George O'Brien, Author at BusinessWest

Yirancis Rivera

By George O'Brien July 3, 2025

Healthcare News

She Serves as an Inspiration — in Any Language

Yirancis Rivera, center, at the nurse pinning at Westfield State University in May.

Yirancis Rivera came to Springfield from Puerto Rico when she was 7 years old.

She has many memories from her youth, but among those that stand out are visits to healthcare facilities, where she would serve as an interpreter for her mother — who didn’t speak any English — even though she was still learning the language herself and was basically relying on what she learned from watching TV shows.

“I still remember walking into a hospital with my mom for the first time … the unfamiliar sounds, the sea of English words I didn’t understand, and the weight of her trusting me to be her voice,” she recalled. “I was overwhelmed but determined.”

Remember those two words.

In many ways, they define a truly inspiring story of how Rivera overcame challenges, some long odds, and many occasions when she felt overwhelmed to graduate from Westfield State University’s nursing program and earn a job on N3, a med-surg unit at Cooley Dickinson Hospital (CDH) in Northampton; she’s due to start in early August.

“I still remember walking into a hospital with my mom for the first time … the unfamiliar sounds, the sea of English words I didn’t understand, and the weight of her trusting me to be her voice.”

Her story begins with that hospital visit with her mother, which planted a seed, if you will, and motivated Rivera to become much more than a mere translator.

“I wanted to be a nurse who could provide comfort and care, no matter what language someone speaks,” she told BusinessWest. “I developed a passion for helping others that is deeply personal. Learning medical terminology in English felt like learning a second language, and there were times when I doubted myself. But I kept going, driven by the knowledge that families like mine need nurses who truly understand them.

“I knew that I wanted to be someone my patients could look up to in the sense that they speak the same language as me,” she went on. “But I also saw that there weren’t many nurses who looked like me, and I wanted to be part of that change.”

Returning to her youth, Rivera recalled that, while she had the vision and drive to be a nurse — with some inspiration from her great grandmother, who served a tech in a maternity unit — she wasn’t at all sure if such a career was within reach, financially and otherwise. But she worked hard, earned scholarships that essentially left her debt-free after graduating, and was able to enroll at Westfield State.

She credits her professors at the school with helping her not only with the rugged course material, but also with overcoming doubts that she fit in and could make it in this field.

“I had such amazing people in my life to get me here — especially the people in the Westfield program; I don’t know if I would have made it this far without them,” she said. “The small nursing classes there allowed me to build close connections with professors who encouraged me and helped me grow.”

Rivera completed rotations at Baystate Noble Hospital, the Holyoke Senior Center, Mercy Medical Center, Baystate Pediatrics, Springfield Public Schools, Hampden County House of Corrections, and Holyoke Medical Center, where, coincidentally, she worked on the M5 Adult Behavioral Health Unit with charge nurse Kim Larrier (see related story on page 32).

She said she chose CDH to start her career for several reasons, especially because it offers an opportunity to serve her community and also “be a bridge for patients who might feel unseen or forgotten.”

As noted, she is expected to start early next month, and is currently taking part in the hospital’s nurse residency program, where recent graduates are paired with a preceptor, but also other recent graduates.

“They’re going through that transition with you,” she said of the jump from school to the workplace, adding that it’s good to have the opportunity to work beside people who are also getting started in the field.

And while she’s looking forward to the med-surg unit — “it’s an amazing place to start, especially as a new grad, because you get many different kinds of cases” — her goal is to work in the intensive care unit.

“As nurses, one of our main goals is to help people cope,” she explained. “But especially in an ICU, you have to learn how to critically think. I’d love to experience the challenge on that floor.”

While she’s just getting started in her career as a nurse, Rivera hopes her story can serve as an inspiration and that she can be a role model of sorts to others facing the many types of challenges she did.

“Nursing isn’t just a job for me … it’s a calling,” she explained. “As a bilingual, first-generation nurse, I want others from backgrounds like mine to know they belong in healthcare and can succeed. My journey wasn’t easy or typical, but it shaped me into a nurse.”

Joseph and Vincent Bartolucci

By George O'Brien July 3, 2025

Healthcare News

Identical Twins Double Down on the Passion They Bring to Nursing

Joseph and Vincent Bartolucci

Joseph and Vincent Bartolucci say they’ve always enjoyed intentionally confusing people and assuming each other’s identity — starting in kindergarten.

Let’s call it an identical-twins thing.

“It was really fun, especially with our mom — I used to answer to ‘Vincent’ all the time,” Joe said. “She would always confuse us, whether it was calling for us across the house or seeing us in the room.”

And their mother, Michele, who they say possesses a healthy sense of humor, was never shy about joining in on the fun, to the point of using her eyeliner to draw a freckle on Joe’s right cheek to match the one on Vin’s, in an effort to further confuse their teachers and classmates. She would also dress them in identical outfits, making it still harder to tell them apart.

A penchant for fun is not the only thing the Bartolucci twins took from their mother. Another is a passion for helping others and, more specifically, the nursing profession.

Indeed, Michele Bartolucci has been a nurse at Mercy Medical Center in Springfield for more than 30 years, working in intermediate care and endoscopy, where she is now nurse manager.

“That’s her passion … she just loves the field; she just loves helping people,” Vin said. “She would always come home with stories, talking about how she would help her patients that day and how it made her feel. She had hard days, too, but she would always express that she just loved helping people.”

This sentiment rubbed off on the twins, who recently graduated from the nursing program at Holyoke Community College (HCC), where they were in most classes together and where they greatly confounded fellow students, professors, advisers, and even the photographer at commencement, who thought they were the same person.

“My mom would be working with the patients, and I saw how passionate she was and how awesome a nurse she was, and that was the moment when I said, ‘I can do this; I want to do this.”

And they are now both working at Baystate Medical Center as apprentice nurses, on separate units, which will certainly help both patients and co-workers, because these two are pretty much indistinguishable except for slightly different hairstyles, Vin’s freckle, and the different earring preferences. They even sound alike.

At Baystate, they are building on a family tradition of work in healthcare — their stepfather, Brett Hayes, is also a nurse at Mercy, and their sister, Lexie, who majored in public health at UMass Amherst, will be pursuing a nursing degree at HCC in the fall.

“I think maybe we influenced her,” said Vin, who, like Joe, recalls his mother taking the twins to work with her when she was on call — because she had no one to leave them with — and being inspired by what he saw and heard.

The Bartolucci brothers at their recent graduation at HCC.

“We would sit in the recovery room,” he said. “My mom would be working with the patients, and I saw how passionate she was and how awesome a nurse she was, and that was the moment when I said, ‘I can do this; I want to do this.’”

Joe, who tells a similar story, said he started at Baystate, again as an apprentice, on a neurology unit.

“It was a challenging unit; it was a heavy unit, really sick patients with declines, lots of rapid responses and code blues on that floor,” he said, adding that he will soon move to a med-surg/telemetry unit at Baystate Medical Center.

As for Vin, he started as a patient care technician on a med-surg unit last August and is now a nurse apprentice on that floor. And, like his brother, mother, and stepfather, he enjoys all aspects of this work.

“The best thing is being the person that improves someone’s day or makes a person’s day better,” he explained. “A lot of the people that I see don’t really want to be in the hospital, so to make someone’s day a little better is the best feeling. And just to see someone smile or say ‘thank you’ is a really good feeling, and it makes you want to work harder.”

Joe concurred. “It’s a rewarding job, and it’s great to be able to make a difference in someone’s day,” he said, “even if that difference is making them feel a little cleaner or just talking with them and hearing about their concerns.”

Meanwhile, having a brother that he’s still living with, who’s also just starting his career and going through the same experiences, is a unique benefit, he went on.

“It’s really good to have someone to bounce things off,” Joe said. “Whether I have a good day or a bad day, I have someone to go to at the end of the shift and talk to about things.”

Joe and Vin don’t sound like they’re done having fun confusing people and assuming each other’s identity. But right now, they have more important things to do — like getting entrenched in careers they knew they were destined for while sitting in that recovery room on those days their mother was on call.

When it comes to bringing the requisite passion to their work, they’re doubling down — in all kinds of ways.

Donut Dip Builds on 68 Years of Tradition

By George O'Brien June 19, 2025

Cover Story

Flour Power

Paul Shields and Katie Warren, third- and fourth-generation managers.

Paul Shields says it wasn’t his plan to make a career out of the West Springfield institution known as Donut Dip.

But then again, it wasn’t his father’s plan to do that, either. Or his grandfather’s. Or his daughter’s.

But things happened … and now four generations of this family, usually working side by side, have made this Riverdale Street landmark — in every sense of that word — home. They’ve also made it a destination, a place generations of different families return to, a first job for hundreds of young people, an architectural throwback that will prompt people to pull into the parking lot and snap pictures, and much more.

“There’s a lot of history here,” said Shields, who said this history comes as a side to a glazed donut, a cinnamon cruller, a cup of coffee, or, more recently, a breakfast sandwich. And this history, or tradition, is part of the attraction.

A huge part.

Our story begins in the mid-’50s, when Paul’s grandfather, Charles Shields, was the general manager of a large commercial bakery that thrived until it was shut down by a drivers strike. The company eventually reopened, but was never the same and eventually closed. With a young family to support, Shields was at a critical crossroads, and made the then-daring decision to open a shop devoted exclusively to donuts.

His son, Richard, then just out of college, joined him in the venture. At the time, he was also a physical education teacher and football coach, but ultimately decided to leave those pursuits and devote all his energies to the emerging business. They would both work at the shop well into their 80s.

After graduating from UMass Amherst in 1981, Paul went to work for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield in its Communications office, producing the Chalise of Salvation televised Mass and other programming while working at Donut Dip on Tuesday nights (the night baker’s evening off), making donuts with his dad. When his father lost a key employee in 1987, he stepped in, and has been there ever since, serving now as president.

His daughter, Katie Warren, went into physical therapy after graduating from UMass Amherst. She enjoyed most aspects of the work, but not the paperwork and the uncertainty concerning where healthcare and that profession were headed. So, facing her own career crossroads, she chose the family business and has never looked back.

“I do a little bit of everything, like my dad and my grandfather before that.”

That’s the short story of the business and the people who have managed it. The longer story involves perseverance — weathering everything from the building of I-91, which siphoned large amounts of traffic off Route 5, which was the main north-south artery in the region, to the coming of Dunkin’ Donuts (now just Dunkin’) and other forms of competition, to a global pandemic.

The landscape has changed considerably on Riverdale Street since 1957, but Donut Dip has been a constant.

It also involves some change — there’s now a maple-frosted donut sprinkled with bacon, for example — but, overall, not much change at all when it comes to the offerings, the signs above the donut racks (yes, the prices have been adjusted), and the neon signs outside, which are expensive to maintain, but part of the overall experience.

There’s also been little change when it comes to different generations of the Shields family growing in the business, gravitating toward it as a career, and doing essentially anything that needs to be done.

“I do a little bit of everything, like my dad and my grandfather before that,” Warren said. “Office work, and you’re making coffee, and not long ago, we were short someone in the kitchen, and I was coming in Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays to make donuts; that’s just how it is.”

Not much has apparently changed when it comes to the popularity of donuts, as evidenced by the steady stream of customers on the Friday we visited, and what is usually a constant stream until closing time at 10 p.m.

“A shop strictly for donuts was a new concept. Dunkin’ had just gotten started in Quincy a little earlier than we did, and they were starting to establish themselves, but this was somewhat of a flier, a leap.”

“We’re busier than ever,” said Shields, adding that there are many reasons for this, as we’ll see, but especially the company’s reputation for quality and doing things the old-fashioned way.

Moving forward, Shields sees opportunity for growth as competition increases in some respects but declines in others as major chains like Dunkin’ focus their energy and marketing dollars on beverages, and he intends to raise the company’s profile, if you will, through more aggressive marketing.

Visitors crowd the counter at Donut Dip a few days after it opened in 1957.

For this issue, we take an in-depth look into the fascinating world of donuts and especially this unique family-owned business that has become part of the landscape on Riverdale Street and … well, an institution.

The Hole Story

As he talked about 68 years of change — and what hasn’t changed — Paul Shields started with some recollections about the evolution of Route 5.

Back in 1957, the street was much different. It was, indeed, the main north-south artery, handling traffic heading north to go skiing and south to go to Connecticut and beyond. And it wasn’t a divided road, as it is today. Shields remembers his father and grandfather telling stories about how the traffic would be bumper to bumper on Friday afternoons, and many other times as well.

This was well before the vast shopping centers and big-box stores were constructed, he went on, noting that section of the street featured a drive-in theater, a driving range, farms, a cinema complex with just a few screens, and a host of businesses that have long since vanished from the landscape.

It was into this environment that Donut Dip opened — and it is one of the few businesses on the street that can trace their roots to the Eisenhower administration.

When it opened, it was a relatively new and different model, said Shields, adding that, at the time, there were countless small bakeries that made donuts, but few, if any, shops dedicated entirely to that product.

“We have people traveling that will stop in on their way to vacation, and they’ll say they stopped here when they were a kid. We’ve been around for such a long time; we’ve seen generations of different families come through here.”

“A shop strictly for donuts was a new concept. Dunkin’ had just gotten started in Quincy a little earlier than we did, and they were starting to establish themselves, but this was somewhat of a flier, a leap,” he noted, adding that the venture got off to a solid start, and his father and grandfather would soon add other locations. There was one on Route 20 in West Springfield that closed in 1971, another at the corner of White and Orange streets in Springfield that closed in 1980, and one on North Main Street in East Longmeadow that closed after storm damage in 2019.

These new locations would become a blessing in 1968 when I-91 opened, changing the complexion of Route 5 and essentially splitting it into two zones, north and south of the new highway.

“Many businesses on this road closed — they couldn’t stay alive,” he recalled. “My father and my grandfather had the Westfield Street store and the East Longmeadow store, and they were able to get by. They were lean years, but they were able to hang in there.”

Over time, Riverdale Street would evolve into the commercial district that it is today, with new businesses ranging from car dealerships to Costco bringing traffic to the area. Some people heading to and from such destinations will stop at Donut Dip, said Shields, adding quickly that, for many others, it is the destination.

“We have people traveling that will stop in on their way to vacation, and they’ll say they stopped here when they were a kid,” Warren added. “We’ve been around for such a long time; we’ve seen generations of different families come through here.”

From left, Paul Shields, his daughter, Katie Warren, and his father, Richard Shields. None of them planned to Donut Dip a career, but they’ve all made the institution home.

Shields agreed. “People come up from Long Island; they drive from Boston, Albany, or points north,” he noted, adding that posts on Facebook and Instagram, as well as direct word of mouth, have helped fuel interest and bring the brand far and wide. “I hear it a lot … people will say, ‘I came from so and so to get these donuts,’ and oftentimes they walk out with their arms full, with a dozen boxes; they bring them home to their neighbors or family.”

Making Some Dough

Beyond the dramatic transformation of Riverdale Street, there have been other changes to the landscape as well, said Shields, noting that, about the same time Donut Dip was opening in 1957, Dunkin’ Donuts was greatly expanding its presence in the Northeast.

And for the next several decades, the chain, now based in Canton, Mass., certainly presented a challenge, he said, both in terms of its offerings and its omnipresence. Indeed, there are four locations in West Springfield alone, including one further north on Route 5, and several more across the river in Springfield.

“They’re everywhere, and for years we competed directly with them — when we heard there was a Dunkin’ Donuts going in down the street, we took that very seriously,” said Shields, noting that, in recent years, the chain has essentially de-emphasized donuts, as indicated in the change to the brand’s name to Dunkin’, and it has become what many analysts of this sector now consider a beverage company.

Other chains have followed suit, he went on, adding that the donut landscape, if you will, has changed, with the major chains scaling back and few companies stepping in to fill the void.

“Part of the reason for this is all the work that’s involved,” he said, “and also because there’s a perception that, if there’s a Dunkin’ somewhere, no one else is going to survive selling donuts.”

