WESTFIELD — Westfield State alumna Jessica Kennedy, assistant principal at South Middle School in Westfield, was one of eight educators to receive the Massachusetts State Universities Alumni Recognition Award for 2014. The State Universities of Massachusetts honored eight of the Commonwealth’s outstanding K-12 educators who graduated from the system’s teacher preparation programs in a ceremony held in Boston on Tuesday. Kennedy was selected by Westfield State University in recognition of her accomplishments as a teacher and as a role model for students for service to the community. “Jessica Kennedy reflects the very best of Westfield State and the State University system, which has a proud tradition of developing and graduating educators of excellence,” said Elizabeth H. Preston, president of Westfield State University. “Jessica is deeply dedicated to helping students achieve more and reach higher, leading to stronger schools and communities in the Commonwealth.” Kennedy received her B.A. and M.A. at Westfield State in 2008 and 2010. Her first teaching job was as an English teacher at Powder Mill Middle School in Southwick, where she also served as mentor teacher, team leader, and pre-advanced placement lead teacher. In 2013, she was hired as assistant principal at South Middle School. Kennedy was nominated by Susan Dargie, director of Curriculum and Instruction at Westfield Public Schools. Dargie said that Kennedy has made quite the impression during her first year as assistant principal. “Jessica possesses the unbeatable combination of supportive supervision and true enthusiasm for the work that makes her an effective administrator,” Dargie said. “It is clear that Jessica is a rising star that will continue to have a positive impact on students for years to come.”
SPRINGFIELD — The Grainger Foundation, an independent, private foundation located in Lake Forest, Ill., has donated $5,000 to the Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) Foundation in support of its Foundation Innovation Grant program. “This grant will be used to help us continue to support faculty and staff innovation here at STCC,” said STCC President Dr. Ira H. Rubenzahl. “The Foundation Innovation Grant program helps us to improve excellence in the delivery of academic or student retention services at STCC. We are grateful to The Grainger Foundation for its generosity and in helping us to continue our mission.” In addition to the contribution from the Grainger Foundation, the STCC Foundation will match Grainger’s $5,000 contribution this year. Foundation Innovation Grants are awarded in the spring. “We want to thank the Grainger Foundation for its generous support,” said STCC Foundation President Kevin Sweeney. “With their assistance, the STCC Foundation will continue its commitment to support innovative projects at the College that promote community impact, economic growth, workforce development, and quality of life in our region.” The donation to the STCC Foundation was recommended by John Duffy, market manager of W.W. Grainger Inc.’s, Springfield location. Grainger has been a part of the Western Massachusetts business community for nearly 40 years as the leading broad line supplier of maintenance, repair, and operating products. “We are proud to recommend the programs offered by STCC,” said Duffy. “We understand the need for active engagement and partnership between our technical education providers, businesses and the community.” The Grainger Foundation, an independent, private foundation based in Lake Forest, Ill., was established in 1949 by William W. Grainger, founder of W.W. Grainger Inc.
SPRINGFIELD — Access to Baystate Medical Center, including Baystate Children’s Hospital and the Medical Office Building, via the hospital’s Medical Center Drive entrance off Springfield Street will be temporarily closed to both vehicular and pedestrian starting Nov. 22 for one month.
The closure will not affect access to the hospital’s Emergency and Trauma Center, Wesson, and Chestnut Buildings, all of which remains the same.
The change in traffic pattern is necessary in order to provide space on Medical Center Drive, between the Daly Building main entrance and Springfield Street, for a large crane required for the installation of a new air handling unit, part of the hospital’s continuing efforts to upgrade its facilities.
During the approximately four weeks of construction and installation of the air handler on the hospital roof, access to Baystate Medical Center will be via the Chapin Terrace end of Medical Center Drive. Signs off both I-91 north and southbound will direct vehicle traffic south on Springfield Street to Chapin Terrace. The project is expected to be complete on or about Dec. 20. Also, the PVTA will temporarily suspend service to its bus stop on Medical Center Drive, and will bring riders to its stop on Chestnut Street, where they will be directed to enter the hospital through the Wesson Building. “Our goal is to continue to provide easy access to Baystate Medical Center and the Medical Office Building, and to ensure patients, visitors, and employees can safely get where they need to go. We’ll put in place plenty of signage, police redirecting traffic at the closed-off entrance on Springfield Street, and valet parkers who will further assist people in reaching their destination,” said Louis Faassen, manager of Construction Services, Facilities Planning and Engineering, Baystate Medical Center.
For more information on Baystate Medical Center, visit baystatehealth.org/bmc.
SPRINGFIELD — Dakin Humane Society has announced the successful conclusion of its Fall Matching Challenge Campaign, in which an anonymous donor agreed to match, dollar-for-dollar, all monetary donations up to $125,000. Thanks to contributions from more than 1,700 people, the final tally came in at more than $153,000. “We couldn’t be more pleased about this outcome,” said Dakin’s Executive Director Leslie Harris. “The initial goal was to meet a $100,000 level, which our donors did one week prior to deadline. Our amazing benefactor then added another $25,000 incentive in the remaining days, and our donors rallied to meet – and exceed – that amount as well. The dedication of our supporters is incredible, and their generosity will make a difference in the lives of countless animals.”
On Nov. 22, Dakin will welcome 16 “Dixie Dogs” from Kentucky, all rescued in conjunction with the Paris Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) of Paris, Kentucky. The intake is part of the national Subaru “Share the Love”/ASPCA Rescue Ride program that distributes grant funding to animal welfare organizations across the country to fund the safe transport of sheltered dogs from overcrowded shelters to those with space and a higher demand for adoptable animals. PAWS will be one of 19 animal welfare organizations sharing the $100,000 grant total. The program is projected to transport over 2,000 animals to locations where they will have a better chance of finding a home. Dakin’s “Dixie Dogs” program involves the transportation of dogs from overcrowded shelters in southern states (mostly Kentucky and Texas) to Dakin so they can receive a second chance at a new life here in New England. Dakin is also preparing for its annual “Black Friday” adoption event on Nov. 28 from 12:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. at its Springfield and Leverett locations. Cats five years and older will be available for a $5 adoption fee, and there will be a 50% discount on adoption fees for small animals including bunnies, doves, mice, chinchillas, hamsters, guinea pigs and rats. Dakin’s Diamonds in the Ruff Thrift Store will also offer its variety of pet and gift items at half price on that day. On Dec. 10, Dakin will participate in “Valley Gives,” a day-long online philanthropy event, hosted by the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts that encourages participants to log on and contribute to their favorite charitable organizations.
SPRINGFIELD – The Springfield Boys & Girls Club will host a Premiere Party for the 14th Annual Festival of Trees on Nov. 23 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. at Tower Square, 1500 Main St. The Premier Party is an invitation-only event, held to provide a sneak peek of the Festival of Trees for sponsors, VIPs, members of the media, and volunteers. In addition to great food – and the 142 spectacular trees – the event includes a visit from Santa and Mrs. Claus. The official opening for this year’s Festival of Trees will take place in conjunction with the Parade of Big Balloons on Friday, Nov. 28 and will run through Dec.14. On Nov. 28, the Festival will open at 10 a.m. Visitors can purchase raffle tickets to win the trees, which includes everything on and under it. These items are often worth hundreds of dollars, and can include electronics, gift certificates and more. The winners will be chosen at the close of the Festival, just after 5 p.m. on Dec 14. Proceeds from Festival of Trees benefit the Springfield Boys & Girls Club, providing memberships, programs, enrichment activities, field trips, and other aspects of the Springfield Boys & Girls Club experience for 1,500 youths each year. Hours for the Festival of Trees are Wednesdays, 11 a.m. to 3p.m.; Thursdays through Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Sundays from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. The cost for adults is $5, seniors are $4, and children 12 and under are free. Free parking is available in the Tower Square garage with admission. For more information about the Festival of Trees, visit www.sbgc.org or call (413) 785-5266.
GREENFIELD — Baystate Franklin Medical Center’s Community Benefits Advisory Council (CBAC) has issued a request for proposals to not-for-profit and governmental organizations serving Franklin County and the North Quabbin area, to address one or more of the unmet health needs identified in the hospital’s 2013 Community Health Needs Assessment. Specific areas of focus include: projects that create systems of improved coordination of care; implementation of evidence-based primary prevention curriculum in schools; Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) training for school staff and coaches; chronic disease prevention and/or self-management; substance abuse prevention and support of mental health; and nutrition and physical activity system change projects. Deadline for grant applications is Dec. 19 at 3 p.m. Funding for these community health initiatives is being made available as part of the hospital’s Determination of Need (DON) process related to capital expenditures for its new surgery modernization project, per Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) requirements. The Baystate Franklin CBAC is using these funds to address demonstrated needs in Franklin County and the North Quabbin region. The CBAC will prioritize funding of projects that will have broad-based, lasting impact. To request a grant application and guidelines, contact Amy Swisher, director of Public Affairs & Community Relations at Baystate Franklin Medical Center: [email protected] or (413) 773-2268.
SPRINGFIELD — The construction project to expand the Sister Caritas Cancer Center at Mercy Medical Center is on schedule, and a ‘topping off’ ceremony will be held Nov. 20 to mark the completion of the project’s main structure with the placement of the top steel beam. A topping off ceremony is a tradition within the construction industry and is held when the highest structural point in the building construction is attained. To celebrate this event, the last steel girder is signed, lifted into place and welded to the structure. A small evergreen tree and the American flag are also secured to the girder as it is hoisted to the top of the structure. The tree is meant to represent the strength of the new building and the desire for the construction project to remain injury-free. The $15 million expansion of the Sister Caritas Cancer Center, which will add an additional 26,000 square feet of space on two levels, is designed to provide more comprehensive care delivery and added convenience for patients. In addition to Radiation Oncology services, Medical Oncology offices, physician offices and exam rooms will be located on the first floor. Medical Oncology treatment and infusion space, an oncology pharmacy and laboratory space will be located on the second floor.
SPRINGFIELD — In response to ongoing concerns about limited parking in the city’s downtown, the Springfield Business Improvement District has launched a ‘Park with Ease’ program for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Two valet stations will be set up along Main Street for the convenience of visitors. The first will be located by Court Square and the MassMutual Center, and the second will north on Main Street at the corner of Washington Street in he heart of the dining district. The BID is underwriting the service, with a cost of only $5 for each car. The ‘Park with Ease’ program will be in effect on Thanksgiving Eve, Nov. 26, as well as Friday and Saturday, Nov. 28 and 29. Car acceptance is from 5-9 p.m., with retrieval until midnight. For more information, visit www.SpringfieldDowntown.com/ParkwithEase.
Casino Project Generates Challenges, Anticipation
A panoramic view of the section of Springfield’s South End that will be transformed into MGM’s $800 million casino complex.
That’s how long MGM Resorts International has to complete construction on its $800 million casino complex in Springfield’s South End, according to the host-community agreement inked early this year.
That means August 2017, if you haven’t already done the math.
Kevin Kennedy, Springfield’s chief development officer, said the city (or MGM) might eventually erect one of those digital displays that counts down the months, days, hours, minutes, and seconds until something starts, as cities hosting the Olympics have done. But even without such a device, everyone involved will know that the clock is ticking — and that time, as that old saying goes, is money.
That’s why MGM didn’t put this project aside during the four months between when it was announced that a measure to repeal the state’s gaming law would appear on the election ballot and when it was soundly defeated, said Mike Mathis, president of MGM Springfield.
“There was a mandate from our chairman, Jim Murren, and our president, Bill Hornbuckle, an attitude that ‘we’re going to win this on Nov. 4, so let’s keep the intensity up so we don’t lose that time,’” said Mathis, adding that work pressed on with everything from final design to workforce-development issues to the overall timetable for what will easily be the largest construction project in this region’s history.
In some ways, this initiative will look like one of those 1960s-style urban-renewal projects, said those we spoke with, noting that several buildings, many of them damaged by the June 2011 tornado, will be torn down within the 14.5-acre site, and a number of businesses will be relocated to make way for the casino project. But it will also be different in many respects.
Indeed, this will be a private project, one that won’t bulldoze an area, but rather preserve many buildings within it, including historic 101 State St. — the original home of MassMutual — as well as First Spiritual Church and the façade of distinctive 73 State St. And instead of taking taxpaying properties off the rolls, as many of those massive urban-renewal projects did, this one will raise the amount of taxes generated within those 16 acres from $634,000 at present to $17.6 million when the casino opens its doors.
Mathis, who has been involved with several MGM casino initiatives, in this country and abroad, said the Springfield project presents some distinctive challenges — and opportunities — with its urban setting, its location in a state that has no experience with gaming at this level, and its so-called inside-out design.
“They’re all unique, but this is particularly unique, because of the integration with the existing downtown environment; this is not a greenfield project,” he explained. “There’s no template in our portfolio for a project like this, but that said, we’ve built in challenging environments at major scale, so this is certainly within our wheelhouse.”
Mike Mathis says MGM’s Springfield casino complex is unique in many respects, and thus it presents a number of challenges.
Next will come the hotel tower, which will incorporate the façade of 73 State St. into its design, as well as other components on what Mathis called “parallel tracks.” These include retail areas, a projected 50 units of market-rate housing near the casino site, and other facilities. Many of those components will be preceded by demolition of existing structures, including the school, the Western Mass. Correctional Alcohol Center on Howard Street, and a retail complex on Main Street, among others, and the relocation of roughly 20 businesses.
Meeting that 33-month mandate will be challenging on many levels, especially if the planned I-91 viaduct reconstruction project takes place at the same time, as expected. But all parties involved — MGM, the city, and the state — have no shortage of incentives to meet that timetable.
For this issue, BusinessWest talked with Mathis, Kennedy, and others about what the next 33 months might be like. The words heard most often were ‘challenging’ and ‘exciting.’
The Suspense Is Building
Kennedy, who has played a role in several development projects — from the new federal courthouse to significant improvements to State Street to Union Station — in his current role and also as aide to U.S. Rep. Richard Neal, said the casino will be like those initiatives in some ways, but there are important differences that might actually make the MGM complex a smoother, easier undertaking.
“The scale is obviously much different than anything we’ve ever done here in Springfield before — there haven’t been any $800 million projects,” he told BusinessWest. “However, the nature of the projects and how a project gets done … they’re all pretty similar in terms of permitting, demolition, and all the things that will happen here.
“But in terms of complications, while this is the largest economic-development project we’ve undertaken, the complexity of it, from a government standpoint, is actually less than either the U.S. courthouse and State Street,” he went on. “On the courthouse, not only did we have to make deals with property owners, tear down a portion of Technical High School, and move the Alexander House, but this was a three-tiered governmental project — there was federal, state, and local involvement, and everyone has their regulatory issues. And when you’re redoing 3.2 miles of State Street, we were two years in the planning process alone.”
But the casino project will undoubtedly have its challenges, said Kennedy, adding that one matter of particular concern is infrastructure and, more specifically, old and deteriorating water and sewer lines in that part of the city.
“When we had our negotiations with MGM, we talked to them extensively about these infrastructure issues, and they are very much on board for this because they can’t afford to have a water or sewer problem,” Kennedy noted. “And we don’t want them to have a breakdown, either, because some of our funds are attached to their ability to do business.”
The Western Mass. Correctional Alcohol Center on Howard Street will be one of the buildings demolished to make way for the casino.
“We’ll start to scope out what the issues are, how we’re going to do this, and who needs to be assembled on either side of the table in order to coordinate this and deliver the project by August 2017,” he explained.
Mathis acknowledged that building an urban casino — and building one in a heavily regulated state like Massachusetts — will be a different experience for himself and MGM, but lessons learned during other projects will serve the company well.
“We’ve built City Center, an 18 million-square-foot project in Las Vegas, one of the largest private developments at that time in the entire country, so we know how to do sophisticated construction in tough environments,” he said. “So we’re confident we can hit our time period. But it takes a lot of work, it takes a lot of preparation, and our group recognizes that.”
Meanwhile, all the principal parties involved — MGM, the city, and the state — have plenty of motivation to help this project proceed on schedule.
“The great thing is that the state is our partner on this, as is the city,” said Mathis. “We all have the common goal to get this facility up and start generating revenue and putting people to work.”
Overall, he said he hopes to harness the considerable energy present at a gathering at the Basketball Hall of Fame on election night to move the casino project from the drawing board to reality.
“The energy in the room was palpable — everyone wanted to be a part of this,” he told BusinessWest, adding that this level of support and enthusiasm should help the company navigate the many kinds of challenges that will present themselves over the next 1,000 days or so.
Placing Their Chips
Indeed, while the transformation of the site in the South End will be the focus of most of the region’s attention over the next three years, there are many other matters to address to ensure a successful opening in the summer or fall of 2017, said Mathis, adding that MGM and its many types of partners in this region are already working on some of them.
Relocation of businesses to be displaced by the casino complex is one such matter, said Mathis, noting that uncertainty in the wake of the referendum vote has delayed this process somewhat and has now generated a new sense of urgency (see related story, page 43).
“One of the things that we negotiated with the city was to provide incentives — we’ll pay the moving costs for tenants if they relocate in the downtown Springfield area,” he explained. “For those who take us up on that offer, we’ll be happy to subsidize that move and keep the energy downtown. We’re already talking with other commercial property owners about space that they can make available that we can provide a pre-agreed group rate to and make this transition as easy as possible.”
Meanwhile, MGM is preparing to close on roughly $35 million worth of real estate it has acquired in the South End for the project, he went on, adding that designs for the project, while not final, are close, and at this moment they do not require any additional acquisitions.
As designs are completed, the company will also go about hiring a general contractor for the massive project, he went on, adding that there are a number of developments happening simultaneously.
“We’re excited about our preparedness to move forward with the project with our different contractors and suppliers,” he said, adding that workforce development is another focal point moving forward. And there are challenges in this regard, Mathis told BusinessWest, because gaming is new to the Bay State, and thus there is no trained workforce in place, as there would be in Las Vegas, Atlantic City, or Macau.
“There is a significant amount of training that needs to take place in a market like this that doesn’t have casinos or gaming,” he said, adding that MGM is working with a host of parties, including the area community colleges and regional employment boards, to identify and then train a workforce.
Another partner is the American Red Cross and its Boots to Business program. As part of that initiative, several area veterans will go to Las Vegas to be trained on table games. After eight months of training and honing their skills, they will return to this region and train others who have been identified as good candidates for those positions.
Other priorities for MGM and various partners are to develop a comprehensive marketing strategy for MGM Springfield — one that focuses on the Bay State as well as surrounding states with competing casinos — and work to sell Springfield (and its new casino) as a destination for meetings and conventions.
“A casino is one of the things that meeting planners look for, but they also look for the things that come with a casino, like four-star hotel rooms, which this market doesn’t have. They look for high-end restaurants and diverse entertainment experiences,” he said, adding that MGM’s complex will make this region that much more attractive to those booking conventions.
“We’re one of the largest convention-space operators in the world — our Mandalay Bay events center is the fifth-largest convention facility in the country — so we know as much about conventions as we do about gaming,” Mathis went on, adding that MGM has a huge database of current and potential clients, including some groups that are too small to consider Las Vegas, but would find Springfield a good fit.
Mary Kay Wydra, director of the Greater Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau, said that, with the defeat of ballot Question 3, Springfield and the region as a whole can now market themselves as the future home of a gaming complex, a considerable addition to the current list of amenities.
“If we can capture a fraction of their [MGM’s] national and international database and get the regional groups that those entities represent, those will be obvious targets as the building opens and the casino comes online,” she told BusinessWest. “They’re already familiar with MGM — they know what that brand stands for — and they know its quality and what they’re going to get. We’re excited about starting our work with them in that matter.”
Not Hedging Their Bets
That excitement, coupled with large doses of anticipation, should make the next 33 months an intriguing time for the region, one that will test the imagination — and sometimes the patience — of all those involved.
“It would not be wise to think that we’re not going to have some challenges as we go through this,” Kennedy told BusinessWest. “There will be some bumps in the road. We have a partnership with MGM, and any partnership will have some tension built into it. There will be some issues as we move through this process.”
But as all those we spoke with noted, there is more than enough incentive to get through those issues and clear those bumps.
August 2017 will no doubt arrive quickly, and the countdown has already begun.
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
Southampton’s Building Boom Brings Challenges
Although the downturn in the economy in 2008-09 caused building to come to an abrupt standstill in most cities and towns across Western Mass., Southampton was an exception.
“Building never came to a halt here, and new housing continues to go up,” said Ed Cauley, vice chair of the Board of Selectmen.
“Right now, there are four new subdivisions with 35 lots in various stages of development, plus a half-dozen single lots where new homes are being built; there is a lot of growth going on,” he continued, adding that the new homes are priced between $400,000 and $500,000.
Heather Budrewicz says 24 building permits for new homes have been issued this year in Southampton.
In fact, Selectman David McDougall calls home ownership in Southampton “the dream,” explaining that, as people become successful, they want to build a home in the country on an expansive lot.
“But if you work in Springfield or the surrounding cities, your options are limited,” he said. “You can buy land in Montgomery or Huntington, but they are farther out and require longer commutes. Southampton is one of the last areas that is convenient to I-91 and has reasonably priced land that people can build a dream on.”
Cauley also cites Southampton’s location and adundance of land as attributes that have led to the town’s popularity, but said the school system, large amount of open space, and opportunities for recreation also attract homeowners, who often move to the town from Holyoke and Westfield.
“Route 10 runs through Southampton, and we’re close to I-91 and exits 3 and 4 off the Massachusetts Turnpike; we’re a bedroom community, but are close to Northampton and Easthampton, which have a lot to offer in the way of arts and restaurants,” Cauley said, explaining that residents are able to enjoy living in a rural atmosphere but also benefit from nearby shopping and entertainment venues.
“Southampton is a beautiful place. It’s picturesque, people are friendly, we have a great school system, the taxes are reasonable, and we provide good services,” he went on.
The town was once an agricultural community, and although there are still two working dairy farms, several equestrian operations, and a number of small farms, former farmland has become a prime focus for developers, and because there is so much of it, Cauley said the majority of lots in new subdivisions are at least an acre in size.
“Plus, we have 14 conservation areas that contain 600 acres. They range from 9 to 200 acres and are under the jurisdiction of the Conservation Commission,” Budrewicz said. “We also have three parks, including Labrie Field, which contains 19.4 acres and is a multi-field athletic complex that is so new, we are still waiting for the grass to reseed itself so the soccer fields can be fully utilized.”
Growing Pains
However, rapid growth in Southampton has led to significant financial problems as voters have repeatedly turned down proposals to increase taxes.
In July, a Proposition 2½ override was rejected by voters. Town officials were hoping to raise $1 million to avoid budget cuts, and said if the override was passed, $200,000 would have gone into two dwindling stabilization accounts and $40,000 would have gone into a fund to pay future employee benefits.
But it didn’t happen, and there have been repercussions, which include a change in the student/teacher ratio at Norris Elementary School. “It’s a very small school, and for many years the ratio of students to teachers was 17/1, which is what you find at many private schools,” Budrewicz said. “But this year, we had to change, and it is now 24/1.”
Town officials say they may also have to close the library, and although Cauley says the town’s police officers, firefighters, and other service providers are doing an excellent job, the growth in population indicates a need for more feet on the street.
“We’re a small town that is growing faster than other communities, and we would like to be able to do more, but we have been forced to tighten our belts,” he said.
McDougall said there has been significant controversy surrounding the budget, but what new residents often don’t realize is that the town spends $1.19 in services for every dollar it takes in, with 60% of the annual budget allocated for educational expenses.
