this time is that we have faculty members who are experimenting with ways to utilize this technology to more effectively reach their students and enable them to complete the work,” she went on. “And when you think about combining that with the pedagogy of the traditional classroom and their expertise in that setting, I imagine there’s going to be some wonderful opportunities to grow the blended student experience.”

 

Career Milestone

In 2021, HCC will celebrate its 75th anniversary.

At this time, no one, including Royal, can say when and how that milestone will be celebrated. But she does know it will be a time to look back at what’s been achieved, but, more importantly, focus on what will come next and how the school can do more to serve its communities and its students.

That’s what Royal has done since she’s arrived in Holyoke. It’s a mindset that has made her a great leader — at all times, and especially during these times.

And it has also made her one of this year’s Women of Impact.

 

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

Picture This

By
Picture This

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

 

 

Manufacturer of the Year

State Sen. Eric Lesser, Senate chair of the Manufacturing Caucus, recognized Toner Plastics as the First Hampden and Hampshire Manufacturer of the Year in a virtual, reimagined fifth annual Manufacturing Awards ceremony also attended by state Rep. Jeff Roy, Manufacturing Caucus co-chair; House Speaker Robert DeLeo; Senate President Karen Spilka; and Secretary of Housing and Economic Development Michael Kennealy. This followed an in-person presentation of the award by Lesser (pictured, left) at the East Longmeadow facility on Oct. 15 alongside company President Jack Warren and members of his team.

 

Grand Opening in Amherst

bankESB recently celebrated the virtual grand opening of its newest branch location at 253 Triangle St., Amherst. The event was commemorated in a Facebook Live broadcast hosted by the Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce. Pictured, from left: Claudia Pazmany, executive director of the Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce; Nancy Lapointe, senior vice president of Retail Administration at bankESB; Matt Sosik, bankESB president and CEO; Jessica West, bankESB assistant vice president and Amherst branch officer; and stste Rep. Mindy Domb

 

 

COVID-19 Relief

The state awarded Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) two grants totaling nearly $662,000 for COVID-19 relief. The money will be used to help keep the campus safe during the pandemic, compensate faculty for their work developing online courses, and boost student aid. Pictured: STCC President John Cook speaks at a news conference announcing the funding, alongside, from left, Heriberto “Herbie” Flores, president and CEO of Partners for Community; state Rep. Angelo Puppolo Jr; state Rep. Bud Williams; state Rep. Carlos Gonzalez; and Denise Hurst, vice president of Advancement and External Affairs at STCC.

 

 

Halloween, 2020-Style

 

The United Way of Pioneer Valley staged a unique, COVID-era Halloween-day celebration at the TD Bank building in downtown Springfield. Sponsored by Colebrook Realty Services and Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno, the event drew more than 3,000 cars, with those driving through dressed for the occasion. From top to bottom: Sarno waves to an approaching car; Paula Wysocka, a United Way staff member, gets into the spirit of the event; some of the goodies that were handed out to the young people being driven through; the entrance to the building was decorated for the holiday.

 

 

Celebrating STEM Week

As a way to celebrate STEM Week in Massachusetts last month, the Red Sox Foundation and the Museum of Science in Boston partnered to distribute nearly 650 at-home science and engineering design-challenge kits to children at Springfield’s Square One (pictured), the Lawrence YMCA, and the Lawrence Boys & Girls Club. The Try It! kits are a part of the virtual learning resources the museum has developed through its curricular division, EiE, and its MOS at Home digital platform, to provide families with all the materials needed to enjoy fun and engaging science education any time, any place.

 

Toni Hendrix

By Contributor
Women of Impact 2020

Director of Human Resources, Loomis Lakeside at Reeds Landing

She Changes Organizations for the Better Through Empathetic Leadership

By Mark Morris

Toni Hendrix

Toni Hendrix

 

Toni Hendrix has a few philosophies she’s fond of sharing.

The first is “the fish rots from the head.” To prevent that rot, she believes it’s important for each person to set a high standard.

“We need to lead by example,” said Hendrix, director of Human Resources at Loomis Lakeside at Reeds Landing in Springfield. “I’m extremely passionate about leadership, and when it’s done right, good leaders are role models.”

Her second philosophy is “God don’t like ugly.” She acknowledges the phrase uses improper grammar, but stating the idea this way gives it more impact. The point is not to treat others in an ugly way.

“Let’s do the right thing and treat people with dignity and respect because, if you don’t, karma can come back and bite you.”

Her third philosophy comes from a sergeant she served with while stationed in Germany with the U.S. Army.

“You won’t know how much people can do until they know how much you care,” she said, calling it a great message about the power of empathy. “If you show people that you care, take time to learn about their families, and show a real interest in them, they will take that hill for you. They will even die for you. Otherwise, they’re not even going to follow you up that hill; you’ll be by yourself.”

“If you show people that you care, take time to learn about their families, and show a real interest in them, they will take that hill for you. They will even die for you. Otherwise, they’re not even going to follow you up that hill; you’ll be by yourself.”

Those three philosophies basically boil down to one guiding principle, she added: treat people with dignity and respect. In a quarter-century of honing her skills as as a human-resources professional, she’s followed that guiding principle, especially when facing her toughest challenges.

After graduating from West Springfield High School, Hendrix served for seven years in the Army, which brought her to several U.S. states as well as Germany, Turkey, and South Korea. Her job was supposed to be as a military policewoman, but in the 1980s, the Army prohibited women from serving in that role.

“I ended up doing other duties, like guarding the gate and working as the provost marshal’s secretary, but I was never allowed to work as a military police person,” she said. But instead of letting that experience bring her down, she turned it into a motivator.

“I’ve had my own personal experiences with gender discrimination, sexual harassment, and being treated very differently because I lived in a country where I didn’t speak the language.”

Treating people with dignity and respect has been a touchstone of Toni Hendrix’s career, including in her current role at Loomis Lakeside.

Treating people with dignity and respect has been a touchstone of Toni Hendrix’s career, including in her current role at Loomis Lakeside.

But those experiences provided a background that would become valuable in shaping her career, first as a Human Resources director with Mass Mutual and at several stops after that — all of them marked by a simple desire to be impactful by leading with empathy and treating people the right way.

 

Focus on Diversity

In the mid-1990s, Mass Mutual was working to address diversity issues that affected not only internal employees, but potential customers as well.

“At that time, their marketing messages were directed to white men with salaries over $100,000,” Hendrix said. “But they were ignoring families with dual incomes, women business leaders, and women entrepreneurs.”

When then-CEO Tom Wheeler decided he wanted diversity to be his legacy, Hendrix became the leader of that effort at MassMutual. Later, in the early 2000s, she brought those same leadership skills to Pennsylvania-based Simmons Consulting.

“We worked with a number of Fortune 100 and Fortune 500 companies that had gotten in trouble around gender or race discrimination issues,” she told BusinessWest. “With our help, they were able to better address diversity in their workforces.”

Hendrix also worked to improve human-resource processes at the American Cancer Society and Baystate Health before taking on her current role with the Loomis Communities.

It was a Loomis board member who encouraged her to be part of Bridge for Unity, a group of people from around the Pioneer Valley who come together to talk about race relations. With a goal of starting a dialogue among diverse people in a thoughtful and safe environment, the group has also hosted similar groups from South Carolina and Kentucky.

The simple act of gathering people to have a dialogue about race has been enlightening at times for Hendrix. “The people from Kentucky have a very different experience than the people from Amherst,” she observed.

A desire to be involved in the community has provided numerous opportunities for Hendrix to share her philosophies. In what she calls “my love project,” she serves as board president for the Art for the Soul Gallery in Springfield. Founded by Stella Butler and Rosemary Tracy Woods, Art for the Soul is a place where underrepresented groups can to display their art in all its various forms. When Woods decided to form a board of directors for the gallery, she asked Hendrix to lead it.

As a first order of business, Hendrix set a strategic goal to get the gallery out of the red. After some modest local fundraising, Art for Soul stepped up its game and organized its largest event, arranging for Harold Melvin’s Blue Notes to perform a concert in Springfield in 2018. Since then, the gallery has operated in the black, allowing the board to be more forward-thinking.

“We can now start to build the brand and develop our board to put the organization in a good place for the future,” she said.