This helps explains the crowds at the counter on that Friday, and also why Shields believes there is strong growth potential for the family business.

“I’ve added people in recent years, and we have more production capacity than we’ve ever had,” he explained. “So, I think the time is right to increase our volume.”

While there has been change in the industry, and some at Donut Dip, what’s more important is what hasn’t changed. First and foremost is the fact that this is a family business, one where members of several generations work side by side, and do … well, whatever needs to be done, whether it’s making coffee, ringing up orders, or making or finishing donuts.

Indeed, Shields said he has many fond memories of working with his grandfather for several years, and with his father for several decades. It’s been the same for Warren, who has worked beside her father and grandfather; the latter still stops in but is officially retired.

“My grandfather used to call me into the office once in a while and give me a little talk, a little lesson,” she recalled. “He’d say, ‘remember, this isn’t a job, this is your life.’ And in large part, it is. He also said, ‘if you want people to work hard, you have to work hard right beside them,’ and I believe that wholeheartedly.”

Meanwhile, not much change has come to what’s in those donut racks.

“We really stick primarily with the classics — they will always be the biggest sellers,” said Shields, adding that the maple frosted with bacon is an outlier. “There are some donut shops, not necessarily around here, that specialize in taking a donut and putting layer upon layer of special toppings on it, making these crazy concoctions and charging $5 to $7 apiece. That’s their niche, but we believe the classics will always outsell any of those fancy kinds of things.”

Beyond donuts, bagels, muffins, and coffee, Donut Dip provides what would have to be called an experience. The shop itself is a throwback, architecturally and otherwise. The signage and layout are vintage. And, as noted, earlier, the hand-painted signs above the donut racks are original, save for the prices: a dozen donuts cost 65 cents when the shop opened.

There are a few pictures on the south wall showing things in the early days — the sign for a Castro Convertible outlet can be seen behind the shop in a night shot, and there’s another showing a crowd at the counter days after the grand opening, revealing that very little has changed since then.

That includes the shop’s track record as a place where many young people, including the city’s mayor, Will Reichelt, found their first or second job. Most move on to other things, but some stay for years and even decades, Warren said.

And many of those former employees will stop in regularly, or, for those not living in the area, occasionally.

“We see many of those people come back and say, ‘I worked for your father,’ or ‘I worked for your grandfather 100 years ago,’” Shields recalled. “Many of them worked while I was here; they were high school kids, and now they come back with their kids.”

Bottom Line

Paul Shields said his grandfather had one overarching piece of advice for him.

“He said, ‘the donuts have to be fresh, and they have to have enough jelly in them,’” he recalled, adding that these are just some of the words he’s tried to live by and pass on to the next generation.

Putting enough jelly in the donut is just one of the enduring traditions at this institution, which has had countless landmark moments in its long history and is poised to script many more.

In Monson, Things Are Percolating

By George O'Brien June 19, 2025

Community Spotlight Special Coverage

Community Spotlight

Amanda Roy, center, with several staff members at the Better Bean coffee shop on Main Street in Monson.

Amanda Roy likes to say the devastating ankle injury she suffered in 2021 when she missed the last step at her house didn’t happen to her; it happened for her.

That mishap left her in a wheelchair and facing a lengthy recovery period, which she chose to spend with her parents, in the Monson home where she grew up. And while recovering, she spent a lot of time thinking about what the next chapter in her life would look like and where it would play out.

She ultimately decided it would look somewhat like a previous chapter, when she spent 10 years operating a coffee shop in Plymouth, but with some real changes (more on those later). As for the place … she chose downtown Monson with the thought that this would be a short-term gig.

But things changed, and quickly.

“I thought, ‘I’m going to open a coffee shop, and when I get better, I’m going to sell it, move back to Plymouth, and get on with my life,’” said Roy, who opened the Better Bean in the summer of 2023, when she thought she was recovering from that ankle injury. Instead, she was told she would need a replacement. And while getting it and some subsequent surgeries, she made the decision to get on with her life in her hometown. She’s making the Better Bean one of the more intriguing business stories in this community, while she and her boyfriend build a house there.

These developing stories are just a few of many in this town of just over 8,000 people. Others include:

• Progress with the redevelopment of the sprawling Monson Developmental Center (MDC) site. The board of Westmass Area Development Corp. is expected to vote soon on a proposal to acquire a 100-acre portion of the site with the intention of redeveloping it for housing and related purposes;

• Renovation and expansion of the town’s fire station;

• A town meeting vote to move from three selectmen to five;

• Continued growth of what would be called agritourism, with businesses such as Silver Bell Farms, Echo Hill Orchard, Westview Farms Creamery, and others, which grow and sell everything from apples to Christmas trees to wine to ice cream, and draw people from across the region and beyond; and

• Anticipation and excitement concerning the planned east-west rail station in Palmer, which has the potential to make Monson a more popular place to live for those who work in Greater Boston but can’t afford home prices in the capital area.

“It’s still costs a lot to build a house, but from a value standpoint, this is an opportunity to bring people here, and when individuals move in, now you have an opportunity for another restaurant or two, and then businesses will look at Monson as a vibrant place to move to.”

Westmass President and CEO Jeff Daley said the board is expected to vote by the end of this month on a proposal to acquire a section of the MDC property, on which he envisions a ‘village concept’ for the parcel, which represents a new and intriguing opportunity for the agency.

“What we’ve done in the past has been mostly commercial and industrial-type projects,” he said, noting industrial park projects in cities like Westfield, Agawam, and Chicopee, as well as redevelopment of the massive Ludlow Mills complex in Ludlow, which includes large housing components. “We’ve worked with partners on housing in the past, and housing is definitely a need, and the demographics of Monson have been changing; housing would be a good fit at that location.”

The MDC was among many state-owned properties featured in a recent showcase of parcels available for housing development that hosted the Healey administration, said Jenn Wolowicz, Monson’s town administrator, noting that, while there are several potential future uses, housing, especially affordable and 55-and-over housing, are critical needs.

One of the long-shuttered buildings at the Monson Developmental Center, which is moving closer to redevelopment, with housing as one of the likely new uses.

“As of April 30, our population of seniors is 33% of our overall population,” she explained. “We have a lot of people living in single-family homes, their children are grown, and they’d love to be able to downsize to a townhouse-type unit, and we’ve made sure that this is something that’s being heard by Westmass.”

As for east-west rail, Jim Przypek, CEO of the Quaboag Hills Chamber of Commerce, which serves 15 communities, including Monson, said that service will benefit many of the communities in the Quaboag region simply by making them more accessible.

“The trend of people moving out of Eastern Mass. and migrating farther and farther west will continue and be accelerated by east-west rail,” he said, adding that rail service will make it easier to live in those towns but still work in Boston or Hartford.

For this latest installment of its Community Spotlight series, BusinessWest turns its lens on Monson, the picturesque town roughly halfway between Springfield and Worcester that has established its own identity.

Developing Stories

Mike Rouette grew up in Monson, and it has remained his home. He described it as the “perfect place to raise a family,” and a community where people team up to get things done, right down to planning and executing the Fourth of July parade and fireworks.

“Everyone pitches in and does what needs to be done to keep the town vibrant,” said Rouette, executive vice president and chief operating officer at Monson Savings Bank, who, as he surveys the landscape, sees both challenges and opportunities for the town.

The challenges are similar to those facing other rural communities in that area, including the loss of manufacturing jobs — plants once made everything from hats to toilet seats here — as well as retaining existing businesses and grappling with declining enrollment in local schools stemming from school choice and other contributing factors.

“It’s not easy to access Monson,” he explained. “Sometimes, people tend to look at Monson, from a Springfield standpoint, as if Wilbraham Mountain is almost like a Great Wall of China — it’s ‘over there.’”

As for opportunities, they mostly involve abundant land (although much of it is on hillsides) and still-affordable buildings lots, at least when compared to towns to the west (like Wilbraham, Hampden, and East Longmeadow) and to the east (Sturbridge and Auburn).

“There’s an opportunity there that the town should take advantage of,” Rouette said of lot prices. “It’s still costs a lot to build a house, but from a value standpoint, this is an opportunity to bring people here, and when individuals move in, now you have an opportunity for another restaurant or two, and then businesses will look at Monson as a vibrant place to move to.”

Meanwhile, the MDC site provides a wealth of opportunities — much like the site of the former Belchertown State School has — for creative reuse, everything from housing to commercial sites to Rouette’s vision of a regional high school that would serve Monson and Palmer and help keep students in those communities.

The MDC, which closed in 2012, was spread over more than 650 acres. A large portion of the property will be transferred to the Massachusetts Department of Fish and Game to become a wildlife management area, said Wolowicz, adding that Westmass could become the developer of the remaining 100-acre parcel, where the hospital buildings and other facilities still stand.

“We would be demoing the hospital buildings and doing a mixed-use development with quite a bit of housing,” said Daley of plans that are still being formalized and, of course, contingent on the upcoming vote of the board. “We’re proposing that it would be affordable, market-rate, and workforce, to make sure that people can come into town if they want, or upsize or downsize in the town of Monson, as well as potentially some retail and commercial use to create a village atmosphere, as opposed to just coming in and putting some buildings up.

“We really want to respect the town of Monson and the surrounding communities, and that’s why we’re proposing something with more of a village feel rather than just putting up ranch homes or duplexes,” he went on. “This would be more strategically thought out … a village concept where people could still enjoy that rural farm life, if you will, in Monson, while also creating a new development for housing upgrades for people who want to get out of their homes, as well as workforce housing. This could be a game changer for Monson, Palmer, and the surrounding communities.”

Bean Optimistic

The staff at the Better Bean likes to get creative and theme its specialty drinks and other fare.

Such was the case last fall, with a two-month salute to Gilmore Girls and the small, fictional Connecticut town called Stars Hollow, where the show takes place.

“Stars Hollow looks a lot like Monson,” said Roy, referencing both her coffee shop and Dan Grieve Park, across the street from the shop, and its gazebo, which is very similar to the one in the show.

Monson at a Glance

Year Incorporated: 1775
Population: 8,150
Area: 44.8 square miles
County: Hampden
Residential Tax Rate: $14.87
Commercial Tax Rate: $14.87
Median Household Income: $52,030
Median Family Income: $58,607
Type of Government: Select Board, Open Town Meeting
Latest information available

The park, complete with several Adirondack chairs and benches, is quite popular with Better Bean clients, most of them regulars, said Roy, who chose a grab-and-go format rather than seating, one of many lessons she took from her time in Plymouth, which was split between two locations.

The first was a kiosk inside a Registry of Motor Vehicles office, and the second was a much larger space in the same industrial park, “with seats and a public bathroom and a big menu … and I burned myself right out,” she said, adding that she sold that enterprise six months before COVID arrived.

“Someone was looking out for me big time, because I can’t imagine being that burned out and having to deal with COVID,” she said, adding that her ankle injury brought her back to Monson and, eventually, to a storefront — the same one her father operated a realty office out of when she was young — on Main Street.

Learning her lesson from Plymouth, she created a place that’s not too big or too small, although it’s been cramped since she opened, so she will soon take over the space next door (the former Petal and Wren flower shop, which relocated) and will use the back for storage and the front for a small gift shop, something she said the town needs.

Overall, Roy told BusinessWest, the downtown has lost some storefronts — a cannabis shop closed recently, for example — but it remains an emerging destination.

Wolowicz agreed, but noted that the town’s business community is diverse, with many ventures existing in the agritourism and hospitality spaces.

“We have quite a few people who are being very creative when it comes to what their land is used for, be it what they’re growing or their animals,” she said, adding that one of the priorities for town officials has been to promote the preservation of farmland and, overall, a healthy rural community.

The Monson Agricultural Commission goes about this work in many ways, she said, listing everything from Right to Farm bylaws, which protect farms from noise, odor, and other complaints, to a farmers market event with live music and more than a dozen local vendors, including farms, bakeries, and artisans; the next such event is slated for Sept. 13.

“The town of Monson supports its commercial farms,” Wolowicz said, “and wishes to ensure their continued existence and positive impact on the town economically, ecologically, and socially.”

Przypek, who came to the chamber after a lengthy stint with the Basketball Hall of Fame in marketing and sponsorships, and then several years as general manager of the Three County Fairgrounds, agreed, noting that agritourism has become a large part of Monson’s identity as it transitions away from its manufacturing heritage.

“Businesses like Silver Bell Farms and Echo Hill and Westview Farms Creamery are thriving, and they bring people from all over to Monson,” he said, adding that new businesses downtown, like the Better Bean, do the same.

A Picture of Progress Is Taking Shape on Worthington Street

By George O'Brien June 5, 2025

Features Special Coverage

Filling in the Canvas

Raipher Pellegrino stands near the huge curved window on the second floor of the property at 280-302 Worthington St., known as the Underwood Building.

Raipher Pellegrino paused at the huge, curved second-floor window facing the corner of Worthington and Dwight streets.

“How’s that for a view?” he asked rhetorically, noting that it’s been quite some time since anyone — other than those he’s had out for tours — has looked out that window, some recent history he intends to change.

Indeed, he envisions a Pilates studio, a gym, or something similar on the second-floor space at 280-302 Worthington St., a property known as the Underwood Building, which has been vacant or mostly vacant for more than decade. And that space is just part of a much larger canvas that Pellegrino, the noted personal injury lawyer and real estate developer, working in partnership with his brother, Joseph, and the city of Springfield, is intent on filling in.

While doing so, he’s writing the intriguing next chapter in the history of what has been called (and is still called, even though it hasn’t lived up to the title) Springfield’s ‘entertainment district.’

This is the Worthington Street corridor, specifically the blocks just west of Dwight Street. It has been growing increasingly quiet over the past decade or so as restaurants, clubs, other businesses, and even a nonprofit (Suit Up Springfield) have shuttered or moved. The closing of Dewey’s Jazz Lounge last month was just the latest blow for the area.

It was with the intent of reinvigorating that corridor that Pellegrino and his brother acquired the three buildings east of Duryea Way at auction in 2021. With support from the city in the form of a $2.5 million grant and infrastructure improvements, Pellegrino is filling in his canvas.

Some of the spaces have been filled, like Petra Hookah Lounge, which features Mediterranean food and reopened last fall in extensively renovated space. Others are nearing completion, such as the new restaurant called Mamou, to be owned and operated by the chef at the former Chef Wayne’s Big Mamou, set to open this summer. And still others, including three more restaurants, a music venue to host between 250 and 400 people, and other businesses, like that projected Pilates studio, are still weeks or months away. Meanwhile, several residential units have been renovated, and more will be added to the mix.

“I think it’s vitally important to bring this area back — it raises the quality of living for those living downtown, and it provides places for people to go and eat. That was my desire with this, and it’s a much more difficult project than I think anyone envisioned, but I think we’re starting to see it evolve, and we’re seeing a lot of momentum.”

“The pieces are coming into place,” said Pellegrino, who envisions five restaurants in all, most with doors opening out onto Worthington Street and outdoor dining, in addition to a club and other businesses that will support one another and bring people — and energy — back to the Worthington Street corridor.

“I think it’s vitally important to bring this area back — it raises the quality of living for those living downtown, and it provides places for people to go and eat,” he said. “That was my desire with this, and it’s a much more difficult project than I think anyone envisioned, but I think we’re starting to see it evolve, and we’re seeing a lot of momentum.”

Tim Sheehan, Springfield’s chief Economic Development officer, agreed, noting that the city has invested more than $3.2 million in the entertainment corridor for everything from outdoor dining facilities to small-business assistance to interior buildout for commercial tenants.

This ground-floor space in the Underwood Building is being renovated for use as a music venue, what Raipher Pellegrino describes as an “Iron Horse-like” facility.

“The city’s investment continues in the corridor, and with what’s coming forward, people will see a lot of different options relative to dining in the dining district,” he said, adding that the goal is to bring both new businesses and a degree of long-term stability to a region that has not seen much of the latter.