The shortfall and differing opinions in the community led the selectmen to request a review of their budget process this summer by the Department of Revenue’s Division of Local Services. The results were released last month, and state inspectors said the town is in a “vulnerable financial condition,” and noted that voters have failed to pass every Proposition 2½ override proposal on the ballot since 1991, although 39 override questions have been put before them during that time period, ranging from $1,500 to the recently requested $1 million.
In addition, a recent report from the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission shows the number of housing units in Southampton grew by 47% between 1990 and 2010, and the population increased by 93% between 1970 and 2012.
And therein lies the problem, said McDougall.
“Proposition 2½ was passed in the early ’80s when the town’s population was between 1,500 and 1,900 people. At that time, the town was a small farming community, but since then it has become a bedroom community of about 6,000 people, and the budget has not kept pace with the growing cost of services,” he noted, explaining that the town is losing money on new homes.
“When new roads go in, they have to be plowed, which requires trucks and manpower. The police need to patrol these roads, but the police force has shrunk in size in the last decade due to a lack of funds. We only have one full-time firefighter, our chief, with the rest working part-time or on-call. People complain that we are slow to plow the roads, but we just don’t have the resources,” he went on. “Our Finance Committee has been advocating for an override to Proposition 2½ for six years to reset the financial equation, so it’s not a new problem, but one that has slowly grown. No one wants to pay more taxes, but we have gone from having $670,000 in our stabilization fund in 2007 to $90,000 today in two accounts, and although some people say we are mismanaging the money, it’s hard to do when you don’t have any.”
The Department of Revenue also noted the difficulty of balancing the town’s budget due to the shortfall, but recommended a number of changes, which the selectmen have begun to implement.
Moving Forward
However, town officials don’t expect the growth to stop or even slow down, and Cauley says the town is a great place to live because there is a lot to do, including activities staged by the school and a wide variety of sports teams for children.
Recreation includes fishing on the Manhan River, along with an endless number of hiking trails. “We’re in the foothills of Pomeroy Mountain, and hikers who go to the top can see UMass Amherst on one side and Mount Tom on the other side,” Cauley said, adding that other enjoyable venues include concerts at Conant Park held throughout the summer and fall, as well as the annual Celebrate Southampton event that evolved from the former Old Homes Day.
“One-third of the area that makes up Hampton Ponds is in Southampton, and we also have a Memorial Day parade with ceremonies that a large number of people march in,” Cauley told BusinessWest.
Residents also enjoy the Manhan Rail Trail, which starts on Coleman Road and continues through Easthampton into Northampton. In fact, it is so popular that a new greenway project is underway that would connect to the trail and extend in the opposite direction toward Westfield.
Charlie McDonald, chairman of the Conservation Commission, said a group called The Friends of Greenway has kept the idea moving forward over the past few years. The initiative involves purchasing 4.25 miles of old railroad track owned by Pioneer Valley Railroad and transforming it into a bike path.
Two years ago, after the section of rail corridor was appraised at $340,000, the Conservation Commission applied for and received a state Local Acquisition for Natural Diversity Grant. It will pay for 80% of the land, and the town will be responsible for the remaining 20%, which will come from Community Preservation Act funds.
“In November of 2012, 80% of the residents at a town meeting voted in favor of purchasing the track,” McDonald said, adding that the Mass. Department of Transportation has been supportive, and the town is currently in negotiations with the railroad to purchase the property.
After that occurs, officials will find a company to remove the rails in exchange for keeping and selling them. “The final step will be to develop a design for a permanent, paved trail,” McDonald said.
He believes the project will enhance quality of life in town and may lead to economic growth, because it will bring new people into Southampton. “This is a residential community, and many people like to bike and take their children with them. So the new trail will make it safer and give people a great place to exercise, as well as connecting the town to a variety of cities through a network of trails, he explained.”
Continuing Process
In short, although Southampton is primarily a residential town, it has a balanced slate of offerings. “We don’t have a lot of restaurants and businesses, but we have enough,” Cauley said.
McDougall agreed. “People move here to escape the noise and crowds in nearby cities,” he said.
Still, both say it is a mixed blessing, due to the budget situation. “People want a simple answer, but it’s a complicated issue, and it will take earnest, open discussions to solve it,” McDougall said. “But it’s not a new problem, and the dream of owning a country home with a long driveway in Southampton will continue.”
Southampton at a glance
Year Incorporated: 1753
Population: 5,792 (2010)
Area: 29.1 square miles
County: Hampden
Residential Tax Rate: $15.20
Commercial Tax Rate: $15.20
Median Household Income: $61,831
Family Household Income: $64,960
Type of government: Town Meeting; Board of Selectmen
Largest Employers: Town of Southampton/Norris Elementary School, Big Y
* Latest information available
Americans Repudiate Obama, Finally
At an address last month at Northwestern University, President Barack Obama gave his critics a present and the voters a unique opportunity, one they certainly seized.
“I am not on the ballot this fall … but make no mistake: these policies are on the ballot. Every single one of them,” said the president in words that would come back to haunt him, apparently referring to everything from his administration’s foreign policy (whatever that is) to Obamacare.
With those words, Obama made the election all about him — not the Democrats who have faithfully carried his water for six years, but him. And in many ways, the voters made it all about him as well. By giving the Republicans full control of the House and Senate and handing the Democrats one of their worst defeats in decades, the voters spoke loudly, and what they said was that this president is not a leader and his administration is failing the country.
Indeed, from the government’s ill-fated takeover of what most consider the best healthcare system in the world to its policies that allow illegal aliens to have more and better benefits and healthcare than U.S. veterans, the Obama presidency has been a disaster, and the voters finally, and thankfully, acknowledged this on election night with a stern repudiation.
On Nov. 4, Americans rejected Obama’s policies, which have left so many of America’s middle class and poor worse off now than they were six years ago and this nation going backward, not forward, on a changing global stage.
The message was sent, loud and clear, that progressive liberalism is certainly not the answer. Rewarding the takers (those staying home taking a government handout while fully capable of working) over the givers (those who go to work every day, pay taxes, and balance a family budget with no expectation of a government handout) has no sustainable path in a free-market economy.
But it’s not just the substance of this president and his administration (or the lack thereof) that clearly rankled voters. It’s also the arrogant style.
It’s best summed up by presidential historian Jonathan Turley, who said, “Barack Obama is really the president Richard Nixon always wanted to be … he’s been allowed to act unilaterally in a way we’ve fought for decades.” He’s right. From actions that most see as ordering the IRS audits of conservative groups for political purposes to tapping the phones of journalists (and untold others) and monitoring their e-mails, to allowing illegal aliens to step in front of the line and grab jobs from U.S. citizens through executive amnesty, to ignoring the U.S. Constitution, this administration has embarked on an attack against everything America stands for.
And when it comes to foreign policy, well, this administration doesn’t have one — or at least one that works. The infamous Hillary Clinton ‘reset button’ with Russia has reset relations back to Cold War status. Meanwhile, the Arab Spring has turned into the Arab Fail, with Muslim extremists taking control of Libya and many parts of Syria and Iraq, forcing our hand into fighting a new foe that this administration allowed to take hold: ISIS.
When the president told reporters in early September that “we don’t have a strategy yet,” he was referring specifically to ISIS, but he might as well have been talking about his foreign policy since he was elected. The world is on fire, and it is a direct result of the greatest power leading from behind on virtually every major world issue.
As the president said in 2009, just after he was swept into office, elections have consequences. In his post-election news conference just two weeks ago, our so-called chief executive must have forgotten that phrase he so triumphantly uttered. The hubris, arrogance, and ineptness that has characterized this administration was indeed a sight to behold as Obama so indigently dismissed what had just happened the night before. It was inarguably one of the worst Democratic landslides in recent memory, and the president was in total denial.
It is our hope that the November election results will remind the president that the consequence of this election is to change course. Yes, elections do have consequences.
How to Repurpose Your Thanksgiving
By BAYSTATE HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
Thanksgiving is about more than just enjoying a delicious holiday feast of turkey with all the trimmings, then heading out the door before the day is over to get a jump start on Black Friday bargains. Enjoying a healthy Thanksgiving also means sharing time with others and nurturing the mind and spirit as part of the holiday. In that spirit, Baystate Health professionals offer the following five tips to repurpose your Thanksgiving.
Get unplugged. “With our hectic lifestyles, many families find it increasingly difficult to maintain the valuable routine of having a family meal. Fortunately, the tradition of families eating a meal together is preserved on Thanksgiving. In order to make the most of this, it’s helpful for both young people and adults to strive to be truly present at the Thanksgiving table.
Consider adopting a new tradition which may not have been relevant in previous generations: as the food is being served, ‘un-serve’ all of the smartphones by asking everyone to put them onto a tray and remove them from the room. This will eliminate the temptation of checking e-mail and texting during the meal and help everyone to get the most out of the precious time of sharing a meal together and valuing the relationships and traditions of the family.” — Dr. Barry Sarvet, chief of Child Psychiatry and vice chair of Psychiatry, Baystate Medical Center
Exercise in the name of family and health. “It’s well-known that exercise has many health benefits, from lowering your blood pressure and cholesterol to helping prevent heart disease, to uplifting your spirits and managing depression.
Instead of plopping down on the couch and watching football all day on Thanksgiving, why not consider continuing quality family time after leaving the dinner table and taking a nice family walk, or even playing touch football outdoors? Other outdoor sports like soccer, or anything that gets you moving, such as turning up the music and dancing after your Thanksgiving feast, is good for your health.” — Dr. Quinn Pack, Heart & Vascular Program, Baystate Medical Center
Remember, it’s a time for giving. “Faced with the over-consumerism of today, especially on Thanksgiving, when some children may see a parent heading out the door even earlier now to grab up all the Black Friday bargains, it’s important to remember that our national holiday is made up of two words, thanks and giving. Adults need to remember what they were hopefully taught as youngsters, that it is better to give than to receive, and to pass that same wisdom onto their children.
Whether adult or child, scientific studies show that there are pleasure centers in the brain that are stimulated when we connect with someone in a meaningful way, such as volunteering at a homeless shelter or providing food for a family in need at Thanksgiving. Other research points to the fact that we are happier when giving and not focusing on the ‘me,’ and that can lead to both better physical and mental health.” — Dr. Laura Koenigs, interim chair, Baystate Children’s Hospital
Be thankful and mend relationships. “The ‘thanks’ in Thanksgiving reminds us to be thankful for being together on the holiday. But what about those loved ones and friends we might be estranged from? Thanksgiving is a time to reflect on ways to improve family relationships. And eliminating latent feelings of disappointment and sadness over a stressed relationship can also benefit both one’s mental and physical health.” — Dr. Benjamin Liptzin, chair, Department of Psychiatry, Baystate Medical Center
De-stress your Thanksgiving. “Sure, you want everything to be just right for Thanksgiving, from a perfectly cooked Turkey to avoiding any conflict among relatives who might not always see eye-to-eye. It’s stress, holiday style. Making sure you get enough sleep leading up to the holiday can benefit your immune system and help keep you free of illness. Getting a good night’s sleep can also help to relieve stress and keep you alert, productive, and focused on the true meaning of the holiday.” — Dr. Karin Johnson, director, Sleep Clinic, Baystate Medical Center
A Primer on the New Law Requiring Employers to Provide Sick Leave
By JEFFREY TRAPINI and HUNTER KEIL
Jeffery Trapani
Hunter Keil
Here what employers need to know about this measure and how it will impact their business.
What the Law Requires
The law applies to all employers, regardless of size. If the employer has 11 or more employees, then the sick time must be paid, and if the employer has fewer than 11 employees, it may be unpaid.
Regardless of the size of the employer, the law has the same requirement for accrual. Employers must provide a minimum of one hour of sick time for every 30 hours worked by an employee, up to a maximum of 40 hours of sick time per year. The law applies to both full-time and part-time employees, although obviously part-time employees will not accrue sick time as quickly as full-time employees. Employees who are exempt from overtime requirements are presumed to work 40 hours per week for the purposes of accrual, unless their normal work week is fewer than 40 hours, in which case it will accrue based on their normal work week.
Employees are allowed to carry up to 40 hours of sick time accrued in one calendar year over to the next calendar year, but employers are not required to allow employees to use more than 40 hours of sick time in one year. For that reason, this carry-over provision affects when an employee can take his or her sick time, but not the total amount of time that can be taken in a year.
Sick time may be used by employees for a number of reasons. In addition to caring for an employee’s own health, it can be used for caring for the employee’s child, spouse, parent, or parent of a spouse. Sick time can be used for both unforeseen illnesses and for routine medical appointments. If the use of earned sick time is foreseeable, the employee is required to make a good-faith effort to provide notice to the employer. Finally, sick time can be used to address the psychological, physical, or legal effects of domestic violence.
Employees will begin accruing sick time under this law on July 1, 2015 or on the date of their hire, whichever is sooner. Although employees begin accruing sick time upon hire, there is a 90-day waiting period for use of the sick time. Therefore, employees cannot use accrued sick time until they have been employed for 90 days or more by the employer, but they begin accruing it immediately.
The law does not require accrued sick time to be paid to an employee upon termination or resignation. Employers should be careful, however, if they have a paid-time-off (PTO) policy that grants employees a certain amount of paid time off that can be used as either vacation or sick time. The law does not require an employer to provide paid sick time in addition to PTO, provided that the PTO policy meets the minimum criteria of the law.
The Massachuetts Wage Act, however, requires employers to pay employees for all of their accrued vacation time upon termination or resignation. If an employer does not differentiate between vacation time and sick time, then it arguably must pay all accrued PTO at the time of the employee’s departure. If a policy is unclear, the courts may construe it against the employer, so it would be wise for an employer to make sure it is clear on this point.
The Law Is a Floor
The new law, which will be codified as Chapter 149, §§ 148C, 148D, acts as a floor below which employers may not drop, but nothing in the law forbids employers from granting more benefits to employees than the law requires. If an employer’s existing policy grants more generous sick-time benefits to its employees than the law requires, the employer does not need to modify its policy in reaction to this law. However, employers should be cautious in assuming that their policy is in compliance with the law, and it would be prudent to seek advice.
While an employer’s sick-time policy may be generous, it may still have details that are not in compliance with this law. For example, an employer may grant more than 40 hours of sick time per year, but if it does not allow up to 40 hours per year to be rolled over to the next calendar year, it may not be in compliance. Likewise, if an employer does not provide benefits, including sick time, to part-time employees, it will not be in compliance with the law regardless of how generous its sick-time policy may be for full-time employees.
Potential Liability for Employers
Both individual employees and the Massachusetts attorney general have the right to enforce the provisions of the law. Like other statutes relating to employment discrimination and wages, employers may be sued for interfering with or denying an employee from using earned sick leave, or for retaliating against employees for asserting their rights to sick leave or for supporting the rights of another employee. If the employer is found to have engaged in such conduct, it can be liable for any lost wages or other damages resulting from the adverse employment action. Further, it also appears that an employer’s decision maker may also be liable to the employee.
Employers should take special note of the retaliation provision of the statute. Where damages are awarded, they must be automatically tripled, and the employee may also recover attorney fees and costs. The mandatory tripling of damages and the availability of attorney fees for a successful plaintiff pose the possibility of surprisingly large awards, creating an incentive for attorneys to represent employees in these cases. It would be wise for employers to be meticulous in ensuring that their sick-time policies comply with the law, and that their policies are uniformly followed.
Attorney General Regulations
The law requires the attorney general to promulgate regulations on a number of the provisions in this law. These regulations will clarify ambiguities, and employers will have to make sure that they are in compliance with these as well. Employers should be aware that further modifications to their policies may be necessary when this occurs.
Jeffrey Trapani and Hunter Keil are attorneys with Springfield-based Robinson Donovan, specializing in employment law and litigation; (413) 732-2301.
Banks Navigate a Rapidly Changing Chess Board
In assessing the many ways banking in Massachusetts has changed, Dan Forte summons two numbers: 338 and 175.
The first, said Forte, president of the Mass. Bankers Assoc., is the number of banks with offices in the Bay State in 1990. The second number is the same tally at the end of 2013.
“That’s a 48% drop, which, annualized, is a 2% drop per year,” Forte said. “There have been some periods where the consolidation was slower, while in some periods, it has been a little faster. We’re coming out of an economic trough, albeit slowly, and as the economy gets stronger, you’ll see mergers pick up over the next few years.”
Indeed, after a few relatively — but never totally — quiet years on the bank-merger front, 2014 has brought a rush of movement, most recently Berkshire Bank bringing Hampden Bank under its banner (see sidebar, page 19).
“It’s a combination of things,” Forte said, noting that the region’s most recent big moves — Berkshire’s in-market acquisition of Hampden, the interstate ‘merger of equals’ between United Bank and Rockville Bank a year ago, and Connecticut-based Farmington Bank’s plan to expand into Massachusetts — are very different from each other.
“The community banks are going to remain strong, but, like every other industry, there’s going to be a lot of change, and this is part of the change,” he said. “It’s really nothing new.”
Or, as Brian Corridan put it, “we have a lot of very good banks here in Western Massachusetts. But the world is changing, and the checker game in banking has become a chess game.”
Corridan, a local expert on the financial-services industry and president of Corridan & Co. in Chicopee, emphasized that not only are mergers and consolidations par for the course these days, they’re not the biggest story.
Berkshire Bank leaders are discussing whether to retain, consolidate, or close Hampden Bank branches that overlap Berkshire branch footprints — including Hampden’s headquarters in downtown Springfield.
“Look around — people have accounts at Citizens, TD Bank, and Santander. We’re not just talking about regional banks anymore, but foreign banks. They see the value of retail banking in our area,” Corridan said. “And it’s just the tip of the iceberg; there’s a lot of consolidation to come as banks look for economies of scale.”
That’s one of the reasons offered by Sean Gray, Berkshire Bank’s executive vice president of retail sales, in explaining why his institution is “doubling down on Springfield,” where Hampden Bank is headquartered, and where Berkshire already has a significant presence.
“Ultimately, there are economies of scale that come with larger size,” he said. “We believe we have to be big enough to do all the things larger institutions can do, but we feel we need to keep our roots in local decision making, and stay active in foundations and volunteerism and all the things you want a community bank to do at the end of the day.”
When it comes to making moves on this massive chessboard, how does a bank become more efficient, more profitable, and offer expanded services and a broader range of loans, while also maintaining the community involvement and high-touch environment long valued by retail customers in Western Mass.? For this issue’s focus on banking and financial services, BusinessWest examines how creating this balance has become, for banks large and small, the name of the game.
In the Red Tape
Ironically, much of the recent movement among banks to grow larger, quickly, has come as a result of new regulations in the wake of the 2008 financial collapse — a crisis in which the largest banks shouldered much more blame than smaller community banks.
“Since Obama came to town, it’s been a regulatory jungle, and the departments within individual banks experiencing the highest growth rate are the compliance departments,” Corridan said. “In response to more complicated regulations, the federal government is demanding more reports, and that rocks your bottom line. If you have to put $400,000 to $500,000 into your compliance department, that may upset the balance of whether you had a profitable balance or you’re in the red.”
Forte agreed, citing the way ‘call reports’ — the condition reports banks issue to regulators at the end of each quarter — have become much more onerous.
“The costs of doing business are clearly increasing,” he told BusinessWest. “As of 2012, there were 1,995 items in a call report. In 1990, there were 569 items. And the regulations coming out of Dodd-Frank are going to increase them even further; they’re looking now at increasing the number of reporting requirements by 63 elements. Every item takes time and costs money, and the risk of not completing these forms correctly is significant.”
Therefore, he said, banks aren’t just expanding their brand when they merge; they’re spreading these regulatory costs over a larger footprint.
For William Crawford IV, CEO of Rockville Bank, the decision to merge United with Rockville was about investing smartly in an aggressive growth plan.
“Getting to $5 billion in assets, getting to that scale, was very important,” he said. “We’re seeing a lot of small banks seek out strategic partners, much as we saw with Hampden, simply because the economics of being a very small community bank — say, under $1 billion — is very difficult when you look at the interest-rate environment out there. It makes it very difficult to lend money, and, unfortunately, we may be in this environment for an extended period of time.”
Still, he emphasized the importance of maintaining community ties, particularly in the realm of long-established charitable and volunteer efforts.
“Both companies, United and Rockville, have significant foundations that will continue to invest here as we always have,” he said. “And because of our increased size and scale, we have more resources to do those things. So, from a community perspective, two companies coming together is definitely a plus.”
While customers might occasionally feel disoriented by changes in bank ownership, Forte noted that banks have been contracting nationally at a 3% annualized rate, putting Massachusetts behind the U.S. pace. Some of that has to do with the fact that 70% of the banks in Massachusetts are mutual banks, which are limited in how they can merge.
“It requires the right alignment of planets — the board, management, succession timing, etc.,” he said. “Clearly, the trend from this year is a little faster than three years ago, which is not surprising, given all that’s been going on economically.”
The loosening of state laws across the U.S. governing interstate banking, starting around 30 years ago, created a much more nurturing environment for mergers, leading to the remarkable contraction in Massachusetts-based banks since 1990, Forte said.
“State lines are fairly arbitrary; you’re looking more at economies. That’s why interstate banking is so critical; it gave banks large and small the ability to expand geographically, regardless of state boundaries.”
Cache and Carry
Forte emphasized, however, the vigilance with which merging banks protect their reputation as local institutions.
“Community banks are a vibrant sector of the economy, and they help their local communities,” he said. “Their biggest strength is being high-touch. If they can maintain the high-touch aspect and be quick followers of technology and keep costs down going forward, they will continue to confound the pundits who have long predicted their demise.
“I believe there will continue to be a strong community-bank sector of the industry, and we’re not going to become like Canada, with six large banks and 100 credit unions that serve as the local banks,” he added. “We have vibrant community banks here in Massachusetts.”
That said, Corridan noted, “we’re down two publicly traded banks in the Pioneer Valley — Chicopee and Westfield. Look back 25 years, when we had BankBoston, Shawmut, Bank of New England, Baybank … we had smaller banks, and dozens of them.”
With their gradual fade, he predicted that the next 10 to 15 years will see a rapid ascent in credit-union membership. “If you want to bank locally, you’ll see credit unions get stronger, because they’re going to be the local banking entity.”
Springfield resident Morriss Partee, creator of EverythingCU.com, an online source for credit-union information and advocacy, hopes that’s the case, but admitted progress toward that goal has been gradual at best.
“Consolidation in banking has been going on for a very, very long time, and people always say the credit unions stand to benefit from that, and they certainly have to some extent,” Partee said. “At the same time, it’s surprising that they haven’t benefited even more than they have.
“The option of banking locally is just not that important to a lot of people,” he continued. “Of course, it’s important, but a lot of people don’t think deeply about their bank relationship. They say, ‘OK, I have checking; I have a big bank with lots of ATMs around; I can be functional in society.’”
Partee says there’s still plenty of untapped potential for credit unions, but they have to convince people it’s easy to switch over. EverythingCU.com has long offered a ‘switch kit’ to make that task easier and, in recent years, help people do it online. “People hear about credit unions from their friends or see representatives at a trade show and say, ‘OK, your credit union sounds great, but it’s not worth the hassle of moving.’”
Partee, who has been a vocal opponent of a Springfield casino, puts large national and international banks in the same category — businesses, he says, that want to benefit from Springfield but who, at the topmost levels, don’t care about detrimental effects on the community because they don’t live here.
“When lending decisions are made locally, that’s going to help the local community,” he said. “There are still local community banks that are staying local, and a lot of people feel just as passionately about their local community bank as they do about their credit union. With the largest banks — the internationals, especially — it seems like doing business with them is not necessarily helping the local economy; they’re not as responsive to entrepreneurs or people who don’t fit into neat little boxes they can check off in their system.”