Woods appreciates the impact her friend has had on the gallery. “Toni’s leadership and out-of-the-box thinking have been an inspiration and a godsend to the sustainability of Art for the Soul Gallery,” she said in nominating Hendrix to be recognized as a Women of Impact.

 

Building Community

As a human-resources professional, Hendrix has been a member of the Employers Assoc. of the NorthEast for some time, and in January, EANE invited her to join its board of directors. She admitted she was initially hesitant because the group lacked minority staff and board members. “Then I reminded myself, it’s not good enough to just be critical — I also have to serve when asked.”

Once the pandemic is behind us, she said, the human-resources profession will have to operate under a whole new set of rules and policies. “And I think the Employers Association will be right at the forefront of what this new world will look like, so I’m glad to be on their board.”

Meanwhile, years of experience anchored by those strong principles have enabled Hendrix to manage her own staff during these unprecedented times of COVID-19.

“In my entire career, I’ve never seen the kind of fear employees have now,” she said. “I’ve always been a proponent of treating people right, so we are focused on helping people feel more safe.” That involves reassuring employees that their workplace is a safe place and that support systems are in place should they have a problem.

Hendrix and her husband Joe, owner of Smokey Joe’s Cigar Lounge, have lived their lives in a way in which they are always building community. She credits her mother with setting the example a long time ago by always having room at the dinner table, treating visitors with dignity and respect.

“I start every board meeting at Art for the Soul Gallery by going around the table to ask, ‘what’s good in your world?’” she noted. “That way, we know what’s happening in each other’s lives.”

Whether it’s inviting people to her own house for dinner or offering Smokey Joe’s to a family that can’t afford a post-funeral gathering, Hendrix and her husband are dedicated to building community by treating others the way they’d like to be treated. “If that’s the only impact I leave in this world, that’s perfectly fine with me.”

 

Agenda

By
Agenda

A+ Awards Show

Nov. 12: The Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce 2020 A+ Awards Show will be held virtually and broadcast live from Hadley Farms Meeting House, with PeoplesBank serving as presenting sponsor. Each year, the chamber gives A+ Awards to individuals and organizations that enrich the life of the community through their work in education, business, and civic engagement in Amherst, Belchertown, Hadley, Leverett, Pelham, Shutesbury, Sunderland, and the Pioneer Valley as a whole. This year’s honorees include Betsey McInnis (Lifetime Achievement Award), Phoenix Fruit Farm of Belchertown (Leader in Innovation Award), Kestrel Land Trust of Amherst (Leader in Sustainability Award), Ash Crawford, director of Operations at Amherst Coffee (Young Professional Award), Mercedes-Benz of Springfield (Community Service Award), and Lisa Eugin of Encharter Insurance (Chamber MVP). New this year is the COVID Hero, a nonprofit or individual who provided essential support services, went above and beyond, and took initiative to put others before self to benefit the greater good. Live voting will take place to choose a winner from the following organizations and individuals: Amherst Survival Center, Arizona Pizza, Bistro 63, Mary Beth Ogulewicz of the Amherst Senior Center, Rebekah Demling of ARPS PGO, and Wheelhouse Catering. Also new this year, David Jeffway, owner of Sharper Vision, will create video tributes for each awardee. A virtual access pass to the view the live awards show costs $20, or a $50 VIP package includes the virtual access pass, a $25 Amherst-area gift certificate, a hard copy of the 2020 A+ Awards Journal, and sponsor gifts. Registration is open, and A+ Award dinner sponsorships and ads are still available for the virtual extravaganza; for more information, visit amherstarea.com. E-mail Pazmany at [email protected] with any inquiries.

 

Bright Nights at Forest Park

Nov. 25 to Jan. 3: Bright Nights at Forest Park will take place this year. Spirit of Springfield and the city of Springfield have developed protocols to provide a safe and festive event that has been a holiday tradition since 1995. They will be instituted during setup, breakdown, and during the event, and include masks, regular cleaning, online ticketing, and more. Restrooms will be for emergency use only, and the usual bustling gift shop, amusement rides, horse-drawn wagon and carriage rides, and visits and supper with Santa will not be available. This will help keep all visitors safe and socially distanced in their vehicles during the experience. Bright Nights at Forest Park is three miles of a unique holiday experience featuring more than 675,000 lights and iconic displays like Seuss Land, Everett Barney Mansion, Toy Land, Happy Holidays, Springfield, and so many more. It generates $15 million in economic impact annually and has created a lifetime of family memories in its 25-year history. It also promises to be one of the safest events, with families contained in their cars. Admission will be $23 per car weeknights, weekdays, and holidays. Discounted tickets will be available at participating Big Y World Class Markets for $16.50. Due to bus-capacity limitations in Massachusetts, admission for buses has been reduced to $100 for buses with capacity of more than 30 people. Vehicles with seating from 17 to 30 people will be charged $50 for admission.

 

Healthcare Heroes

Nov. 18: Since the phrase COVID-19 came into our lexicon, those working in the broad healthcare field have emerged as the true heroes during a pandemic that has changed every facet of life as we know it. BusinessWest and its sister publication, the Healthcare News, will pay tribute in their own way, by dedicating their annual Healthcare Heroes program in 2020 to those who have emerged as true heroes during this crisis. The gala celebrating the winners will be held from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Sheraton Springfield Monarch Place Hotel in two separate events because of state restrictions on crowd size. The first event will honor the staff at Holyoke Medical Center; Christopher Savino, Emeline Bean, and Lydia Brisson, clinical liaisons for Berkshire Healthcare Systems; Rabbi Devorah Jacobson, director of Spiritual Life at JGS Lifecare; the Nutrition Department at Greater Springfield Senior Services Inc.; and Friends of the Homeless. The second cohort includes Mark Keroack, president and CEO of Baystate Health; the Institute for Applied Life Sciences at UMass Amherst; Maggie Eboso, Infection Control and Prevention coordinator at Mercy Medical Center; Jennifer Graham, home health aide at O’Connell Care at Home; and Helen Gobeil, staffing supervisor at Visiting Angels West Springfield. Tickets cost $90 per person. To make a reservation, contact Jennifer Godaire at (413) 781-8600, ext. 100, or [email protected]. The Healthcare Heroes program is sponsored by Elms College (presenting sponsor), Baystate Health and Health New England (presenting sponsor), and partner sponsors Bulkley Richardson, Comcast Business, and Trinity Health New England/Mercy Medical Center.

 

Andrea Harrington

By
Women of Impact 2020

Berkshire County District Attorney

She’s Transforming the Criminal Justice System in This Rural Region

Andrea Harrington

Andrea Harrington

Like most who join the legal profession, Andrea Harrington says there’s a story behind her choice of career path.

In her case, it wasn’t a family member in that line of work who inspired her, or even a role  model from the community — meaning the Pittsfield area. Instead, it was the lawyers she saw on TV shows, especially L.A. Law, which was in its prime when she was in high school, and some real-life lawyers, like Anita Hill and Hillary Rodham Clinton, who inspired her to become the first in her family to go college, and eventually earn a law degree.

“Growing up, I didn’t really know many professional people,” she recalled, noting that her parents, like so many others, worked at General Electric’s massive transformer-production complex in Pittsfield. “I would see TV shows with lawyers, and to me, they looked like people who have the power to make change.”

Not all lawyers have used that power, but Harrington certainly has. In two short years after being sworn in as district attorney of Berkshire County, she has introduced a number of important changes to the criminal-justice systems in this rural county — changes that are already having an impact. For example, Harrington has:

• Implemented a no-cash-bail policy for most defendants in county courts;

• Created the county’s first domestic- and sexual-violence task force;

• Assembled a staff of reform-minded individuals that better reflects the makeup of the county’s population;

• Implemented a vertical prosecution model so that crime victims in District Court work with the same assistant district attorney and victim-witness advocate while their cases are resolved; and

• Initiated work to develop a formal Berkshire County DA’s Juvenile Diversion program to reduce juvenile crime and help youths make smart decisions.

Above all, Harrington said she is changing the mindset of criminal justice in the Berkshires, from a system that has focused on punishment to one centered on “problem solving.”

And there are many problems to solve, she told BusinessWest, listing poverty, opioid addiction, domestic violence (Berkshire County has a 33% higher rate of restraining orders than the rest of the state), behavioral-health issues, and many others.