Indeed, Brian Connors, deputy Development officer for the city, used understatement when he said the entertainment district has had “ebbs and flows.”

By that, he meant some good times, but also controversy with several late-night/early-morning incidents, and, from a business perspective, a high degree of turnover when it comes to restaurants and other businesses, problems compounded by the natural-gas explosion a block away in 2012.

For this issue, BusinessWest takes an in-depth look behind the plywood and brown paper over the doors and windows along that stretch of Worthington and into the future of the city’s entertainment district.

Work in Progress

It was raining intermittently as BusinessWest took its visit to the properties being redeveloped along that block on Worthington Street. The showers quickened the pace of the walks between the buildings, but they could hardly dampen the enthusiasm Pellegrino brought to his work as erstwhile tour guide, something he’s been doing often.

“This is a labor of love,” he said of the project, which is now approaching roughly $6 million in cost and represents perhaps the most extensive undertaking in a growing portfolio of real estate projects in Pellegrino’s portfolio.

That list includes the property at 265 State St. in Springfield — the large home later populated by commercial tenants but vacant in the ’90s and then restored by Pellegrino as a home to his offices — and its adjoining carriage house.

But it also includes a diverse mix of other properties, from charter schools in Springfield and Lowell, where Pellegrino went to college as an undergrad, to Springfield Country Club, which he acquired in partnership with the Hannoush brothers; from the property at 401 Liberty St. in Springfield, a former wire-manufacturing complex, now home to Behavioral Health Network, to the former Lunt Silversmith property in Greenfield, now home to a substance abuse center and mental health offices.

“The tenancy that we have needs to be established tenancy. In terms of going into the restaurant business as a startup business, it’s very, very difficult, and if the business model isn’t spot on, you have a tendency to have what we’ve had — businesses come in, businesses go out, businesses come in.”

Often, the projects involve properties that are historic in nature that require considerable renovations and modernization. Such is the case with the Worthington Street properties, which comprise a new challenge and a tremendous opportunity to reshape and reinvigorate the entertainment district, said Pellegrino, who started his tour at Petra Hookah Lounge, which opened its doors last fall, with the intent of showing what will be happening at the other properties along the street.

The block-long string of properties includes three buildings: 250-270 Worthington St., 272-280 Worthington, and 280-302 Worthington. The first two were built in the 1880s, and the third dates to the early 1930s.

Moving west to east, the properties were in progressively worse condition, he told BusinessWest, adding that 250-270 Worthington, most recently home to Jackalope Restaurant and now Petra (next door), was in decent shape, although both the residential units and restaurant spaces needed upgrades, including new HVAC systems. The property at 272-280, formerly home to several different restaurants, was in worse shape, he said, while 280-302 was “horrendous … uninhabitable.”

Efforts to make it habitable are among the many going on concurrently along that block, a project that came, as Pellegrino noted, with plenty of challenges — everything from renovating historic but badly deteriorated structures to securing established tenants — which became clear as he walked and talked about each of the buildings and the progress being made.

“With historic buildings like these, including one that hadn’t been occupied in 15 years, there are a lot of challenges,” he said, listing everything from floors one could see through to roofs that needed replacing to staircases that no longer meet code and need to be replaced. “This is a project that you can only figure out as you do it; we’ve systematically started at one end, 250-270 Worthington Street, and are working our way to the other.”

Starting with 250-270, he said Petra is now an established tenant, and there will be a new restaurant moving into the former Jackalope space by August or September. He declined to say what the entity will be but noted that it is an already established Springfield restaurant.

Raipher Pellegrino projects that five new restaurants, a music venue, other businesses, and new residential units will take shape along Worthington Street, reinvigorating the city’s entertainment district.

At 272-280, another new restaurant, Mamou, is expected to open later this month, and another new restaurant, a “bar-like” establishment with light fare, will be opening in the fall, he went on, adding that 280-302 Worthington will have a music venue, a breakfast/lunch restaurant, and other commercial spaces, six units in all, with tenants yet to be identified.

The music venue he’s envisioning will not compete with but rather complement existing venues such as the MassMutual Center, Symphony Hall, and the former CityStage, now being renovated into an arts center for youth, and be an “Iron Horse-like” venue, he said, a reference to the Northampton landmark that reopened last spring.

“The concept is to offer people live entertainment, but also support the restaurants,” Pellegrino said. “If you have an act and sell 250 to 400 tickets, people will want to eat before that.”

Building Momentum

As he stopped at that massive, curved window in the second-floor space above what will be the music venue, Pellegrino pointed to all the parking in the surrounding area, one of the many keys to the success of this project and the entertainment district overall.

Others include everything from improving the perception of public safety to creating stability with the business mix, as well as that supportive element that he mentioned.

Indeed, as the canvas gets filled in, the entertainment district will have a core of new restaurants and businesses, as well as some established eateries — Theodores’ and Del Rey Taqueria on Worthington Street, Osteria on Bridge Street, the nearby Student Prince, and other restaurants and taverns that will support one another, said Pellegrino, adding that the critical mass in his block of buildings should become a draw.

“All of the tenants understand the synergy — there’s discussion about that, and they work well with one another,” he noted. “The idea is that maybe someone can have dinner in one place tonight and have a drink in your place the next night; it feeds off one another. The more people we pull down into the region, the better the restaurants will do. The idea is to create the entertainment district, and the more the merrier.”

Sheehan agreed, noting there are several other keys to the success of this iteration, if you will, of the entertainment district.

These include everything from bringing experienced restaurateurs with proven concepts into the area to infrastructure upgrades.

“The tenancy that we have needs to be established tenancy,” he noted. “In terms of going into the restaurant business as a startup business, it’s very, very difficult, and if the business model isn’t spot on, you have a tendency to have what we’ve had — businesses come in, businesses go out, businesses come in.

“Our objective is to get more stabilized entrepreneurs into the spaces, and I do believe the tenancy that [Pellegrino] is putting forward reflects that stability,” he went on, adding that infrastructure improvements continue in the area, including additional upgrades, including more uplighting and plantings, to Stearns Square, capitalizing on work previously undertaken at that landmark.

Overall, the city has made a large commitment — in funding but also other forms of support — to the stability and growth of the entertainment district, said Connors, noting that public sector support, in the form of loans and grants for initiatives like outdoor dining, interior renovations, and relocation costs, are critical at a time when banks are often reluctant to lend for restaurant and brewery initiatives.

Pellegrino agreed, adding that the investments being made in the three properties along that block of Worthington Street and the individual spaces for restaurants and other businesses are another factor in the success quotient.

“These are major facelifts … these are beautiful, state-of-the-art restaurants. They’re coming into beautifully renovated spaces,” he told BusinessWest. “There’s no guarantee that any restaurant is going to succeed, but this gives them the best opportunity to succeed.

“Everyone has to do their part,” he went on. “The restaurateur has to put out good food and atmosphere; we collectively, with the city, have to provide a safe atmosphere and parking, so it’s inviting, and people feel comfortable coming downtown.”

Whether this picture will come together as Pellegrino and city officials anticipate remains to be seen. But there is great anticipation about what’s behind all that plywood and brown paper.

It’s the next big chapter in the life and times of Springfield’s entertainment district.

Orlando Ramos

By George O'Brien June 5, 2025

Alumni Achievement Award

State Representative, 9th Hampden District

Orlando Ramos

Orlando Ramos when he was named to the 40 Under Forty class of 2014, and today (top)

Orlando Ramos has a small classic car collection.

He once had four vehicles, but recently sold a 1974 Corvette. He still has a 1970 Chevy Monte Carlo, a 1989 Chevy Camaro IROC-Z, and a 1991 Ford Escort, and shows them all at area shows.

The Escort doesn’t sound particularly sexy, and Ramos acknowledged that, but it has taken home a lot of hardware at those shows, as has the Monte Carlo, he said, adding that the Camaro wins at pretty much every competition he brings it to.

Beyond first-place ribbons, the cars bring Ramos memories, a chance to meet new people and add more friends to an already large roster, and, perhaps most importantly, some relaxing moments to counter the many chaotic ones at the State House and within his district.

“I try to drive them on the weekends when I get some downtime, and I do some car shows on the weekend if I’m not busy with work,” he told BusinessWest. “It takes my mind off things. That’s where I find my peace — driving my classic cars … no radio, just the sound of the engine with the windows down.”

He considers the cars a passion, one of two that he has, with the other being the city of Springfield, which is now his sole focus within the 9th District (he used to represent a small section of Chicopee).

He grew up in the City of Homes, among several other places (his family moved frequently in his youth), graduated from Putnam Vocational Technical High School, did some boxing in the city, and later settled in Indian Orchard, which he still calls home. He served on the City Council, including as its president, before being elected to the House, and ran, unsuccessfully, for Springfield mayor in 2023, leaving the door wide open for another run down the road.

Most of those who nominated Ramos for the Alumni Achievement Award — and there were several — called him an ambassador for the city, a mentor to young people, and, in many ways, an inspiration to those in the minority community.

FAST FACTS

Age: 42
40 Under Forty Class: 2014
Title Then: Springfield City Councilor
Title Now: State Representative, 9th Hampden District
Walk-up Song: “Aguanile” by Marc Anthony
Years an AAA Finalist: 2

In addition, he’s a prolific filer of bills designed, in many cases, to safeguard the interests of his constituents while also addressing inequalities that still exist on many levels.

Indeed, Ramos said he filed 27 bills at the beginning of this session, the most he’s ever filed, and they involve everything from regulations for facial surveillance technology (there currently are none) to measures to protect taxpayers and cities and towns from utility companies that withhold property taxes by closing existing loopholes.

“The law was intended to help small, mom-and-pop businesses and individual residents that were struggling to pay their tax bills,” he explained. “It wasn’t meant to help multi-billion-dollar utilities to abuse that loophole.”

In addition to all this work at the State House, Ramos remains actively involved with the community, whether it’s in his neighborhood, where he sits on the Indian Orchard Citizens Council; coaching in a basketball league; turning up at car shows; or supporting small businesses.

“I always try to show up at small businesses and festivals and community events and be supportive of everything that’s happening in the community,” said Ramos, who has a new initiative that touches on many of his priorities, goals, and efforts to make a difference.

It’s called Ties to Success, and it’s designed to teach young men in Springfield public schools how to tie a tie — what he calls an important but overlooked life skill.

“Eventually, I hope to reach every graduating class in the city,” he said, adding that, in this, the program’s inaugural year, he and others working with him started with about 30 students at Putnam.

“I’ve recruited about 15 volunteer mentors from the public and private sector,” he said. “In addition to learning how to tie a tie, each student will leave with a brand-new tie, written instructions, and the invaluable experience of connecting with positive role models from the business and government sectors.”

Speaking of tying the knot, Ramos, a proud single parent of daughter, Ariana, now 21 (who was his date at his 40 Under Forty gala), announced that he recently got engaged to a member of the 40 Under Forty class of 2024, Natalie Mercado, owner and CEO of Sweetera & Co.

That adds another passion to a man who has several, including those cars. You might say he’s a driving force for positive change. Many people do.

—George O’Brien

Ryan McCollum

By George O'Brien June 5, 2025

Alumni Achievement Award

Owner, RMC Strategies

Ryan McCollum

Ryan McCollum when he was named to the 40 Under Forty class of 2012, and today (top)

Ryan McCollum says he likes to have the circles in his life intersect.

And by circles, he means people who are in his life for various reasons — clients, friends, colleagues, elected officials — and causes and agencies he supports, everything from early childhood education provider Square One to the game of golf, especially for populations not generally associated with it.

To get his point across, McCollum gave a couple examples that help tell his story, and this particular story of how he is again a finalist for the coveted Alumni Achievement Award.

One references his involvement with a group called 16 Lyrics (formed with 15 friends), which is committed to combating racism and, among other initiatives, helps provide schools with books featuring diverse characters, authors, and storylines — “because, whether it was books or TV, it was hard to find characters that looked like me,” he noted.

“We had a golf tournament last year,” he said of 16 Lyrics. “I had Trap Golf, which I work with to bring people in the game, donate a bunch of stuff. I had a client from PricewaterhouseCoopers play with me. I made sure to ask elected officials to play or sponsor — we had a cart full of state reps. My wife and daughter helped in planning it. Circles intersected: my charitable world, a lobbying client, my family, and all my friends, and Get Set Marketing designed and printed all the tee signs and the like, and I work with them.”

FAST FACTS

Age: 45
40 Under Forty Class: 2012
Title Then: Owner and Principal, RMC Strategies; Marketing Consultant, Get Set Marketing
Title Now: Owner, RMC Strategies
Walk-up Song: “Get By” by Talib Kweli
Years an AAA Finalist: 2

The second example involves one of his clients, Holyoke Mayor Joshua Garcia, and the kickoff to his re-election campaign in February.

Garcia wanted Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll to attend, and McCollum made some calls and secured an appearance, not just for that announcement, but also for a tour of the Hope for Youth Arts Center (formerly CityStage), a project being undertaken by another McCollum client, Robert Bolduc, and his Center for Hope & Families Foundation. He also helped organize a fundraiser for the lieutenant governor at LightHouse Holyoke, a non-traditional middle and high school that is another McCollum client. And to top it off, Young at Heart, the Northampton-based chorus and yet another client, performed at the event.

You might say bringing worlds together and having circles intersect is what McCollum does. Professionally, he’s an entrepreneur, the owner of RMC Strategies, a consulting firm that partners with Get Set Marketing to provide one-stop shopping for those with political marketing needs. He’s worked on several campaigns over the years, including those for Garcia and State Rep. Orlando Ramos, another of this year’s AAA finalists (see story on page 19).

McCollum is also heavily involved in the community and has been for decades. He’s among the founders of the Young Professional Society of Greater Springfield and currently sits on several boards, including those for Square One, Suit Up Springfield, 16 Lyrics, the Healing Racism Institute of Pioneer Valley, and the National Conference for Community and Justice.

“When people ask me what I do, I tell them I’m a political consultant, I tell them I’m a lobbyist, but I do a lot of connecting of folks whom I think should be connected,” he said, adding that this unique and important skill has defined his professional career and personal life.

And it certainly explains why is a finalist for the Alumni Achievement Award for the second time in three years.

As does his outlook on simply … being kind.

“Kindness, and being kind, is a great business and career strategy, and on so many levels,” he told BusinessWest. “Especially in my business — the relationship business. Treating people kindly goes a long way. It can be hard to be kind all the time, because we’re all human … but it’s important, and it’s something I work on.”

As for the game of golf, McCollum plays whenever he can — he’s partial to Springfield’s municipal courses, Franconia and Veterans — and has become involved with various efforts and outfits, such as Trap Golf out of Atlanta, which was created to bring more people into the game, “especially communities that don’t intersect with it often,” as he put it.

“I like to be America’s golf guest,” he joked, adding that he plays with friends as well as entering tournaments for various causes throughout the summer.

“It’s a great game,” he went on, adding that, among other things, it provides more opportunities to enable circles to intersect and for him to continue his work as a connector.

—George O’Brien

FAST
FACTS

Age: 45

40 Under Forty Class: 2012

Title Then: Owner and Principal, RMC Strategies; Marketing Consultant, Get Set Marketing

Title Now: Owner, RMC Strategies

Walk-up Song: “Get By” by Talib Kweli

Years an AAA Finalist: 2

James Krupienski

By George O'Brien June 5, 2025

Alumni Achievement Award

Partner, Meyers Brothers Kalicka, P.C.

James Krupienski

Jim Krupienski when he was named to the 40 Under Forty class of 2010, and today (top)

It’s called Krupienski’s Korner.

That the name of the … let’s call it gathering spot in the break room at the accounting firm Meyers Brothers Kalicka.

Jim Krupienski is host and unofficial bartender at the Korner on Friday afternoons just after 5 during tax season. He said tax preparers and others at the firm can get a libation if they are so inclined, but also, and more importantly, a much-needed reprieve from the pressures that build as April 15 approaches.