Pittsfield-based Berkshire Bank, for its part, has been careful to characterize its acquisition of Hampden as a way of doubling its commitment to Greater Springfield, not uprooting a locally headquartered bank with a 162-year presence.
“We are keeping local leadership and local decision making right here,” Gray said, noting that Hampden Bank President Glenn Welch will remain the combined bank’s regional president for the Pioneer Valley. “We are the largest bank headquartered in Western Mass., and when we look at our overall investment in the region, Springfield has to be a part of that. We are very committed to Glenn and his leadership and his commitment to this region.”
Checking the Landscape
Partly because of the economies of scale produced by the merger, Gray said the combined institution would grow more quickly than the two would have separately. The fate of individual branches, some of which now have overlapping footprints, is still being discussed, though Berkshire is determined, he added, to keep as many current Hampden employees in place as possible.
That brings up a common concern in the industry — overbranching. Strikingly, while the number of banks in the Bay State has been cut in half over the past 25 years, the number of total branches has risen by 12%. “You’ve got a lot more branching,” Forte said, “as well as more services that provide easier access to customers, like remote deposit capture, online banking, and mobile banking.”
Considering these trends, and the fact that real-estate is the second-highest cost for banks after personnel, one would expect banks to start closing branches, rather than open more, he noted. But that hasn’t happened yet.
“New England is overbanked in terms of the number of branches per household,” Crawford said. “And it’s higher than it needs to be. Look at the transaction levels, and look at how frequently people conduct business inside a branch, versus using a mobile device for bill pay, or even a call center. The reality is, there are probably too many bank branches right now, and that structure can’t be supported by the way customers do their banking these days.”
Perhaps that’s the next phase of what has become an intriguing and unpredictable game.
“Think of how much change banks have gone through, and imagine what they will look like in three years, seven years, or 10 years,” Crawford told BusinessWest. “We need to have leadership that can figure out what’s working and work with vendors to get there — and do it in a way that’s attractive to customers and cost-competitive with much larger players. That’s the challenge.”
Berkshire Hills Acquisition of Hampden Bank Creates $7B Institution
Berkshire Hills Bancorp’s recent acquisition of Hampden Bancorp — bringing Hampden Bank under the Berkshire Bank banner — means that, for the first time in generations, no bank will be headquartered in Springfield. But Berkshire leaders say customers and the community will both benefit from the merger.
“This in-market partnership will create a strong platform for serving our combined customers, while producing attractive returns for both our existing shareholders and the new shareholders from Hampden joining us in this transaction,” said Michael Daly, president and CEO of Pittsfield-based Berkshire Bank. “This merger complements our expansion initiatives in Central Massachusetts and Hartford, a combined market area that is the second-largest in New England.”
Berkshire Hills Bancorp and Hampden Bancorp have signed a definitive merger agreement under which Berkshire will acquire Hampden and its subsidiary, Hampden Bank, in an all-stock transaction valued at approximately $109 million. Berkshire’s total assets will increase to $7.1 billion, including the $706 million in acquired Hampden assets.
Sean Gray, Berkshire’s executive vice president of retail banking, said the move “deepens our investment and commitment to the marketplace. We’re already in Springfield and the surrounding communities, so this gives us better economies of scale in that marketplace, which allows is to do more, and we’re excited about that opportunity.”
The in-market merger is expected to create efficiencies, strategic growth, and market-share benefits for the consolidated operations of the two banks in the Springfield area. Hampden operates 10 branches in the Greater Springfield area and reported $508 million in net loans and $490 million in deposits as of Sept. 30, 2014. Berkshire operates 11 branches with $627 million in deposits in the same market area.
“We will move into the top-five position in deposit market share,” Daly said, “and plan to use this opportunity to further capitalize on our strong product set and culture of customer engagement.”
Gray echoed the concept of culture. “I think we started with like values. We believe that a community bank has a responsibility to the community, and I think Hampden Bank thinks about it the same way. There’s a mutual respect there,” he said, adding that “our CEO has a great relationship with their CEO, and they both felt that the time was right.”
He also noted that Berkshire, like Hampden, has a culture of community involvement through donations — $269,852 since 2013 — and employee volunteerism.
Glenn Welch, president and CEO of Hampden Bank — who will become Berkshire’s regional president for the Pioneer Valley — said he is “delighted to be joining the Berkshire franchise. Our two banks share rich histories, consistent core values, and a strong commitment to customers and communities. I’m proud of our 162 years of serving customers in our markets and believe the combination created by our two companies will benefit our clients, communities, and shareholders.”
Under the terms of the merger agreement, each outstanding share of Hampden common stock will be exchanged for 0.81 shares of Berkshire Hills common stock. The merger is valued at $20.53 per share of Hampden common stock based on the $25.35 average closing price of Berkshire’s stock for the five-day period ending Nov. 3, 2014. The $20.53 per-share value represents 133% of Hampden’s $15.49 tangible book value per share and a 6.0% premium to core deposits based on financial information as of Sept. 30, 2014.
Gray conceded that the merger could lead to closings where Berkshire and Hampden have an overlapping branch presence, but nothing has been decided yet.
“Right now, we’re in the evaluation process,” he said. As for employees, “obviously, there will be some redundancy in jobs. But Hampden has 126 employees, and Berkshire right now has 102 openings. Will each of those employees map directly to these openings? We don’t know yet, but we do have a track record here.”
Specifically, he referred to Berkshire’s acquisition of Legacy Bancorp in 2010. “We were able to retain a good majority of those jobs. We put a lot of emphasis on that part of the evaluation process.”
Meanwhile, “from a customer perspective, they will have more branches,” Gray said. “We’ll be looking at what makes sense moving forward, but at the end of the day, the customers of this region will have enhanced services and more total branches.”
Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]
Pioneer Valley Credit Union Takes a Service-focused Approach
By KEVIN FLANDERS
In her 30 years with PVCU, Anabela Pereira Grenier has seen assets rise from $2 million to $52 million.
Celebrating her 30th year with the institution, President and CEO Anabela Pereira Grenier has witnessed most of this growth just during her tenure. Since she started with PVCU, the credit union has increased its assets from $2 million to $52 million, in addition to expanding from 900 members to 7,500. It wasn’t always easy — especially during the recent recession — but PVCU has weathered the storm, she said, and emerged even stronger.
“We are the oldest operating postal credit union in the nation,” Pereira Grenier said of PVCU, which began as an institution exclusively for postal workers nearly a century ago. “It took a while, but once membership grew, we really took off.”
In 2008, right after the financial-industry collapse, PVCU officials decided to reach out to major Western Mass. employer groups in an attempt to stabilize business through a turbulent period. The decision not only provided an infusion of short-term momentum, but ultimately helped the member-owned credit union steer a course toward sustained success.
Baystate Health added PVCU as its credit union in 2008, followed by Westover Air Reserve Base. Later, Westfield’s Savage Arms and other prominent employers came on board, and the credit union now serves several other large companies and organizations, as well as federal employees in Springfield.
“We have increased our staff by more than 50% to keep up with the demand of the programs we offer,” said Trecia Marchand, vice president of marketing and business development. “Everyone is excited about the growth we have experienced. People know they can trust us when they see that these large employers have entrusted us with their most valuable assets — their employees.”
Creating Solutions
For Pereira Grenier and her team, the impetus behind every decision is member satisfaction. She said her staff understands the constraints of a challenging economy and strives to make it as easy as possible for members to navigate their finances, which has led to the creation of several innovative approaches.
For example, the CU on the Go Mobile Branch Solution was launched to enable members to use PVCU’s financial services at their workplaces. The project has been successful, she said, especially for people whose schedules don’t allow them to visit the credit union during normal business hours.
“When people see that their credit union is there to help them and provide services, they really appreciate it,” added Marchand, who has been with PVCU for eight years. “Employers don’t have to pay to offer this employee benefit. We bring the services to them — it’s a win-win situation for everyone.”
To ensure that members understand their options, PVCU has also developed a training system that elevates loan officers to certified financial life coaches. The certification process takes about one year, during which time loan officers learn how to familiarize members with financial practices and explain complex procedures in coherent, easily understandable presentations.
A session between a member and a financial life coach, Pereira Grenier said, is usually a one-on-one meeting tailored toward the member’s individual needs. From teaching people about their credit scores to analyzing how their budgets can be improved, the goal of every life coach is to help people save money and gain knowledge.
Additionally, the credit union offers financial-literacy courses for larger audiences, usually a few times yearly. PVCU is also amenable to visiting employers upon request for large group presentations.
“We are very dedicated to financial literacy,” Pereira Grenier told BusinessWest, “and have invested a lot of time and money into training our financial life coaches.”
Solid Services
In a competitive industry, Pereira Grenier said, PVCU has tried to set itself apart through consistent, ever-expanding member services. For individuals looking to improve their homes’ energy efficiency, PVCU has partnered with the Mass Save Heat Loan program to offer 0% loans. And for members who step through the doors with a loan application, it’s possible for them to come out with a check in a half-hour or less.
To accomplish that goal, the PVCU staff processes everything in-house, with no outsourcing or external complications, improving efficiency and keeping members coming back for additional programs.
“When others are trying to take money away from people, we are offering services that put money back into their pockets,” Marchand said, noting that the credit union’s investor-rewards checking program pays eight times more than the national average for interest-bearing accounts of its kind.
Moreover, the credit union pays money on debit transactions and also provides members an opportunity to donate their cash-back rewards to charity. The institution has partnered with Baystate Health Foundation, the Children’s Study Home, and the Soldiers Home in Holyoke as charitable partners for this program. For members interested in participating, they can choose which charity they will benefit with their rewards. In addition, PVCU is engaged in a number of other charitable and community-outreach efforts, including an annual essay contest for seventh- and eighth-graders and college scholarships for high-school seniors.
PVCU also offers online banking, express banking, mobile banking, online information about financial coaching, and myriad other services and programs. It’s all about keeping up with technology and utilizing it in advantageous ways, Pereira Grenier says.
Speaking of technology, the credit union’s marketing team continues to employ everything from social media to radio ads to promote PVCU’s services. The staff also works closely with human-resources departments of member companies to keep their employees apprised of upcoming events and opportunities. Whether someone is buying a used car, applying for a student loan, purchasing a home, or simply trying to learn how best to manage money, the staff is always available to help members create a plan to achieve sustainable financial security.
Total Team Effort
Originally chartered to “promote thrift among its members and to make loans to its members for provident purposes,” PVCU previously operated on Dwight and Main streets in Springfield before eventually shifting to its main office to 246 Brookdale Dr. in 1991. But continued staff growth has necessitated major restructuring and rearranging within the building, which the leadership team agrees is a great problem to have, especially at a time when many businesses have needed to make cuts to services.
Pereira Grenier remembers how spacious the main office was back in 1991, when PVCU had only a handful of employees working in the building. But with major staff increases over the last 20 years, the building has undergone a makeover to ensure that the office remains comfortable and welcoming to both employees and members. The basement, once used solely for record retention, now houses offices for the HR, marketing, and operations departments, as well as the credit union’s call center. Loan officers and service representatives, meanwhile, occupy the main floor for ease of member accessibility.
“We feel it is important to have our loan officers right there on the main floor where they are easy for members to reach,” Marchand said. The credit union strives for a similar environment at its other locations: at Baystate Medical Center and at 1883 Main St. in Springfield; at Westover Air Reserve Base in Chicopee; and at Savage Arms in Westfield. PVCU also operates a number of ATM locations in Springfield, Chicopee, and Holyoke.
“In the three years I have been here, the morale is at an all-time high,” said Human Resources Coordinator Jennie McPherson. “We have gone from a transaction culture to a consultative culture, and everyone is excited about what we are doing for our members. We all work well together as a team, and it’s a very inclusive environment. When we do off-site team-building exercises, staff members are happy to attend.”
McPherson and Marchand agree that PVCU’s success starts from the top, with the leadership Pereira Grenier has provided for three decades, and especially since taking over as president and CEO in 1998. They say employees have been inspired by how hard she works and her commitment to achieving success.
“She is a leader who really believes in what she’s doing every day, and the team comes together because of that,” Marchand said.
Guided by an 11-member board of directors that sets policy, governed by its members, and led by a dedicated staff, she added, PVCU is poised to continue its success into 2015. Invested in far more than its bottom line, Pereira Grenier and her team understand that, in this business, everything starts and finishes with member satisfaction.
Know the Rules to Understand If You Qualify for Deduction
Today, technology allows us the opportunity to work from just about anywhere. One benefit is the ability to work from home. This has brought the home-office deduction into play for some taxpayers — or so they think. Taxpayers assume that, since they work from home, they will qualify for the deduction. This may not be the case, as we will see in this article.
Sean Wandrei
A principal place of business is a location that a taxpayer uses for the administrative or management activities of the taxpayer’s trade or business if there is no other fixed location where the taxpayer conducts substantial administrative or management activities.
‘Exclusively used on a regular basis’ can be a difficult hurdle to overcome. A taxpayer must use the space exclusively for business all the time and not just during business hours. This means that the kids cannot go into the ‘office’ to watch TV or do their homework. It also means that the business owner who does his or her billing on the kitchen table does not have a space that is exclusively used in business.
The most likely scenario is that a self-employed business owner has an office in his or her home that they use for business. The billing, scheduling, administrative work, etc. is done in this room since the taxpayer has no other location to do these types of activities. The office is not used by anyone else in the household during off hours.
A note on employees: if you are an employee who works from home and has a home office, you can take the deduction as long as you are working from home for the convenience of the employer. Most employees work from home for their own convenience.
If it has been determined that there is a home office, what expenses are deductible, and how is the deduction calculated? Relevant expenses are categorized as direct and indirect. Direct expenses benefit the office portion of the home directly (e.g. painting the office) and are deducted in full. Indirect expenses are incurred while maintaining and operating the home. Indirect expenses must be allocated since they benefit both the home and the home office. The allocation is based on floor space of the office compared to that of the home in total to arrive at a business percentage. The indirect costs are multiplied by the home-office percentage to arrive at the total indirect cost.
The allowable home-office deduction cannot exceed the gross income from the business less all other business expenses attributable to the activity. Home-office expenses of a self-employed individual are trade or business expenses, and are deductible for adjusted gross income. Any disallowed home-office expenses are carried forward and used in future years, subject to the same limitations.
In January 2013, the IRS released guidelines that allow a taxpayer an optional ‘safe-harbor’ method to calculate the deduction. This optional method has been available since 2013. If the taxpayer elects this method, he or she can deduct $5 per square foot of office space in the home, up to a maximum of 300 square feet. The maximum amount of home-office deduction using the safe harbor is $1,500. The requirements discussed above must be met to deduct the safe-harbor amount. If the taxpayer is using the safe-harbor method, he or she cannot deduct the actual cost as well.
If the safe-harbor method is elected, no depreciation is allowed in that year. Taxpayers who itemize deductions can still deduct all costs that are normally deductible as an itemized deduction if the safe-harbor method is used. If you elect the safe-harbor method one year, you can switch the actual cost in the next year. There is no limitation on switching between methods year-to-year.
As you can see, potential exists to save some tax dollars if you use a portion of your home for business.
Sean Wandrei is a lecturer in taxation at the Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst. He also practices at a local CPA firm; [email protected]
Physicians Get Back to Work After HCPA Bankruptcy
Dan Moen understands that the closing of Hampden County Physician Associates (HCPA) is a big story in the region, but it’s just a part of a much larger story going forward.
“Physicians are concerned their reimbursement has been reduced by payers over a period of time, and their overhead, the cost of keeping up with all the administrative complexities, is also going up,” said Moen, president and CEO of the Sisters of Providence Health System (SPHS).
In short, he added, “I think physicians, to some degree, are feeling squeezed — not to say there aren’t some very successful physician groups out there, but in general, physicians are feeling they need to be part of a bigger entity, one that might have the resources to help them bridge that gap.”
The new building that houses several SPHS services, including physicians formerly affiliated with HCPA.
That’s why Moen believes taking on 19 doctors from four former HCPA practices, in the wake of the physician group’s bankruptcy filing and closure late last month, is a win-win for both the doctors involved and SPHS itself.
“We had a long, positive working relationship with Hampden County,” Moen said of the now-disbanded physician network. “When we heard from them that they were concerned about their future, we said, ‘this is too important to this community to let it just go away.’”
Thus, a month-long effort commenced to bring the doctors, plus two physician assistants and six nurse practitioners, into the SPHS-owned Mercy Medical Group, headquartered on the Mercy Medical Center campus in Springfield. Three business days after the bankruptcy proceedings forced all HCPA offices to close, the four practices that joined Mercy were back online in the same locations, in Springfield, East Longmeadow, Ludlow, and Feeding Hills.
Dan Moen, president and CEO of the Sisters of Providence Health System
Similar negotiations ensued throughout October at Noble Hospital, which decided to take two HCPA practices into the Noble Medical Group. Two physicians who practiced in Westfield have moved to the Noble campus in the city, while five based in Southwick, along with a physician assistant and a nurse practitioner, will remain in their existing office.
“The decision was made for us,” said Noble President and CEO Ronald Bryant, speaking not literally, but in terms of the importance of physician access in his community. “Hampden County Physician Associates, by their dissolving, left a void in our market for primary-care physicians. Southwick and Westfield were already in our market, so not only was picking them up the right thing to do for our community and our patients, but it’s also the right thing for the physicians and staff, who will remain in the community for their patients.”
Other pieces on the board shifted as well. The Southampton Road office in Westfield, abandoned by the doctors who moved to Noble, was taken over by Mercy and will reopen in the spring, offering specialties including wound care, cardiology, hyperbaric therapy, and vascular medicine.
Meanwhile, allergists who had been part of Hampden County Physician Associates established their own practice, Allergy and Immunology Associates of New England, on the campus of Baystate Medical Center in Springfield. HCPA doctors who had practiced in nursing homes have also launched their own practice, Pioneer Continuing Care Providers. Finally, pediatrician and internal-medicine specialist Dr. Naomi Rosenberg has started her own practice.
Dr. Scott Wolf, senior vice president of Medical Affairs and chief medical officer at Mercy, said SPHS acquired the assets and equipment of the four practices as part of negotiations with HCPA. “Our primary goal from the outset was making sure nothing would change for patients, their relationships with their physicians would remain intact, and physicians would eventually welcome new patients into these practices.”
Bigger Pond
In its initial bankruptcy petition on Sept. 29, HCPA claimed it had lost doctors and was unable to recruit replacements. At the time, the physician group claimed $3.3 million in assets and $5.4 million in liabilities, while gross income across its network of practices had fallen from $39 million in 2013 to $25 million through the first nine months of 2014.
“There’s still a huge shortage of primary-care physicians in the area; we know that,” Moen told BusinessWest. “We’re seeing a lot of this happening these days across the country, where physicians are aligning themselves more closely with hospitals and health systems.”
The reasons have much to do with economies of scale and access to a fuller range of resources, he continued.
“Instead of working on their own, this gives them a bigger entity to work with. For example, we’ve got an IT team here at Sisters of Providence. That’s an automatic savings; they probably had to spend some dollars with an outside vendor and consultant, while we can do it inside.
Ronald Bryant said Westfield’s need for primary-care doctors practically made Noble Hospital’s decision to take seven former HCPA doctors into its network.
Wolf agreed that physicians will enhance their current practices by being part of a medical system. “They can coordinate care and leverage the infrastructure we have as a comprehensive health system, which will help us achieve the goal of overall population health, and will keep patients in their primary-care environment, where care should be delivered.”
He noted that a hospital with Mercy’s community demographics should average about 50,000 emergency-room visits per year, but the hospital actually averages about 80,000, partly due to a shortage of primary care. It’s also important for physicians to be more closely aligned with hospitals in this era of accountable care, a model that requires close coordination among hospitals, doctors, and other medical professionals.
“We’re moving away from fee-for-service,” Moen said. “People are starting to move toward risk-based contracts, flat-rate contacts, where the incentive is going to be for physicians and hospitals and other providers, like home care, to work even more closely together and be available to move patients along a continuum of care in the best possible fashion — to keep people well and out in the community. So it makes sense for physiciants to be more involved with hospitals in this care.”
Back to Work
Though most of the HCPA practices continued operations within a few days of the Oct. 31 shutdown, the group’s West Springfield office was shuttered, and doctors who worked there transferred to Mercy or the Feeding Hills practice. Meanwhile, the group’s urgent-care center in East Longmeadow was closed for the time being, its fate currently undecided.
Overall, though, Moen praised the transition that brought 19 new doctors into the Mercy Medical Group with minimal shutdown.
“We knew we’d keep this going,” he said. “It’s a great group of physicians and practitioners, and we never thought we wouldn’t make this move in some form or fashion.
“It’s just too disruptive for patients not to have their appointments,” he continued. “Simple thing like prescription renewals are so important. People booked these appointments months ago; it’s not like there are lots of openings in the schedule going forward. So we didn’t want more than a day or two of those schedules being interrupted. This is a talented group, in spite of the financial challenges, and we’re happy to have all of them get back to work doing what they love to do, which is taking care of patients.”
There were practical considerations for Mercy, too. “We knew we couldn’t afford to have this big gap in service for patients. We didn’t want them to look elsewhere for care. So this has been a success, from my point of view.”
Both SPHS and Noble stressed that patients would experience no insurance changes in the ownership transition. In fact, Wolf said, in some instances coverage will be expanded because of services provided under the Sisters of Providence umbrella.
Meanwhile, the system has been busy contacting some 60,000 patients to let them know how to find and contact their providers, and has set up a ‘coordinated care center’ telephone line to help patients navigate the changes. “This will be a transparent and seamless transition for patients as they maintain access to their physicians and other providers,” Moen said.
Wolf agreed. “All appointments are going off as scheduled, all practice sites up and running, our waiting rooms busy, and the physicians are busy seeing patients.”
Bryant reported an equally smooth transition of care, and said his biggest concern was making sure residents of Westfield, Southwick, and the environs were able to continue accessing the services they need.
“From our standpoint, the more important thing is that we’re here to provide care for the community,” he said. “These doctors were already located here in our market, so it’s a natural transition to join the hospital. There was minimal downtime and minimal glitches in the transition. They’re seeing a full schedule of patients.”
Eyes on the Future
Wolf noted that the 19 physicians who joined Mercy Medical Group already practiced at Mercy Medical Center, so their practices were never impacted that much. But their affiliation with the medical group helps Mercy build a foundation of primary care — a larger footprint, so to speak — and boosts its profile in recruiting efforts.
“This truly gives us an opportunity to recruit additional primary-care physicians in an area where they’re so desperately needed,” he said. “I think, with the reputation of the Sisters of Providence and Mercy Medical Center, it gives physicians comfort to be part of a bigger system and have access to the resources of that larger system.”
Moen agreed. “This gives us a base to recruit additional physicians. Having an established group, one that has a relationship with a strong hospital — that’s the kind of opportunity primary-care physicians are looking for, and we hope to be able to alleviate the primary-care shortage for the community.”
Doubling its primary-care pool from seven to 14 certainly won’t hurt Noble’s efforts, Bryant said, but “we did a pretty good job recruiting to begin with. What this allows us to do is enhance patient services. It makes it easier for them when they access our healthcare system; we’re able to provide a continuity of care, from primary care to specialist to the hospital, that might not have been present before. So I think it enhances the customer experience more than anything.”
In other words, the doctor is still in.
Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]
Holyoke Medical Center Works to Raise Its Profile in the Community
Spiros Hatiras says Holyoke Medical Center isn’t changing what it is and what it does — it’s just doing a better job of communicating it.
He goes on to note that he was a five-pack-a-day smoker and had long battled chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). His life changed, he implied, when a hospitalist at Holyoke Medical Center intervened.
“She just said, ‘you can fix this.’ You just felt like someone cared,” Morris said into the camera. “If it wasn’t for Holyoke Medical Center, I wouldn’t be going on tour with the Stones this fall.”