“I saw a criminal-justice system that was stuck in this old model — a punishment model. And given how many resources were being put into it, we were not getting a good return on that investment, and it was just spreading misery throughout our community.”

Harrington’s influence, just two years after triumphing in a hotly contested race, is perhaps best summed up by Noreen Nardi, executive director of the Hampden County Bar Assoc., who nominated her for the Women of Impact award.

“The election of Andrea Harrington to Berkshire district attorney has had a transformational effect on the county, its criminal justice system, and politics,” she wrote. “Andrea has remade operations in the Berkshire District Attorney’s Office with an eye toward modernization, innovation, and integrity. She’s revamping how the staff prosecutes crime and handles court cases, changing its media and communications practices to emphasize complete transparency, and overhauling operations on community outreach, victim-witness advocate, and the Child Abuse Unit so that Berkshire County citizens receive the fair and equitable justice they deserve whenever they come into contact with the Berkshire DA’s Office.”

 

Impact Statement

The race for DA in 2018 wasn’t Harrington’s first bid for public office. Indeed, two years earlier, she ran, unsuccessfully, for a state Senate seat. It was a moment in her life that would in many ways crystalize all that came before — and pave the way for all that has followed.

But before getting to that race, we need to go back further and explain how she got there.

As noted, Harrington, inspired by the characters on L.A. Law and other shows, and those real-life role models as well, graduated from the University of Washington and earned her juris doctor degree from American University Washington College of Law in 2003. One of her early career stops involved work representing convicted death-row inmates in post-conviction appeals in South Florida, which she described as eye-opening.

Andrea Harrington addresses those gathered at a press conference

Andrea Harrington addresses those gathered at a press conference to announce the launch of a juvenile-justice initiative, one of many programs she has introduced.

“That experience drove home for me how much power law enforcement does have over people’s lives,” she noted. “And also, how vital it is that we have prosecutors and police who have a healthy respect for the constitutional rights of defendants, and for civil rights.”

Elaborating, she said her work, which involved both the guilt and penalty phrases of these convictions, often centered on why such heinous and tragic crimes were committed. “And this gave me a different kind of lens — more of a problem-solving lens,” she said. “It’s sad to look back at someone’s life and recognize that, if there had been other kinds of intervention earlier on, then these really terrible crimes could have been prevented.”

After Florida, Harrington amassed more than a dozen years of legal practice, much of it defense work, while also raising a family — and watching her native Berkshire County change, for the worse.

“I was working in the courts, I had two young kids, and I was frustrated by what I was seeing in Berkshire County,” she explained. “In the courts, we see the big societal problems, we see the effects of the economic downturn in high rates of domestic violence, lack of opportunity, and drug use.

“I saw a criminal-justice system that was stuck in this old model — a punishment model,” she went on while explaining her involvement in politics and eventual run for the state Senate. “And given how many resources were being put into it, we were not getting a good return on that investment, and it was just spreading misery throughout our community. I thought that, if anyone was going to address these problems, I was going to be a part of it. I didn’t want to just be a cog in this machine that I didn’t think was working.”

While she lost that race, she was certainly encouraged by those who were telling her she should be running for a different seat — district attorney. And after winning a race ranked the top story of 2018 by the Berkshire Eagle, Harrington immediately went to work, fulfilling campaign promises and, more importantly, changing the criminal-justice system in Berkshire County.

One of her primary initiatives involved essentially eliminating the prosecution’s request for cash bail, which data shows disproportionately penalizes low-income individuals and African-Americans in most District Court cases.

“Who remains incarcerated pre-trial is driven by who can afford to post bail or not,” she explained, adding that this is one of many attempts to bring changes to long-established policies that were — in her estimation, at least — not working.

Another initiative undertaken early on was the formation of the Berkshire County Domestic and Sexual Violence Task Force and Steering Committee, assembled to address a growing public-health crisis in Berkshire communities and build prevention programs, she explained, adding that the Berkshires, like other rural areas, has high rates of these crimes.

Overall, Harrington said, the nature and volume of crime in Berkshire County has changed since she was growing up there, with more violent crime (there are eight homicides currently being prosecuted, a much higher number than in years past), drug-related crime, gang-related crime, and domestic and sexual violence. And her office is responding accordingly.

Andrea Harrington says she’s adjusted the focus of the criminal-justice system

Andrea Harrington says she’s adjusted the focus of the criminal-justice system in the Berkshires from one focused on punishment to one centered on problem solving.

“One of my proudest accomplishments is how we serve victims in this office,” she explained. “Previously, the practice was, once a case is actually arraigned and being prosecuted in court, the office would provide services to victims of crime. But we’ve expanded that; we want to have contact with victims as soon as there is a complaint of a crime — we think that’s really critical in being able to prosecute domestic violence and sexual assault.”

Another important change taking place involves the culture of local law enforcement, she told BusinessWest.

“We’re putting a lot more emphasis on doing high-quality investigations for violent crime,” she noted. “And we’ve out a lot of work into that, building our relationships with small-town police departments and also the State Police.”

 

Making Her Case

Harrington is currently prosecuting her first murder case, a matter that involves the shooting death of a woman in August 2019. COVID-19 has slowed the pace of progress in the courts, she noted, adding that she can’t say when the case will be coming to trial.

She can say that she’s looking forward to the challenge. “I love the law, I love being a lawyer, I love being in court.”

What she loves more, though, is having a bigger impact — an impact that goes beyond a single case, as significant as it might be, and translates into real change, real reform, and lasting significance.

This is what she thought lawyers had the power to do when she was watching those TV shows more than a quarter-century ago. Now, she’s proving they can, and while doing so, she has become a true Woman of Impact.

 

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

Pattie Hallberg

By
Women of Impact 2020

CEO, Girls Scouts of Central & Western Massachusetts

She’s a Role Model and a Strong Advocate for Women and Girls

Pattie Hallberg

Pattie Hallberg

Pattie Hallberg has a large collection of keepsakes scattered about her office on Kelly Street in Holyoke. Together, they effectively tell a story of who she is, what she does, what she believes, and what’s important to her.

There’s the Ruth Bader Ginsburg bobblehead, for example, an indication of whom she draws inspiration from. There’s also the sign siting on her window sill that reads “No Solicitors, Unless You Sell Thin Mints,” a nod to her role as CEO of the Girls Scouts of Central & Western Massachusetts (GSCWM) and one of the programs for which the organization is most noted — cookie sales.

There are also a few framed quotes. One, attributed to Juliette Gordon Low, founder of the Girl Scouts, reads: “The Work of Today is the History of Tomorrow, and We Are Its Makers.” There’s another that’s unattributed and says simply “Do One Thing Every Day That Scares You.”

Hallberg must have been at least a little scared the day she made the decision to leave her job as chief executive of Invent Now Kids Inc., a subsidiary of the National Inventors Hall of Fame, and find a new challenge. Actually, she and her husband took the same plunge, if you will.

“I had four girls, and we were all kind of in transition,” she said while relaying the story. “My oldest was graduating from college, my two youngest were graduating from high school, and Jessica was at Lehigh University. I decided it was time for a transition for me; my husband and I decided that we were going to leave Northeast Ohio, and whoever found a job first — that’s where we were going to go.”

Long story short, she found employment first. Only it wasn’t a job she found, but a passion — or, to be more, precise, a new outlet for an existing passion.

“This is a business about relationships. I spend a lot of time talking to people who were Girl Scouts about what Girl Scouts meant to them. And then I talk to a lot of girls about what they’re doing, what they want to do, and where they want to go.”

This bold career move itself, fueled by ambition, confidence, and some adventurousness as well, makes a Hallberg a fine role model for the thousands of Girl Scouts under her charge. But there are plenty of other reasons why she’s worthy of that descriptive phrase. That list includes her accomplishments with this Girl Scout body, which resulted from a merger, which she managed, of three councils; her advocacy for young women; her work to inspire girls to pursue careers in STEM; her involvement in the community (she’s involved with groups ranging from the Women’s Fund of Western Massachusetts to the Investing in Girls Alliance in Worcester); and even how she has handled the responsibilities of being a mother and grandmother.