FAST FACTS

Age: 46
40 Under Forty Class: 2010
Title Then: CPA Manager, Health Care and Pension Audit Divisions, Meyers Brothers Kalicka, P.C.
Title Now: Partner, Meyers Brothers Kalicka, P.C.
Walk-up Song: “Dream On” by Aerosmith
Years an AAA Finalist: 1

“It’s just a way for people to step away after a long week and just talk about something other than tax returns, take a deep breath, and unwind,” said Krupienski, noting that, with his Korner, he is continuing a tradition started years ago by retired partner Bob Perry, who operated Perry’s Pub for those same reasons.

Korner keeper is one just one of the many additional roles and responsibilities Krupienski has assumed since he joined the 40 Under Forty club in 2010. Then, he was CPA Manager for the Health Care and Pension Audit Divisions. Now, he’s one of six partners who together manage all operations at the firm.

Krupienski’s focus points are marketing and what’s known as the firm’s Business Development Group, an initiative that empowers emerging professionals to develop their networking skills, build a clientele, and foster strong client relationships.

To this and his many other assignments, Krupienski brings energy, creativity, a strong emphasis on teamwork, and a mindset of building a stronger firm through a focus on people. All this helps explain why he is a first-time finalist for the Alumni Achievement Award.

“Jim has not only enhanced his professional stature but also elevated the firm’s reputation in the broader business community,” wrote Howard Cheney, another of the firm’s partners, who nominated Krupienski for the honor. “This ongoing commitment to excellence, innovation, and community engagement has significantly contributed to the firm’s success and continued growth, marking Jim as a pivotal figure in its upward trajectory.

“Jim’s contributions to the firm’s corporate culture, especially through initiatives like Krupienski’s Korner, illustrate his dedication to creating a cohesive, supporting, and engaging workplace environment,” Cheney continued. “These somewhat intangible contributions to the firm are invaluable, playing a significant role in enhancing employee satisfaction and morale.”

Krupienski, who became partner in 2017, said his new role and responsibilities have created learning experiences on many levels that are, of course, continuing. He listed COVID as one of those experiences.

“That was an interesting, challenging time … we were all learning together,” he said of the partnership team. “We’d have partner meetings several times a week just to figure out the next steps while the governor was making his decisions; we were trying to figure it all out and make very quick, very real decisions that were impacting people and their well-being. And this was the in middle of tax season.

“Through it all, we learned a lot about ourselves, about our firm, about our employees — and in the end, we came out stronger,” he went on, adding that this learning continues on many levels.

And while he continues to mature as a leader, mentor, and motivator, Krupienski remains active in the community, especially in his home community of Westfield. There, he is involved with everything from Little League to the Chamber of Commerce to the YMCA. He is also current chair of the Westfield Foundation.

Meanwhile, he is involved with the firm’s many efforts to support area nonprofits and individual causes and initiatives. Under his influence, MBK has supported entities such as Habitat for Humanity of Greater Springfield and the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts through donations, volunteering, and raising awareness. He’s also a strong supporter of the firm’s Dress Down for Charity Days, a fundraising effort that benefits various local charities, including the Veterans Home at Holyoke and the Massachusetts Special Olympics.

And he is continually encouraging those at the firm, especially the young professionals, to get involved themselves, as supporters of nonprofits, but also as board members, roles that support those agencies but also help individuals develop into leaders in the community.

When not working — at MBK or in the community — Krupienski is usually spending time with family — wife Megan, son James, and daughter Hayley. His children were very young when he joined the 40 Under Forty club, but are now a junior in college and a graduating high school senior and softball player, respectively, with James poised to follow his father into the accounting field.

—George O’Brien

Amelia Holstrom

By George O'Brien June 5, 2025

Alumni Achievement Award

Partner, Skoler, Abbott & Presser, P.C.

Amelia Holstrom

Amelia Holstrom when she was named to the 40 Under Forty class of 2015 and today (top)

Amelia Holstrom won’t ever have any trouble remembering when she joined the 40 Under Forty club.

It was near the time her first child was born. Make that very near.

Indeed, the day after Holstrom posed for her 40 Under Forty photo — “they told me to bring a prop; I said, ‘isn’t my stomach enough of a prop?’” — she was in labor. She recalls being in the hospital after delivery and facing a deadline to pick a walk-up song for the gala.

FAST FACTS

Age: 39
40 Under Forty Class: 2015
Title Then: Associate Attorney, Skoler, Abbott & Presser
Title Now: Partner, Skoler, Abbott & Presser, P.C.
Walk-up Song: “Gonna Fly Now” from Rocky
Years an AAA Finalist: 1

“I didn’t have a lot of time to think, so I just went with the theme from Rocky,” she recalled, adding that the gala at the Log Cabin that June marked her first real public event since she gave birth to Carter, who is now 10 and an avid soccer player.

Attending his games, and also her younger son Reid’s track meets, are just a few of the many things Holstrom now packs into a busy schedule that also includes many forms of giving back, including several roles within her home community of Wilbraham, as well her day (and sometimes night) job as a partner with the Springfield-based law firm Skoler, Abbott & Presser.

It’s a schedule that’s helps explain why she is a finalist for the Alumni Achievement Award for 2025.

Holstrom was an associate attorney when she became a member of the class of 2015. Today, she is a partner and one of the leaders of a firm that specializes in employment law, a subject Holstrom likes to talk about, and on many different levels, from interviews with the press to leadership roles in events hosted by the Employers Assoc. of the NorthEast, MassHire Springfield, and others.

“I pride myself on being able to explain complex issues in everyday language so that everyone will understand and get a grasp of what they need to know.”

This is an intriguing area of the law, she told BusinessWest, one where there is both constant change and an overriding mission — to help employers stay on of top of all that change and, at the same time, avert potential legal trouble.

“In this area of the law, I have a unique opportunity to advise employers before something happens,” she said. “I can give them advice so that, if they are sued by an employee, they’re in the best position to defend that matter. And sometimes, I can guide them through the process with a specific employee issue, and a lawsuit never arises.

“Employment law is an area of the law that changes frequently, and it’s really important for employers to keep up with that change,” she went on. “If they don’t do that, they could find themselves facing a lawsuit, including a wage-and-hour claim or another type of claim. So I’ve dedicated my time to learning employment law inside and out, knowing everything there is to know.”

Helping employers navigate the rough seas created by constantly changing employment law requires several skills, said Holstrom, especially the ability to both listen and communicate effectively.

“One of my mentors when I first started with the firm really talked about how knowing the information is one thing, but being able to explain it to supervisors and managers in a way that is understandable is the most important part of the equation,” she noted. “I pride myself on being able to explain complex issues in everyday language so that everyone will understand and get a grasp of what they need to know.”

And there are several areas they need to know, including, most recently, paid family medical leave and issues involving diversity, equity, and inclusion.

As for other items on her busy schedule … these include serving with several area nonprofits, including the Girl Scouts of Central and Western Massachusetts, as chair of board development; the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, as a member of the personnel committee; Clinical & Support Options, as a board member and clerk; and the East of the River Five Town Chamber of Commerce, as legislative chair.

Meanwhile, in Wilbraham, she serves as vice chair of the town’s Commission on Disabilities, chair of the Personnel Advisory Board, and, most recently, library trustee; she filled a short-term vacancy on that board and was recently elected to a three-year term.

These various contributions to the community were recognized by the Massachusetts Bar Assoc., which honored Holstrom with its Community Service Award for Hampden County in 2016.

And then, there’s her family, for which she always finds time, and to which there will always be a special connection to 40 Under Forty.

—George O’Brien

Jeffrey Fialky

By George O'Brien June 5, 2025

Alumni Achievement Award

Managing Shareholder, Bacon Wilson, P.C.

Jeffrey Fialky

Jeff Fialky when he was named to the 40 Under Forty class of 2008, and today (top).

Jeff Fialky says being managing shareholder of a law firm allows him to “put my money where my mouth is.”

For decades, he’s been counseling business owners large and small on matters from personnel to growth through acquisition to being prepared for the future and whatever it might bring.

And now, he’s doing all of the above and more for Bacon Wilson, a firm celebrating its 130th birthday. Fialky says it’s his job — his mission, in fact — to make sure it’s around for another 130.

“We have 115 employees, four offices, and we’re looking to expand — we’re looking at other geographic areas, other firms, other attorneys looking to join,” he said. “And you balance that with a business with exponentially increasing expenses, which creates unique challenges, but is exciting for someone who has been representing businesses and business owners for 30 years.”

Including the recently announed class of 2025, there are 760 members of the 40 Under Forty club. Fialky is now among the … let’s call them ‘most senior.’

“Will humans get to a point where they’re satisfied looking at a blinking cursor and a computer screen? I don’t think I’ll see that in my lifetime, but as lawyers, as a legal industry, we must be thinking about what the future has in store.”

He was honored in 2008, the program’s second year, just a few years after joining Bacon Wilson as an associate. That was so long ago, honorees didn’t have their own walk-up music, as they do now. When asked what he may have chosen, Fialky gave an answer that spoke to just how many years have passed.

“My tastes have changed over time … it would probably be something country now,” he said. “Back then, probably Beastie Boys, Metallica, or something in between; now it’s country.”

While his tastes in music have changed over the years, so have the responsibilities for Fialky, a finalist for the Alumni Achievement Award several times early on (the award was created a decade ago), but not recently. His ascension to managing partner has something to do with his return to the field, as does his continued involvement with the community.

With the former, he noted, it’s an intriguing challenge at any time, but especially now — for the legal industry and for business in general.

FAST FACTS

Age: 55
40 Under Forty Class: 2008
Title Then: Associate Attorney, Bacon Wilson, P.C.
Title Now: Managing Shareholder, Bacon Wilson, P.C.
Walk-up Song: None
Years an AAA Finalist: 4

“I enjoy this side of what I do,” said Fialky, who remains chair of the firm’s corporate and commercial department and serves as the senior mergers and acquisitions attorney as well. “I enjoy the entrepreneurial aspect, as well as the management, and they’re different.

“The management side is the day-to-day, P&L and balance sheet, the budget,” he went on. “The entrepreneurial side is imagining where the future lies and the practice of law in the Pioneer Valley.”

Which brings him to the subject of AI, technology that is casting a shadow over the future if many industry sectors.

“I don’t think we’ve seen it yet in our day-to-day, but you have to be realistic that it is going to change the way the practice of law looks in the future, maybe five to 10 years out,” he told BusinessWest. “Predicting what that’s going to look like is more art than science, but you must be thinking that far out as you see the billions that are being invested in AI and will continue to be.

“For so long, people wanted to look their lawyer in the eye; they wanted to hear from a human being when they were asking, ‘what should I do?’” he went on. “Will humans get to a point where they’re satisfied looking at a blinking cursor and a computer screen? I don’t think I’ll see that in my lifetime, but as lawyers, as a legal industry, we must be thinking about what the future has in store.”

As for his work in the community, Fialky continues to be involved with several nonprofits and business groups. That list includes the Springfield Regional Chamber of Commerce, which he has served as a board member since 2007 and as chair from 2013 to 2016, and the Springfield Museums, which he has served as a trustee since 2012.

Previously, he has been involved with agencies and causes ranging from the United Way to the Young Professional Society of Greater Springfield; from Leadership Pioneer Valley to the American Cancer Society.

Today, while continuing to give back and leading Bacon Wilson into its next 130 years, he finds time for family, especially his son, Samuel, born just after he was presented with his 40 Under Forty plaque, and daughter Madeline.

“They’re both just wonderful, so I spend a lot of time with them,” said Fialky, the now country music fan who has returned to being a finalist for the Alumni Achievement Award.

—George O’Brien

For Nonprofits, It’s a Time of Challenge, High Anxiety

By George O'Brien May 22, 2025

Cover Story

Mission: Imperiled

Nicole Blais, CEO of Holyoke Chicopee Springfield Head Start

Nicole Blais was troubled when she clicked the link.

Forwarded to her by her the executive director of the Massachusetts Head Start Assoc., it led to an April 14 U.S. News & World Report article stating that the Trump administration was considering an FY 2026 budget that would zero out funding for Head Start.

Overall, the piece confirmed what Blais, CEO of Holyoke Chicopee Springfield (HCS) Head Start, already knew about the federal budget and this $12 billion line item — that a presidential budget is essentially a wish list, only Congress can allocate federal funding, and Head Start enjoys support on both sides of the aisle.

But she wasn’t in any mood to be complacent.

Indeed, within days, she had penned an op-ed for area media outlets, stating, “HCS Head Start is more than just a program; it is a lifeline that connects families to vital resources. The looming threats of federal funding cuts — especially to programs that safeguard the health and well-being of our children and families — is an issue affecting more than just those we serve.”

On May 2, said Blais, the president unveiled what’s known as a ‘skinny budget,’ which did not list Head Start as a program to be eliminated. But, as with that April 14 article, this latest report, while reassuring, is by no means final.

“That budget is just a proposal that’s sent to Congress. That was a good sign, but we’re still waiting to see the budget that Congress puts together before we exhale.”

“That budget is just a proposal that’s sent to Congress,” she said. “That was a good sign, but we’re still waiting to see the budget that Congress puts together before we exhale.”

There are many nonprofit managers and board members holding their collecting breath these days, including Andrew Morehouse, executive director of the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, who said proposed cuts to SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) funding and Medicaid would dramatically increase demand for the agency’s services at a time when demand is already soaring due to inflation and a softening jobs market.

“For the fiscal year October of 2023 to September 2024, we saw a 30% increase, and since then, we’ve seen a 10% increase,” he said, adding that this number will likely increase due to tariffs and other forms of pressure on consumers.

Meanwhile, several grants for area programs and initiatives have already been terminated, including:

• A $20 million grant from the Environmental Protection Agency to Springfield that was slated for home energy retrofits, air pollution monitoring, and de-leading of homes, an initiative involving several area nonprofits;

• A $1 million EPA grant to address asthma in Western Mass. through in-home environmental remediations, such as mold removal and improved ventilation, in Chicopee, Holyoke, and Springfield;

• A $50,000 National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grant to MASSMoCA in support of Jeffrey Gibson’s “Power Full Because We’re Different” exhibition;

• A $400,000 funding package from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to the Food Bank for the fiscal year ending in August; and

• A $20,000 grant from the NEA to Amherst Cinema for its Bellwether series, which promotes “creative, thoughtful, and inventive approaches to non-fiction cinema,” according to a statement from the theater.

That list, and it is certainly just a partial list, shows that the cuts have come across the broad spectrum of nonprofits, agencies in categories ranging from the arts to public health to food security.

Common denominators, aside from language from the Trump administration stating that the programs in question fall outside the administration’s priorities, are actions to appeal the cuts while also looking for other ways to fund them — when possible.

Andrew Morehouse says looming cuts to SNAP benefits and Medicaid could greatly increase demand for services provided by the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts.

That’s not possible with a $20 million grant or even a $1 million grant, but it is with the NEA’s grant to the Amherst Cinema, for example, and also with the cut to the Food Bank’s budget, and both agencies are appealing to the public.

Meanwhile, at least one nonprofit, the YWCA of Western Massachusetts, is considering the launch of a capital campaign to sustain programs that are funded by federal grants that are mostly no longer available (more on this later). And many nonprofits are reaching out to area foundations, not only with appeals for funding, but for support with efforts to find ways to collaborate with other agencies to meet needs within the community and keep their agencies active and financially stable.

“People are reaching out, and not just with appeals for direct funding; we’ve been in conversations with our current grantees and others in the nonprofit ecosystem, and we’ve been having conversations about how else we can be of service in these challenging times,” said Denise Hurst, vice president of Community Impact and Partnerships with the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts. “They’re asking about opportunities to partner with one another, share ideas, and collaborate in real time to navigate these difficult times.

“There’s still domestic violence going on, there’s still child abuse going on, there’s still sex trafficking going on, there’s still human trafficking going on, and there’s still stalking going on. And that means that the nonprofits in that arena that do that work are being stripped of the funding, and the survivors aren’t able to get the services they need.”