And with that 30-second message, now airing on several area television stations, Morris became part of an ambitious new marketing campaign launched by HMC this fall. This spot, like all the others, ends with another voice saying, “Holyoke Medical Center: experience the new standard in patient care.”
It’s not exactly a new standard, in the sense that the staff at HMC has always been caring and compassionate, said Spiros Hatiras, the system’s president and CEO. But it is new in the sense that many from this region, including some living in Holyoke and adjacent communities, are not familiar with the hospital.
This simple fact convinced Hatiras, who took the helm at the medical center 14 months ago, and others at HMC that they had to become more aggressive, and pointed, in their branding efforts.
“We’re not necessarily changing who we are — we’re just doing a better job of communicating it,” said Hatiras, who prefers the phrase ‘brand definition’ to ‘rebranding’ to describe what the system has undertaken. “The basic elements are still here — we are a solid, quality provider, and we’re a hospital of a size that is conducive to personalized care because it’s not very big and intimidating and confusing; we’re located in a great area, and we’re easily accessible. And at the same time, we’re big enough to have the services that most people would need.”
Elaborating, Hatiras said the basic goal of the campaign is to drive home the point that, in most cases, people in the Greater Holyoke area don’t have to drive past HMC on their way to Springfield, or anywhere else, to get the kind of quality care they want and need.
“There’s absolutely no reason, in my mind, why a resident of Holyoke, Chicopee, South Hadley, or Easthampton needs to go far away to another provider to receive the kind of care they can get here,” he explained. “Ultimately, what this campaign is aiming to do is let people know of the things we do and do well and what they can expect here, and keep people in the community.”
The marketing campaign includes a new logo (see page 29), television spots such as Morris’s, print ads (many of them in Spanish), billboards, banners within the hospital, and a revamped website. It’s all part of a multi-faceted initiative to raise HMC’s profile and increase volume, which also includes $2 million in upgrades to the Emergency Department and a new strategic plan.
Overall, the system’s efforts are focused on putting out a new, stronger message, and then making sure it can back up those words ‘new standard in patient care,’ said Hatiras.
As for that logo, Hatiras told BusinessWest that it says different things to different people. To him, it speaks of both the region — through the use of the colors blue and green, representing water (Holyoke’s canals and the Connecticut River) and nearby mountains, respectively — and also a new beginning through its use of yellow.
“It’s a like a dawn, a new beginning, a bright day — that kind of feel,” he said. “That’s what we wanted to communicate.”
For this issue, BusinessWest takes an indepth look at this new beginning and the many forces that will shape it.
Ad Infinitum
“I’ve always looked at my patients, and cared for my patients, with the thought that that could be my mother, or that could be my grandmother, and I’ve always treated them as if they were mine, and I’ve treated them as I would want my family to be treated. I love being a nurse.”
That’s another of the 30-second spots airing on area television stations. It stars Lorimar Crus, a registered nurse who has been at HMC for three years. The sentiments she expresses reflect those of the system as a whole, said Hatiras, and sum up nicely both the message that is being sent through these various marketing vehicles, and the current focus of the system.
“While we’re not reinventing ourselves, I will say that we’re enhancing what we do and we’re focusing more on the experience that people have here,” he explained. “On the quality side, we do very well; we’re rated very highly. So what we’re really focusing on are those other qualities of the patient experience, or what people sometimes call the ‘softer skills’ — are we treating people with respect? Are we treating them with compassion? Are we treating people with empathy? Do we really care for people when they come in on a deeper human level?”
Hatiras said the work to revamp the system’s marketing efforts began almost immediately after he arrived last summer, because it was apparent that something needed to be done.
“We started talking about rebranding right away — at least started to think about how we needed to do significantly better in terms of communicating who we are, what we do, and what we do best,” he told BusinessWest, adding that these initiatives are being undertaken simultaneously with efforts to enhance (that’s a word Hatiras would use repeatedly) a culture of caring and compassion.
He said a market survey revealed that HMC’s primary problem wasn’t that people had a negative opinion of it, but that they didn’t have much of an opinion at all. Meanwhile, there was confusion, or ignorance, about the system.
“There were gaps in what people knew about us and about what we did; we still get confused with Holyoke Health Center, and frankly, there were people who didn’t know if we delivered babies here,” he went on, adding that the base of knowledge was broader in Holyoke, but much less so in surrounding communities such as Chicopee and South Hadley.
Hatiras believes HMC’s prior marketing efforts fell short for many reasons. For starters, there wasn’t enough of them, he said, adding that there was a also a lack of cohesion among messages sent by the medical center and its affiliates, River Valley Counseling Center, Holyoke VNA & Hospice Life Care, and Western Mass. Physician Associates, with each entity having its own logo, type style, and marketing strategy.
“No one could ever put it all together — no one really quite understood that the VNA was part of our system and River Valley was part of our system,” said Hatiras. “If your ads don’t all have a certain feel and look, they don’t resonate … if there’s nothing that ties it all together with the whole, it doesn’t make an impact.”
Part of the new branding initiative is broader outreach, especially to the Hispanic community, said Hatiras, adding that ads in Spanish are only a part of this effort.
For example, HMC was the lead sponsor of Holyoke’s annual Puerto Rican Parade in July. The hospital did not have much involvement with the event previously, he noted, and, ironically, Baystate Health was lead sponsor in recent years.
Care Package
But more aggressive marketing and greater outreach are only part of the equation, said Hatiras, returning to that phrase ‘softer skills’ and a recognized need to raise HMC’s game still higher.
“Even these have been core qualities of Holyoke Medical Center,” he said, referring to compassion, respect, and empathy. “What we’re doing now is putting a very significant internal focus on enhancing these qualities and making sure that we develop them further.”
The medical center is working with Pensacola, Fla.-based Studer Group, which, according to its website, “works to bring structure and focus to healthcare organizations through the creation of cultures in which people hold themselves accountable and help set them up to be able to execute quickly.”
HMC has ben working with the company for nearly a year now, and will continue to do so for at least three years, said Hatiras, adding that it takes time to make the kinds of fundamental changes the system is undertaking.
And there are several points of focus within this initiative, said Hatiras, listing everything from private rooms for all patients to revamped food service to valet parking for visitors. A common theme is to provide patients with a greater sense of control over their care.
“We started with some simple things, such as patient amenities,” he explained, “so that when people come here they feel safe, they feel they get treated the right way, and it’s a comfortable environment for them and their families.
“We’re converting all our rooms into private rooms so that there’s space for the family to visit and privacy, and we’ve revamped our food service so that people have choices in what they’re going to eat,” he went on. “When they get admitted, people have very little control over things, in general, and giving them the ability to have control is very important.”
Beyond these initiatives, HMC is also focusing on how the team administering care relates to patients and families.
“Studies have shown that, if physicians take the time to pull up a chair and sit next to the patient at eye level and communicate with them at that level, the interaction is much more meaningful, they get better information out of the patient, and the patient feels they’ll be listened to and understood a lot better than if someone stands at the foot of their bed,” he told BusinessWest. “By giving them that feeling of empathy, compassion, and respect, they heal better and faster.
“It’s just hard science — healing takes good medicine, and it takes good care,” he went on. “But it also takes that human touch, the compassion, the feeling of reducing the patient’s anxiety and making them feel safe.”
One priority for HMC is improving the environment in its Emergency Department, Hatiras noted, adding that the hospital was recently awarded $3.9 million by the Mass. Health Policy Commission to undertake renovations to the ER, and will launch a capital campaign to raise the balance of the projected $6-7 million project.
“The physical environment is very limiting and uninviting,” he said of the current emergency room. “It was built for 15,000, maybe 18,000 visits a year, and we’re doing 45,000.”
Brand Definition
Once the rebranding effort and other initiatives have gained traction, Hatiras said, HMC will conduct another market survey to see if attitudes, and overall awareness of the system and its services, have changed.
He suspects that they will change, and that verification will come in the numbers involving inpatient volume and, overall, the number of people driving elsewhere to receive care.
“The proof is in the pudding,” he said, adding that, while inpatient volume is down across the state, Holyoke’s rate of decline has been greater than in other areas. Reversing this outmigration, as he called it, will require a system-wide focus on not merely branding, but enhancing the patient experience.
And that’s what the system means by a ‘new standard in patient care.’
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
Demand for Nurses Rises — Along with a Push for More Education
Joyce Thielen says a significant shortage of nurses nationwide is on the horizon, with some specialties, like OR nursing, expected to be in particular demand.
At issue is the so-called nursing shortage, which made headlines 15 years ago but has receded somewhat since then, yet is expected to percolate again as Baby Boomer nurses finally move into retirement.
“I think, because of the age of our workforce right now, a shortage is going to happen,” said Joyce Thielen, associate dean of the Elms College School of Nursing, adding that many were ready to retire several years ago, but postponed that step when the economy went south in 2008.
“But as the market improves, as the economy improves, more people will start to retire. That’s the current thinking, anyway,” she noted. “There are specialties where that is particularly true. One example is the OR; many of the nurses in the operating rooms in area hospitals have been here for many years, and they’re predicting a shortage of them coming up.”
Nancy Craig-Williams, assistant dean of Nursing at Greenfield Community College, also sees plenty of opportunity, noting that all her school’s recent graduates who have passed the National Council Licensure Examination have received job offers in fairly short order.
However, “the opportunities may be changing from what people stereotypically think of as nursing,” she told BusinessWest. “Some students come in and expect to see the ER all the time, or they come into the nursing program and say, ‘I want to work in the hospital; can you guarantee me that?’ Well, no — we educate you to become a nurse and use the knowledge and skills you learn in school at a facility that needs those skills. Sometimes their ideas change once they’re in school.”
Some graduates, she said, don’t find themselves working immediately in their preferred environment, or working as many hours as they’d like, while about 20% of GCC’s nursing graduates move on from the two-year program and enroll in bachelor’s-degree programs elsewhere, reflecting a trend toward higher education for nurses in general.
“For them, this is a stepping stone as opposed to an end point,” Craig-Williams noted. “I think it has become more apparent to our associate-degree students that a bachelor’s degree will get them into positions, like acute care, that they want to go on to. Some of our graduates do go right to acute care, though, because they’ve been working at the facility or an opportunity presents itself.”
The Institute of Medicine (IOM), among other groups, has been calling for a better-educated nursing workforce, Thielen noted, especially at a time when a shortage of primary-care physicians is becoming more acute and nurses are being called upon to do more.
“Overall, we’re seeing a trend where associate-degree programs are highly encouraging their graduates to get their bachelor’s degree right away, and those with bachelor’s degrees are thinking about graduate schools,” she said, noting that fields like physical therapy, occupational therapy, and pharmacy are starting to require doctoral degrees for certain jobs, and nursing may not be far behind, especially at a time when the accountable-care model of care requires healthcare providers from various disciplines to work more collaboratively. “In order to be equal around the disciplinary table, nurses need to be better educated; it’s all about better patient outcomes.”
Still, she said, these trends shouldn’t scare prospective nurses from a field that’s sure to pose plenty of career opportunity over the next decade and beyond, at every education level. “It’s still a real phenomenon. It’s looking up. The last few years have been brigher, and opportunities continue to improve.”
Driving Demand
Healthcare economist Peter McMenamin told American Nurse Today recently that a combination of factors, from the aging of the nursing workforce to implementation of the Affordable Care Act, is driving rising demand for new nurses.
“Nursing is a good job,” he said. “Work satisfaction is high. If you look at the employment in U.S. hospitals for the last decade, month after month, there’s only a single month where employment went down. Hospitals have been continuing to hire during the recession.”
He cited U.S. Labor Department projections that 712,000 new jobs for registered nurses would be created between 2010 and 2020. “Everyone is expecting there are going to be more jobs. We’re hoping that there will be enough nurses to fill all of those jobs.”
The problem is that nursing schools are actually turning away applicants en masse, with capacity issues stemming partly from a long-standing lack of nursing professors.
From 2012 to 2013, for example, enrollment in bachelor’s-degree nursing programs increased by 2.6%, the slowest increase in five years. Meanwhile, nursing programs turned away 53,819 applicants in 2013.
Nancy Craig-Williams says the nursing profession provides a variety of opportunities and practice environments for graduates at every level of education.
“One of the trends is, we’re seeing hospitals offering residencies — they’re waiting for the right graduates to become licensed, and they’re offering residency programs that allows for a very intense orientation and helps with their entry into the practice,” Thielen explained. “And, again, we’re seeing a lot of graduates going to graduate programs earlier than ever. We’ve seen a lot of that because of IOM’s recommendation that nurses become a better-educated workforce. And the need for nurse practitioners is increasing because we have a decreasing number of primary-care providers. These are all trends.”
Craig-Williams agreed. “There’s a huge call for nurse practitioners right now. We do have students graduate from our program and transition to nurse-practitioner programs. In some cases, if they have other education or background, there are a lot of opportunities.”
Thielen also noted that a graduate’s chance of getting the job they want might depend on how willing they are to relocate.
“Our graduates are getting jobs, and they’re getting them right away if they go beyond New England,” she said. “We’ve had students go to North Carolina and other states — there are many more opportunities if you’re able to move out of the area. People staying in the area are taking a little more time; they may start out with part-time positions that grow into full-time positions or evolve into something else.”
According to the BLS, Texas, Florida, Washington, and Virginia ranked highest in job postings for nurses in the first quarter of 2014, while other states that showed significant growth over the last year include Georgia, Minnesota, and New Mexico.
“I believe that most of our national organizations, including the departments of Education and Labor, are saying we’re still looking at a nursing shortage,” Craig-Williams said. “Maybe it’s not as pronounced here in the Northeast, but it certainly is apparent in other areas of the country.”
Golden Years
Demographics — specifically, what’s commonly referred to as the aging of America — creates demand for nurses in two ways: by creating a wave of retiring older nurses, and by keeping people alive longer and needing more nursing care.
In fact, according to the American Medical Assoc. (AMA), adults 65 years and older represent the fastest-growing segment in American society, and this group is expected to surpass 40 million, or 13% of the nation’s population, in the next decade. America’s adult mortality rate, for men and women combined, ranks only 49th in the world.
At the same time, the AMA notes, chronic diseases account for 75% of American healthcare dollars spent, while more than half of Americans have some sort of chronic disease, like diabetes, heart disease, or cancer. Meanwhile, obesity has reached epidemic levels, with more than 72 million Americans, including 12.5 million American children, classified as obese.
The result is an American healthcare system approaching a state of dire need for many types of healthcare providers, nurses foremost among them — in all sorts of care settings, not just hospitals.
“Many of our students are getting positions in step-down, subacute units, long-term care, rehabilitation services. Some are working in the community, doing visiting-nurse or home-care placements. There are a few working in acute care,” Craig-Williams said, adding that a number of GCC graduates work at the Brattleboro Retreat, a behavioral-health facility just over the Vermont line, due to an ongoing relationship between the center and the nursing program. “Every year we do a rotation there.”
Overall, she told BusinessWest, nursing provides an abundance of opportunity for young people considering careers.
“We’re a small school, and we don’t graduate a large population of students, but our graduates are excellent candidates,” she said, adding that many are adult learners with bachelor’s or master’s degrees in other fields who considered nursing as a career later in life.
Whatever the case, she added, it’s becoming an increasingly good idea for many nurses to attain as much education as possible. “The research is pretty clear — a bachelor’s in nursing is going to increase your possibility of working where you want.”
Wherever that is, it’s important to remember that the greatest career benefit of nursing may be the ability to do something meaningful each day to help other people, Vicki Good, president of the American Assoc. of Critical Care Nurses, recently told nursezone.com.
“It may sound cliché, but we need to keep our eye on the ball, which is our patients and their families,” she said. “It’s so easy to become overwhelmed and distracted by the inevitability of change that we forget on whose behalf we do what we do.”
Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]
Retailers Cautiously Optimistic About Holiday Shopping Season
Ken Williamson believes people are gaining confidence in the economy and are less afraid to spend than they were in the past.
Eastfield Mall Marketing Manager Nicole Sweeney said retailers are catering to what she calls a “creeping” trend in which people begin buying gifts long before the holiday-shopping season officially kicks off on Black Friday.
“People are already shopping. They aren’t waiting until weeks before Christmas to buy gifts. They are stretching out their spending, and national retailers have definitely taken note; they put trim-the-tree and holiday-related items on the shelves before Halloween even arrived,” Sweeney told BusinessWest, adding that popular gifts include perfume sets and newly released video games and music.
Furthermore, many people started their annual shopping spree when the iPhone 6 hit the shelves in September.
Lisa Wray concurred that the season has begun. “Quite a few stores are already decorated for Christmas, and shoppers have been asking about our holiday return policy,” the marketing manager for Holyoke Mall reported during the first week of November.
Although they don’t sell electronics, Williamson’s Clothier in Chicopee also had a fair number of shoppers in September buying gifts and requesting holiday gift wrap. “We get customers who want something special,” owner Ken Williamson said. “People come here to look for items they wouldn’t find elsewhere, and many want to get an early start.”
In fact, a Google consumer study conducted this summer showed that 29% of people planned to start their shopping in July, although most do wait until December.
Wilson’s Department Store in Greenfield is another independent retailer in sync with the growing trend. “We kicked off the holiday season during the last week of October with our ‘Fabulous Harvest Sale,’” said Vice President Pamara Beauregard. “We opened our Trim A Tree Shop, put holiday paper in our gift-wrapping department, and have racks stacked to the ceiling with extra merchandise. We also expanded our hours, and many people are already taking advantage of them.”
However, the majority of shoppers do wait until Black Friday to begin their shopping, and this year Eastfield Mall will open at midnight for the first time in its history.
“Black Friday is always a huge day, and we are approaching it very aggressively. We know customers are out shopping, and we have to open to be competitive,” Sweeney said, adding that the first 250 people to enter the mall will receive free coupons, gift cards, concert tickets, and more. “Black Friday is something people plan for, and groups wait in line together for stores to open.”
Setting Sale
Online shopping has forced retailers to engage in very competitive pricing, and local spokespeople agree that shoppers are waiting for sales, spending judiciously, and, in many cases, purchasing practical items they know will be used.
“Although things aren’t as tight as they were a few years ago, people are still cautious about spending. They remember what it was like when the price of oil and gas was really high. They also know what they want and are being very careful with their money,” Beauregard said. “They’re purchasing gifts that tend to be practical and will help recipients stay warm, such as sweaters, down comforters, or cozy flannel nightgowns. People want to give, but also want to be sure the gifts will be helpful.”
Kate Gourde has taken note of the trend, and the shopkeeper from Cooper’s Gifts and Curtains in Agawam said she’s made some changes in the type of merchandise the store carries, replacing tabletop and decorative items with jewelry, fashion accessories, and clothing. “People want practical gifts that not only have a fashion flair, but will help to keep them warm,” she said, adding that the shop began wrapping holiday gifts in September.
However, Sweeney stressed that sales and competitive pricing are critical, especially at Eastfield Mall.
Nicole Sweeney says holiday shopping at the Eastfield Mall began in September after the iPhone 6 was released.
However, Williamson believes there has been a change in the economic climate and thinks shoppers are less afraid to spend than they were in the past. “I have gotten the feeling for the first time this year that people are finally a little more confident,” he said.
His sentiment is backed up by research. A National Retail Federation survey released last month says the average holiday shopper will spend about 5% more this year, or $804 compared to the $767 spent in 2013, while a report from the International Council of Shopping Centers predicts shoppers will spend 4.1% more than they did last year. Still, other studies forecast only a 2.5% to 3% increase.
Williamson thinks 5% is overly optimistic and said he will be happy if his store does the same amount of business as it did last year. “It exceeded my expectations and was what I was hoping for,” he told BusinessWest. “And although I would gladly settle for a 5% increase, it’s quite a big number.”
Sweeney agreed, and added that many factors play into the equation.
“Last year the outlook was good until the government shut down, which caused a hangover of fear during the holidays,” she said. “Many local shoppers were affected, especially since Westover Air Reserve Base is so close to the mall. And shopping can also be affected by the weather. So if I knew we would end up with a 3% increase in sales, I would be dancing right now.”
Gourde agrees. “We feel 5% is really optimistic, but would love to think it could happen,” she said. “Last year sales were down in December due to a major snowstorm, so many people stayed home and ordered online, which meant the brick-and-mortar stores took a big hit. Just a little mood snow would be fine, but I hope we don’t have any major snowstorms in December again. And the economy is still challenging, so we are hoping we will have a solid year, rather than a stellar year.”
Positive Projections
Holyoke Mall has undergone significant change since last year. Renovations include new tile on every floor, new seating areas and rest rooms, a newly opened Michael Kors store, and a renovation of Victoria’s Secret, which Wray says all adds up to a better shopping environment for guests.
She believes it will bode well for the holiday season, and added that a lot of stores are offering online ordering with in-store pickup, or allowing people to reserve items online and pick them up in the mall. “If they pay for them here, it adds to our sales,” she said, “so we are optimistic we will have a solid gain over last year.”
Beauregard agreed. “We would be really happy if the numbers are even with what we did last year when we exceeded our expectations, and based on what we have seen so far, we don’t see any reason that things shouldn’t be just as good,” she said. “But it doesn’t happen every year, and if we do even better than last year, we will be ecstatic.”
Local Ideas for Gift Giving Sure to Please Everyone on Your List
Leisurely shopping is a pastime many people enjoy, but when it comes to finding gifts to suit the people on your holiday list, the venture can become stressful.
So, as we immerse ourselves in the spirit of the season, BusinessWest offers some ideas sure to please the most discriminating gift recipients. Even better, they can be found at local establishments, which means a purchase helps to support the Western Mass. economy.
We have listed a few ideas, beginning with the name of the business, followed by an item they sell and, in some cases, information about different options, styles, or choices.
Silverscape Designs
One King St.
Northampton, MA 01060
(413) 584-3324
www.silverscapedesigns.com
Wind Swept Tree by Randy Adams, $145-$225
Colleen Kellogg of Silverscape Designs says a Wind Swept Tree sculpture by Randy Adams is the perfect gift for the person who is difficult to buy for. “It’s a conversation piece and an item people will be proud to display in their homes,” she said, adding that the individually handmade trees start out as wire on a spool and are very popular.
Pioneer Valley Balloons
130 Cross Path Road
Northampton, MA 01060
(413) 218-7823
www.pioneervalleyballoons.org
Christmas Special, $200 per person
The sky is literally the limit when you give someone a gift certificate for a hot-air balloon ride, and it’s something that is guaranteed to create memories that will last a lifetime. Choose from a sunrise or sunset excursion on a balloon manned by owner and chief pilot Lisa Fusco. This unique offering is sure to surprise and delight an individual, couple, or family.
Elements Hot Tub Spa
373 Main St.
Amherst, MA 01002
(413) 256-8827
www.elementshotubspa.com
Hot Tub for Two, 60 minutes, $60
Relaxation Massage, 60 minutes, $75
Today’s workplace can be stressful, and if you are searching for a gift for someone who really needs to unwind and enjoy themselves, consider a gift certificate to Elements Hot Tub Spa. The recipient will be rejuvenated after a half-hour or hour in their choice of state-of-the-art hot-tub rooms, saunas, and/or a steam room. And if water therapy isn’t high on their list, a Swedish massage, deep-tissue massage, sugar scrub, herbal wrap, hot-stone massage, or Ayurvedic body-work session may fit the bill. Gift certificates come in different denominations, but are a definite treat for the mind, body, and spirit.