“It’s so important to teach children in general — for me, my job is girls — to learn about the community and to give back to their community,” she said. “That’s the ultimate community service in Girl Scouting, and I try be a role model for that; I try to give back to my community as best I can.”

Mostly, though, she is a role model, and a Woman of Impact, for the way in which she has devoted most of her career to understanding the issues and challenges facing women and girls — and there are many of them — and being proactive in finding ways to address them.

When asked about what her work entails, Hallberg said there is a lengthy job description, as might be expected when managing a $4 million agency. But overall, she said it boils down to two main duties — listening and relationship building.

“This is a business about relationships,” she explained. “I spend a lot of time talking to people who were Girl Scouts about what Girl Scouts meant to them. And then I talk to a lot of girls about what they’re doing, what they want to do, and where they want to go.”

Suffice it to say, during her career advocating for women and girls, she has gone well beyond talk. And that’s why she was nominated for, and is a recipient of, this BusinessWest honor.

 

Moving Stories

Among her many goals and aspirations, Hallberg wants to someday hear someone say, ‘Eagle Scout? Is that the equivalent of being a Gold Scout in the Girl Scouts?’ or words to that effect.

Pattie Hallberg says she enjoys spending time with Girl Scouts, and those who have been Scouts and can talk about what that organization has done for them.

Pattie Hallberg says she enjoys spending time with Girl Scouts, and those who have been Scouts and can talk about what that organization has done for them.

She’s heard the reverse of this question more times than she would care to say or count, because while most everyone has heard references to Eagle Scouts, the highest rank in Boy Scouts and a proud line on any résumé, only those in the know understand its counterpart. Hallberg wants more people to know and thus put an end to those frustrating questions.

But she has more pressing concerns at the moment, especially the many challenges facing girls of all ages today. When asked to give a list, Hallberg put stress at the very top of it.

“Girls are under an incredible amount of stress today,” she explained. “There’s the stress to do well in school, and all those things that we’ve all had, but there’s this added layer to it now that’s really overwhelming.”

Much of this stress is connected to bullying, she went on, adding that, while it has always been an issue, today it is an even deeper concern, for obvious reasons.

“The stories are overwhelming … what can happen to a girl in just a moment, mostly around the internet,” she said. “It’s frightening, and it really takes its toll on these girls.”

For these reasons, the Girls Scouts and especially the GSCWM have always been focused on creating what Hallberg called a “safe space,” one in which they could be different and unique. But beyond that, the agency is devoted to giving them opportunities — and the confidence to realize them.

Pattie Hallberg has devoted much of her life to being an advocate for women and girls, especially in her current role with the Girl Scouts.

Pattie Hallberg has devoted much of her life to being an advocate for women and girls, especially in her current role with the Girl Scouts.

Which brings her back to STEM, and the numbers involving girls in those fields, statistics that in large part fueled her desire to seek a new career challenge.

“I developed a sincere concern about girls and women in the STEM field,” she recalled, flashing back to her days at the Inventors Hall of Fame. “The youth STEM programs we ran … at the elementary-school level, in kindergarten, first, and second grade, half of those kids were girls, and half were boys. Around third or fourth grade, the girl numbers started to drop, and there were more and more programs where there was a disproportionate number of boys.”

Years later, the problem persists to a large degree, she said, adding that changing this equation has been one of her many goals with the GSCWM.

Indeed, since arriving in Western Mass. in 2008, Hallberg has done much more than merge three Girl Scout councils, covering 186 communities, into one, although that was a significant feat in itself. She has shaped the organization into a leader in this region in advocacy for young women and also put in place an aggressive strategic planning process that has sharpened the council’s focus and championed leadership development of young women.

As part of these efforts, the council has instituted a Girl Leadership Board made up of two dozen girls who meet regularly with Hallberg to share ideas, concerns, challenges, hopes, and aspirations. An important aspect of this board is the manner in which she has created space and practice for young women to speak out and experience being heard and empowered to bring their ideas to life through scouting.

“We have 18 middle- and high-school girls, and I meet with them once a month on a Saturday morning,” she told BusinessWest. “They are fantastic at talking about what it’s like to be a girl right now, what they need from programs like the Girls Scouts, and what they want, which is different from what they need. So I get a lot of perspective.”

And this perspective often helps shape programming and the overall direction of this 108-year-old institution, said Hallberg, noting that her job essentially involves a balance of honoring the history and traditions of the Girls Scouts, but also looking to the future as well.

“There’s so much to learn from the past and so much to learn about the future from these girls,” she went on. “What I try to do beyond the job of running this business and organization is to really try to understand the issues for both women and girls in our area and to advocate for them.”

 

Bottom Line

Managing the GSCWM, an agency that covers territory ranging Worcester to the New York border, requires Hallberg to travel extensively. She rolled her eyes when asked how many miles she puts on her car each year.

She spends the time on the road listening to books on tape — and thinking.

Thinking about the many challenges facing young women today — from bullying to financial literacy to having the skills needed to succeed in today’s technology-driven economy.

She’s managed to convert many of these thoughts into effective action, and this helps explain why she is a member of the Women of Impact class of 2020.

 

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

Helen Caulton-Harris

By
Women of Impact 2020

Health and Human Services Commissioner, City of Springfield

This Leader in Public Health Is a Fierce Advocate for Social Equity

Helen Caulton-Harris

A career like that of Helen Caulton-Harris can’t be adequately summed up in just a few words. But she offered three important ones anyway.

“I believe in three things that are important to me and how I have spent my career: educate, advocate, and legislate.”

They apply both on the broader level and to specific moments in time — like the era of COVID-19 we’re living in now.

“To educate during this pandemic means to make sure we are educating the community about those things we need to do to stop the spread of this virus,” said Caulton-Harris, who has served as Springfield’s Health and Human Services commissioner for almost a quarter-century. That education has been a challenge, she added — and a constant learning experience as well.

“In the beginning, we really didn’t know what the impact was going to be. That’s why it’s called a novel coronavirus, because it’s new. Even the infectious-disease doctors, people who have studied all the science around diseases, had a learning curve with this virus. So we all are on this journey to try to educate.”

As for her advocacy role, “there are individuals in our community who don’t have a voice; they don’t have the ability to advocate for themselves, so our job in public health has really been to be the voice for the voiceless in our community, to make sure they get what they need, but also make sure we are speaking truth to those individuals who need to hear the truth around how to stem the tide.”

“Poverty is really the number-one public-health issue that I’ve had to deal with over the years — the fact that individuals living in poverty do not have equal access to the kinds of outcomes that we want for a healthy population.”

Finally, “what are the legislative interventions that need to be put in place in order to make sure we are doing what’s necessary on a political level?” she asked. “The messages from the political landscape, particularly at the federal level, have been very mixed, so it’s really been local public health out front, trying to do what we need to do in order to stem the tide of this virus.”

It’s been a busy year for someone whose role with the city — she also oversees animal control, veterans’ affairs, elder affairs, and libraries — has kept her plenty busy even without a pandemic to track every day. But it’s also been an opportunity to spotlight one of her passions: the demographic inequities that exist in public health.

“The pandemic has caused all of us to pause and really tear the Band-Aid off of what has been a festering wound,” Caulton-Harris said. “We’ve had to look criticially at our populations and how this virus is really impacting our community.”

It starts with the frontline workers — not only healthcare workers, but grocery-store employees, bus drivers, those who clean the hospital rooms, and so many others. “Those individuals overwhelmingly are black and brown, based on the data that we have.”

Then there’s the connection between poverty and healthcare access, and how economic factors put people at greater risk.

“Poverty is really the number-one public-health issue that I’ve had to deal with over the years — the fact that individuals living in poverty do not have equal access to the kinds of outcomes that we want for a healthy population,” she told BusinessWest. “So, from the beginning, we recognized that this virus really is impacting on the black and brown communities of the city of Springfield. It has been eye-opening from that perspective.”

 

Game Changer

‘Equity,’ as applied to topics of social justice, is more commonly discussed today than it once was, but it’s much more than a buzzword to Caulton-Harris, who recalls being passionate about matters of equity as a UMass Amherst student in the 1970s.

Helen Caulton-Harris has long recognized the connection between economic well-being and health, and COVID-19 has negatively impacted both for many families.

Helen Caulton-Harris has long recognized the connection between economic well-being and health, and COVID-19 has negatively impacted both for many families.