“We’re just four months into this new administration, and we’re really thinking about stabilization and sustainability of the nonprofit ecosystem,” she went on, adding that the region’s nonprofits not only meet critical needs, but they are an important pillar in the Western Mass. economy, providing not only jobs but critical services that benefit employers and their workforces.

For this issue, BusinessWest examines this time of challenge and high anxiety for nonprofits, what’s at stake, and how these agencies are responding.

Waiting to Exhale

As she talked about the plight of her agency, Liz Dineen, CEO of the YWCA of Western Massachusetts, shared information concerning grants from the Department of Justice for programs to assist those the agency serves.

They fall into various categories, such as transitional housing assistance grants for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking; grants to improve the criminal justice response program; the Sexual Assault Forensic Exam hiring and training program; and others, she said, adding that she and her staff continuously peruse the DOJ website, and, specifically, the Office of Violence Against Women, for notices of funding opportunities and apply to whatever is available.

Colleen Shanley-Loveless

“Private funding is not going to have the impact of some of these larger grants, and the state can’t make up for all of it.”

But starting in January and the start of the Trump administration, there has been very little available. Indeed, the DOJ recently terminated more than 360 victims’ services grants, which stripped hundreds of millions of dollars away from programs that promote public safety and provide victims and survivors with access to safety, security, and justice.

“Traditionally, at the beginning of February, there’s a bunch of new grants that are posted; they posted several new grants at the beginning of February, and then they pulled every one of them,” she explained. “There were no federal grants at all available for us to pursue.”

Recently, there were a few grants posted, one for Indian tribes and the other for rural areas, which meant this particular YWCA is ineligible for both, she went on, adding that the one program the agency could apply for had just 19 grants for the entire country.

“In the past, we might have had an opportunity to look at 30 to 35 grants; now we’re looking at one,” she said, adding that she’s found it difficult to even talk with anyone at the DOJ to get some direction on what’s happening — or not happening. “There’s a real dearth of opportunities out there right now.”

This reality prompted Dineen to consider a capital campaign so that the agency may continue to provide its services. A feasibility study is now underway, she noted, adding that the question isn’t whether there will be a campaign, but what the monetary goal should be.

“We’re trying to gauge what funders and foundations will be able to give us,” she said, acknowledging that, in most campaigns of this nature, funding is sought for capital projects such as a new building, but in this case, it’s to continue programming for which the agency can no longer secure grant funding.

“There’s still domestic violence going on, there’s still child abuse going on, there’s still sex trafficking going on, there’s still human trafficking going on, and there’s still stalking going on,” she said. “And that means that the nonprofits in that arena that do that work are being stripped of the funding, and the survivors aren’t able to get the services they need.”

What Dineen is experiencing — and her response, in terms of both action to keep programs running and strong words about what will happen if they are curtailed or eliminated — is being repeated across the region, at dozens of nonprofits.

Including Revitalize Community Development Corp. (CDC), where President and CEO Colleen Shanley-Loveless is responding to the termination of that $1 million grant to combat asthma as well as a $1.5 million stake in the EPA grant to Springfield that was terminated.

The former went to the state Department of Public Health, she said, adding that roughly $900,000 was left to be spent on the Healthy Homes program and initiatives that have been successful in bringing the rates of asthma down in this region.

“Indoor air quality in housing is impacted by gas stoves, older housing stock with leaky roofs, poor ventilation, etc.,” she said. “We piloted healthy homes work with Revitalize CDC and the city of Springfield. The work to address housing needs is critical to keep people healthy; these are proven interventions to help folks control asthma.”

Elaborating, she said funds have been terminated, or are in limbo, for several air-quality-related initiatives, including an EPA grant to the Hitchcock Center in Amherst and Springfield’s $20 million EPA Community Challenge grant, and the impact from these cuts could be devastating, with area health officials projecting increases in asthma hospitalizations and the cost of that care, as well as higher morbidity and mortality rates.

Jessica Collins

“We were being set up for a decade’s work to engage, educate, and inform people of how climate impacts health, but also to work with partners like the city of Springfield to literally change policy and infrastructure. And now, all of that will be paused.”

Shanley-Loveless said her agency has diverse funding streams and some public support, but nothing that can make up for the loss of millions of dollars in federal grants.

“Private funding is not going to have the impact of some of these larger grants, and the state can’t make up for all of it,” she explained. “And that’s the challenging part; $1.5 million is a large amount — if we apply to a foundation for $50,000, that’s a good amount, but it doesn’t come close to the amount and the impact of those federal grants.”

Clearing the Air — or Not

Jessica Collins, executive director of the Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts, agreed, adding that, while nonprofits of all kinds are under duress, the Trump administration seems to be “piling on” when it comes to those involved with public health.

She has some theories about why, including lingering resentment over how the COVID crisis was handled. But the ‘why’ isn’t as important as the ‘what,’ she noted.

“The attack on climate change is really devastating,” said Collins, adding that her agency was to be a major subcontractor to Springfield to help the city carry out strategies related to that $20 million EPA grant, just one initiative in the broad realm of climate change her agency was slated to be involved in.

“We were being set up for a decade’s work to engage, educate, and inform people of how climate impacts health, but also to work with partners like the city of Springfield to literally change policy and infrastructure,” she said. “And now, all of that will be paused.”

There will be appeals to lawmakers to restore the funds and, in many cases, lawsuits to accomplish that same end, said Collins and others we spoke with, but nonprofits are bracing for the possibility, if not the probability, that they will have to move on without that funding.

And that has implications for individual nonprofits as they look to maintain staff and carry out missions, as well as their various partners in various initiatives.

“Last year, our budget was $4 million, but more than $1 million went out to 35 different organizations in subcontracts,” she explained. “So when we take a hit, everyone else kind of takes a hit as well because we’re seen as a convener and a lot of the funding we get is collaborative.”

And while shoes have already dropped for many nonprofits, others are bracing for the possibility that they might be impacted as well, while hoping they’re not — while at the same time acknowledging that hope is not a strategy.

That’s certainly the case at the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, where the threat of cuts to SNAP benefits and Medicaid loom large over the agency and all those food pantries and survival centers that it supports.

“To the extent that those programs are cut, more people will turn to their local food pantry, meal site, and, ultimately, the Food Bank for more food,” said Morehouse, adding that a 20% cut in SNAP benefits has been proposed, which, if it becomes reality, would result in the loss of 19 million meals in Western Mass.

“That’s more than the Food Bank provides in a whole year, our entire inventory,” he went on, adding that there are nearly 200,000 people in the four counties of Western Mass. that receive SNAP benefits totaling $35 million a month. “That’s a lot of food, and it would, at the very least, result in a tremendous increase in demand for food assistance to make up for that loss. This would be a devastating blow.”

The same sentiment prevails at HCS Head Start, where Blais is optimistic that Head Start will remain in the federal budget, but not complacent given what’s at stake.

“At a time when the early-education world is rebounding from COVID and we’ve been so focused on providing access, this would be a ginormous step in the wrong direction,” she said, adding that Head Starts are “making noise” locally and nationally about how cuts to the agency would impact young people, families, and businesses still struggling to maintain workforces. “It’s like that ripple on a pond. Head Start reaches so many people; it’s not just families and children in the classroom.”

In the wake of cuts (and possible cuts), area nonprofit leaders are responding in many different ways — from hard looks at other sources of funding to educating the public and elected leaders alike on what’s at stake with these cuts, to looking at ways to collaborate to provide needed services.

Hurst told BusinessWest that the Community Foundation has received calls from nonprofits across a broad spectrum — including public health, the arts, environmental justice, and higher education — about cuts, what they mean, and how their broad impact can be mitigated.

“We’re doing a lot of deep listening, learning, and connecting them with resources,” she said. “We’re connecting them with other organizations so they can think about resource sharing and partnering with other organizations that are also trying to figure out next steps and strategy around culturing some of these funding losses as well as stabilizing internal operations.

“We’re there to listen, and thinking about ways to use that information that we’re gathering to influence and inform how we move forward,” Hurst went on, adding that the discussions are far more about strategies for meeting needs than plugging gaps in funding — because the gaps are too large to plug.

“We’re having discussions and conversations with donors about the importance of giving locally and regionally,” she said, “and how to be more strategic and intentional with their giving, both in the current and the long term.”

Fast Pace of Change Clouds Projections for Auto Industry

By George O'Brien May 22, 2025

Autos Special Coverage

Too Many Moving Parts

‘Fascinating.’

That’s the first word Ben Sullivan, chief operating officer at Balise Motor Sales, used to describe the current landscape for the auto industry, and especially dealers, as tariffs of some kind, involving some countries and some products, loom over the sector.

He would use many others, especially ‘uncertainty’ and ‘volatility,’ terms that explain why, by and large, the large Balise stable of dealerships across Western Mass., Connecticut, and Cape Cod isn’t really doing much of anything at this point in response to what’s happening and is conducting what could be described business as usual.

That includes refraining from use of ‘beat the tariffs prices’ advertisements and similar messages that many others have deployed — although they’ve been discussed.

“We just didn’t think we had enough clarity to do that,” Sullivan said, hitting on just how much uncertainty exists today. “If we’re going to say something to our customers, we have to make sure that we’re on solid ground. We absolutely stayed away from creating any kind of frenzy around these things because we just don’t know if it’s true or not.”

But while it’s business as usual in some respects, dealers are certainly doing more business than usual for this time of year.

“Consumers are getting smart when it comes to how to manipulate the market and take advantage of the best opportunity and time to upgrade their vehicle and learning how to really maximize their equity.”

Indeed, while Sullivan said sales in March and April were up 24% over that same period a year ago, Carla Cosenzi, president of TommyCar Auto Group, which has five dealerships in Hampshire County, put the number at more than 30% across all brands, with Hyundai and Volkswagen leading the way.

“We’ve seen a surge in consumer urgency — they’re trying to get ahead of the potential tariffs,” she said. “And, right now, incentives are still good — there are a lot of low APRs available for consumers across the board — and their trade values are worth more than now than they were a month ago or two months ago. That combination is driving a sense of urgency.”

Other impacts include:

• An increase in leasing, as consumers in need of a new car survey the situation and see that option as a way to get a decent price and buy themselves some time until there is more clarity on what will happen long-term, or at least longer-term;

• With uncertainty about new cars, marked growth in demand for used cars, with prices holding generally steady, at least for now, said Cosenzi, adding that this demand translates into those higher trade-in values she mentioned; and

• A similar increase in demand for service contracts as consumers read and hear about how the prices of parts might be soaring as well due to tariffs.

“Consumers are getting smart when it comes to how to manipulate the market and take advantage of the best opportunity and time to upgrade their vehicle and learning how to really maximize their equity,” said Cosenzi as she surveyed the landscape and what’s she’s seeing from her front-row seat regarding all of the above.

Ben Sullivan says there are too many variables and unknowns to say with any kind of certainty what the short and long term look like for auto dealers.

As for what comes next … well, that’s where uncertainty takes over, especially with headlines changing seemingly every week, or even every day, on the levels of tariffs, possible exemptions, new deals with countries — such as the 90-day truce recently struck with China — and possibly individual manufacturers, and more.

“Nobody’s making major adjustments — the manufacturers are not making wild swings in what they’re doing because the landscape is changing almost by the day,” said Sullivan, who drew a parallel to the recent run on iPhones, a surge that quickly abated when it was announced that there would be exemptions on those products, but then picked up again when it was announced that the chips inside them would not be exempt.

“Overall, I don’t believe the tariff news will end up being as bad as we fear or as good as we hope,” said Sullivan as he summed things up, adding that it is simply too soon to know what will happen in the months and years to come.

Cosenzi agreed, noting that, beyond prices, inventory will be something to watch. Availability will likely become more limited, she said, adding that the great unknowns are when and to what degree this will happen.

“It’s too soon to really know, and it depends on the brand, but we’re starting to see that slowdown with brands like Volvo and VW,” she noted, adding that she doesn’t know if these cars are still in Europe or at the dock waiting for the smoke to clear. “It’s really complicated right now, and it’s very gray, so it’s hard for us to give consumers a clear picture.”

‘Fascinating.’ ‘Complicated.’ ‘Volatile.’ ‘Gray.’ These are the adjectives that describe the current state of the auto sales market, and it appears they will prevail for some time.

Driving Forces

March and April are traditionally not big months in the auto industry, said those we spoke with. They’re not bad months, necessarily, but they’re not like February (the real start of the sales season), end of year, or even some summer months, when there are usually deals to be had.

But this year was, of course, different.

With the coming of President Trump’s Liberation Day and news reports of car prices rising several thousand dollars as a result of traiffs, consumers took the initiative and found not only locked-in prices, but some incentives as well, said Cosenzi, adding that demand has been steady across the board, brand-wise, with small to mid-sized SUVs still dominating sales. Overall, the trend continues even as the rhetoric on tariffs continues to soften.

“When you back it up and look into an industry like ours with a truly global supply chain, it is nearly impossible right now to determine all of the impacts.”

Some of these buyers needed a new car, she said, but most were trying to beat the clock when it comes to expected price hikes and reduced availability.

“They may not necessarily be in the market for a new car, but they’re saying, ‘I might as well take advantage of the market conditions and upgrade sooner rather than later,” she explained, adding that this surge speaks to still-high levels of confidence in the economy.

Meanwhile, some manufacturers are price-protecting until the end of May and June in some cases, which provides even more incentive to buy now.

“If someone is in the market for a new car or coming up to be in the market, this is the perfect time to purchase,” said Cosenzi, adding that, while no one has a crystal ball and can say what the landscape will look like in six months or even six weeks, it is unlikely that it will look as good as it does now for consumers.

So, for now, it is still business as usual, and more of it. The overriding question is for how long. And no one really knows.

There are too many variables, especially when it comes to the impact on the thousands of parts that go into a vehicle, how many times these parts cross boundaries, and, thus, how many times they may be subject to a tariff.

“When you back it up and look into an industry like ours with a truly global supply chain, it is nearly impossible right now to determine all of the impacts,” Sullivan said. “A car might be assembled in Alabama, but there are parts from all over the world. And some of those things start as a small part, get put into an assembly, they cross the country border, get into the next stage of development … some of these assemblies might cross a country border seven times. So, if the tariffs become stackable, it would be devastating to consumers.”

Which explains the surge in new-car and used-car buying in March and April, but also the increases in leasing and service contracts as consumers digest the news and look to beat some worst-case scenarios with regard to both pricing and availability.

“With the tariffs, inventories will start to tighten, and consumers want to get ahead of that,” Cosenzi said. “They don’t want to be in a situation like the one they were in with COVID, where if they wanted a car, they really had to sacrifice what they were looking for in terms of color or trim.”

Carla Cosenzi says March and April were much busier than normal amid tariff and inventory concerns, and that trend is continuing.

While this is certainly a good time to buy, and many consumers are, Sullivan said Balise has been reluctant to encourage consumers to buy now because of the high levels of uncertainty and the pace at which the landscape is changing.

“Most industry analysts say the average car price could go up by between $4,000 and $15,000 if all this comes to pass,” he noted. “There will certainly be some cost increase, but I don’t think it will be as severe as people fear at this point. But there is so much that is not known.”

Dealers are already seeing swings in consumer activity, he went on, adding that, while April was a very strong month for Balise, by late April, as the headlines started to reflect a softening of tone on tariffs, the pace of sales eased accordingly.

He drew some parallels to the early months of COVID, when news of shortages of paper towels and toilet paper sent consumers into stores for what amounted to panic buying.

It’s not quite like that with auto sales, but there was a similar knee-jerk reaction, Sullivan said, adding that the frenzy, if it can be called that, is already abating.

Bottom Line

Returning to his analogy with iPhones, Sullivan said it provides some appropriate context for any conjecture on what might happen next in his industry.