Ski Butternut
380 State Road
Great Barrington, MA 01230
(413) 528-2000
www.skibutternut.com
Lift Ticket, $25; Learn to Ski Package, $75
New England winters can be long and dreary until one discovers the joy of cruising down a ski slope surrounded by snow-covered trees. If you are shopping for someone who works out or loves the outdoors, a gift certificate to Ski Butternut may open the doors to a new passion. If the person is already hooked on downhill sports, a lift ticket will also be a gift they are sure to appreciate
Black Birch Vineyard
155 Glendale Road
Southampton, MA 01073
(413) 527-0164
www.blackbirchvineyard.com
Vineyard Tour and Wine Tasting with Signature Glass, $10
Gift Basket (wine, two glasses, and a tasting certificate for two),
$45 for white wine; $50 for red wine
Iced Dessert Wine (with two glasses), $45
Anyone who enjoys wine will appreciate a bottle of the award-winning, hand-crafted red or white wine made by hand at Black Birch Vineyard. Prices start at $16 for a bottle, although there’s also nothing like an outing to the vineyard for a wine tasting. Other choices choose a gift basket or a special iced dessert wine made from grapes that are pressed while they are frozen.
Sonny’s Place
349 Main St.
Somers, CT 06071
www.sonnysplace.com
Go Kart, $8 ($4 for a passenger)
Rock Wall Climb, $5
Soaring Eagle Zipline, $7
Bounce House, $5 for 30 minutes
Need a gift for a child, teen, adult, or entire family that loves to have fun? A gift certificate to Sonny’s Place may be your answer, as the recreation center offers an arcade, batting cage, karting, rock wall, bounce house, Soaring Eagle Zipline, and much, much more, including food and a bar. Adults don’t need to be accompanied by a child to enjoy a one-day getaway here. The prices are reasonable, and when Christmas Day is over, there will be an exciting, fun-filled experience to look forward to.
Hannoush Jewelers
Holyoke Mall, 50 Holyoke St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
(413) 536-7353
www.hannoush.com
River of Love Locket, $285
Abe Hannoush recommends that anyone looking for a “perfect expression of love” consider the River of Love locket by artist Petra Azar. A row of diamonds is embedded across the heart, and the magnetic clasp in the center of the piece eliminates the need to struggle putting it on. The locket is part of a line created exclusively for Hannoush Jewelers by Azar, with prices ranging from $99 to $400.
Springfield Museums
1 Edwards St.
Springfield, MA 01103
(413) 263-6800
www.springfieldmuseums.org
Day Trip to Sterling and Francine Art Institute, $85 or $72 for members (includes admission, tour, lunch, bus transportation, and gratuities)
Matt Longhi says the gift store at Springfield Museums has so many unique items that people could find something there for everyone on their list. In addition to high-end jewelry and handmade gifts for adults, there are interactive toys and games for children, a wide range of books for the young set and adults alike, memorabilia from Indian Motocycles, and all sorts of things related to Dr. Seuss.
The museums also offer classes in painting and drawing, family genealogy, and eclectic offerings like Polish and Ukrainian egg decoration and “Drawing in Pubs,” with basic drawing instruction provided while sipping a pint.
Springfield Symphony Orchestra
1350 Main St.
Springfield, MA 01103
(413) 737-2291
www.springfieldsymphony.org
Jeans and Classic Pop Series concert, $31-$66
Tickets to a Jeans and Classic Pop Series concert are sure to please anyone on your list who loves this genre of music. Hits that chronicle the history of Michael Jackson will be performed Feb. 7. There’s also a concert titled “Blood, Sweat, Tears, Earth, Wind, Fire … and a Little Chicago!” on March 8, and either offering will have recipients rockin’ in their seats as they forget the world around them and get into the groove.
Steaming Tender Restaurant
28 Depot St.
Palmer, MA 01069
(413) 283-2744
www.steamingtender.com
The holidays are a sentimental time, and a gift certificate from the Steaming Tender Restaurant will provide people on your gift list with a nostalgic experience. Prices range from $11 to $23 for a meal served in this historic public train station built in 1884. It has been restored to museum quality and is filled with antiques, original artifacts, and railroad memorabilia. There is a Conductor’s Lounge where people can enjoy signature cocktails such as the Locomotion or Steaming Tender’s own Railroad Brew Ale. Diners can also enjoy a view of passing trains on the railroad that goes past this remarkable eatery.
Table and Vine
1119 Riverdale St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
(800) 474-2449
www.tableandvine.com
V-One Vodka, $25
This hand-crafted vodka was created by Hadley native and entrepreneur Paul Kozub, who launched the product in 2005. It is sure to please people with the most sophisticated palates and can be enjoyed by itself or in an endless number of cocktails. Manufactured in Poland, it is the only vodka made from 100% spelt wheat (an ancient variety first grown in Europe), and was feted with the World Spirit Competition Double Gold Medal in 2010.
Children’s Learning World
1029 North Road
Westfield, MA 01085
(413) 538-9800
www.childrens-learning-world.com
Fast Track – Ready, Aim, Score!, $20
Wooden Project Workbench $100
Cheryl Thivierge says children age 5 and older who love action games will have tons of fun playing a board game for two players called Fast Track – Ready, Aim, Score! The goal is be the first to spin 10 disks across the board with the help of an elastic cord.
Another gift that will amuse children ages 3 and older for hours is a Wooden Project Workbench. It comes with a complete set of wooden tools and pre-cut pieces to build a helicopter, racecar, motorcycle, dune buggy, airplane, and robot. A project book is also included.
Platterpus Records
28 Cottage St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
(413) 203-5305
Vinyl Records, $6-$8
Dave Witthaus from Platterpus says vinyl records make a great gift for people who appreciate high-quality sound. “Vinyl is making a comeback because it’s the best sound recording you can buy,” said, adding that many stores have also started selling turntables to respond to this renewed interest.
Platterpus has about 10,000 albums in stock, and although jazz, rock ‘n’ roll and rhythm and blues tend to be the most popular genres, shoppers are sure to find some tunes to spin that will please anyone of any age.
Now that you’re armed with plenty of local ideas, happy holiday shopping from BusinessWest!
Casino Vote Spurs Movement in Real-estate Market
The buildings along Main Street between Harrison Avenue and Falcons Way are among those expected to draw interest from businesses to be displaced by the casino.
That’s how he chose to describe the relative — and unexpected — quiet on the morning of Nov. 5, maybe a dozen or so hours after it became clear that ballot Question 3 was going to be defeated and that the casino era had officially begun in Springfield.
“But then on Thursday, the floodgates opened,” said Jennings, president of Springfield-based Jennings Real Estate, in reference to the volume of phone calls to his office, most of them from business owners who will be displaced by the $800 million gaming complex to be built by MGM Resorts International in the city’s South End.
And he expects the calls to keep coming in the weeks and months to come as the dust only begins to start settling from this momentous development, one that has the potential to lift the local real-estate market from the general doldrums that have characterized it for the more than a decade now.
“My expectation is that we will be busy, and the whole trickle-down from this will be fantastic,” he told BusinessWest. “It will involve not only the real-estate brokers, but the lawyers, the phone companies, the contractors, the rug companies, the movers, and many others.
“The trickle-down will be significant and exciting,” he went on. “For the first time in I don’t how long, the landlords in Springfield who have slugged it out for the past 15 years will finally see some rent appreciation.”
While he was somewhat more reserved in his tone, Doug Macmillan, president of Macmillan & Son Inc., said essentially the same thing as he speculated on what will certainly be an intriguing time for the downtown real-estate market.
“I don’t think we’ve ever seen anything quite like this — it’s a dynamic change,” said Macmillan, who came into the business started by his father just as the real-estate bust of the late ’80s was gaining steam and has seen a number of economic cycles since. “This is certainly going to be interesting.”
The stately building at 73 State St., part of which will be used for the casino’s hotel, is among those whose tenants must find new homes.
Indeed, while many tenants in buildings along State, Main, and other streets in or near the South End will have to be moved to make way for the casino and MGM’s operations, there are others who will want to be near that $800 million complex — or away from it, as the case may be. Meanwhile, Macmillan has started getting calls from some parties concerned about the casino and I-91 reconstruction projects happening simultaneously, and the possible negative impact on their business.
“We’ve seen a fair amount of people who are actively contingency planning for how all this construction for the casino and the viaduct might impact their business downtown,” he said. “They’re wondering if customers are going to be able to get to them and if employees are going to be able to get to work. They’re thinking about whether they should set up a satellite office or do something different. It’s created a lot of … not pandemonium, but certainly uncertainty.”
MGM is offering incentives to businesses to be displaced by its complex — $3 per square foot for those who stay in Springfield and $4 per square foot for those who remain in the central business district.
And while the downtown market has tightened up somewhat in recent years, with new businesses and organizations ranging from MassLive to Bay Path University moving in, there is still plenty of space available in many different categories.
One full floor and many smaller spaces are available in 1350 Main St., also known as One Financial Plaza, said Bill Low, a broker with NAI Plotkin, which is leasing agent for the top 12 floors in that building. There is also some space in both Tower Square and Monarch Place, Macmillan noted. Meanwhile, considerable square footage is available in Harrison Place and other buildings along Main Street between Harrison Avenue and Falcons Way, noted Jennings, who is handling those properties for owner Glenn Edwards.
Jennings said he’s already had a few soon-to-be-displaced business owners sign on the dotted line, and he expects several more in the months to come as the project moves forward.
“Our goal is to be 100% occupied,” he said of the properties along Main Street. “That’s ambitious, but we’re optimistic.”
One Financial Plaza, a.k.a. 1350 Main St., is another property expected to draw interest from displaced businesses, including many law firms.
New Lease on Life
MacMillan told BusinessWest that he didn’t care to speculate on how many businesses will be displaced by the casino and MGM’s day-to-day operations and how much square footage is represented by those pending relocations. “I really have no idea, and if I guessed, I’m sure I’d be way off.”
Jennings said he’s heard some numbers, such as 250,000 square feet, in reference to the amount of real estate involved — meaning property to be demolished or made part of the casino complex.
Whatever the figure is, it adds up to an unprecedented opportunity for area landlords and brokers to fill space that in some cases has been vacant for more than a decade.
And, in many ways, movement to seize that opportunity began months ago.
Indeed, Edwards has invested a significant amount of money in capital improvements to the properties along Main Street in anticipation of the casino moving forward, said Jennings, adding that his firm has been proactive with regard to marketing the space, opting not to wait until after the vote on Question 3.
“We put together a strategic list of properties that we have both for sale and lease in Springfield,” he explained, “and knocked on doors.”
And there are many to knock on within the 14.5-acre area in which the casino will be built, he said, noting that there are many lawyers and other professionals in both 95 State St. and 73 Main St. — located just a block or two from the Hampden County Hall of Justice — which will both become part of the casino complex.
Meanwhile, there are several retail operations along Main Street and other service businesses within the casino site that will have to be relocated.
Some will move out of that area and perhaps out of the city, but Jennings and Macmillan believe many will opt to stay downtown.
And some of these business owners are being proactive themselves when it comes to finding a new address, opting not to wait until the votes were counted on Nov. 4 to consider some options.
“The day after the election, my phone did ring a little louder and a little longer than it normally does,” said Macmillan. “But a lot of these people have been forward-thinking enough to understand that they need to be proactive about this, because they’re only going to have X amount of time to find a new home.
“We’ve been working with some groups for more than a year now,” he continued, “because they’ve recognized this eventuality and wanted early on to identify where they thought they might like to be.”
However, some waited until after the vote, said Low, and now they’re making up for lost time.
“There were some people who didn’t bother calling — they just showed up at 1350 Main St. and asked to see space,” he told BusinessWest, adding that a few businesses have made verbal commitments to take space there. “You hardly ever see anything like that.”
He noted that the building is attractive to the law firms and solo practitioners that will be displaced by the casino because of its proximity to the courthouse and the flexible nature of the available space.
Jennings said he’s brokered some deals for smaller spaces, 2,000 square feet and under, and also a few in the 2,000-to-4,000-square-foot range. And since Question 3 was defeated, the volume of inquiries has increased exponentially.
They come during a time that Macmillan described as a “resurgence of interest in downtown,” a period during which UMass Amherst has opened a center in Tower Square; Bay Path, MassLive, and Thing5 have moved into 1350 Main St.; New England Public Radio has relocated into the Fuller Block; and Accountable Care Associates has taken a full floor in Monarch Place; just to name a few developments.
“There’s been a renewed interest in downtown that is unrelated to the casino,” he explained. “We’ve been extremely busy leasing an awful lot of downtown office space for the past two years. Some of them are new tenants, some of them expanding; there’s been a lot of activity, and we’ve done a number of deals.”
The “shuffling of the deck,” as he called it, that will result from the casino projectg — and is, in many respects, already underway, will further tighten and stabilize the market, and likely push lease rates higher.
“With all this interest we’ve seen in downtown before the casino, the downtown market has tightened up; there’s still a fair amount of space, but there’s not the same amount that there was two years ago,” Macmillan said, speculating that perhaps 80% of the Class A space and 70% of the Class B space downtown was occupied.
Jennings said the surge of interest is already impacting rates in some of the properties he’s representing. At Harrison Place, he noted, space that was quoted at $11 or $12 per square foot is now being quoted at $17, and there have been similar increases at other properties along Main Street.
Low said the asking prices at 1350 Main St. may soon be rising, adding that those who wait to begin the process of finding a new home will likely pay more for that square footage.
Building Momentum
As he talked about the recent history of the downtown commercial real-estate market, Macmillan said there have been a number of “fits and starts” over the past few decades, small gains that have been slowed or reversed by economic declines in the early ’90s, just after 9/11, and the Great Recession.
The dawn of the casino era presents the opportunity for something far more substantial and lasting, he said, although the overall impact of this massive development is still difficult to predict.
What is known is that this situation presents a rare opportunity, one that all those involved are committed to take full advantage of.
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
Is More Accountability the Answer? Think Again
By ANN LATHAM
“We need more accountability!”
This is a familiar cry. Executives, managers, and employees alike, all frustrated by delays and incomplete work, are demanding greater accountability.
What exactly do they want? They want clear goals, follow-up, answers, and consequences. They crave order and predictability so everything can go more smoothly. If necessary, heads must roll.
It is easy to see why. The norm in most companies includes many dropped balls, missed deadlines, crossed signals, and inadequate responses to requests and problems. The frustration and demand for greater accountability are totally understandable.
If management would just tighten everything up and take control, results would be easier to achieve for all. Right? Wrong.
The solution isn’t accountability. There are far too many situations where accountability practices fail.
When the work is unfamiliar and unpredictable, strict accountability, with its black-and-white goals and black-and-white follow-up, only highlights repeated failures as employees hit one obstacle after another. Accountability doesn’t make the goals, which are merely guesses in new situations, more reasonable. It doesn’t eliminate unanticipated problems. It doesn’t magically reveal to employees what they don’t know. And it doesn’t instantly create new skills. But it does generate feelings of disappointment, stress, anger, insecurity, and injustice. It does encourage employees to invest time and energy in developing excuses at the expense of achieving results.
When the goals require contributions from many employees, strict accountability doesn’t magically reduce dependencies and create autonomy. It doesn’t increase the impact of any one employee’s tiny piece of the puzzle. It doesn’t make less-skilled employees more capable, or less-committed employees more determined. But it does pit employees against each other. It encourages us-versus-them thinking and finger pointing. And it leaves employees feeling powerless, frustrated, and overwhelmed.
And when the work lands in the hands of employees who just aren’t highly effective, strict accountability sets them up for failure, not success. It doesn’t hand these employees self-mastery, critical thinking, interpersonal skills, patience, persistence, confidence, courage, discipline, or great communication skills. It doesn’t suddenly make them superstars. But it does leave many well-intentioned, hardworking employees at the mercy of the many obstacles common to humans and complex organizations.
These are just a few examples where accountability fails. Tighten accountability for employees in these situations, and you create losers, not winners.
The Power of Commitment
Now, if all your employees are either highly effective or have highly predictable days, great autonomy, and goals over which they have total control, then accountability practices will work great for you. But when you think about it, those employees probably deliver even without much emphasis on accountability.
No, accountability is not the answer. Commitment is.
Committed employees keep on plugging, surpass goals, constantly look ahead, and give no thought to excuses for missing the mark. They help each other and don’t point fingers. They are open to honest feedback because they don’t feel threatened. They see themselves as important players, not pawns in a game where raises, bonuses, promotions, and jobs are on the line.
Committed managers help employees identify and overcome obstacles. They team up to solve problems and don’t feel the need to hold feet to the fire. They build confidence and reduce stress. And they build the commitment of their employees.
When employees and managers are truly committed, they get the job done. Somehow. Collectively. It might not be pretty, but it works. They band together. They are inventive. They are excited and determined. Often, it doesn’t even really matter who was supposed to be accountable. They succeed because of their commitment, not because of accountability practices.
When it comes to getting results, nothing is as powerful as commitment.
To generate commitment, managers must partner with their employees. They must be true partners — partners who win and lose together. Partners who are obviously on the same team.
How do partnering managers behave? They:
• Treat employees as equals, needed for mutual success, not subordinates;
• Encourage employees to take ownership of their own success, on the job and in life;
• Listen, ask, answer, and offer — and resist the temptation to do more until asked;
• Provide honest feedback so employees know where they stand, know how they can improve, and develop self-awareness and self-management; and
• View the employment relationship as a win-win deal, which is created and ended with mutual respect, professionalism, and no shame.
When managers tap into the natural accountability of partnerships, which prevents either party from letting the other down, everybody wins.
Ann Latham is the president of Uncommon Clarity Inc. She has done projects in 28 industries, and her clients include for-profit organizations, such as Hitachi, and nonprofit organizations, such as public television and Smith College. Her words of advice have appeared in 85 media sources, including Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Forbes, MasterCard.com, MSNBC.com, and the New York Times. Her writing can also be found at Ann’s Clarity App, bit.ly/anns-clarity-app, and at uncommonclarity.com.
Send photos with a caption and contact information to: ‘Picture This’ c/o BusinessWest Magazine, 1441 Main Street, Springfield, MA 01103 or to [email protected]
Entrepreneurship Conference
The 10th annual Grinspoon, Garvey & Young Entrepreneurship Conference was staged Nov. 7 at the MassMutual Center in Springfield. More than 650 people representing 14 area colleges and more than 55 local businesses and organizations took in a full day of programming, including hands-on workshops, entrepreneur exhibits, a Shark Tank competition, and keynote speaker Parker Holcomb, founder of All College Storage Inc. and Research Habits Digital. Organized by the Harold Grinspoon Charitable Foundation, the Entrepreneurship Conference is held annually to inspire, motivate, and support college students to turn their ideas into small businesses. Students began the day collaborating on teams representing several colleges and universities for the “Change-It-Up” competition. They identified contemporary problems they see emerging on their campuses and aimed to create solutions based on rapidly changing technology and the expectations of students. From top to bottom: Audra Quintin (a Grinspoon Entrepreneurial Spirit Award alumna) and Blake Bryan, co-founders of East Coast Taps; Greg Lewis of Nudger presents the story of building his business as part of the Grinspoon Entrepreneurial Spirit Award panel; a student presents her business concept to the Shark Tank judges; Patrick Burr, principal with Feat Socks and Promo Lacrosse, and a Grinspoon Entrepreneurial Spirit Award winner, was one of 32 exhibitors at the conference.
March of Dimes Awards
The annual March of Dimes Signature Chefs Auction was held at the Log Cabin in Holyoke on Oct. 23. The event featured the presentation of several awards to people who have served the organization in various ways. At left, Dr. Glenn Markenson of Baystate Medical Center, left, receives the March of Dimes Citizen of the year Award from Western Mass. March of Dimes Board Chairman Ken Albano, an attorney with Bacon Wilson, P.C. Above, Nancy Mirkin, a vice president and commercial loan officer with Florence Savings Bank, receives the March of Dimes Charitable Leadership Award from Albano.
Halloween Costume Walk
The Chicopee Pumpkin Patch Party & Halloween Costume Walk was staged on Oct. 28. The well-attended event featured something for people of all ages. Here, from left, are Mauren Buxton, city Treasurer Marie Laflamme, Chief executive officer of Sunshine Village Gina Golash Kos, and Carol Campbell, President of Chicopee Industrial Contractors.
The following is a compilation of recent lawsuits involving area businesses and organizations. These are strictly allegations that have yet to be proven in a court of law. Readers are advised to contact the parties listed, or the court, for more information concerning the individual claims.
FRANKLIN SUPERIOR COURT
Frances Harrington v. John A. Rousou, M.D. and Cardiac Surgical Associates of Western MA, P.C.
Allegation: Negligent implantation of prosthesis: $30,000
Filed: 8/22/14
Roberta Ovitt v. First Transit Inc. and John Sierakoski
Allegation: Negligent operation of transit bus resulting in personal injury: $234,406.24
Filed: 8/14/14
Shelly Chapin v. Crooked River Corp. and Food City
Allegation: Negligence in property maintenance causing slip and fall: $100,000
Filed: 8/29/14
GREENFIELD DISTRICT COURT
Stiller Distributors Inc. v. Billy Whitaker d/b/a BK Tile and Stone
Allegation: Non-payment of goods sold and delivered: $4,752.04
Filed: 9/19/14
HAMPDEN SUPERIOR COURT
Ryder Transportation Services v. Mass Web Printing Co. Inc.
Allegation: Breach of contract for lease of a vehicle: $97,595.71
Filed: 9/26/14
Van Duc Tran and Charles Tran v. Chau K. Tu and Long Kim Le, individually, and Lucky Nails, LLC
Allegation: Breach of contract: $200,000+
Filed: 9/24/14
HOLYOKE DISTRICT COURT
Falcetti and Clark Supply Co. Inc. v. Hot Mama’s Acquisition Corp.
Allegation: Non-payment of supplies and services: $1,788.44
Filed: 9/4/14
Poly-Plating Inc. v. Package Machinery Co. Inc.
Allegation: Non-payment of metal finishing services rendered: $4,802.50
Filed: 9/8/14
SPRINGFIELD DISTRICT COURT
American Express, FSB v. Raymond Nadeau d/b/a Kare Realty
Allegation: Breach of credit agreement: $13,225.03
Filed: 9/19/14
Camelback, LLC v. LD Acquisition Co. 2, LLC
Allegation: Breach of cell-tower lease agreement: $17,000
Filed: 9/23/2014
Stiller Distribution Inc. v. Boston Carpet and Flooring Distribution Inc.
Allegation: Non-payment of goods sold and delivered: $2,586.94
Filed: 9/22/14
VK Transportation, LLC v. Viacheslav Chabanov and USA ALFA Transportation Inc.
Allegation: Non-payment for materials and labor: $6,910.57
Filed: 9/16/14
ACCGS
www.myonlinechamber.com
(413) 787-1555
• Nov. 19: ACCGS Government Reception, 5-7 p.m., at the Carriage House, Storrowton Tavern, 1305 Memorial Ave., West Springfield. Seize this opportunity to meet with your local, state, and federal delegation in an informal setting. Cost: $50 for members, $70 for general admission. Reservations may be made online at www.myonlinechamber.com.
• Nov. 25: ACCGS Pastries, Politics, and Policy, 8-9 a.m., at the UMass Center at Springfield, 1500 Main St., 2nd floor. Featuring MassDevelopment President and CEO Marty Jones discussing “New Programs for Gateway Cities and the Effect on the Region.” Cost: $15 for members, $25 for general admission. Reservations may be made online at www.myonlinechamber.com.
GREATER CHICOPEE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
www.chicopeechamber.org
(413) 594-2101
• Nov. 19: November Salute Breakfast, 7:15-9 a.m., at La Quinta Inn & Suites, 100 Congress St., Springfield. Cost: $20 for members, $26 for non-members.