“During that time, there was a lot of momentum around social change and equity,” she said. “Public health says that everyone should have equal access, and we were thinking even then about how we can make social change. We are still — I am still — on that journey.”

When Mayor Michael Albano — the first of three Springfield mayors she has served under — appointed Caulton-Harris to her role in 1996, tasking her with combining the then-separate Department of Public Health and Department of Human Services, she didn’t consider herself a political person or a public figure. But she did relish the challenge of tackling some very serious issues, from infant mortality to teen pregnancy; from HIV and AIDS to substance-use disorders.

None of those have faded into irrelevance, of course. “All those things we saw as really challenging public-health issues are things we still work with today.”

But there were other shifts. For example, after 9/11, weaponized anthrax was a big issue, and on numerous occasions, Caulton-Harris helped investigate some suspicious white powder in Springfield. It was the first time her public-health focus shifted from behavior-related and community-based issues to external threats.

The other shift has been a growing understanding of how social determinants like employment, education, environment, and housing conditions directly impact health.

“We were working in silos, trying to help individuals make smart behavior changes, but public health is population-based,” she said. “We need to think about public health in the broadest sense and how it impacts populations. And social equity is the central piece of these social determinants of health — really looking at where a person works, plays, and lives.”

Meanwhile, the education aspect of her job continues to be critical, particularly with the COVID-19 infection rate rising in the city and across the state.

“When we were doing well, there were individuals in the city of Springfield and in Massachusetts who thought we were in a position where we could begin to take risks. And I think individuals did that. So we’re seeing a surge in the virus,” she said, noting that the previous week’s new case count in the city was 235, up from 107 the week before.

“COVID fatigue is absolutely real. I think each of us is tired. We have been battling this since late February, so I understand that individuals are tired,” she went on. “I have personally met residents who can’t go to funerals, who had to cancel weddings, who can’t go to hospitals and hold the hands of their loved ones. It is just really heart-wrenching to understand what’s going on. We believe that health is physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional, and all the quadrants of our health have been compromised by this virus.”

But if Springfield could control the spread in the spring — which it did, remarkably well — it can do so now, she believes. But it will take a collective effort.

“This virus really jumps from person to person; it loves having a host, and we are the host. Unless we do things like face covering, washing our hands, social distancing, and staying home when we’re sick, then the virus will continue to replicate itself until we have a vaccine.”

 

 

Family Legacy

When Caulton-Harris talks about responsibility, she speaks from the heart, and from a family legacy stretching back from her father, who was a Springfield police lieutenant, to her great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather, who served in the 10th Cavalry of the U.S. Army and the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, respectively.

“They contributed to the person I am,” she said. “We were raised to understand we had a role in the community and needed to give back.”

She’s also quick to credit the impactful women who shaped her own career, including the African-American nurses and nurse supervisor with whom she worked at her first job, at Neighborhood Health Center in Mason Square.

“To become a Woman of Impact is really important because I was immersed in women who had an impact on my life,” she told BusinessWest. “And they paid it forward by nurturing me, by mentoring me, and by making sure their behavior was something I would want to emulate.

“So, all these years later, to think about having an impact in my career, in my life, with other women is very, very gratifying,” she went on. “My journey has been completely dedicated to that social-justice movement that I saw as very important when I was a young woman at the University of Massachusetts. So I am really fortunate to sit here and feel as though I have lived that social-justice experience, rooted in science.”

She’s equally gratified when others follow in her footsteps.

“Three mayors allowed me to make decisions and supported those decisions,” Caulton-Harris said. “I would like to see more women, particularly women of color, emerge in leadership positions where they are decision makers and they can also have an impact on our residents, our state, and our nation.” u

 

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

 

Tania Barber

By Contributor
Women of Impact 2020

President and CEO, Caring Health Center

In Both Healthcare and Ministry, She Leads with a Servant’s Heart

By Mark Morris

Tania Barber

Tania Barber

Tania Barber likes to say her main motivation is servant leadership.

As president and CEO of Caring Health Center, as well as the founder and pastor of Living Water Global Ministries, her passion is focusing on the needs of others rather than the wants of self.

“I’m working in the career of healthcare, and I’m intertwining my calling, which is being a help to others,” she said. “It’s what gives me my drive.”

Barber’s story with Caring Health Center (CHC) begins in the salon where she worked as a hairdresser, which was about to close. As she was trying to figure out what to do next, one of her customers offered Barber temporary work as a switchboard operator at CHC.

“That was definitely not in my future plans, but it was bread and butter on the table for my children, so I said, ‘absolutely, I would love to come and help out,’” she recalled.

After a year as an independent contractor, Barber was hired as the permanent switchboard operator. As the years progressed, so did her career in roles of increasing responsibility, culminating in 2005 when she was asked to be CHC’s chief operations officer. She declined that offer and was asked two more times before finally accepting the position. Her hesitation was due to a concern that the COO position would remove her from the ability to engage and communicate directly with patients.

“I finally realized that I could have a greater impact in an executive management role, to help inform the policies and practices of the organization,” she told BusinessWest. “It was a chance to make positive changes to the issues I saw first-hand when I worked on the front line.”

 

Community Ties

Barber’s empathy for people in the community goes much deeper than her experience as a healthcare worker.

“I am one of our patients; I come from the same community,” she said. “When I was on MassHealth, I was denied services because they weren’t covered.”

These inequities made her more passionate about her position because community health centers are mandated to provide care for everyone, whether they have insurance or not. “It gave me the chance to speak to family members and people in the community that they could receive high-quality healthcare like everyone else and not be denied because of their ability to pay.”

Her passion for helping others led to her promotion to president and CEO of CHC in 2013. Under her leadership, the center has increased the number of patients seen every year from 14,000 to nearly 20,000, while staffing has increased from 109 employees to 250.

New services offered under her watch as president include a pharmacy, behavioral-health and substance-use treatment, and a wellness center. She has also built a diverse team, with strong representation by people of color in executive management and throughout the organization.

Barber has also put a special emphasis on improving services for the underserved and refugee populations in the community, noting that “I want to help remove the barriers and increase their access to quality care.” Currently, CHC serves the largest number of refugee and immigrant patients outside of Boston.

“I finally realized that I could have a greater impact in an executive management role, to help inform the policies and practices of the organization. It was a chance to make positive changes to the issues I saw first-hand when I worked on the front line.”

COVID-19 has brought multiple challenges to healthcare organizations, and CHC is no exception. Like most facilities, CHC offers telehealth, which works well for those who can access it. For others, it leads to a ‘digital divide’ where patients who might benefit from telehealth lack access to the internet or the devices to connect. This concerns Barber because recent data shows communities of color have contracted COVID-19 at a disproportionate rate.

While patients can still go to CHC for care, fear of leaving the house and becoming infected by coronavirus are preventing many from treating their other ailments. For the refugee population, these fears are compounded by the dual concerns of being exposed to immigration authorities, as well as to the coronavirus.

One solution, then, was to bring CHC to its patients.

“We purchased a mobile van to bring care to the community,” she explained. “The Mobile Health Clinical Services program has enabled us to confront some of the challenges we’ve seen during these times of COVID.”

Working with the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, CHC also arranged to provide mattresses as a way to combat COVID-19. Barber explained that a mattress makes a big difference for patients who live in dense neighborhoods or housing.

As a person of faith, Tania Barber says she believes in adding value to the lives of others.

“Many of these people were sharing the same sleeping quarters or even sleeping in the same bed. By setting up individual mattresses, they are able to get some separation.”

 

Woman of Faith

In addition to her full-time career with Caring Health Center, Barber is a minister with Living Water Global Ministries, which she founded in 2011. While wearing two hats can be exhausting, the key for her is balance. “I make sure to rest and take a vacation when I feel its time. Of course, I factor in family time as well.”

As a woman of faith, Barber said she believes in adding value to the lives of others. It starts with seeing a person’s potential, and she has encouraged several CHC employees to enroll in undergraduate and graduate programs.

“They have gone back to school, graduated, and now work in different roles in the organization. Two of our employees are currently pursuing doctorate programs,” Barber said with pride. “If you believe in people, they will have the faith to believe in themselves.”