“You go to bed one night assuming that your iPhone is going to cost $2,000, and the next morning, it’s still going to be $800 to $900 for the top-end models that it was the day before,” he said, adding that the same is likely — not definite, but likely — to be the case with all those mid-sized SUVs on the market today.

But no one really knows.

So dealers have to be ready, willing, and able to adjust on the fly and absorb whatever comes at them, Cosenzi said, adding that, over the past several years, they’ve had plenty of practice at pivoting.

“This is a really challenging industry anyway, so dealers have to be resilient to be able to be in this business,” she explained. “We know how to pivot quickly and adjust to whatever the customers’ needs and demands are, and that’s what we’re doing in these unsettled times.”

That’s what’s needed when there are so many moving parts, literally and figuratively.

Great Barrington Is a True Destination

By George O'Brien May 22, 2025

Community Spotlight Special Coverage

Community Spotlight

The Daniel Arts Center is one of many individual pieces on the Bard College of Simon’s Rock campus that have caught the attention of developers.

John Weinstein said the phones started ringing seemingly within hours after the news broke last November.

This was the official announcement that Bard College at Simon’s Rock, an institution in Great Barrington for 60 years, would be closing its campus there and relocating programs to Bard College’s main campus in New York for the start of fall classes.

The phone calls were — and are (they’re still coming at a good clip) — from those interested in acquiring and developing all or a piece of the 280-acre campus, with a wide range of specific intentions, including housing.

“The inquiries have ranged from totality to the very granular,” said Weinstein, the school’s vice president and provost, meaning everything from the entire campus to individual buildings to specific pieces of equipment.

Interest in those pieces picked up in intensity with passage of an overlay zone at the recent town meeting, one that will permit many different uses beyond education, said Weinstein, adding that some uses — cannabis facilities and an amusement park, for example — are still not allowed.

The fate of the Bard campus and the prospect of losing such a large contributor to the Great Barrington economy are at the top of a long list of storylines involving this picturesque Southern Berkshires community and its mostly tourism-driven business community.

“The inquiries have ranged from totality to the very granular.”

“This will have an impact on the town in multiple ways,” said Betsy Andrus, executive director of the Southern Berkshire Chamber of Commerce, based in Great Barrington. “We won’t have the influx of students coming into the town for shopping and eating, and you also have teachers and staff, an athletic center, and the Daniel Arts Center; it’s certainly a loss for this area.”

A loss that is in many ways balanced by anticipation about what might come next.

As for other storylines, they include everything from new ownership for several downtown properties — and reshaping of those properties for retail and office use (including a new home for the chamber) as well as residential units — to lingering housing concerns, especially a shortage of affordable, or ‘workforce,’ units, putting a burden on both business owners and their employees.

“This whole area needs more workforce housing; our employees can find places to live, but often at a fairly substantial commute,” said Janis Martinson, executive director of the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center. “It’s a real challenge; people are coming a long way to get to work because they don’t have a choice.”

Janis Martinson says the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center will open a second facility later this year, one of many efforts to connect the community to the arts.

On another note (pun intended), this is shaping up to be a big year for the Mahaiwe, built in 1905, which has a full slate of performances on tap — from classic movies like Casablanca, shown on Valentine’s Day, and Sabrina, which aired May 23, to a Brian Cox tribute to opera, comedy, and a wide variety of musical performances — and is set to open an accessory venue in the town’s former fire station.

“A group of businesspeople have restored the firehouse, and they’re leasing us a portion of the first floor,” said Martinson, adding that the building is roughly the same age as the Mahaiwe. “We’re using that as an intimate, flexible performance venue and a concession space.”

The Mahaiwe is one of many key contribitors to a vibrant downtown that has made a near-complete recovery from COVID and extensive infrastructure work in the central business district, said Martinson, adding that, while Great Barrington once had slow times of the year — most of September, for example — it is now vibrant year-round.

“I think the town has grown a little younger,” she said. “And while there used to be some times when it would be pretty sleepy, it’s not like that anymore; this is a 12-month-a-year busy town.”

Andrus agreed, noting that the investments made in several downtown properties will bring more people, and more vibrancy, to the area, with some new businesses and several existing ones with new mailing addresses.

“I think the town has grown a little younger. And while there used to be some times when it would be pretty sleepy, it’s not like that anymore; this is a 12-month-a-year busy town.”

“Change is always a positive thing,” she said, noting that several existing businesses have or will find new and better spots. Meanwhile, new housing units equate to more people living in the central business district — and more opportunities for some workers to shorten their commute.

For this latest installment of its Community Spotlight series, BusinessWest takes an in-depth look at Great Barrington and the many developing stories in this destination community.

A Loss — and an Opportunity

Weinstein said the decision to close Bard College’s Great Barrington campus and relocate its various programs — early college and some high-school offerings — came down to numbers.

Getting more specific, he said it was the number of students that would make sustaining that campus feasible. That number is at least 450 and preferably much higher, he noted, adding that the school hasn’t been able to reach that threshold, and with current demographic shifts — specifically fewer high-school-age people — it wasn’t going to get there anytime soon.

So the decision was made to move the school and its programs to the main Bard campus, where economies of scale will make this operation much more sustainable, said Weinstein, adding quickly that, while this move represents a loss for the community, the campus as a whole and its individual parts present a unique development opportunity.

And the zoning overlay district certainly helps in this redevelopment, said Weinstein and others we spoke with, noting that it will permit operation of an athletic center and performing-arts center — those are just two examples — without a school being attached.

“Those most interested in the future of the property did that shift,” said Weinstein, noting that the redevelopment of the campus will afford the town an opportunity to address some of its pressing needs and challenges, a list that certainly includes housing.

Great Barrington at a Glance

Year Incorporated: 1761
Population: 7,172
Area: 45.8 square miles
County: Berkshire
Residential Tax Rate: $13.79
Commercial Tax Rate: $13.79
Median Household Income: $95,490
Median Family Income: $103,135
Type of Government: Open Town Meeting
Largest Employers: Fairview Hospital; Iredale Mineral Cosmetics; Prairie Whale
* Latest information available

Andrus agreed, noting, as Martinson did, that businesses and their employees are impacted by the current lack of affordable housing.

Many of these businesses are in the broad tourism, hospitality, and retail sectors, said Andrus, noting that Great Barrington draws visitors from nearby New York, other communities within the Berkshires, and well beyond. Meanwhile, its population increases threefold in the summer, from 7,000 to 21,000, as snowbirds and those with second homes in the area return.

“With that influx of people, even going to the grocery store can be chaotic,” she noted, adding that the town’s character changes as its population swells, especially the central business district.

Residents and visitors alike enjoy a very walkable downtown that features attractions like the Mahaiwe, a diverse lineup of restaurants, and unique arts-related programs such as Berkshire Busk — organized street entertainment (everything from singers and flamenco dancers to poets and aerialists) that runs on Railroad Street and other parts of the downtown on Friday and Saturday nights from early July to Labor Day.

There have been some changes within this downtown, and more are on the way, as some aging properties have changed hands, said Andrus, adding that this list includes the so-called Mahaiwe Block, the Marble Block, and other properties.

“All these buildings have changed hands to younger, probably more energetic people,” she said, adding that these landmarks are being renovated and, in some cases, reimagined, with mixes of retail, office, and much-needed housing.

The chamber’s new home at 343 Main St., across from Town Hall, is a good example. The property there, acquired and redeveloped by the Alander Group, will house the chamber’s offices as well as an enlarged visitors’ center, as well as other retail, 15 apartments, and a wine bar, said Andrus, noting that, prior to its move, the chamber was in two locations, a small visitors’ booth in front of CVS and a business office on Railroad Street, a situation that was less than ideal.

“It was like working in a cave — it was hard to find; it wasn’t easily accessible,” she said of the Railroad Street location. “Now, we’ve combined the business office and visitors center, and it’s a real improvement.”

The Alander Group also owns the Mahaiwe Block, which houses the performing arts center, she said, adding that it also features retail and housing units.

Meanwhile, at the Marble Block on Main Street, the former Gorham & Norton grocery store, a fixture for generations, is being remade into Robbie’s Community Market, said Andrus, adding that the property will soon feature several apartments as well. As for the market, it will be a collective, including a coffee bar, pizza oven, sandwich shop, and more, combining the past — this was a soda counter decades ago — with the present.

Taking Center Stage

These investments, as well as the new or relocated businesses and residents they bring to the area, will create more vibrancy in the downtown, said Andrus, adding that, overall, the downtown continues to thrive and build on its status as a destination.

Martinson agreed. She took the reins as executive director of the Mahaiwe in January 2020, just two months before COVID arrived and essentially shut down its scheduled season.

But the facility survived that challenge by getting creative, she recalled, adding that one of first initiatives that year was to partner with Bard College at Simon’s Rock to create a drive-in movie theater in one of its parking lots.

“They had a parking lot outside their performing arts center that happened to be tiered down a hillside, so we could have all the cars facing in one direction and put the screen at the bottom of the hill,” she recalled, adding that the schedule included a few of the Star Wars movies, American Graffiti, The Princess Bride, and other family stalwarts.

“That’s how we got through summer,” she went on, adding that the Mahaiwe partnered with other performing arts nonprofits in the area to record concerts from its stage in efforts that were more about the arts than revenues. “We managed to stay in touch with our community throughout the pandemic, and that’s really the point — to bring people together, and bring them together around the performing arts.”

This creative spirit continues today, she said, adding that the facility hosted more than 125 individual events last year and will grow that number this year, especially with the opening of the new space in the renovated former fire station.

“We’ll be able to do much more intimate performances there — things that are a little more niche and involving emerging artists and more local artists,” Martinson told BusinessWest. “And we’ll be able to rent that space out to local performing arts organizations.

“We’re really excited about that coming online,” she went on, adding that there have been some ‘sneak previews,’ with a planned opening for later in the year, probably the fall.

The auxiliary theater is part of a broader five-year strategic plan now in year two, said Martinson, adding that, in simple terms, the plan calls for bringing more performing arts than it already brings to its main stage and “reaching further into our community.”

That community includes Great Barrington residents, but also visitors from a wide radius, she said, adding that this town is a true destination, one that has made its way all the way back from the dark days of COVID.

And one that is looking to turn the loss of Bard College at Simon’s Rock into new opportunities.

Project Will Restore WMA Chapel, Make It a Gathering Place

By George O'Brien May 9, 2025

Education

Turning Back the Clock

The historic chapel, seen above in an archival photo, will be restored to its former glory and given a new role as a dining facility, as seen in the architect’s rendering below.

architect’s rendering

Brian Easler calls it “an inflection point … a seismic shift in the academy’s upward trajectory.”

He was referring to a $20 million project to create a new kitchen and servery at Wilbraham & Monson Academy (WMA) and convert its historic chapel into a dining commons.

Those phrases ‘inflection point’ and ‘seismic shift’ refer to several aspects of this project and cover a lot of ground. Indeed, they reference everything from the magnitude of the upgrade in dining facilities — from fairly nondescript quarters to the fully restored chapel, with its vaulted ceilings and stained-glass windows, what students are calling the ‘Harry Potter dining hall’ — to the way this project will shift still more of the activity at WMA to the east side of Main Street, thus reducing traffic crossing the busy street.

“This will move the center of the campus from the west side of Main Street to the east side,” said Easler. “And that will generate a 70% reduction in student Main Street crossings, which is just one big impact.”

Meanwhile ‘inflection point’ also refers to the way this project galvanized the WMA community and especially its alumni base, from which the vast majority of the funds for the project were raised.

“This was not one of those fund-raising efforts where you put the ask out to everyone in the community … 7,000 alumni and everyone chips in,” Easler explained. “This was a handful of donors already close to the school, already close to me.

“We went out to them with personal appeals from the school to see if they were interested in the project,” he went on. “We were fortunate in that they were all interested in the project, and they were almost all able to help us with it; that’s how we were able to make it happen relatively quicky.”

“This space will serve as a unifying gathering place for our community. The dining commons will become the heart and soul of our campus, and a central part of the student experience.”

Elaborating, he said there were two lead gifts — from donors he was not ready to name — that generated much-needed momentum for the initiative, one for $7 million, the other for $5 million. “Several other people picked up on that momentum, and that enabled us to get to $20 million.”

Groundbreaking ceremonies were staged on April 25. Work is slated to commence soon, and the plan is to have the facility ready for the start of the 2026-27 school year.

Easler said the initiative represents the next phase in the school’s master plan for its campus, one with several components, including the construction of a new athenaeum, completed in 2020, which is connected to the chapel and will be connected to the new kitchen and server area, with the current dining hall to be converted to a state-of-the-art large-capacity theater and performance and meeting space.

The past and present will come together — literally, and in powerful ways, said Easler, noting that the rough-hewn brownstone exterior chapel will become the servery’s interior wall.

“During the day, the skylights will illuminate the servery with natural light,” said Easler, “highlighting the beauty of the original brownstone exterior and creating a stunning backdrop for a modern country-kitchen style.”

But while the project has many aspects to it, in many respects, the chapel is the primary focus. Completed in 1870, it has been used sparingly in recent years — for school meetings once a week, said Easler. It’s transformation into a dining hall will make it a much larger part of the school’s identity and its daily activity.

“This space will serve as a unifying gathering place for our community,” said Easler. “The dining commons will become the heart and soul of our campus, and a central part of the student experience.”

And the project will turn back the clock and restore the chapel to its original elegance and architectural allure.

“We have photos of the chapel when it was first constructed; it was magnificent on the inside, with exposed beams and stained-glass dormers,” said Easler. All of that is still up there, but it was covered with sheet rock somewhere along the line, probably to minimize the cubic yards that had to be cooled or heated. We have other ways to mitigate that now, so we’ll be opening it back up to its original beauty, and it will be a stunning dining room.”

Dave Fontaine Jr., CEO with Fontaine Bros., the general contractor for the project, as well as the athenaeum, agreed, noting that this project falls into several categories, everything from new construction to what would be considered historic renovation.

“It’s a very cool project,” he told BusinessWest. “There’s a lot of history in the chapel, it’s a really cool building, and I think this will be a gem of a project when it’s completed.”

— George O’Brien

Link to Libraries Creates Fund to Honor Steve, Sue Kaplan

By George O'Brien May 9, 2025

Education

Recognizing a Legacy of Giving Back

Steve and Sue Kaplan, left, with Laurie Flynn, executive director of Link to Libraries, and John Doleva, president and CEO of the Basketball Hall of Fame, a strong supporter of the agency.

As she talked about Steve Kaplan and his many contributions to the nonprofit Link to Libraries, Laurie Flynn, the agency’s executive director, didn’t start with his service on the board, his lengthy stint as treasurer, or even his role as quiet, behind-the-scenes co-founder with his wife, Susan Jaye Kaplan.

No, she started by talking about the manner in which Kaplan, who passed away in January after a lengthy battle with brain cancer, adopted, for lack of a better word, the Kensington International School in Springfield — because, in many ways, that says even more about him.

“He started off as a volunteer reader,” she recalled, noting that the nonprofit helps place such readers in schools across the region to help encourage young people to read. “And he turned it into so much more; it became near and dear to him. He tutored there, he did all kinds of things, and he did it without asking for a spotlight … he just quietly gave and gave and gave.

“He always joked that he was “Mr. Susan Jaye Kaplan,” Flynn went on. “But he was a force in his own right; it was just different energy.”

It was that above-and-beyond approach at the Kensington School, and the varying forms of energy displayed by both Kaplans that helped inspire Flynn to create a legacy fund in both their names to help continue and even expand LTL’s service to the young people in the region.

Susan Jaye Kaplan, as most now know, co-founded not only LTL but also the nonprofit GoFIT. She was honored for her work with BusinessWest’s Difference Maker award in 2009.

“When Steve passed in January, I thought it was an important time to honor his work and Sue’s work, and their work as a couple in Western Mass.”