• Dec. 4: Holiday Open House, 4:30-6:30 p.m., at the Chamber Office, 264 Exchange St., Chicopee. Sponsored by Charter Business. Free to attend for all members. RSVP requested.
• Dec. 11: Workshop 6: “Strategic Networking: Networking to Increase Profitability,” 9-11 a.m., at Days Inn, 400 Memorial Dr., Chicopee. Cost: $20 for members, $30 for non-members.
• Dec. 17: December Salute Breakfast, 7:15-9 a.m., at the Castle of Knights, 1599 Memorial Dr., Chicopee. Cost: $20 for members, $26 for non-members.
GREATER EASTHAMPTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
www.easthamptonchamber.org
(413) 527-9414
• Nov. 18: GRIST (Get Real Individual Support Today) meeting, 9-10 a.m. at the chamber office. No fee. RSVP requested.
• Dec. 11: Holiday Dinner Dance 2014, 6 p.m. Details to follow. Comedy show, dinner, and the big raffle drawing for $5,000. Call the office to sign up for a table at (413) 527-9414.
GREATER HOLYOKE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
www.holycham.com
(413) 534-3376
• Nov. 18: “How to Start and Maintain Your Business: Financing Your Business,” 5:30-7:30 p.m., in the executive conference room at the Holyoke Chamber, 177 High St., Holyoke. Series sponsors: PeoplesBank, Common Capital, Mass Cultural Council/the Artery, in partnership with Holyoke Creative Arts. This workshop will explore loans, grants, and other types of funds; property and loss of income; and full-spectrum lending. Cost: $20. To sign up, call the chamber at (413) 534-3376 or visit holyokechamber.com.
• Nov. 19: Chamber After Hours, 5-7 p.m., at Slainte Restaurant, 80 Jarvis Ave., Holyoke. Great food, door prizes, 50/50 raffle, and the popular Ambassador Bake Sale. Cost: $10 for members, $15 for non-members. To sign up, call the chamber at (413) 534-3376 or visit holyokechamber.com.
• Dec. 2: “How to Start and Maintain Your Business: Accounting and Taxes,” 5:30-7:30 p.m., in the executive conference room at the Holyoke Chamber, 177 High St., Holyoke. Series Sponsors: PeoplesBank, Common Capital, Mass Cultural Council/the Artery, in partnership with Holyoke Creative Arts. This workshop with touch on what you need to save, how often taxes have to be filed, quarterly withholdings, accounting and bookkeeping, software, personal assets versus payroll management, and tax-increment financing. Cost: $20. To sign up, call the Holyoke Chamber at (413) 534-3376 or visit holyokechamber.com.
• Dec. 10: Holiday Business Breakfast, 7:30-9 a.m., at the Log Cabin Banquet and Meeting House, 500 Easthampton Road, Holyoke. Sponsored by Holyoke Gas & Electric, Health New England, Holyoke High School Madrigal Choir, and Bresnahan Insurance. Business networking while enjoying a hearty breakfast and sounds of the season. Cost: $22 for members in advance, $28 for non-members and at the door. To sign up, call the chamber at (413) 534-3376 or visit holyokechamber.com.
• Dec. 17: Chamber After Hours, 5-7 p.m., at the Delaney House. Business networking event includes a 50/50 raffle, door prizes, and money (scratch ticket) tree. Tickets: $10 for members, $15 for the public. To sign up, call the chamber at (413) 534-3376 or visit holyokechamber.com.
GREATER NORTHAMPTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
www.explorenorthampton.com
(413) 584-1900
• Dec. 10: Joint Chamber Mixer for Greater Northampton and Amherst Area chamber members, 5-7 p.m., hosted by the Lord Jeffrey Inn, 30 Boltwood Walk, Amherst. Sponsored by Florence Savings Bank. Cost: $10 for members, $15 for non-members.
• Dec. 15: New Member Orientation, 3-4 p.m., hosted by the Greater Northampton Chamber of Commerce, 99 Pleasant St., Northampton. This is the chance to tell us more about your business and how the chamber can best serve you. Cost: free.
GREATER WESTFIELD CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
www.westfieldbiz.org
(413) 568-1618
• Nov. 19: Annual Meeting & Awards Presentation, 5:30-8:30 p.m., at East Mountain Country Club, Westfield. Event Sponsor: United Bank. Cost: $50 for chamber members, $60 for non-members. To register, call Pam at the chamber office, (413) 568-1618.
Farmington Bank announced the following:
Michael Moriarty
Joseph Kulig
Joseph Young
Candace Pereira
•••••
Jean Deliso
•••••
Morrison Mahoney LLP announced that attorney Jennifer Rymarski has been elected a Partner. Rymarski, who practices in the Boston-based firm’s Springfield office, serves a wide base of clients in the arenas of medical malpractice litigation, as well as employment, business, and corporate law. Rymarski has more than 10 years of experience as an attorney and more than 15 years of experience in the legal field. She has a diverse background in medical-malpractice defense work and general business law, communications, and management. Rymarski advises healthcare clients on litigation matters and other issues involving healthcare law. She also serves as defense counsel for court cases and Board of Registration in Medicine investigations and complaints. For general business clients, she offers business advice, including dispute resolution, collections, adherence to corporate and regulatory formalities, and negotiations concerning leases, contracts, financing, and bankruptcy. Rymarski earned a bachelor’s degree from Westfield State University, a certificate of paralegal studies from Elms College, and a juris doctor from Western New England University School of Law. She is a member of the Massachusetts Bar Assoc. and the Hampden County Bar Assoc., and is also licensed to practice law in Connecticut. She serves as a board member of the Children’s Study Home. Rymarski has been named a “Rising Star” in Boston magazine for four consecutive years.
•••••
Mary Hurley
•••••
Patrick McCann
Robert Herchert
•••••
Craig Smith
PeoplesBank Again Named a Top Corporate Charitable Contributor
HOLYOKE — PeoplesBank was honored by the Boston Business Journal with a “Top Corporate Charitable Contributor” award for the seventh year in a row. The bank was recognized along with other recipients at the publication’s annual Corporate Citizenship Summit on Sept. 10 at the Westin Copley Place hotel. The award was accepted by Douglas Bowen, president and CEO of PeoplesBank, on behalf of the bank’s more than 250 associates. Susan Wilson, first vice president of Corporate Responsibility at PeoplesBank, noted that, “through our Community Care Program, we have contributed millions of dollars to local nonprofit organizations that provide services to the residents of Hampden and Hampshire counties. Our bank associates are committed to the community through their own generosity as well. They enthusiastically volunteer their time to help local schools, teach financial-education classes, clean up parks, plant trees, and help revitalize neighborhoods.” Wilson added that the bank’s charitable-giving program focuses on academic excellence, community vibrancy, and environmental sustainability. She also noted that PeoplesBank associates devote an average of 6,000 hours to volunteer work each year, and that 48 of the bank’s officers serve on the boards of directors and committees of 115 area nonprofit organizations.
Southwick Forastiere Funeral Home Celebrates 30 Years in Business
SOUTHWICK — Forastiere Family Funeral & Cremation announced the 30th anniversary of Southwick Forastiere Funeral Home, which opened on College Highway in Southwick in 1984. “For three decades, we have had a professional and compassionate team caring for families in Southwick and surrounding communities,” said Frank Forastiere, president and funeral director of Forastiere Family Funeral & Cremation. “Building a connection within the community and earning the trust of the families we work with are important aspects of our longevity, and we hope to continue to provide the same quality of service for years to come.” Forastiere Family Funeral & Cremation has served the Greater Springfield area since 1905, when Frank M. and Carmela Forastiere opened the original storefront on Water Street (now Columbus Avenue) in Springfield. In 1911, Forastiere’s flagship facility moved to William Street in Springfield before finally settling on Locust Street in Springfield, where it still resides today. Colonial Forastiere Funeral Home, located in Agawam, opened its doors in 1980, followed by Southwick Forastiere Funeral Home in 1984. “We have a vested interest in this community. We care for its members during times of grief,” said Forastiere. “Our staff is dedicated to meeting the needs of each and every family that passes through our doors. That dedication means a lot to our clients.” For more information, visit www.forastiere.com.
Monson Savings Bank Wins Gold Community Champions Award
MONSON — For the second year in a row, Monson Savings Bank has won the Gold Community Champions Award given by the New England Financial Marketing Assoc. (NEFMA). This year, the award was based on the bank’s extraordinary measures to improve and increase financial literacy throughout its communities. While the award was given by NEFMA, in order to insure impartiality, the judging was done by members of the PennJerDel Bank Marketing Assoc. in Pennyslvania, New Jersey, and Delaware, so that there was no connection to any of the banks being reviewed. Efforts by banks and credit unions all over New England were considered. According to Vincent Valvo, the organizer of the competition, “we received a record number of submissions, yet we gave out a more limited number of awards this year. That’s a clear reflection that judges held the submissions to a high bar and only rewarded the best of the best.” Monson Savings was the only winner in the financial-literacy category in which up to nine awards could have been given (gold, silver, and bronze for large, medium, and small banks). “We were extremely pleased to receive this award,” said Steve Lowell, president of Monson Savings. “We have become increasingly concerned about financial literacy and the fact that many people lack the money-management knowledge and skills they need to ensure long-term stability for themselves. We’ve made this a strategic priority and are addressing the issue on many fronts, including teaching in the schools; holding complimentary workshops on important financial topics that are open to everyone in the community; partnering with MassSaves, a statewide effort to help people improve their financial knowledge and build wealth; and offering banking products and services specifically designed to help young people learn how to bank and save. Our people are working very hard at this, and I am so very proud of them.”
MassMutual Approves $1.6B Dividend Payout to Policy Holders
SPRINGFIELD — Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. (MassMutual) announced that its board of directors has approved an estimated dividend payout of $1.6 billion for 2015, marking the third consecutive year the company has paid a record dividend to eligible participating policy owners and members. The dividends to be paid in 2015 reflect a dividend interest rate of 7.10% — maintaining the same rate as 2014 — for eligible participating permanent life and annuity blocks of business. The approved estimated payout represents an increase of $92 million — or 6.2% — over 2014, and reflects updated investment, mortality, expense, and other experience, as well as the distribution of other business earnings from the company’s asset-management and non-participating businesses. The 2015 MassMutual dividend payout marks the 17th consecutive year that it exceeds $1 billion. MassMutual has paid more than $21 billion in dividends over the last two decades, and although dividends are not guaranteed, the company has paid dividends to eligible participating policyowners consistently since the 1860s.
HMC Receives $3.9M for Behavioral Health, ED Enhancements
HOLYOKE — Holyoke Medical Center (HMC) has been awarded $3.9 million by the Mass. Health Policy Commission (HPC) for a project to enhance behavioral healthcare services for patients. The two-year project has an aggressive completion deadline of January 2017. The funds awarded by HPC are Phase 2 of the Community Hospital Acceleration, Revitalization, and Transformation (CHART) investment program, dubbed “Driving System Transformation.” HPC awarded $60 million for projects throughout the Commonwealth, for which they received requests of more than $117 million. HMC’s award was the highest award for a single hospital and reflects the recognition of the need for improved conditions as well as the vital role HMC plays in the community. The award also came with the expressed support from many local and state officials, including state Reps. Aaron Vega, Joseph Wagner, and John Scibak and state Sen. Don Humason. “This funding will allow us to create significantly improved conditions for all our patients, especially those with behavioral-health needs. Programmatic changes and designated treatment space for behavioral-health patients in the Emergency Department will help to avoid unnecessary hospitalization and reduce re-hospitalization of behavioral-health patients,” said HMC President and CEO Spiros Hatiras. Approximately half of the funds awarded by HPC, nearly $2 million, are designated to assist in a designated treatment space in the ED for behavioral-health patients, of which the total cost is estimated to be between $6 million to $7 million. Holyoke Medical Center will organize a capital campaign and invest in the balance of funds needed to complete the Emergency Department redesign project. The HMC Emergency Department serves more than 45,000 patients per year and will continue to serve the community through the redesign and construction phase of the project. The renovations of the ED will provide a designated treatment area needed to deliver safe, comprehensive behavioral-health services to a wide range of patients. The renovations are expected to begin in early 2015 and be completed by the end of the same calendar year. This initiative will also introduce robust care navigation in partnership with community organizations to ensure that patients receive targeted interventions, are referred to the ‘right’ services, and successfully follow through on their care plans to achieve optimal short- and long-term health outcomes. “This project is an amazing opportunity to provide specialized emergency care for people with mental-health and substance-abuse issues,” said HMC Director of Behavioral Health Baxter Chandler. “Not only will we more effectively address a patient’s emergency behavioral-health needs, we will also enhance our ability to connect patients with appropriate treatment and community services, reducing the need to return to the ED.”
Springfield Museums Announce Major Grants to Fund Renovations
SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Museums have received two major grants to fund exterior renovations to the William Pynchon Memorial Building (formerly known as the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum). Through $120,000 from the Cultural Facilities Fund of the Massachusetts Cultural Council and another $50,000 from the Beveridge Family Foundation Inc., the Museums will be able to repair and restore the building’s slate roof, replace its gutters, rebuild its shutters and dormers, and paint the building in accordance with historical-preservation standards. Renovations to the building have already commenced, with completion targeted for the spring of 2015. The ultimate goal of the renovation is to reclaim the museum’s aesthetic appearance and prepare it for the installation of an exhibition honoring the life and work of Theodor Geisel (Dr. Seuss). Working in close collaboration with community leaders and educators, the museums plan to design and build a literacy-based, interactive exhibition titled “The Amazing World of Dr. Seuss” that will make his works come alive for children and their families, while also helping to boost Springfield’s profile as a regional and national destination. “The Pynchon Memorial Building is an integral component of the architectural landscape of the Quadrangle and cultural life of downtown Springfield, and we’re deeply indebted to the Massachusetts Cultural Council and the Beveridge Family for their help in reviving this elegant building,” said Springfield Museums Vice President Kay Simpson. Named after the founder of Springfield, the William Pynchon Memorial Building was built in 1927 to house the extensive collections of the Connecticut Valley Historical Society. Designed by Springfield architect Max Westhoff, the building exemplifies the Georgian Colonial Revival style that was popular in the early 20th century and reflected the prevailing attitudes about the importance of preserving and interpreting America’s colonial past. The central doorway has a ‘broken scroll’ pediment, pineapple centerpiece, and flanking pilasters, all characteristic hallmarks of Connecticut Valley homes of the 18th century. The Massachusetts Cultural Facilities Fund is a program of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, administered through a collaborative arrangement between MassDevelopment and the Massachusetts Cultural Council.
Cooley Dickinson Recognized for Patient-safety Record
NORTHAMPTON — Cooley Dickinson Hospital was honored with an ‘A’ grade in the fall 2014 Hospital Safety Score, which rates how well hospitals protect patients from errors, injuries, and infections. The Hospital Safety Score is compiled under the guidance of the nation’s leading experts on patient safety and is administered by the Leapfrog Group, an independent industry watchdog. The first and only hospital-safety rating to be peer-reviewed in the Journal of Patient Safety, the score is free to the public and designed to give consumers information they can use to protect themselves and their families when facing a hospital stay. “Cooley Dickinson is fortunate to have a community of staff and providers who make delivering quality and safe care their daily priority,” said Joanne Marqusee, president and CEO of Cooley Dickinson. “But high quality and patient safety require not only skilled people with a commitment to great care, it also requires leadership at all levels to make safe systems and teamwork a priority.”
Visual Changes Announces Start of Construction Project
EAST LONGMEADOW — Visual Changes Inc. has announced its plans to build a premier day spa and salon at 100 Shaker Road in East Longmeadow. The company will partner with Craig Sweitzer & Co., LLC on the project. The site is a former post office and currently houses Atrium Dental Group, another Sweitzer construction project. With the addition of Visual Changes, the property is near full occupancy. “The design goal for Visual Changes is to create an environment that is simultaneously serene and high-tech with a cosmopolitan feel,” said founder Mark Maruca. The 2,300-square-foot facility will feature vaulted ceilings, state-of-the-art private spa spaces, and upscale stations for salon services.
DevelopSpringfield to Create Downtown Innovation Center
SPRINGFIELD — Gov. Deval Patrick’s recent announcement of $2 million in MassWorks Infrastructure Program funding to MassDevelopment marks a critical step toward the creation of the Springfield Innovation Center. The project is a collaboration between DevelopSpringfield, the state Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development, MassDevelopment, the city of Springfield, Valley Venture Mentors, the Springfield Innovation Hub, and MassMutual. “The Patrick administration has been committed to providing support to communities like Springfield so that they can grow and prosper,” said Secretary of Housing and Economic Development Greg Bialecki. “Revitalizing a community through infrastructure improvements will make it easier for businesses to grow and communities to flourish.” The project includes rehabilitation of more than 16,000 square feet of mixed-use space, which will include a 9,000-square-foot business-accelerator program with co-working, presentation, and function space and an innovation café, as well as additional office space. “We are really looking forward to collaborating on this project,” said Paul Silva, co-founder of Valley Venture Mentors. “This new space will provide a home that will bring together more than 50 startups a year to collide with each other, investors, customers, and the local business community.” The Springfield Innovation Hub’s goal is to create a series of “watering holes” throughout the Pioneer Valley with the flagship location being in downtown Springfield, said Delcie Bean, founder of the Springfield Innovation Hub. “These cafés will cater to audiences ranging from students to professors, business people to entrepreneurs, and just about anyone else looking for a cool, energetic spot to grab a coffee, have a meeting, or meet a friend. We will be featuring a mix of high-tech and low-tech solutions that will create a space that is both exciting and approachable. The objective of these watering holes is to create concentrations of energy and people where ‘collisions’ can occur. The Springfield Innovation Hub will be a 501(c)(3) organization which seeks only to spur economic growth and development by creating centers for energy, collaboration, and collision.” DevelopSpringfield purchased a building earlier this month at 276-284 Bridge St. in a block of historic buildings known as the Trinity Block. On Oct. 20, the Springfield City Council approved the sale of a vacant adjacent building at 270-272 Bridge St. to DevelopSpringfield in the same block to support the project. Funds to advance the development of this project, including property acquisition and rehabilitation of the two buildings, have been provided by the Commonwealth through a MassWorks Infrastructure Program grant to MassDevelopment by MassMutual. “Less than 500 feet around the corner from 1550 Main, the Springfield Innovation Center will represent an exciting addition to the city of firsts,” said MassDevelopment President and CEO Marty Jones. “MassDevelopment appreciates this vote of confidence in us from MassWorks, and looks forward to partnering with Mayor [Domenic] Sarno, DevelopSpringfield, and the local business community to continuing to make downtown Springfield a more attractive destination for businesses old and new alike.” Planned rehabilitation includes the installation of an elevator, window restoration and replacement, mechanical-system upgrades, re-roofing, and re-pointing on the front exterior and interior fit-out for Valley Venture Mentors’ business accelerator and office space. “The Springfield Innovation Center is conceived as a cornerstone of downtown Springfield’s newly designated Innovation District, building on the legacy of the area’s 19th-century history of industry and innovation, a wealth of architecturally significant historic buildings, and proximity to the downtown core,” said Jay Minkarah, President and CEO of DevelopSpringfield.
Western Mass. Sports Commission Launches ‘Fan in a Can’ Initiative
SPRINGFIELD — The Western Mass. Sports Commission (WMSC), a division of the Greater Springfield Convention and Visitors Bureau (GSCVB), recently put together a memorable direct-mail campaign called “Fan in a Can,” providing rights holders with all of the necessities they need to be a fan … literally. With plenty of indoor and outdoor facilities to choose from, along with the area’s outstanding attractions, full complement of lodging and restaurants, easy accessibility, and great affordability, Western Mass. offers everything event planners need to host an unforgettable and highly successful event. Close to 200 cans are in the process of being mailed out across the nation to senior-level planning executives within sports organizations for all types of events from disc golf, rowing, and bowling to more traditional sports like soccer and basketball. The eye-catching tin can includes a foam finger that screams “we’re #1,” a pom-pom, a cowbell, a temporary tattoo, a Lands End winter beanie, and a printed, call-to-action sales piece. “We hope that, by doing such a fun and interactive direct-mail piece, potential event planners who would not have considered Western Mass. as a location for their next event will now reach out and have a conversation with us about bringing their event to our area,” said Mary Kay Wydra, president of the GSCVB. “On behalf of the Western Mass. Sports Commission, we look forward to working with event planners and are excited to bring a diverse mix of sports to the area.” The WMSC will be at TEAMS Expo in Las Vegas in November where rights holders will be able to find a Fan in a Can on display and speak to a representative from this region regarding hosting potential events. For regional information, visit the GSCVB website at www.valleyvisitor.com, or contact Director of Sales Alicia Szenda at (413) 755-1346 or [email protected] to plan your next sports event.
Construction Employment Rises in Most Metro Areas
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Construction employment expanded in 236 metro areas, declined in 53, and was stagnant in 50 between September 2013 and September 2014, according to a new analysis of federal employment data released by Associated General Contractors of America. Association officials said that, as firms expand their payrolls, many are finding a limited supply of available qualified workers. “It is good news that construction employment gains have spread to more than two-thirds of the nation’s metro areas,” said Ken Simonson, chief economist for the association. “But there is a growing risk that contractors in many of these regions will have trouble finding qualified workers to complete the rising volume of projects.” According to a recent construction-industry survey conducted by the association, 83% of construction firms report having a hard time finding qualified craft workers. They called on federal, state, and local officials to act on the measures outlined in the association’s workforce-development plan to make it easier to establish new programs designed to prepare students for high-paying careers in construction.
Grants Awarded for Workforce-development, Job-training Efforts
SPRINGFIELD — In July 2014, the city of Springfield issued an RFP soliciting proposals from providers for job training and workforce development. As a result of this solicitation, the city is awarding a total of $250,000 in HUD Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) funds to three separate agencies to provide job-training and workforce-development programs to residents of disaster-impacted neighborhoods. There will be a special focus on recruiting residents of the Six Corners and South End neighborhoods, as the residents of these neighborhoods face multiple barriers to employment, and both areas were heavily impacted by both the long- and short-term effects of the natural disasters that occurred in 2011. Training Resources of America will receive $85,100; Springfield Technical Community College will receive $94,449; and Window Preservation, LLC, in partnership with the Hampden County Sheriff’s Department, will receive $70,451. “Providing education and job training to our residents is vital in our efforts in knocking down poverty and crime,” said Mayor Domenic Sarno. “Whenever we can step up and provide opportunity, it is a win-win for us all.” The city anticipates that the contracted organizations will provide training to a minimum of 100 Springfield residents. The programs will involve a variety of educational instruction subjects, including high-school-equivalency preparation, English language, math, computers, customer service training, and more. The varied programs will prepare and enable trainees to obtain permanent positions in fields such as educational and health services, food service, leisure and hospitality, social assistance, wholesale and retail trade, financial and business services, insurance and real estate, office and administrative support, accounting, bookkeeping, payroll services, legal services, advertising, manufacturing, asbestos/lead abatement, and construction.