In the spirit of that philosophy, Barber founded EST.HER, a leadership-consulting firm, in 2019. “One day I was looking at the Book of Esther and I didn’t see the name ‘Esther’ I saw E-S-T, H-E-R, and thought, ‘establish her.’”

Because her passion is to help others achieve their goals and dreams, Barber founded EST.HER to help motivate disenfranchised women and allow them to eventually become pillars in the community. In fact, the EST.HER logo uses the acronym PILLHERS, which stands for ‘Purposely Impacting Lifestyle Leaders Helping Each Reach Success.’

Biblical scholars have noted that the Book of Esther teaches that our past doesn’t dictate our future, and God places mentors in our lives to teach us wisdom, she noted. “I want to help women aspire to become the pillars in our community and serve as the anchors who can help the next generation of leaders.”

In her nomination of Barber as a Woman of Impact, Yvonne Williams, chief Development officer at CHC, noted that “it’s not an overstatement to say that Tania Barber’s intelligence and vision directly impact the lives of thousands of patients and their families, as well as hundreds of employees.”

Early in her career, Barber took a professional-development course titled, “How to Take Charge of the Front Desk.” Among other things, she credits it with teaching her how to switch gears to the supervisor role after making friends with co-workers.

“The course was also instrumental in teaching how to lead, how to help people see beyond the horizon of where we are and where we need to go, and, finally, how to get there.”

That early course launched a career of servant leadership, in which she is still helping people see beyond the horizon by making the simple declaration, “I’m here to help.”

With a long track record of leading by example and helping others do the same, Barber is a true Woman of Impact.

Beset by Wasteful Spending, American Healthcare Needs an Overhaul

By Contributor
Health Care

What’s Next for Hospitals

By Spiros Hatiras

The year is 2020, in the midst of an unprecedented pandemic, and the subject is the U.S. healthcare system — more specifically, the average U.S. hospital. Is it alive and well, or is it ailing?

I will argue that all is not well with our healthcare system, and that the average U.S. hospital is facing tremendous challenges now and for the foreseeable future.

It is important to establish that, while the healthcare-delivery model has been shifting to less hospital-centric models, the acute-care hospital remains solidly in the center of our delivery system and, in my opinion, will continue to do so. Any notion of a more decentralized model with less emphasis on hospitals has been pushed many years into the future, in part as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the accelerated growth of telemedicine during the pandemic, the need for hospital bed capacity, specialized equipment, and personnel — including the ability to ‘surge’ when needed — has all but ensured that the trend toward a smaller hospital footprint will slow down if not entirely reverse.

Shouldn’t that be good news for the future of hospitals? Well, not quite. While we may have a new appreciation for the need of readily available inpatient hospital care, we have also not solved any of the problems that hospitals have been facing for many years. In fact, the pandemic laid bare one of the most fundamental problems facing the industry, especially for smaller community hospitals. At the very onset of the pandemic, it was immediately clear that many hospitals, suffering from years of underfunding, faced immediate financial threat and would not be able to survive without a financial bailout, while private insurance companies reported record profits.

“I will argue that all is not well with our healthcare system, and that the average U.S. hospital is facing tremendous challenges now and for the foreseeable future.”

Why is this the case in a country where healthcare demands the highest per-capita expenditure of all developed countries? According to a study published in January 2019 by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, the U.S. topped the ranking of healthcare spending among developed countries in 2016 at $9,982 per capita per year, a figure that is more than double the median of $4,033.

The reason for this disconnect is that most of that money is spent not on actual care, but on administrative costs. A recent study by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services found that, of the $3.5 trillion spent on healthcare in 2017, 33%, or $1.1 trillion, was paid to hospitals. Unfortunately, a significant portion of that money covered unnecessary costs to process bills and get paid by insurance companies, meaning the total spent on actual hospital care was far less. The same is also true for doctors’ offices.

In a study published in 2017 in Annals of Internal Medicine, Steffie Woolhandler and David Himmelstiein noted that the administrative cost of our healthcare system was estimated to be $1.1 trillion, of which the vast majority is excess and unnecessary spending. We are spending vast sums of money on a deliberately confusing and complex insurance system.

Trying to navigate the onerous billing requirements, denied-claims management, pre-authorization requirements, and a host of other administrative hurdles unique to the U.S. healthcare system is wasteful and frustrating to hospitals, doctors, and patients alike. We spend more money administering the system than we spend on care. This should alarm each and every one of us and prompt us to look a little more carefully at proposals for a single-payer system.

It is time to ignore private insurers who portray a single-payer system as the boogeyman, or the end of healthcare as we know it, and recognize their argument for what it really is: a reluctance to part with huge profits being made from a broken system at the expense of our health.

 

Spiros Hatiras is president and CEO of Holyoke Medical Center.

Pandemic Has Accelerated Inevitable Technological Progress

By Contributor
Health Care

What’s Next in Health Education

By Marie Meckel, Kathleen Menard, Susan McDiarmid, and Theresa Riethle

Despite the complexities that COVID-19 has brought to healthcare education, the trajectory from traditional models to hybrid or virtual experiences was inevitable. Today’s technology allows healthcare educators to transcend geography, which widens access to health education in all segments of the population despite location, economic status, and race. The pandemic also revealed the vulnerabilities of underrepresented minorities.

These challenges caused many educators to pause to re-evaluate and readapt to how we teach and develop medical curriculum. Incorporating technology through virtual learning experiences while focusing on how social determinants of health impact patient care and outcomes are two areas of focus in the future of healthcare education.

Health programs can integrate in-person and remote simulation experiences; these include the traditional simulation lab consisting of realistic mannequins where learners can develop clinical skills in a safe setting without patient harm. Additional virtual experiences include a wide array of interactive patient-encounter portals where learners can conduct histories, perform physical examinations, order and interpret diagnostic tests, develop assessments and treatment plans, all while documenting patient records and receiving coaching and feedback every step of the way.

“By incorporating technology into healthcare education, medical learners will be better prepared for clinical practice.”

Live rounding with certified medical providers has also enabled learners to experience traditional hospital rounding from wherever they are in an interactive manner. Even surgical experiences can be supplemented with high-definition surgical videos and medical lectures from subject-matter experts.

While none of these experiences will replace the need for traditional hands-on learning, they can provide learners with unique education experiences that directly correlate to what is seen in clinical practice. With the increase in telehealth visits, medical learners are now equipped to adapt to these visits, delivering care in a better and more effective manner.

Technology is intertwined into healthcare today as seen with diagnostic imaging, robotic surgery, and electronic health records. By incorporating technology into healthcare education, medical learners will be better prepared for clinical practice. The virtual experiences will also develop independent and critical thinking, thus making it easier to adapt to innovations and changing patterns of illness and health systems.

In order to provide equitable, high-quality healthcare to all patients, we must include social determinants of health in the curriculum. These include socioeconomic status, education, neighborhood and physical environment, employment, and social-support networks, as well as access to healthcare.

This charge became more evident with the pandemic, as we have seen its profound impact on underrepresented minorities. It would be a disservice to future providers to ignore the current healthcare disparities in these populations. Addressing these determinants is not only important for improving overall health, but also for reducing health disparities that are often rooted in social and economic disadvantages.

Healthcare providers of the future will not necessarily be those who have a traditional classroom education, but will be those who know how to use, implement, and apply technology in healthcare systems and provide high-quality healthcare to all patients.

 

Marie Meckel, MS, MPH, MMSc, PA-C; Kathleen Menard, MS, PA-C; Susan McDiarmid, MS, PA-C; and Theresa Riethle, MS, PA-C are physician assistant faculty members at Bay Path University.

Researchers Continue to Make Advances in Treatment Options

By Contributor
Health Care

What’s Next in Cancer Care

By John Sheldon, M.D.

Cancer is the second-leading cause of death in the U.S., but we continue to make significant advances in reducing its toll.

John Sheldon

John Sheldon

Key developments have included targeted drug therapies resulting from genomic profiling of tumor samples, which determines the molecular ‘fingerprint’ of the tumor; immunotherapy, which allows the body’s own natural immune system to better attack tumors; more sophisticated radiation-delivery technologies, which allow for more precise targeting of tumors and better sparing of adjacent normal tissues from radiation dose; and newer combination or ‘multi-modality’ treatment regimens, taking advantage of a combination benefit effect of different ways of attacking and killing tumor cells.