“When Steve passed in January, I thought it was an important time to honor his work and Sue’s work, and their work as a couple in Western Mass.,” she told BusinessWest. “They’ve done so much, not just for Link to Libraries, but we’re a huge piece of their legacy. It seemed to me that … when you look at the two of them, and how much they gave, not just through the schools, but through community partnerships, it seems like a great opportunity, a great way to honor their legacy, to have something that is permanently part of Link to Libraries, that is dedicated to doing more than we’re doing now.”

Elaborating, Flynn said the Stephen Kaplan & Susan Jaye Kaplan Community Legacy Fund, which was formally announced at LTL’s biennial fund-raising ball at the Basketball Hall of Fame, will enable the nonprofit to extend its reach, and impact.

“While most of Link to Libraries’ work is done through underserved elementary schools, we frequently receive requests from other local nonprofits for book donations to support their own work with children and families in need,” she explained. “We do our very best to say ‘yes’ to every book request we get, but we have limited funds, limited ability to do that.

“By creating this fund and having this cache of money set aside to support our community partners, who are serving the same kids and families that we are, that will enable our reach to expand,” she went on, adding that that the legacy fund will be a permanent fixture at LTL.

Flynn said there is no specific goal for the fund, adding that whatever is raised — and she is expecting support from individuals and businesses alike — will enable LTL to support more groups serving children and families, such as the Salvation Army, the Springfield Museums, and countless others.

“Steve’s passing was a terrible loss to our Link to Libraries family, to the Western Massachusetts community, and to all who knew and loved him,” said Flynn. “We hope that this tribute will be a living reminder of Sue and Steve’s tireless work and passion for improving the lives of others.”

For more information on the legacy fund, visit linktolibraries.org.

— George O’Brien

Go Graphix Founders Mark 20 Years of Persistence, Evolution

By George O'Brien May 8, 2025

Cover Story

Co-founders Gary Stone (left) and Jim White. Photo by Bob Zemba, Simple Truth Imaging

Jim White calls them ‘transformations.’

Architectural transformations, to be more precise. These are graphics such as wall coverings, murals, treatments for ceilings and windows, door wraps, and more.

They help individual businesses create environments that stand out, that help attract and retain employees, and that probably help improve productivity, said White, noting that these transformations have become a big part of the growing portfolio of products and services at East Longmeadow-based Go Graphix, which he founded with partner Gary Stone in 2005.

“These days, businesses want to create a more-exciting environment, something that’s a little more welcoming, more interesting, more brand-centric,” said White, noting that the company has created architectural graphics for a wide range of businesses and institutions, from Baystate Children’s Hospital to Central High School; UMass Amherst Athletics to the new Doherty Memorial High School in Worcester; White Lion Brewing to Providence College.

These architectural installations represent just one example of how this company, which started humbly, handling mostly printing and copying services, has achieved a transformation itself, into a multi-faceted branding firm with a roster of products and services — from signs to vehicle wrapping — best summed up by its own marketing slogans — ‘’branding where you need it,’ and ‘you name it, we’re on it.’

Go Graphix is an intriguing business story, one that brings together many of the elements of entrepreneurship — especially a desire to leave the corporate world behind and start a business from scratch, a decision White and Stone made together, over time, while working for medical laser producers Biolitec and then Lumenis.

White was serving the latter as director of Global Marketing, and Stone as national sales manager, when they decided to ditch the travel, time away from their families, and ample amounts of stress for … well, less travel, more time with their families, but often more stress and of a different kind.

“These days, businesses want to create a more-exciting environment, something that’s a little more welcoming, more interesting, more brand-centric.”

As they looked back on 20 years in business — and expansion from a tiny storefront in East Longmeadow to two adjacent buildings in the town’s industrial park — they talked about the roller coaster ride that is entrepreneurship, how nothing has really come easy, but also how there are many rewards from persevering and working through the hard times.

“Our persistence is definitely what kept us going,” said Stone. “We had many opportunities to quit or to get back into our cushy corporate jobs, but we never turned back; when we made the decision to start our own business and build it, it was pedal to the metal.

“We just kept moving forward,” he went on. “And whenever we came up on any obstacles or challenges, we made a commitment to each other that we could keep powering through and someday reap the benefits of business ownership.”

White concurred, noting that there have been many challenges along the way, from the Great Recession, which hit just a few years after they opened, to COVID, which brought most of the traditional work to a standstill, and early on, the loss of a major fleet-wrapping client.

Jim White says Go Graphix has evolved over 20 years, cultivating new markets such as vehicle wrapping and architectural graphics.
Photo by Bob Zemba, Simple Truth Imaging

“We’ve rolled with the punches and learned some important lessons along the way,” he said, adding that resilience is perhaps the company’s strongest trait.

Both partners agreed that, while the cultivation of new business lines, such as vehicle wrapping, architectural installations, and signage of all kinds has been a key to success, a bigger factor has been relationship-building, which has enabled the company to add and retain customers and generate all-important repeat business, often across several different product lines.

For this issue, BusinessWest talked at length with White and Stone about their journey, where it has taken them to date, and where they might go next.

Plane Speaking

While working for Biolitec and then Lumenis, White and Stone spent a considerable amount of time in airplanes, hotel rooms, restaurants, and trade show floors.

And while passing that time talking business, they also spent it talking about going into business for themselves. And the seriousness of those conversations picked up in intensity the more they were away from home and their families.

“We both had young children … Jim had three and I had four, and we were on the road a lot,” Stone recalled, adding that the two were very good at what they did, and the more they succeeded for their corporate bosses, the more that was demanded of them in terms of being on the road.

“I remember looking at my schedule at one point, I was going to be gone 17 out of the next 23 weekends,” said Stone. “And I said, ‘that’s enough; I’ve got to make a change.’”

White had reached the same conclusion and had many of the same recollections.

“Our persistence is definitely what kept us going. We had many opportunities to quit or to get back into our cushy corporate jobs, but we never turned back; when we made the decision to start our own business and build it, it was pedal to the metal.”

“All the money in the world didn’t mean as much to me as my wife and kids, and Gary felt the same way,” he recalled. “And there was just enough shakiness in the business to make a dream materialize. Gary and I were together for many of those trips; you talk about what your life goals are and what’s meaningful to you. I always wanted to own a business, and so did he.”

Fast-forward a year or so, and White and Stone were talking with BusinessWest inside a storefront (a former coffee roaster) in the Heritage Park Plaza in East Longmeadow about their new venture. They didn’t have any furniture at the time, so they talked while sitting in lawn chairs.

Mostly, they talked about leaving corporate America and going into business for themselves. As for their chosen enterprise, they said it came about after considerable discussion about what was needed in the community, what would succeed business-wise, and how they could best deploy their respective talents. In short, they said it was a work in process, a trend that has continued for the past two decades.

“We weren’t sure exactly what we’d do at that point, but we did know that we could sell, and we could market it,” said Stone. “Those are good skill sets to have if you’re going to start a business.”

Their start, as noted earlier, was as a basic print shop, providing many of the same services as the Staples across the street.

“We were just doing copies and prints, and it was just ‘the lowest price wins,’” Stone recalled. “It was a very frustrating, very-low-margin kind of business model that we didn’t enjoy much.”

Gary Stone says resilience has been the company’s best character trait.
Photo by Bob Zemba, Simple Truth Imaging

White recalled that the two struggled in the beginning, printing flyers, business cards, and similar products, and tried to be all things to its clients, and that formula wasn’t working.

“We’d think it up, design it up, and try to produce it,” he recalled. “And we found a love and passion for designing it, making it, and installing it.”

Relatively early on, White and Stone recognized an opportunity with vehicle graphics, an emerging market at the time, and bought a printer that enabled them to produce those products. This was the company’s start in the large-format business.

“We saw the vehicle-graphics market and said, ‘no one owns this,’” White recalled. “We said, ‘let’s be known for something, let’s be the guys,’ and strategically, we went after it.

“I remember looking at my schedule at one point, I was going to be gone 17 out of the next 23 weekends. And I said, ‘that’s enough; I’ve got to make a change.’”

“What you had was a convergence of technologies to make it happen,” he went on. “It wasn’t just the printing … it was the printing, the inks, the media, and the adhesives; you could print something on vinyl, but would it stick? We were at the right place at the right time.”

Covering All the Bases

They started with smaller businesses that provided an opportunity to learn while doing, said White, adding that the company eventually moved on to fleets, such as the 1,200 Edible Arrangements vehicles, and work that was truly national in scope.

“We got really good at it,” said White, adding that the company would survive the loss of the Edible Arrangements account — one third of its overall business at the time — and learn valuable lessons from that experience about diversification and not putting so many eggs in one basket.

Today, vehicle graphics remains a large part, maybe 30% of the overall portfolio at Go Graphix, with several large fleets in the fold, from Maybury Material Handling to Blinds to Go.

And that work wrapping vehicles, helped inspire the next leap for the company, if you will.

“We figured that, if we could wrap contoured vehicles, it can’t be too hard to install this vinyl on walls and windows that are flat,” Stone told BusinessWest. “So, we started studying the different kinds of vinyls we could use for those applications.”

And after gaining needed certifications and making its entry into that specialty, the company soon identified a market to pursue — higher education and school systems, said White, adding that these installations help schools in this market, and well beyond it, “attract, retain, and motivate students.”

It’s the same with businesses and their employees.

“In the corporate world, it’s ‘how do I get these people back?’” he said, referring to the emergence of remote work and the ongoing struggle to get people to return to the office, adding that one way to do that is to create an environment that is more colorful, and more fun.

Consistent investment in new technology and equipment has been one of the keys to success at Go Graphix.
Photo by Bob Zemba, Simple Truth Imaging

The company’s offices boast some of these architectural elements, although in many cases they represent earlier generations of the product lines. The main conference room, for example, features the company’s name and logo in a faux-brick product, as well as hundreds of colored tiles that come together like a jig-saw puzzle. Meanwhile, the break room takes on a patriotic tone, with images and quotes from the likes of Benjamin Franklin and Harry Truman.

And in White’s office, one wall is covered with an image from the 2017 Super Bowl, when Patriots’ running back James White (yes, they share the same name) scored the winning touchdown in overtime.

But it’s what they do for other businesses that has made this a fast-growing portion of the portfolio, said White, adding that the company is working with a wide range of clients, not just on architectural graphics, but also signage and other way-finding elements.”

Indeed, one key to the company’s success is its vertical integration, handling many different needs for the same customer, such as UConn, for which the company has handled both architectural graphics and wraps for the buses transporting its athletic teams.

Pivot Moves

As they talked about continually rewriting the business plan and shifting to meet emerging needs in the market, Stone and White said COVID added several exclamation points to that line of thinking.

And as he got into that discission, Stone flashed back to a meeting with some administrators at Baystate Health about work the company was doing for the system, and what it could do moving forward.

“I was ready to shake their hands as they were coming in, and they said, ‘we can’t do that anymore,’ he recalled, adding that this was very early in 2020, before most in this region had a good understanding of what COVID was. “They said they could tap feet or bump elbows — that was it.

“We did our presentation, talked about our services and projects we’d done with them,” he went on. “I asked the group if there was anything outside of what they know we do that they would have a need for. And one of them said, ‘do you guys make those sneeze guards?’”

The answer was, essentially, ‘no but we could,’ he went on, adding that a few months later, those acrylic shields — as well as ‘stay 6 feet apart’ signs and other items — not only rescued the company at a time when the phones simply stopped ringing, but contributed to what was its best year to that date.

And that pivoting represents perhaps the best example of how the company has responded to change and created new markets for itself.

“We changed our business model a number of times over the years,” said Stone. “When things were going well, we went in that direction, when they didn’t go well, we went in a different direction. And I think we grew smartly; we didn’t grow too big too fast. We did it in a smart way where we added people and added equipment as needed and went after markets where we thought we could be the best.

“Jim and I are both guys where we never got up any morning in our lives and said, ‘let’s be mediocre today,’” he went on. “We’re two guys who get up every day and say, ‘if we’re going to do something, we’re going to be the best at it.’”

White agreed.

“I’ve never been able to really relax,” he explained. “We’re always, always fully focused and looking at everything closely. Maybe it’s over the top, but it’s the only way to keep this a top-notch organization.”

Another element of the company’s growth is team building, said Stone.

“A key part of our success over the years has been to surround ourselves with good people who wanted to be here every day, who enjoyed the work we do, who really bought into our purpose and our mission, and saw opportunity working here,” he said. “Our clients really enjoy working with us and with our people; we know that business is built on relationships, and we’re done a really good job of building relationships and building loyal clients over the years.”

Another key part of their success is continuously setting the bar higher.

We had a great year in 2024, and we celebrated,” said Stone. “But we start at zero at the start of the next year; we’re always looking to go above and beyond what we did previously, and we have a team behind us that is focused on those same goals.”

Outgoing WNE President Talks About ‘Getting to the Other Side’ of Current Challenges

By George O'Brien May 8, 2025

Education Special Coverage

School of Thought

Western New England University President Robert Johnson

“A shift in the market.”

That’s how Robert Johnson, president of Western New England University, chose to describe the current state of higher education, knowing this is a huge understatement.

Indeed, colleges and universities were already under great amounts of stress due to declining enrollments, rising costs, weaker bottom lines, and mounting questions about the cost and value of a college education. And that was before the Trump administration started what the Boston Globe and others are calling a ‘reign of terror,’ pressuring institutions on matters such as DEI policies and efforts to curb antisemitism with threats involving everything from the cancelation of grants to removal of schools’ tax-exempt status.

“It was already a fairly rapid pace of change, and what’s going on at the federal level is merely accelerating the pace of change, creating high levels of anxiety,” said Johnson. “I don’t think higher ed has ever been through this — I’ve been in higher ed 35 years, and I’ve never seen anything like this.”

But, at the end of the day, and in his opinion, this is just … a shift in the market, or another shift, one of many that higher education institutions have faced over the years, decades, or centuries, depending on how long they’ve been around, said Johnson, who referred early and often to the proverbial ‘other side’ of this current shift.

“I don’t want to call it a ‘new normal,’ because I think we’re creating ‘normal,’ and it’s going to be different,” he said. “What that ‘different’ is … who knows? But I think we must remain agile enough to change with the times. My perspective is simple; when it comes right down to it, places like Western New England University — we started as a branch campus for Northeastern University — are at a place where we’ve come through world wars, the Great Depression, the Civil Rights movement, Jim Crow, the dot-com bubble, the Great Recession … and now this. And we’ll figure this out.

“I don’t want to call it a ‘new normal,’ because I think we’re creating ‘normal,’ and it’s going to be different. What that ‘different’ is … who knows? But I think we must remain agile enough to change with the times.”

“Anyone who says they have a crystal ball and understands what it’s going to look like on the other side is fool’s gold,” he went on. “The best that we can do is be agile and try and manage as best we can given the resources that we have to emerge from this. It’s not going to be fun — this is not the golden age of higher education post World War II — it is a shift in the market, and that has to be our view, and there will be winners and losers.”

These were just some of the thoughts from Johnson in a wide-ranging interview with Johnson that turned out to be an exit interview, if you will. Indeed, he announced, just a few days after he talked with BusinessWest, that he will be stepping down from the university in August.

As he talked about the current landscape, he came back repeatedly to his contention that, to survive this latest shift in the market, schools will have to be agile and proactive in response to the factors that created this paradigm. And WNE is doing exactly that, he said, noting that, through several new strategic initiatives, it has improved its position.

Indeed, the school enrolled the largest entering class in its history in the fall of 2024, just two years after it recorded one if its lowest figures in a quarter century, he said. “Three years ago, we had just over 6,700 applications for our entering class. This year, we’re right on the cusp of 13,000 applications.”

This was accomplished, he said, by stressing brand value and return on investment — “including a 94% job-placement rate, starting salaries higher than 52 of the top-100 universities in the country — 36% higher than any of the other schools in this region.

Robert Johnson says that, through aggressive, targeted marketing, WNE entered its largest class ever in 2024, and is on pace to do the same this September.

“That’s the message that we keep driving home,” he went on. “And it’s showing up in our applications, deposits, campus visits … that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.”