Springfield Museums Announce Major Grants to Fund Renovations
SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Museums have received two major grants to fund exterior renovations to the William Pynchon Memorial Building (formerly known as the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum). Through $120,000 from the Cultural Facilities Fund of the Massachusetts Cultural Council and another $50,000 from the Beveridge Family Foundation Inc., the Museums will be able to repair and restore the building’s slate roof, replace its gutters, rebuild its shutters and dormers, and paint the building in accordance with historical-preservation standards. Renovations to the building have already commenced, with completion targeted for the spring of 2015. The ultimate goal of the renovation is to reclaim the museum’s aesthetic appearance and prepare it for the installation of an exhibition honoring the life and work of Theodor Geisel (Dr. Seuss). Working in close collaboration with community leaders and educators, the museums plan to design and build a literacy-based, interactive exhibition titled “The Amazing World of Dr. Seuss” that will make his works come alive for children and their families, while also helping to boost Springfield’s profile as a regional and national destination. “The Pynchon Memorial Building is an integral component of the architectural landscape of the Quadrangle and cultural life of downtown Springfield, and we’re deeply indebted to the Massachusetts Cultural Council and the Beveridge Family for their help in reviving this elegant building,” said Springfield Museums Vice President Kay Simpson. Named after the founder of Springfield, the William Pynchon Memorial Building was built in 1927 to house the extensive collections of the Connecticut Valley Historical Society. Designed by Springfield architect Max Westhoff, the building exemplifies the Georgian Colonial Revival style that was popular in the early 20th century and reflected the prevailing attitudes about the importance of preserving and interpreting America’s colonial past. The central doorway has a ‘broken scroll’ pediment, pineapple centerpiece, and flanking pilasters, all characteristic hallmarks of Connecticut Valley homes of the 18th century. The Massachusetts Cultural Facilities Fund is a program of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, administered through a collaborative arrangement between MassDevelopment and the Massachusetts Cultural Council.
Mullins Center Hosts Toy Drive to Benefit Children
AMHERST — The Mullins Center and Global Spectrum Charities have partnered with Toys for Tots to host the Holidaze Toy Drive, running through Saturday, Nov. 29. The goal of the drive is to collect new toys for less-fortunate children during the holidays. Gearing up for the “Cirque Dreams Holidaze” performance at the Mullins Center on Thursday, Dec. 11, the venue is hosting this toy drive to tie into the performance. Members of the public are urged to drop items off at the Mullins Center box office Monday through Friday between 9 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. and Saturday between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Everyone who donates a toy will receive $5 off their ticket to see “Cirque Dreams Holidaze” on Dec. 11.
AMA Supports Regulation to Restrict E-cigarettes
DALLAS — As electronic cigarettes continue to gain popularity among youth in the U.S., the American Medical Assoc. (AMA) is reinforcing its support for regulatory oversight of e-cigs. The nation’s largest physician organization adopted new policy that would establish the minimum legal purchase age of 18, place marketing restrictions on manufacturers, and prohibit claims that electronic cigarettes are effective tobacco cessation tools. According to estimates from the National Youth Tobacco Survey, electronic cigarette use among middle-school and high-school students in the U.S. has grown at a rapid rate in recent years. The prevalence of those who said they’ve tried an e-cigarette doubled among both of these groups from 2011 to 2012. The survey also found that more than 263,000 middle- and high-school students who had never before smoked reported using electronic cigarettes in 2013, a threefold increase from 79,000 in 2011. “The AMA supports the FDA’s proposed rule to regulate electronic cigarettes, and we urge the federal government to implement more stringent regulations that will further protect our nation’s youth and overall public health,” said AMA member Dr. William Kobler. “The new policy will continue the AMA’s efforts to deter the sale of electronic cigarettes to minors.”
The following building permits were issued during the month of November 2014.
AGAWAM
Chris Wargo
601 Silver St.
$22,000 — Install replacement windows
Coopers Commons
159 Main St.
$5,000 — New means of egress
Dunkin Donuts
389 Main St.
$230,000 — New restaurant
CHICOPEE
Chicopee DPW
63 1/2 Main St.
$165,000 — Upgrade River Mills Pump Station
GREENFIELD
Franklin Medical Center
48 Sanderson St.
$10,000 — Renovations to remove walls and door
Greenfield Savings Bank
400 Main St.
$13,000 — Repairs
Northeast Biodiesel Company
179 Silvio O Conte Dr.
$798,000 — Interior renovations for office space
Sophia Koblinski
226 Federal St.
$14,000 — Interior renovations
SOUTH HADLEY
Top Tier Site
9 Mulligan St.
$3,000 — Replace antenna
SPRINGFIELD
AHAP, LLC
1163 Main St.
$15,000 — Exterior repairs
City of Springfield
121 West St.
$98,000 — Renovations to provide locker rooms
Friends of the Homeless
769 Worthington St.
$30,000 — New roof
Hampden Bank
19 Harrison Ave.
$96,000 — New roof
Springfield Hobby Club
1475 Roosevelt Ave.
$6,350 — Interior renovations
Yukon group
101 Wason Ave.
$856,000 — Interior fit-up for new tenant
WEST SPRINGFIELD
Bel-Mar Insurance
138 Memorial Ave.
$85,500 — New roof
Cerrato’s Pastry Shop
255 Elm St.
$12,000 — Repair stucco facade on front of building
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
ASHFIELD
343 Apple Valley Road
Ashfield, MA 01330
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Justin Sherman
Seller: Diane Greenman
Date: 10/08/14
74 Ranney Corner Road
Ashfield, MA 01330
Amount: $214,500
Buyer: Anne F. Boltz
Seller: Cheryl E. Brown
Date: 10/06/14
BUCKLAND
115 Ashfield Road
Buckland, MA 01338
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Peter H. Wood
Seller: Betsy A. Felix
Date: 10/10/14
96 Clesson Brook Road
Buckland, MA 01338
Amount: $216,500
Buyer: Cynthia A. Simurro
Seller: Jason Heilman
Date: 10/16/14
72 Elm St.
Buckland, MA 01338
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Elia A. Sinaiko
Seller: Johnson Investment TR
Date: 10/16/14
CONWAY
381 South Deerfield Road
Conway, MA 01341
Amount: $229,000
Buyer: Heath E. Roberts
Seller: Justin S. Allis
Date: 10/15/14
GILL
7 Cove View Lane
Gill, MA 01354
Amount: $228,000
Buyer: Simon E. Scher
Seller: Adam N Zaykoski
Date: 10/08/14
GREENFIELD
37 Brookside Ave.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $185,000
Buyer: Patrick J. Merrigan
Seller: Lovette, Beatrice L., (Estate)
Date: 10/15/14
194 Cleveland St.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $180,000
Buyer: Greenfield Real Estate
Seller: Lane Construction Corp.
Date: 10/14/14
150-152 Conway St.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $172,500
Buyer: Caroline A. Whitbeck
Seller: John S. Anderson
Date: 10/15/14
78 Riddell St.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Amount: $218,500
Buyer: Sarah M. Bellemare
Seller: Craig W. Gibson
Date: 10/10/14
HAWLEY
Bozrah Road
Hawley, MA 01339
Amount: $120,000
Buyer: Kyle D. Clark
Seller: Eugene J. Tanguay
Date: 10/06/14
9 Stetson Road
Hawley, MA 01339
Amount: $140,979
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Stephen C. Kimball
Date: 10/06/14
HEATH
26 South Road
Heath, MA 01346
Amount: $650,000
Buyer: Jason Heilman
Seller: Andrew H. Berman
Date: 10/16/14
MONTAGUE
32 Hillside Road
Montague, MA 01351
Amount: $208,877
Buyer: Jason D. Grader
Seller: Benjamin R. John
Date: 10/07/14
5 Lyman St.
Montague, MA 01349
Amount: $142,900
Buyer: Alexia E. Cota
Seller: US Bank
Date: 10/14/14
NORTHFIELD
45 Gill Center Road
Northfield, MA 01360
Amount: $247,000
Buyer: James P. Smith
Seller: James Barrett Parrish LT
Date: 10/10/14
602 Mount Hermon Station Road
Northfield, MA 01360
Amount: $137,000
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Lucille H. Moran
Date: 10/06/14
ORANGE
15-17 East Main St.
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $462,134
Buyer: Orange Teen Housing Inc.
Seller: Orange Teenhousing LLC
Date: 10/17/14
96 Eagleville Road
Orange, MA 01364
Amount: $152,763
Buyer: Bank New York Mellon
Seller: Raymond C. Aucoin
Date: 10/07/14
SHUTESBURY
29 Leverett Road
Shutesbury, MA 01072
Amount: $252,000
Buyer: Michael Pill
Seller: Karen E. Baronas
Date: 10/10/14
WARWICK
50 Athol Road
Warwick, MA 01378
Amount: $128,000
Buyer: Prudence Carnahan-Gavin
Seller: Susanne E. Gunnard
Date: 10/15/14
HAMPDEN COUNTY
AGAWAM
61 Campbell Dr.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $138,000
Buyer: Earl R. McNamee
Seller: Michael J. Paynter
Date: 10/10/14
115 Columbia Dr.
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $282,000
Buyer: Dean M. Berry
Seller: James M. Monteith
Date: 10/15/14
142 Country Road
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: Daren T. Conlin
Seller: Scott Kenney
Date: 10/15/14
35 Elbert Road
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $192,500
Buyer: Steven T. Winter
Seller: William V. Sinico
Date: 10/17/14
187 Lancaster Dr.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $328,000
Buyer: Scott Kenney
Seller: Nils L. Griffin
Date: 10/15/14
30 Lango Lane
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $360,000
Buyer: Jenniffer Duque
Seller: PBI Inc.
Date: 10/10/14
68 Washington Ave.
Agawam, MA 01001
Amount: $132,600
Buyer: Artem Dyachkov
Seller: Charles E. Jenks
Date: 10/17/14
33 Woodcock Court
Agawam, MA 01030
Amount: $177,000
Buyer: Peter J. Porra
Seller: William J. Boyd
Date: 10/17/14
BRIMFIELD
103 Brookfield Road
Brimfield, MA 01010
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Jared Fortin
Seller: Mellnick, Richard, (Estate)
Date: 10/10/14
CHESTER
East River Road
Chester, MA 01050
Amount: $128,900
Buyer: Edgar Phillips-Jones
Seller: Stuart Arbeit
Date: 10/07/14
CHICOPEE
548 Chicopee St.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $275,000
Buyer: 548-554 Chicopee St LLC
Seller: Sandra Cieslak
Date: 10/07/14
202 College St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $229,000
Buyer: Amy B. Kugler
Seller: Christopher M. Peloquin
Date: 10/10/14
165-167 Fairview Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01013
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Donald Peery
Seller: Lynn A. Wightman
Date: 10/09/14
47 Goodhue Ave.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $179,900
Buyer: Timothy K. Bullens
Seller: Brian W. Summers
Date: 10/08/14
126 Labelle Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $229,000
Buyer: Thomas H. Scott
Seller: Gary B. Szymaniak
Date: 10/15/14
73 Leo Dr.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $237,400
Buyer: Robert D. Walker
Seller: Jeffrey F. Wenzel
Date: 10/17/14
Nelson St. #1-2
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: CRA Holdings Inc.
Seller: Lake Point Realty LLC
Date: 10/07/14
234 Old Lyman Road
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Philip Lamoreux
Seller: Sandra M. Kennedy
Date: 10/14/14
65 Royal St.
Chicopee, MA 01020
Amount: $133,000
Buyer: Crystal D. Dasilva
Seller: Teresa Poirier
Date: 10/08/14
EAST LONGMEADOW
52 Bent Tree Dr.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $410,000
Buyer: Claudia F. Penna
Seller: Michael T. Barbieri
Date: 10/10/14
8 Boulder St.
East Longmeadow, MA 01108
Amount: $254,900
Buyer: Normand F. Cormier
Seller: Amanda H. Alexiadis
Date: 10/06/14
177 Hampden Road
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $205,000
Buyer: Sarah E. Moses
Seller: Paul A. Yacovone
Date: 10/07/14
64 Heatherstone Dr.
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $250,000
Buyer: Christopher Dowd
Seller: James F. Foard
Date: 10/10/14
144 Old Farm Road
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $410,000
Buyer: Stephen Zhang
Seller: United Bank Residential
Date: 10/10/14
285 Pease Road
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Amy Schulze
Seller: Claudia F. Penna
Date: 10/10/14
Pondview Dr. #3
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Thomas Hanifan
Seller: Joseph Chapdelaine & Sons
Date: 10/08/14
330 Porter Road
East Longmeadow, MA 01028
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Fredia L. Degray
Seller: Farrell, Antonietta, (Estate)
Date: 10/06/14
GRANVILLE
855 Main Road
Granville, MA 01034
Amount: $305,000
Buyer: Douglas T. Balfour
Seller: John A. Devine
Date: 10/17/14
HAMPDEN
23 Edward St.
Hampden, MA 01036
Amount: $216,000
Buyer: Joseph L. Montano
Seller: Phillip C. Lovell
Date: 10/15/14
HOLLAND
1 Waterfront Way
Holland, MA 01521
Amount: $280,000
Buyer: Eugene J. Segaline
Seller: Quechee RT LLC
Date: 10/17/14
HOLYOKE
314 Apremont Hwy.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Raquelle Defelice
Seller: James R. Franz
Date: 10/15/14
74 Cherry Hill
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $233,000
Buyer: Susan M. Wesolowski
Seller: Maureen Lucey
Date: 10/08/14
220 Easthampton Road
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $249,000
Buyer: Suzanne Cappella
Seller: Edward J. Cauley
Date: 10/10/14
657-663 High St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $599,900
Buyer: HR Holyoke LLC
Seller: Kevin Cruz
Date: 10/09/14
105 Hillside Ave.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $177,000
Buyer: Jose Cora
Seller: Jason L. Curtis
Date: 10/17/14
4 Hillview Road
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $220,000
Buyer: Patricia A. Mullady
Seller: Phyllis R. Feldman
Date: 10/15/14
12 Liberty St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $146,000
Buyer: Jill M. Roach
Seller: Premier Source Credit Union
Date: 10/17/14
50 Lower Westfield Road
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $147,000
Buyer: Hari Sharma
Seller: John P. Brunelle
Date: 10/17/14
116-124 Sargeant St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $599,900
Buyer: HR Holyoke LLC
Seller: Kevin Cruz
Date: 10/09/14
44 Vassar Circle
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: 3f Properties LLC
Seller: Florence Savings Bank
Date: 10/17/14
122 Vermont St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Amount: $196,500
Buyer: Jason M. Proctor
Seller: Louise S. Lashway
Date: 10/10/14
LONGMEADOW
11 Brooks Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $299,000
Buyer: Daniel M. Kelly
Seller: Einzig, Betty J., (Estate)
Date: 10/16/14
144 Burbank Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $337,000
Buyer: Andrew J. Mariani
Seller: Michael P. Dunnirvine
Date: 10/07/14
75 Cobblestone Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $330,000
Buyer: Steven A. Alminas
Seller: Ronald M. Schnitzler
Date: 10/15/14
82 Crestview Circle
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $860,000
Buyer: Alice Y. Chang
Seller: Sturbridge Development LLC
Date: 10/16/14
303 Deepwoods Dr.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $365,000
Buyer: Joseph R. Yvon
Seller: John K. Casanova
Date: 10/08/14
476 Frank Smith Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $233,800
Buyer: Jennifer K. Lapointe
Seller: Rachel E. Chick
Date: 10/06/14
86 Lincoln Road
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Stuart B. Gordon
Seller: Robert F. Chalero
Date: 10/17/14
31 Longmeadow St.
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $440,500
Buyer: Julia A. Cowley
Seller: Ross FT
Date: 10/10/14
93 Osceola Lane
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $385,000
Buyer: Susan E. Fitzgerald
Seller: Bridget T. Regan
Date: 10/17/14
109 Wild Grove Lane
Longmeadow, MA 01106
Amount: $625,000
Buyer: David Fontaine
Seller: Judith M. Collins
Date: 10/10/14
LUDLOW
102-104 Booth St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $270,500
Seller: Anthony Pio
Date: 10/07/14
120 Chapin St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $295,000
Buyer: Robert M. Ollquist
Seller: Joseph R. Stejna
Date: 10/10/14
Daisy Lane
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Gerald E. Dubour
Seller: MHB Inc.
Date: 10/17/14
133 Pond St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $161,000
Buyer: Paul R. Racine
Seller: Gary P. Shannon
Date: 10/15/14
121 Richmond Road
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Paul M. Miele
Seller: Gloria E. Tetrault
Date: 10/17/14
83 Skyridge St.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $203,155
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: James T. Gennette
Date: 10/14/14
54 Stivens Dr.
Ludlow, MA 01056
Amount: $224,000
Buyer: Zachary M. Falconer
Seller: Fernando E. Alfaia
Date: 10/08/14
MONSON
321 Cedar Swamp Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $239,400
Buyer: Nathan M. Kology
Seller: Garrett J. Cavanaugh
Date: 10/10/14
25 Country Club Heights
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $244,000
Buyer: Steven J. Ziobrowski
Seller: Laurie A. Petsche
Date: 10/14/14
28 Country Club Dr.
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Alicia Martel
Seller: William F. Donovan
Date: 10/10/14
11 Pease Ave.
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Frederick J. Baxter
Seller: Remo J. Pizzichemi
Date: 10/09/14
16 Reynolds Ave.
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $190,000
Buyer: Donald T. Macomber
Seller: Timothy B. Gregoire
Date: 10/17/14
170 Wales Road
Monson, MA 01057
Amount: $255,000
Buyer: Matthew Gautreau
Seller: Christopher J. Dowd
Date: 10/10/14
PALMER
3201 Main St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Amount: $230,859
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Tracy Flematti
Date: 10/17/14
2002 Overlook Dr.
Palmer, MA 01080
Amount: $200,000
Buyer: Brenda L. Methot
Seller: Louis A. Brodeur
Date: 10/16/14
SPRINGFIELD
1235 Allen St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $132,000
Buyer: Daniel W. Brueno
Seller: Donald H. Matthews
Date: 10/10/14
96 Appleton St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $136,000
Buyer: Daenia M. Bernard
Seller: Global Homes Properties
Date: 10/16/14
116-118 Ardmore St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $131,000
Buyer: Oscar A. Dalmasi
Seller: Dustin L. Ruby
Date: 10/16/14
136-138 Arthur St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $173,000
Buyer: Giovanni Solivan-Lebron
Seller: Mong D. Nguyen
Date: 10/10/14
115 Clayton St.
Springfield, MA 01107
Amount: $145,000
Buyer: Luis Acosta
Seller: Ayala Enterprise LLC
Date: 10/07/14
211 Breckwood Blvd.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $117,500
Buyer: Aaron Stonacek
Seller: Debbie A. Cowdrey
Date: 10/17/14
52 Brentwood St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $201,684
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Anthony Son
Date: 10/16/14
1041 Carew St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $126,000
Buyer: John H. Sanders
Seller: Jason S. Balut
Date: 10/17/14
82-84 Cherrelyn St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $140,000
Buyer: Ruben D. Avendano
Seller: City Joe LLC
Date: 10/17/14
50 Colony Road
Springfield, MA 01106
Amount: $450,000
Buyer: Charles A. Bellows
Seller: Daniel M. Kelly
Date: 10/16/14
108 Dartmouth St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $209,552
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: James Llewellyn
Date: 10/15/14
189 Dayton St.
Springfield, MA 01118
Amount: $217,777
Buyer: PNC Bank
Seller: Andrea M. Sticco
Date: 10/16/14
18 Doyle Ave.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $148,000
Buyer: Benjamin J. Nadeau
Seller: Blueline Management LLC
Date: 10/14/14
61 Grattan St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $159,900
Buyer: Carlos J. Colon-Alicea
Seller: Mark A. Young
Date: 10/10/14
55 Marengo Park
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $165,417
Buyer: Peter A. Negosanti
Seller: Maria L. Negosanti
Date: 10/16/14
172 Marsden St.
Springfield, MA 01109
Amount: $123,500
Buyer: Juanita Rosa
Seller: Legacy Strategic Investment
Date: 10/07/14
97 Melba St.
Springfield, MA 01119
Amount: $141,000
Buyer: Marjorie M. O’Donnell
Seller: Kevin M. Murphy
Date: 10/09/14
65 Midway St.
Springfield, MA 01151
Amount: $117,000
Buyer: Matthew W. Roache
Seller: Annette Cotela
Date: 10/15/14
340 Naismith St.
Springfield, MA 01104
Amount: $249,900
Buyer: Nicola Barrett
Seller: Bretta Construction LLC
Date: 10/09/14
57 Pomona St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $143,851
Buyer: Nationstar Mortgage LLC
Seller: Judith A. Hanke
Date: 10/14/14
137 Shawmut St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $122,500
Buyer: Linda F. Jordan
Seller: Melro Associates Inc.
Date: 10/08/14
14-16 Taft St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $146,910
Buyer: Katy M. Carpio
Seller: Michael J. Quinlivan
Date: 10/15/14
71 Virginia St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: Danny P. Rebelo
Seller: Catalina Visalden
Date: 10/17/14
SOUTHWICK
66 Davis Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $239,900
Buyer: Tina M. Beaudry
Seller: Neil L. Denowitz
Date: 10/17/14
10 Depot St.
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $183,702
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Douglas H. Teece
Date: 10/17/14
73 North Lake Ave.
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $140,526
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Roger Dalpian
Date: 10/08/14
21 Shaggbark Dr.
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $120,000
Buyer: Lbdnbd LLC
Seller: Andree D. Buscemi
Date: 10/06/14
234 Sheep Pasture Road
Southwick, MA 01077
Amount: $177,714
Buyer: Norman H. Storey
Seller: Rachael W. Teach
Date: 10/07/14
TOLLAND
135 Owls Nest Lane
Tolland, MA 01034
Amount: $159,100
Buyer: Melissa L. Saulenas
Seller: John Mercede
Date: 10/10/14
WESTFIELD
25 Chestnut St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $171,500
Buyer: Cynthia J. Geiger
Seller: Robert J. Schulze
Date: 10/14/14
7 Delancy St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Catherine Naputi
Seller: George Janke
Date: 10/10/14
21 Lindbergh Blvd.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $155,000
Buyer: Vaughn Willis
Seller: Marie A. Kaleta
Date: 10/07/14
14 Livingstone Ave.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Joseph N Rollins
Seller: Sherri A. Hawes
Date: 10/10/14
2 Morris St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $225,000
Buyer: Jacklyn F. O’Neill
Seller: Peter S. Brancewicz
Date: 10/08/14
20 Murray Ave.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $170,000
Buyer: Wells Fargo Bank
Seller: Ethel Ramonas
Date: 10/09/14
168 Prospect St. Ext.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $204,500
Buyer: Shannon L. Oleksak
Seller: Stephen Foster
Date: 10/09/14
41 Saint Dennis St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Buyer: Siarhei L. Ryhal
Seller: FHLM
Date: 10/06/14
14 Sterling St.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $212,469
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Kevin M. Swords
Date: 10/16/14
199 Susan Dr.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $125,000
Buyer: Stephen A. Foster
Seller: US Bank
Date: 10/16/14
91 Woodside Ter.
Westfield, MA 01085
Amount: $192,400
Buyer: Amy K. Dowland
Seller: Linda Steglinski
Date: 10/17/14
WILBRAHAM
23 Deerfield Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Milton L. Knudsen
Seller: Wilbraview LP
Date: 10/10/14
7 Falcon Heights
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $494,340
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Douglas I. Hanson
Date: 10/08/14
10 Marilyn Dr.
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $625,000
Buyer: Shawn O’Connor
Seller: Marian E. Bergeron
Date: 10/15/14
12 Meadowview Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Edward C. Hough
Seller: Charles R. Fortin
Date: 10/17/14
200 Soule Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $325,000
Buyer: Jason Grondin
Seller: Russell C. Mooney
Date: 10/17/14
644 Stony Hill Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $299,900
Buyer: Catherine C. Deloria
Seller: Douglas M. Hagopian
Date: 10/17/14
892 Stony Hill Road
Wilbraham, MA 01095
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Kim L. Crowther
Seller: Jane P. Broderick
Date: 10/10/14
WEST SPRINGFIELD
622 Amostown Road
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $187,640
Buyer: Donald D. Dumais
Seller: Robert A. Bengle
Date: 10/17/14
33 Baldwin St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $154,500
Buyer: Glenn R. Demarco
Seller: SAJ Real Estate LLC
Date: 10/10/14
510 Birnie Ave.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Barbara E. Hawrylciw
Date: 10/17/14
620 Elm St.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $163,000
Buyer: Michael J. Keane
Seller: Paul D. Bessette
Date: 10/10/14
94 Havenhurst Road
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $260,000
Buyer: Michael J. Szawlowski
Seller: Sandra A. Barbeau
Date: 10/14/14
217 Morgan Road
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $212,500
Buyer: Constantin Malancea
Seller: Adam R. Kellogg
Date: 10/17/14
57 Penrose Dr.
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $345,000
Buyer: Brian J. Chapman
Seller: James R. Lachapelle
Date: 10/17/14
70 Robinson Road
West Springfield, MA 01089
Amount: $285,000
Buyer: Nicholas Toma
Seller: James M. Mitchell
Date: 10/15/14
HAMPSHIRE COUNTY
AMHERST
74 Blue Hills Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $430,000
Buyer: John M. Snyder
Seller: Henry E. Whitlock
Date: 10/14/14
22 Eames Ave.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $430,000
Buyer: Tiffany R. Clay
Seller: Kathleen E. Ford
Date: 10/16/14
112 Leverett Road
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: John L. Miller
Seller: Sarah A. Bevilacqua
Date: 10/06/14
3 Moss Lane
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $238,500
Buyer: Naomi M. Elliott
Seller: Audrey M. O’Connell
Date: 10/10/14
147 North Whitney St.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $360,000
Buyer: Pavers NT
Seller: Wharton C. Clay
Date: 10/16/14
265 South East St.
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $165,000
Buyer: Hilary Whitlock
Seller: Karen J. Mills
Date: 10/17/14
11 Teaberry Lane
Amherst, MA 01002
Amount: $485,000
Buyer: John Siano
Seller: Carolyn P. Collette
Date: 10/07/14
BELCHERTOWN
124 Allen Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $355,000
Buyer: Adam C. Hebert
Seller: Craig H. McCauley
Date: 10/17/14
298 Cold Spring Road
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $266,250
Buyer: Corey J. Lajoie
Seller: Andrew K. Carey
Date: 10/15/14
191 East St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $215,000
Buyer: Andree M. Pages
Seller: Ronald Toelken
Date: 10/16/14
87 Railroad St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $162,656
Buyer: FNMA
Seller: Mary E. Fickett
Date: 10/17/14
36 Sarah Lane
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $184,559
Buyer: USA
Seller: Larry G. Desreuisseau
Date: 10/15/14
29 Stebbins St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Phillip E. Chilson
Seller: Scott A. Anderson
Date: 10/06/14
207 Warner St.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Amount: $316,000
Buyer: Christopher Peterson
Seller: 21st Century Green Homes
Date: 10/10/14
CUMMINGTON
225 Trouble St.
Cummington, MA 01026
Amount: $295,000
Buyer: Sarah E. Tompkins
Seller: Paul A. Dion
Date: 10/10/14
EASTHAMPTON
22 Knight Ave.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $269,000
Buyer: John Mortimer
Seller: Norah B. Seiger
Date: 10/15/14
28 Mckinley Ave.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $245,000
Buyer: Emily A. Lees
Seller: Kim P. Hackworth
Date: 10/15/14
41 South St.
Easthampton, MA 01027
Amount: $149,900
Buyer: Mary M. Roensch LT
Seller: Bruce D. Sylvia
Date: 10/17/14
GRANBY
189 East St.
Granby, MA 01033
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Westover Metropolitan Development Corp.