In lung-cancer treatment, for example, we now have drugs to target a variety of specific mutations that may be present, such as EGFR, ALK, ROS1, MET, RET, BRAF, or NTRK. Immunotherapy has been shown to provide a survival improvement in both stage-3 and stage-4 lung cancer. For earlier and smaller lung cancers, highly targeted radiation treatment can be delivered in a short regimen of just three to five sessions, as an alternative to surgery for patients who are not good surgical candidates. And for other patients, combination regimens of radiotherapy and chemotherapy followed by immunotherapy may be the preferred approach.

Even newer types of drugs are now available called antibody-drug conjugates, or ADCs, which target with high affinity a particular protein expressed on the surface of tumor cells, attach to the target, and then deliver a toxic payload to kill those particular tumor cells. This type of treatment was just approved by the FDA in April for metastatic ‘triple-negative’ breast cancer (a more aggressive type of breast cancer), and another drug in this category was approved last December for locally advanced or metastatic bladder cancer.

Molecularly targeted radiation delivery is another category of treatment that is advancing. Also known as peptide-receptor radiotherapy (PRRT), it consists of a radioactive particle, or radionuclide, linked to a protein, and this protein seeks out and targets its intended receptor, which is overexpressed on certain tumor cells. Once the protein-receptor binding takes place, the radionuclide is internalized into the tumor cell — and destroys the tumor cell. This treatment is currently being utilized for neuroendocrine tumors of the abdomen (the type of cancer that afflicted both Steve Jobs and Aretha Franklin), and it is being investigated for the treatment of metastatic prostate cancer.

Quality of life is an ongoing focus of cancer care, and while we always aim to increase survival, we simultaneously aim to optimize quality of life for patients under our care. In the realm of radiation treatment, shorter course regimens are more frequently being used (supported by evidence from clinical trials) in order to increase convenience for patients. Such regimens are now commonly used in the treatment of breast cancer, for early-stage lung cancer (as mentioned above), for some brain-tumor patients, and for some patients with prostate cancer. For the latter, radioactive seed implants into the prostate gland may be an option for a one-visit outpatient treatment.

In short, we continue to push forward strongly in the treatment of a broad range of cancers.

 

Dr. John Sheldon is medical director, Radiation Oncology at the Mass General Cancer Center at Cooley Dickinson Hospital.

New Psychiatric Approaches Promise to Better Meet Growing Needs

By Contributor
Health Care

What’s Next in Behavioral Health

By Barry Sarvet, M.D.

As a science-fiction fan, I would love to be able to travel in time to see into the future of psychiatry. But, of course, the future isn’t really knowable and depends in large part on the choices we make. A more useful and realistic approach is for us to envision a possible future based on our awareness of the most urgent needs in the field, and to assume linear progress from the current state of our scientific knowledge and discovery.

Barry Sarvet

Barry Sarvet

In my opinion, the two most compelling needs within the field of psychiatry are the need for more effective, safe, and reliable treatments for the subset of psychiatric patients who don’t respond optimally to current treatments, and the need to make psychiatric care more accessible and equitable for everyone who suffers from mental-health conditions.

Depression is one of the most common psychiatric illnesses, affecting 7.1% of all adults and 13.3% of adolescents in the U.S. Severe depression is a potentially deadly illness, and suicide is a leading cause of death in this country. Although we already have a host of effective treatments for depression, between 10% and 30% of patients do not respond favorably to treatment. However, ongoing advances in our understanding of the neurobiology of mental illnesses in recent years have led to a number of novel biological treatments for treatment-resistant depression and other psychiatric conditions.

One recently developed treatment that has shown great promise with treatment-resistant depression is repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS). Available at Baystate, rTMS is a non-invasive procedure in which focused pulses of electromagnetic energy are applied to specific regions of the brain resulting in increases in blood flow and metabolic activity. rTMS belongs to a branch of psychiatric treatment referred to as psychiatric neuromodulation. We expect to see further development of this branch in coming years, particularly because of the encouraging observations of clinical effectiveness and safety of this type of treatment for patients whose conditions have not responded to conventional medications.

Other biological psychiatry advancements on the horizon include the development of medications targeting receptors for neurotransmitter systems (such as glutamate and NMDA) which have recently been implicated in the pathophysiology of depression and other psychiatric illnesses. We are also seeing a renaissance of research activity studying the use of so-called psychedelic drugs in combination with talk therapy to induce states of consciousness in which patients may find it easier to change well-worn patterns of thinking associated with psychiatric illnesses such as PTSD, anxiety, and depression.

Lastly, on the biological front, advances in the understanding of genetic variability in metabolism and responsiveness of the nervous system to psychiatric medications promise to usher in an era of personalized medicine in psychiatry, allowing psychiatric clinicians to select effective and tolerable medication treatments for patients without having to go through a trial-and-error process.

Even more important than advances in biological psychiatry is the need for progress in making psychiatric treatment more accessible to everyone who needs it. Currently, a majority of patients with mental illness do not receive any treatment at all, and for many more, treatment is delayed. In fact, many patients with untreated mental illness, disproportionately persons of color, end up in the criminal-justice system because of a lack of access to care.

In recent years, we have seen steady reduction in stigma surrounding mental illness and increased acknowledgment of the importance of mental health across society. Baystate’s recently announced plan for the development of a new, state-of-the-art psychiatric hospital facility for our region reflects the growing recognition of the importance of improving access to behavioral healthcare.

This new facility is just one component of a comprehensive strategy which needs to be executed in partnership with the whole community to improve access to all levels of mental healthcare and address persistent racial and socioeconomic disparities in access to care. Some of the components of this strategy includes work we have been doing at Baystate to embed mental-health services into our primary-care services. In addition, our development of new training programs for psychiatrists and child and adolescent psychiatrists have established a pipeline for enhancing the psychiatric workforce in our region.

We also will see continued use and improvement in telehealth models of psychiatric practice, which, of course, have dramatically grown in response to the pandemic, and have proven to be an important tool in reducing geographic barriers to access to care.

 

Dr. Barry Sarvet chairs the Department of Psychiatry at Baystate Health.

The Wealth Transition Collective Holds Food Drive to Benefit Margaret’s Pantry

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Daily News

HOLYOKE — One of Holyoke’s newest businesses, the Wealth Transition Collective, announced it will host a food drive, beginning the week of Nov. 16-20, to benefit Margaret’s Pantry in Holyoke in honor of National Hunger and Homeless Awareness Week.

Individuals can drop off non-perishable and canned foods during office business hours (Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.) at its newly renovated office at 1632 Northampton St., Holyoke. Weather permitting, there will be a drop-off table outside the front door for easy accessibility. Additionally, people are welcome to drop off non-perishable ans canned foods at the Greater Holyoke Chamber of Commerce, 177 High St., Holyoke on Wednesday, Nov. 18 between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.

Some of the most-needed items at the pantry include canned goods (soups, stews, and vegetables), pasta and sauce, baking mixes, granola bars, and kid-friendly items. Margaret’s Pantry, a division of Providence Ministries for the Needy, is a full-service food pantry that has provided food to residents of Greater Holyoke for more than 30 years. Presently, the pantry provides food to more than 180 families each month, and approximately 72,000 meals a year are distributed to the needy in the community.

“When we decided to move our firm to Holyoke, we wanted to have an immediate impact in the community. Providence Ministries for the Needy has been doing that in Holyoke for decades. Supporting their cause and the people they serve helps us create that impact,” said Greg Sheehan, CEO of the Wealth Transition Collective.

Andréa Marion, the chamber’s executive director, added that “the Wealth Transition Collective is one of our newest members, and their active dedication to the Greater Holyoke community is impressive. We are beyond thrilled to be able to offer a donation location and help our members in every capacity. As a former director for a food pantry, I understand how crucial food drives are, especially as the colder months wear in. Hunger and homelessness are a major effect on our community, and this is an amazing way to build awareness to this cause.”

STCC Virtual Event on Nov. 11 to Explore Health, Wealth, and Race

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Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Why does COVID-19 have a particularly devastating impact on black communities? How does your neighborhood impact your health? How does racism impact health outcomes?