Seller: Robert D. Walker
Date: 10/15/14
School St.
Granby, MA 01033
Amount: $325,000
Buyer: International EC LLC
Seller: FMJ Realty LLC
Date: 10/17/14
HADLEY
133 Middle St.
Hadley, MA 01035
Amount: $159,334
Buyer: John A. Lipski
Seller: Elizabeth A. Newman
Date: 10/08/14
HATFIELD
115 Elm St. #31
Hatfield, MA 01038
Amount: $249,900
Buyer: William H. Bittner
Seller: Hatfield Village LLC
Date: 10/10/14
450 Main St.
Hatfield, MA 01038
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Mt. Tom Properties LLC
Seller: Walker P. Lee
Date: 10/17/14
108 Straits Road
Hatfield, MA 01038
Amount: $450,000
Buyer: Duval Logging LLC
Seller: Stephen F. Bruscoe
Date: 10/17/14
HUNTINGTON
14 Kennedy Dr.
Huntington, MA 01050
Amount: $315,000
Buyer: Maureen Lucey
Seller: Donald & Janice Gormley NT
Date: 10/08/14
84 Searle Road
Huntington, MA 01050
Amount: $345,000
Buyer: Paul C. Stanley
Seller: Theodore M. Lapointe
Date: 10/17/14
NORTHAMPTON
1152 Burts Pit Road
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $235,000
Buyer: Joanne K. Clark
Seller: Samuel J. Lococo
Date: 10/06/14
19 Drewsen Dr.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $135,000
Buyer: Gregory R. Haas
Seller: Deborah Coon
Date: 10/17/14
808 Florence Road
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Daniel L. Polachek
Seller: Lauretta R. Dietrich
Date: 10/17/14
12 Hinckley St.
Northampton, MA 01062
Amount: $305,000
Buyer: Patrick A. Corliss
Seller: Glenn Alper
Date: 10/10/14
SOUTH HADLEY
59 Bardwell St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $206,000
Buyer: Melissa Holmes
Seller: Michelle George
Date: 10/17/14
336 Brainerd St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $308,000
Buyer: Robert F. Caselden
Seller: Bridget E. Gardner
Date: 10/10/14
16 Brittany Road
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $300,000
Buyer: Benjamin H. Hale
Seller: Paul D. Boudreau
Date: 10/06/14
8 Cypress Dr.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $198,000
Buyer: Tracy A. Copeland
Seller: Nancy M. Herrick
Date: 10/07/14
60 East St.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $174,000
Buyer: Prateek Rajbhandari
Seller: William P. Butler
Date: 10/10/14
6 Lawrence Ave.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $166,000
Buyer: Anthony A. Chambers
Seller: Ronald F. Bisiewicz
Date: 10/17/14
36 Ludlow Road
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Steve Aube
Seller: Linda L. Drozdowski
Date: 10/10/14
Ludlow Road #3
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Steve Aube
Seller: Linda L. Drozdowski
Date: 10/10/14
Ludlow Road #4
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $160,000
Buyer: Steve Aube
Seller: Linda L. Drozdowski
Date: 10/10/14
34 Queen Circle
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $169,950
Buyer: Suzanne M. Frenette
Seller: Karen E. Lappalainen
Date: 10/10/14
154 Stony Brook Village
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $307,000
Buyer: Drummer RT
Seller: Whispering Pines
Date: 10/07/14
29 Upper River Road
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $385,000
Buyer: Scott G. George
Seller: Daniel F. Muldoon
Date: 10/17/14
7 Valley View Dr.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $442,500
Buyer: Michael & L. Matyszewski RET
Seller: James Mumm
Date: 10/07/14
8 Virginia Dr.
South Hadley, MA 01075
Amount: $310,000
Buyer: Brian W. Summers
Seller: Todd T. Holt
Date: 10/08/14
SOUTHAMPTON
13 Cottage Ave.
Southampton, MA 01073
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Bruce A. Slabinski
Seller: Nathan Sansouci
Date: 10/17/14
WARE
304 Beaver Lake Road
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $287,500
Buyer: Russell C. Mooney
Seller: Debra A. Charette
Date: 10/17/14
42 Crescent St.
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $203,500
Buyer: Kristine A. Roach
Seller: FNMA
Date: 10/16/14
121 Glendale Circle
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $180,000
Buyer: Jarrod Dandurant
Seller: Mark A. Orszulak
Date: 10/17/14
14 Indian Hill Road
Ware, MA 01082
Amount: $155,500
Buyer: Katie J. Cienciwa
Seller: George E. Moeckel
Date: 10/16/14
WORTHINGTON
123 Capen St.
Worthington, MA 01098
Amount: $210,000
Buyer: Samantha L. Kabat
Seller: Mary A. Munson FT
Date: 10/10/14
8 Dingle Road
Worthington, MA 01098
Amount: $150,000
Buyer: Joshua J. Tanner
Seller: Susan S. Martin
Date: 10/07/14
27 Ireland St.
Worthington, MA 01098
Amount: $230,000
Buyer: Kathleen E. Ford
Seller: Madeleine A. Cahill
Date: 10/16/14
Sam Hill Road
Worthington, MA 01098
Amount: $176,000
Buyer: Theodore M. Lapointe
Seller: Edward & Shirley Porter LT
Date: 10/17/14
The following bankruptcy petitions were recently filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court. Readers should confirm all information with the court.
Archambault, Shirley E.
1015 Baptist Hill Road
Palmer, MA 01069
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/03/14
Bleau, Heath A.
Bleau, Angela M.
1022 Park St.
Palmer, MA 01069
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/03/14
Cabana, Ronald J.
14 Doane Ave.
Agawam, MA 01001
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/02/14
Cormier, Kurt J.
Cormier, Denise R.
69 Peros Dr.
Agawam, MA 01001
Chapter: 13
Filing Date: 10/06/14
Cross, Andrew E.
409 River Road
Agawam, MA 01001
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/02/14
Duprey, Mark W.
18 Harrison Ave.
Greenfield, MA 01301
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/06/14
Finnell, John C.
48 Lake Mattawa Road
Orange, MA 01364
Chapter: 13
Filing Date: 10/09/14
Flashner, April Ann
a/k/a Talkowski, April
136 Fryeville Road
Orange, MA 01364
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/08/14
Foley, Lisa A.
19 Wildflower Dr.
Ware, MA 01082
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/03/14
Girard, Wayne Alan
Girard, Lisa Jean
a/k/a Lyons, Lisa Jean
1506 Windsor Road
Cheshire, MA 01225
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/02/14
Goshea, Katie M.
95 Vermont St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Chapter: 13
Filing Date: 10/08/14
Hahne, Carl
Hahne, Susan M.
12 Alcove St.
Pittsfield, MA 01201
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/14/14
Hampden County Physicians, Inc.
354 Birnie Ave.
Springfield, MA 01107
Chapter: 11
Filing Date: 10/02/14
J.R. Saloon
Route 63 Roadhouse
Gershman, Jessica Lynn
49 Mormon Hollow Road
Millers Falls, MA 01349
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/08/14
Jimenez-Riddell, Martha G.
a/k/a Riddell, Martha G.
a/k/a Moraga, Martha G.
224 Froman St.
Athol, MA 01331
Chapter: 13
Filing Date: 09/30/14
Kargearies Indexing
Karp, Sandra Rae
345 East St. Apt. B
Easthampton, MA 01027
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/06/14
Kieliszek, Judith K.
23 Corey Colonial
Agawam, MA 01001
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/09/14
Korotchenko, Maria
1528 North Main St., 3rd Fl.
Palmer, MA 01069
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/03/14
Leclair, Robert R.
Leclair, Hilary J.
a/k/a Clough, Hilary J.
PO Box 304
Thorndike, MA 01079
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/02/14
Legge, Thomas Stanley
493 Elm St.
Pittsfield, MA 01201
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/07/14
Londono, Elvia Luz
1259 North Westfield St.
Feeding Hills, MA 01030
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/10/14
Major, Renner E.
237 Arnold Ave.
Springfield, MA 01119
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/03/14
McWade, Brendan W.
226 Fountain St.
Springfield, MA 01108
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/03/14
Moise, Marjorie
48 Merrill Road
Springfield, MA 01119
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/03/14
Murphy, Paul J.
Murphy, Angela M.
1199 Northampton St.
Holyoke, MA 01040
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 09/30/14
O’Donnell, Brian V.
27 Pomeroy Meadow Road
Southampton, MA 01073
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/15/14
Passidakis, Pamela J.
229 Green Ave.
Belchertown, MA 01007
Chapter: 13
Filing Date: 09/30/14
Pedro, James Michael
229 Mohawk Trail
Florida, MA 01247
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/01/14
Polished Nail & Hair Gall
Ekstrand, Jonathan H.
Ekstrand, Mary T.
363 Doe Valley Road
Athol, MA 01331
Chapter: 13
Filing Date: 10/09/14
Porter, Andrew William
Porter, Lisa Marie
61 Fifth St.
Turners Falls, MA 01376
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/10/14
Rivera, Aida I.
PO Box 4228
Springfield, MA 01101
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/15/14
Walker, John A.
141 Manor Court
Springfield, MA 01118
Chapter: 7
Filing Date: 10/10/14
Wentworth, Stephanie R.
103 Hardwick Pond Road
Hardwick, MA 01037
Chapter: 13
Filing Date: 10/15/14
The following Business Certificates and Trade Names were issued or renewed during the month of November 2014.
AGAWAM
AEV Media Group
16 Walnut St.
Armen Vartanyan
Che Bella Salon
833 Springfield St.
Shaun Drugan
MAD Chaos Productions
28 Losito Lane
Mark Delnegro
Stellato Home Services
19 Losito Lane
James Stellato Jr.
The Range & Training Academy
396 Main St.
Anneliese Townsend
You’ve Got It Maid
485 Corey St.
Kelly Deprey
CHICOPEE
Blue Spring Management
13 Center St.
Patrick Gottschlict
Family Barber Shop
212 Exchange St.
Alex N. Vazquez
Kimgi Hoops
805 Chicopee St.
Kimberly Knowlton
GREENFIELD
Baystate Home Infusion
489 Bernardston Road
Charles Ledoyt
Frans Designer Clothing Outlet
282 Main St.
Laura Chapdelaine
Sleepyls, LLC
248 Mohawk Trail
Joseph Graci
The Comical Mystery Tour
99 Elm St.
Kenneth Adams
Thin Ice Publishing
53 Prospect St.
Alan Hopkins
HOLYOKE
ABC Pizza
2233 Northampton St.
Jamal Alkattan
Banner Queen
16 Grover St.
Amy J. Quest
DKNA Window Cleaning & More
1010 Dwight St.
Jason Nieznojko
Nailtique
50 Holyoke St.
Stacie Pride
Ridden Staffing
15 Vernon St.
Vic Ridden
Rowan’s
1850 Northampton St.
Erica R. Leahy
Shepard Renovations
542 Rock Valley Road
Michael Shepard
Teanana
50 Holyoke St.
Annie Berkovicz
Verizon Wireless
50 Holyoke St.
Maria Chambers
SPRINGFIELD
American Tire Services
160 Tapley St.
Robert Vanzandt
Auntie Agi Alteration Service
1173 Sumner Ave.
Agnes B. Akoto
Brother Hood on the Move
1500 Main St.
Andrew R. Keton
Carpio Tax Service
340 Main St.
Katy M. Carpio
Civic Center Convenience
1369 Main St.
Nafees A. Awan
Clemente’s Bar & Grill
90 Worthington St.
Paul Ramesh
Creative Lengths
2 Chestnut St.
Joanna Matos
D & B Towing
141 Carver St.
Flor I. Torres
Dona Laura Restaurant
344 Bay St.
Glenny Gonzalez
Eat Bistro, LLC
607 Page Blvd.
Robert F. Lindsey
El Rincon Restaurant
332 Main St.
Efrain M. Fernandez
Eldorado
817 State St.
Suk Forrester
FJR Towing & Transport
250 Albany St.
Francisco Roman
Forest Park Real Estate
668 Dickinson St.
Son Vo
Foundation for TJO Animal Hospital
66 Industry Ave.
Thomas J. O’Connor
Fufu’s Beauty Supply
942 State St.
Dine F. Amadou
GK Watuku Transportation
138 Price St.
Gregory K. Watuku
Grimaldi, Inc.
1121 East Columbus Ave.
Luciano J. Grimaldi
JJ Beauty Salon
1614 Main St.
Yoanda Carpio
JC Home Improvement
159 Tyler St.
Jose Claudio
Jezy’s Cake & Wedding
26 Bancroft St.
Jezenia Delgado
Jon M. Starr Landscape
72 Sunapee St.
Jon M. Starr
WEST SPRINGFIELD
All in One Home Improvement
127 Warren St.
Sandro Scirocco
Creative Alteration
42 Merrick St.
Diana Kovaliuk
Pet Supplies Plus
175 Memorial Ave.
PSP Stores, LLC
Please Inc.
935 Riverdale St.
Kui Lin
The following business incorporations were recorded in Hampden, Hampshire, and Franklin counties and are the latest available. They are listed by community.
CHICOPEE
LAP Distributing Inc., 77 Lapa Farm Road, Chicopee, MA 01013. Luis Pereira, same. Distribution of bakery products.
Mes Associates Inc., 43 Archie St., Floor 1, Chicopee, MA 01021. Margaret Shea, same. Real estate holdings.
EASTHAMPTON
MB Enterprises Inc., 12 Clinton St., Easthampton, MA 01027. Matthew Baca, same. Retail food services.
HOLYOKE
Iglesia Cristiana Luz De Vida, 100 Suffolk St., Holyoke, MA 01040. Edwin Velazquez, 120 Oak Street, Holyoke, MA 01040. Church.
Iglesia Movimiento Pentecostal Camino De Santidad, 773 Dwight St., Holyoke, MA 01040. Luis Edgardo Geigel, 361 Chestnut St., Holyoke, MA 01040. Religious organization with the purpose of worshipping and preaching the word of God, as well as to provide religious support to the community.
LONGMEADOW
Medical Documentation Specialists Inc., 101 Ellington St., Longmeadow, MA 01106. Michael Craig, same. Training in electronic medical systems.
PALMER
Mayberry’s Portable Welding Inc., 229 Peterson Road, Palmer, MA 01069. Peter Mayberry Jr., same. Welding services.
PITTSFIELD
Kim’s Estate Sales Inc., 561 Elm St., Pittsfield, MA 01201. Kim Barry, same. Conduct estate sales and clean-outs for the purpose of carrying on any business.
SPRINGFIELD
Iglesia Pentecostal De Avivameinto La Ultima Cosecha Inc., 2530 Main St., Springfield, MA 01107. Arcangel Galarza, 2991 Main St., Springfield, MA 01107. Church.
Investers Enterprise Inc., 195 Middle St., Springfield, MA 01104. Wanda Ivellise Lopez, same. Eehan, same. Investment in real estate properties, tax, deed, and certificate property management, and remodeling.
WESTHAMPTON
Meehan Estates Inc. 19 Perry Hill Road, Westhampton, MA 01027. James Meehan, same. Real estate holding company.
WILBRAHAM
Neighborhood Pizza Inc., 2481 Boston Road, Wilbraham, MA 01095. Ilyas Yanbul, 82 Bluebird Circle, Ludlow, MA 01056.
WILLIAMSTOWN
Jozacami Enterprises Inc., 910 Cold Spring Road, Williamstown, MA 01267. Michael Oring, same. Motel facility.
SPRINGFIELD — Mayor Domenic J. Sarno will be traveling to Cambridge today to speak to a group of approximately 100 students interested in urban renewal and economic development. The students are all graduate students at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government with experience in economic development and urban planning. Students have been reviewing case studies in economic development and renewal projects that have worked and failed. Sarno will be speaking about economic development and Springfield’s revitalization. Sarno will be providing a perspective on how to grow and sustain a city in today’s urban America. Topics will include an overview of the city of Springfield and its history, demographics, income, as well as issues relating to: affordable housing, access to transportation, poverty reduction, economic development, and access to quality education. Commenting on the invitation to speak, Sarno stated, “it is an honor to be invited to speak to tomorrow’s leaders. Providing a firsthand account of the tireless work done here in Springfield; from bankruptcy to rebirth during the “great recession”, is remarkable. I look forward to sharing our story with the next generation.”
HADLEY — Florence Bank, a mutually-owned savings bank serving the Pioneer Valley through nione branch locations, celebrated the opening of its new Hadley location at 377 Russell St. On Nov. 15, with local and state officials, and more than 100 customers, friends and well-wishers. Florence Bank CEO John F. Heaps, Jr. and bank officials were joined by State Senate Majority Leader Stan Rosenberg, state Rep. John Scibak, Hadley town administrator David Nixon, and Amherst Chamber Executive Director Don Courtemanche, along with customers, friends and supporters who turned out to welcome the bank to its new home. Scibak and Rosenberg presented Heaps with a proclamation from the Legislature commending Florence Bank on its continued service to the region and its new branch in Hadley.
In addition to the ribbon-cutting, Bank officials officially dedicated their new tractor weathervane, which sits atop the new building, to the Devine family of Hadley. John Devine, who was a lifelong farmer and a member of Hadley’s Planning Board, was instrumental in recommending that the bank consider a cupola and weathervane as part of the new building’s design. Bank officials wanted to do something to honor the memory of Devine, who passed away unexpectedly a year ago. Florence Bank Senior Vice President Sharon Rogalski presented a replica of the weathervane to John Devine Jr., who accepted the gift on behalf of his family. Toby Daniels, vice-president and branch manager of the Hadley Branch, will continue in that role in the new location. “Hadley has been our home for nearly 20 years,” said Heaps. “We are especially pleased to renew our commitment to this community with our new location. We thank our many customers and friends for their ongoing support and look forward to serving everyone for years to come.”
AMHERST – Gov. Deval Patrick today announced $1.5 million in funding to build on his administration’s efforts to make Massachusetts a hub for the emerging water innovation sector. Patrick was joined by UMass Amherst and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials as they announced $4.1 million in federal funding for a national center for drinking water innovation at the university. “All over the world and right here at home in the Commonwealth, water challenges are threatening the environment and the economy,” said Patrick. “Investing in the development of water innovation technologies not only protects precious natural resources and public health but creates high-quality local jobs.” The Water Infrastructure Bill, signed by Patrick in August, calls for $1.5 million in investments from the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection for water innovation. The federally funded center, announced today by the EPA, will be one of two national research centers focused on testing and demonstrating cutting-edge technologies for small drinking water systems. The Patrick Administration, through MassCEC matched the federal investment with a $100,000 grant. “Under governor Patrick’s leadership, Massachusetts has pursued cost-effective innovations to address environmental concerns,” said Curt Spalding, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regional administrator for New England. “We are very pleased to join the governor as both EPA and the Commonwealth announce investments in further research and technology development at UMass Amherst that will help continue to provide clean and safe drinking water to people.” Providing safe, clean drinking water is critical for maintaining the health and security of the Commonwealth, said UMass Amherst Chancellor Kumble R. Subbaswamy. “Researchers here at UMass Amherst are on the front lines of efforts to make sure that clean water is a reality for all our communities and citizens. This new funding will help the Commonwealth’s flagship campus make an important contribution to this key public need.” During the Massachusetts-Israel Innovation Partnership Mission in May, Patrick announced the winners of the first Massachusetts-Israel Innovation Partnership (MIIP) water innovation challenge. The governor made this announcement with Israeli Chief Scientist Avi Hasson during the U.S.-Israel Connected Summit “Going Global with Water Tech” forum. The MIIP was launched in 2011 as a direct result of governor Patrick’s first Innovation Partnership Mission to Israel. During that ten-day trade mission in March 2011, a coalition of the state’s leading business executives and senior government officials explored growth opportunities of common interest for Massachusetts’ and Israel’s innovation industries. During that mission Patrick and Shalom Simhon, Israeli minister of Economy signed a memorandum of understanding in Jerusalem resulting in this partnership. “Safe, reliable drinking water has always been a critical need. In the 21st Century, we will need to develop new technologies to meet growing demand,” said Congressman Jim McGovern. “I’m pleased that the federal government is joining with the Commonwealth and UMass Amherst in this promising effort.”