These are some of the questions a Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) professor will raise during a live webinar on Wednesday, Nov. 11 at 2 p.m. Titled “Health, Wealth, and Race,” the event will feature a presentation by Dr. Raja Staggers, assistant professor in Social & Behavioral Sciences at STCC.

Members of the STCC community, as well as the general public, are invited to attend this free Zoom webinar. Visit stcc.io/staggers to register.

Staggers will explore race-based disparities in health outcomes with a focus on the disproportionate burden of COVID-19. In addition, she will consider the impact of a community’s environment and systemic racism on health, and will offer recommendations to address health inequities.

Staggers is a public-health sociologist and social researcher in the areas of health inequities and race and racism. She received a doctorate in medical sociology and social inequality from Howard University and a master of public health degree in community health education from New York University. She has facilitated national conversations on discrimination and the impact on health and has led trainings on anti-racism, cultural competency, and health equity.

Colony Hills Capital Acquires Apartment Complex in Georgia

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Daily News

WILBRAHAM — Colony Hills Capital, based in Wilbraham, announced its recent acquisition of Lakeshire Village Apartments located at 4395 Washington Road in East Point, Ga. Colony Hills paid $22.3 million for the 284-unit, multi-family community.

Built in the 1970s, Lakeshire Village was completely redeveloped in 2003 by the seller using low-income housing tax credits (LIHTCs). Colony will rebrand the community and aims to reinvigorate it with fresh capital and fresh ideas. According to David Kaufman, president of Colony Hills Capital, the company will focus its capital investments on neglected community areas by adding sports courts, bringing the pool back on line, adding a dog park, and installing community picnic and grilling areas. Colony Hills will also add a fitness center, kids’ learning lab, and resident event area to the Community Center building.

“We are very excited to roll out these new amenities and resident programs to our newest community and want to ensure our residents have a high-quality experience living here,” Kaufman said.

Lakeshire Village is Colony Hills’ second LIHTC affordable-housing acquisition in the past year.

Colony Hills Capital is a multi-family real-estate investment-management company that targets investments in workforce, value-add opportunities located in secondary markets, primarily in the Southeast. Since its inception in 2008, Colony Hills and its affiliates have acquired more than 8,800 apartments worth approximately $600 million.

The Children’s Study Home Offers Secret Santa Sponsor Opportunities

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Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Secret Santa is the most robust volunteer effort at the Children’s Study Home (CSH). With the community’s efforts, CSH has been able to put smiles on children’s faces and help families feel the joy of winter gift giving for 154 years running. With a pandemic placing more families in need, CSH is hoping to surpass last year’s total of more than 425 children having their wishes granted.

With its Secret Santa program, CSH begins the journey to ensure hundreds of children throughout schools in Springfield and the Berkshires, as well as family-support, foster-care, and residential programs build memories free from uncertainty, scarcity, and loss.

“This year, more than ever, we need the community to be there with us as they have been so often, supporting the work we do and those we serve,” said William Dávila, executive director and CEO of the Children’s Study Home. “Please consider sponsoring one of our very deserving children. Even a small contribution will go a long way in bringing them — and you — some much-needed holiday cheer.”

Supporting the program can include receiving a child’s wish list for $75, holding a toy drive at a business or organization, or simply making a donation to the Children’s Study Home. To join the community in making dreams come true for children — dreams that are often elusive and difficult to ensure — e-mail [email protected] or call (413) 636-3085, and, if possible, refer a friend so they can join the community of givers.

BusinessTalk with Peter Rosskothen

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Business Talk Podcast Special Coverage

We are excited to announce that BusinessWest, in partnership with Living Local, has launched a new podcast series, BusinessTalk. Each episode will feature in-depth interviews and discussions with local industry leaders, providing thoughtful perspectives on the Western Massachuetts economy and the many business ventures that keep it running during these challenging times.

Episode 38: Nov. 9, 2020

George Interviews Peter Rosskothen, owner of the Log Cabin Banquet & Meeting House

Peter Rosskothen

BusinessWest Editor George O’Brien talks with Peter Rosskothen, owner of the Log Cabin Banquet & Meeting House and other hospitality-related businesses. The two discuss the state of the local events industry, the new restrictions imposed by the state, and how this vital sector of the economy is pivoting and looking for new and viable sources of revenue in these difficult times. It’s must listening, so join us on BusinessTalk.

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STCC Wins Four Marketing and Communications Awards

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Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) won four medals at this year’s District 1 National Council for Marketing & Public Relations (NCMPR) Medallion Awards.

The Medallion Awards recognize excellence in design and communication at community colleges within the district, which covers the Northeast, parts of Eastern Canada, and the United Kingdom. STCC won three bronze medallions and one silver. The Communications and Marketing team was recognized for excellence in creating the following promotional products on behalf of the college: a brochure with facts about STCC and information about how to apply for financial aid (silver medallion); a spring 2020 semester newsletter (bronze); a fundraising pennant (bronze); and the “STCC Around” radio segment that airs on WTCC 90.7 FM on Thursdays at 8:30 a.m. (bronze).

The work was judged by marketing and communications professionals who are members of NCMPR at community colleges. Winners are awarded gold, silver, or bronze medallions.

“I’m super proud of the recognition my team is earning for STCC,” said Keith Paul, director of Communications and Marketing at STCC. “We love telling the stories of students transforming their lives. We’re humbled that our marketing peers at community colleges think we’re doing a good job of it.”

The Communications and Marketing staff at STCC includes Paul, Media Relations Coordinator Jim Danko, and Design and Production Services Coordinator Kerry Ferrero.

Denise Hurst, vice president of Advancement and External Affairs at STCC, congratulated the team.

“I am so excited to see the STCC Communications and Marketing team receive these accolades for their strategic and diligent work,” Hurst said. “Not only are they each talented in their own right, they collaborate with their colleagues across campus and within the community to collectively achieve the mission to share near and far that STCC is the most accessible and affordable higher-education institution in the area.”

NCMPR, made up of seven districts, represents marketing and public-relations professionals at community and technical colleges. NCMPR President Juan Gutierrez applauded the award winners, noting that they demonstrate the very best in design and communication work at two-year colleges within the region.

“To each of you, congratulations on this recognition that is so well-deserved,” Gutierrez said.

NCMPR District 1 received 221 entries from 27 community colleges. The awards ceremony was broadcast live on Oct. 29 on Facebook. Normally, award winners are celebrated at a District 1 conference, but NCMPR canceled the event this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

HCC Opens Registration for January, Spring Terms

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Daily News

HOLYOKE — Registration is now open for January and spring 2021 semester classes at Holyoke Community College.

HCC’s two-week January term, called Wintersession, begins Monday, Jan. 4, and runs until Friday, Jan. 15. The spring 2021 semester begins Monday, Jan. 25.

HCC will also once again be offering two additional, flexible start dates for the spring semester. Spring Start II classes begin Feb. 16 and run for 12 weeks. Spring Start III classes begin March 29 and run for seven weeks. All spring classes conclude by Wednesday, May 12.

“Our flexible fall start dates were very popular with students who were not ready to begin classes at the traditional time in early September because of uncertainties surrounding the pandemic,” said Mark Hudgik, director of Admissions. “For spring, we wanted to again offer flexible start dates to give students as many opportunities as possible to either begin or continue their college educations.”

Because of ongoing concerns related to COVID-19, HCC will continue to offer the majority of its classes remotely through the 2021 spring semester.

Like most colleges, HCC started remote instruction in mid-March after the pandemic forced campus closures. This fall, all HCC classes are being offered in one of three formats: online, blended remote, and blended face-to-face. Wintersession and spring-semester classes will follow these same formats.

Online courses offer a traditional, asynchronous online model with coursework deadlines established by instructors. Blended remote courses have both asynchronous online components combined with real-time scheduled class meetings via videoconference platforms such as Zoom. Blended face-to-face combines blended remote with some in-person instruction on campus. For the most part, this format is limited to health-science programs that require clinical labs, such as nursing, radiologic technology, veterinary technician, and medical assistant.

Last month, HCC also started offering some of its culinary-arts classes face to face in the kitchens of the HCC MGM Culinary Arts Institute on Race Street in downtown Holyoke.

To see HCC’s Wintersession and spring class offerings, visit hcc.edu/class-schedule. To register for classes, please visit hcc.edu/admissions.