Beyond marketing, these increases in applications and enrollment are due to new programs designed to provide a bridge to the workforce, he said, citing the school’s new master’s degree program in Biopharmaceutical Technology, due to launch in September, as just one example.

If current trends continue, the school could exceed 1,050 students, and perhaps more, for the class entering this September, said Johnson, adding that this would be the largest class yet again.

For this issue and its focus on education, BusinessWest talked with Johnson about the current state of higher education and the many factors that will determine how and to what extent schools can ride out this storm.

Course of Action

Johnson, who arrived at WNE just as COVID did, noted that the pandemic represented a stern test for all institutions of higher education, one that forced them to rethink what they were doing and how, and make often dramatic changes to carry on and continue their missions.

This latest shift, one marked by demographic changes and governmental changes alike, and where 40% of private schools in New England are under some form of financial distress, is similar in many ways, but also fundamentally different.

“With COVID, there was a predictability to it — you knew that if you did certain things you would get through it,” he said. “Right now, in this environment we’re in right now, there’s no predictability; that’s what creates the high levels of anxiety we’re seeing right now.”

And this brings him back to that notion that schools will “figure this out.” Or not.

‘There’s something about the human spirit that says, ‘no matter what we’re going through, we’ll come out on the other side,’ and oftentimes, it really does come down to sheer determination with a plan of action that has the ability to pivot as you get different information or new information along the way that enables you to move forward.

“The indelible human spirt says that when a group of people work together toward a common goal, and they’re all rowing in the same direction, you can’t find a time in human history where they did not come out on the other side. And that’s going to be the difference — the institutions that can pull together and have that indelible human spirit that says ‘yes, I can.’ It’s possibility thinking and operating from a perspective of assets and not deficits — ‘I’m not going to focus on what I don’t have and therefore what I can’t do, but what I do have and what we can do with that.”

Elaborating, he said WNE’s success with growing its numbers for applications, deposits, and enrollment, comes down to one word — marketing.

“We’ve been really focused on telling our story,” he explained. “Because if families are going to make the investment, they want to know if I can get a job, a good job. It’s about outcomes, outcomes, outcomes.”

This marketing involves traditional vehicles, but especially social media and digital marketing, he said, but it also involves getting students on the campus.

“Getting them on our campus matters; there’s a higher probability of enrolling a student if they’ve been to the campus,” he said, adding that the school succeeds at being welcoming.

“This is place where, no matter who you are, where you’re from, or what you look like, you’re welcome. “It doesn’t matter what your political persuasion may be. And we don’t engage in highly politicized debate that’s happening in the external world; our heads are down, this is where you come to go to school, where you come to get a job — you don’t have all the drama about what’s going on in the world.”

When asked about how schools will emerge on the other side, and the factors that will determine what will look like when they do, Johnson said financial models and roadmaps that will provide long-term sustainability and growth, where revenues align with expenses, are obviously a key. But the bigger factor will the level to which institutions can focus on academic programs that can provide real jobs, “not just education for the sake of education.”

He mentioned examples at WNE including the new Biopharmaceutical Technology degree program, the Center for Advanced Manufacturing, FinTech program, and the recently opened XR/VR Lab, which provides students with hands-on access to cutting-edge virtual, augmented, and mixed-reality technologies.

“With COVID, there was a predictability to it — you knew that if you did certain things you would get through it. Right now, in this environment we’re in right now, there’s no predictability; that’s what creates the high levels of anxiety we’re seeing right now.”

“Those are the kinds of things that will matter moving forward,” he said. “Part of what will make a winner is programs that are relevant, that enable students to get real jobs … that have innovative and entrepreneurial components in place that become creative in nature and allow students to have hands-on experience and take that experience and go out into the world of work.”

“At the end of the day, each institution will have to decide what’s best for them, and position themselves accordingly,” he went on. ‘For many of them, probably most of them, elements of their plan will work, and for some of them, their plans will not work, and it will be to their own demise.”

Bottom Line

Johnson stressed that neither he, nor anyone else, really, knows just what ‘different will, indeed, look like.

But in these unprecedented times, when there is, as he said earlier, no predictability, schools must be creative and diligent if they are going to get to the other side.

“One of the outcomes of what we’re seeing now is that you’ll see some of the institutions come out of this and evolve and thrive, and there will be others that will contract and perhaps go out of business,” he continued. “I go back to the Great Depression, when the economy was rough, to say the least — which is what we’re starting to potentially see as an outcome of tariffs and uncertainty in the marketplace — some of the greatest companies in the world were started or evolved during that time. And that’s what we’re going to see on the other side of this with higher education — there will be institutions that will be reborn in a different way that will evolve and thrive in an environment in whatever ‘different’ will look like.”

In Southwick, There’s Plenty to See, Do, and Eat

By George O'Brien May 8, 2025

Community Spotlight Special Coverage

Community Spotlight

Kettlebread Deli is just one of the intriguing business storylines in Southwick.

Ed Grimaldi pointed to the small table for two by the door, under the large-screen television.

“I was sitting right there,” he recalled. “I had my head in my hands, thinking, ‘what have I done? What have I gotten myself into?’”

It was April of 2020, a month after COVID-19 officially arrived in the region. Grimaldi had, in keeping with a mandate from the state, shut down Samuel’s, the pub-style restaurant at the Basketball Hall of Fame that he co-owned. And he had already invested, along with partners Melissa Veino and Joe Rondoletto, in a new endeavor on College Highway in Southwick called Kettlebread Deli, that was slated to open in a few weeks.

Which explains why Grimaldi had his head in his hands.

“We muddled through, somehow,” he said, noting that Kettlebread — more on that name and that concept later — pushed on through curbside service and was able to establish a beachhead, if you will. Fast-forwarding a little, the new business survived, has expanded to a second location and central bakery in Westfield, and Grimaldi and his partners are exploring franchising opportunities.

“There’s nothing new about doing things home-made — lots of places do that now; we’re trying to do it in a way that’s duplicatable and scalable,” he said, hitting at the heart of this operation, adding that he believes he has an easily identifiable brand, a name that resonates within the industry, and “food that’s really, really good.”

Kettlebread is one of many intriguing businesses and storylines in Southwick, a recreational community known for its Congamond Lakes, motocross, including the highly anticipated Southwick National in late June, the Ranch golf course, rail trails, a wide range of outdoor experiences, and more.

“Our bread is very good because a portion of each batch is folded into the next day’s batch, allowing for an exponentially small portion of every batch that has ever been to be in every other batch.”

It’s also known for its hospitality and food-related businesses, including one that has risen to the ranks of institution. That would be Mrs. Murphy’s Donuts, another College Highway establishment that will soon — as in next year — be celebrating a half century of serving up a wide variety of offerings, including its signature raised, glazed honey dip.

A family business to the core, Mrs. Murphy’s now has members of three generations working behind the big glass display case, or behind the scenes, said Shane Smith, noting that things really started with her grandparents — and especially her grandmother, Shirley, “the original Mrs. Murphy” — who opened a donut shop in Florida.

“They taught my dad, Earl Murphy, how to make the donuts,” said Smith, adding that her father and mother, Rose, opened the shop in Southwick in 1976.

Today, Rose is mostly retired, with Smith assuming more management responsibilities over the years and sharing duties with her husband, Zack, as well as her daughter, Bryce, and her husband, Jeff, and other team members.

Building on this strong existing base of businesses, while maintaining the community’s rural, recreational character is among the main responsibilities of the community’s government, said Town Manager Nicole Parker, who came to Southwick not quite a year ago after serving in a similar post in the Central Mass. community of Hardwick.

Shane Smith shows off the display case at Mrs. Murphy’s Donuts, a Southwick institution approaching its 50th birthday.

She was attracted by the town’s many attributes, including that rural quality, and has made it one of her priorities to build on that foundation.

“As a recreational community, it’s important to have these kinds of opportunities,” she said, adding there have been some additions in that broad category with others in the planning stages, including a spray park at Whalley Park now under construction, a pickleball court at town hall, and perhaps more pickleball at Whalley Park — there’s an item on the town meeting warrant to that effect.

Meanwhile, the community is in the process of hiring a new town planner, undertaking what Parker called a “major zoning revision” to update bylaws that have not been overhauled for decades, and voting on a proposal for new high-speed internet service through WhipCity Fiber. On the business side, the community’s first cannabis dispensaries will be opening shortly, and a Dollar General will soon join the ranks of the establishments on busy College Highway.

Overall, said Parker, there is a need to achieve balance — between the businesses needed to serve residents and reduce the tax burden on those who call the town home, and maintaining those qualities that make this community so attractive to residents and visitors alike.

“On College Highway … there’s a house, a business, a house, a house, a business, a business, a house — there’s no cohesion. Having strategic zones will really help the town grow the way it needs to grow, the way the residents want to see it grow.”

For this the latest installment of its Community Spotlight series, BusinessWest turns its lens on Southwick, where there is plenty to do, plenty to see, and plenty to eat.

Doughs and Don’ts

There’s a treatment on one wall inside Kettlebread that tells the story of this venture, or at least a big part of it.

It features a dictionary-like definition of the noun Kettlebread — actually, two of them:

1. ‘Our family’s secret all-natural artisan bread recipe involving a 3-day process, baked daily in round kettle pans, butter-salted crust’;

2. ‘Suspiciously awesome sandwiches.’

The latter is a tagline of sorts for the business. Grimaldi was thinking about using ‘curiously awesome,’ but was reminded that the slogan for Altoids is ‘curiously strong mints,’ and he didn’t want to go there.

As for the former … well, the bread is what defines this venture — along with what’s put inside it, especially the makings of a Philly cheesesteak sandwich, the most popular item on the menu. Grimaldi talked in generally vague terms about the bread and how it’s made, stressing repeatedly that it is, indeed, a process.

“All bread has very simple ingredients, it’s just a matter of ratios,” he explained. “Everyone has their own formula; ask 100 people how to make bread, you get 100 recipes. I think our bread is very good because a portion of each batch is folded into the next day’s batch, allowing for an exponentially small portion of every batch that has ever been to be in every other batch.”

Grimaldi was visiting the Midwest several years ago, and became so impressed by a sandwich he had on that trip — a variation of the muffaletta, a New Orleans-style sandwich featuring a round loaf of Sicilian bread — that he became inspired to try to replicate it in the 413.

“They had a very unique bread, and I tried for years to duplicate their bread, and I came nowhere near it,” he told BusinessWest, adding that he came up with something else, something he believes is even better — Kettlebread.

As noted earlier, he and small group of partners introduced the concept near the height of the pandemic in a long vacant former karate studio on College Highway. Using mostly curbside service, the new deli and its offerings built a following, and today, the location is thriving, especially at lunch time.

Southwick at a Glance

Year Incorporated: 1770
Population: 9,232
Area: 31.7 square miles
County: Hampden
Residential Tax Rate: $15.57
Commercial Tax Rate: $15.57
Median Household Income: $52,296
Family Household Income: $64,456
Type of Government: Open Town Meeting; Select Board
Largest Employers: Big Y; Whalley Computer Associates; Southwick Regional School District
*Latest information available

Grimaldi and his partners expanded with a second location in Westfield, which also serves as the bakery. And the long-term plan is to create franchises, said Grimaldi, adding that the first step in that process was to create that central bakery.

“Franchising is still the ultimate goal, but right now, I want to stabilize my own operation,” he said. “So much has changed over the past couple of years — labor costs, food costs … it’s a more challenging environment in many ways.”

As for the Southwick deli, Grimaldi said he fell in love with that location early on, noting that it is close to where Routes 10-202 and Route 57 form a ‘T.’ There are several other eateries and gathering spots in that general location including Tucker’s restaurant, the Summer House, the Southwick Inn, another institution, and Mrs. Murphy’s, which also found a way to persevere through the pandemic.

That was with a drive-through, which remained how business was done until January of 2024, when the front doors were once again opened to a large and thoroughly loyal customer base that includes Southwick residents, of course, but also many from neighboring communities on both sides of the border with Connecticut.

This customer base is treated to hand-cut donuts (a rarity in this business; most are now cut by machine) as well as pastries, breakfast sandwiches, and coffee. But it’s the donuts that make this an institution.

They come in dozens of varieties, including many classics, but also several ‘specialty’ offerings including ‘maple bacon,’ ‘thin mint,’ ‘chocolate crème crumble,’ and ‘strawberry shortcake.’

When asked what the business has planned for its 50th anniversary, Smith said she hadn’t given that much thought — she and her family are busy enough with the day-to-day — but would in the months to come.

“We’re just going to keep on doing what we’re doing,” she said, adding that this is one Southwick tradition that will endure.

Work and Play

Parker told BusinessWest that she wasn’t exactly searching for a new career opportunity when a friend recommended that she take a hard look at Southwick, which was advertising for a successor to long-time chief administrative officer Karl Steinhart.

“I was like, ‘no, I’m happy here,’” she recalled, adding that her friend was persistent and again encouraged her to apply, noting that the town was bigger than Hardwick and presented more opportunities to grow professionally. She listened, did apply, and eventually triumphed in a lengthy search.

“It’s been an amazing 10 months,” she said, hinting that it’s not exactly easy to succeed someone who had been in the job for 35 years.

But the transition has gone smoothly, she said, adding that she was working on the warrant for her first town meeting, set for May 20, when she spoke with BusinessWest.

Among the priorities she’s established is a revision of zoning bylaws, said Parker, noting that the current bylaws haven’t been overhauled “ever.”

And this reality has contributed in many ways to the hodge podge that exists on College Highway today, said Parker, noting that the street is a mix of commercial, residential, municipal, and more.

“On College Highway … there’s a house, a business, a house, a house, a business, a business, a house — there’s no cohesion,” she said. “Having strategic zones will really help the town grow the way it needs to grow, the way the residents want to see it grow.”

Elaborating, she said planning officials can look at current zoning codes and see essentially whatever they want to see whether it comes to including a proposed use or excluding one, and something far more definitive is needed moving forward.

And town residents will have a large say in how the bylaws are overhauled.

“We’ll have a lot of public meetings to let residents let us know what they want to see for their town,” said Parker. “You live in a town because this is where you want to be, and you should make the decisions on how your town should modernize or move forward or really grow; it needs to be the residents who make those decisions, so I’m looking forward to having those meetings so we can gauge what the community wants for a business zone, where they want to see industrial zones, and where they want to see strictly residential zones.”

Meanwhile, another issue confronting this community, like all others in the region, is housing, said Parker, adding that while few developments in the ‘affordable’ category are in the pipeline, there is a 200-unit condo project slated for Depot Street that has received Planning Board approval.

As for the cannabis dispensaries, Pioneer Valley Trading and Haven will be opening in storefronts just a few blocks from each other on College Highway.

“They can’t be within 500 feet each other, but I think they’re maybe 501 feet from each other,” joked Parker, adding that these additions will bring even more variety, and vibrancy to the town’s main business throughfare.

And they provide even more to do and see in a community where there is already plenty in both categories.

At the Hitchcock Center, Environmental Education Comes Naturally

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Features Special Coverage

A World of Good

Billy Spitzer and a friend in the visitors center at the Hitchcock Center for the Environment in Amherst.

It’s called Japanese knotweed.

This is an invasive plant species of plant that, as the name suggests, comes from Asia. It is said to be one of the resilient organisms on Earth and is very difficult to eradicate once it gains a foothold.

“If you cut it down, little bits of it will stick to your mower or your cutter, and when you go to cut something else, you’ve transported it to a new home,” said Bill Spitzer, executive director of the Hitchcock Center for the Environment.

When the center staged an informational program on Japanese knotweed, the room was full of attendees from across the region, with thousands more joining virtually from around the world.

Such programming is one of myriad ways the Amherst-based center carries out a unique mission encapsulated in its tagline, “education for a healthy planet.”

Other ways include field trips for area students, after-school programs, summer camps, and trips to local schools, where students receive lessons in design, engineering, and problem solving.

“We give them these design and engineering challenges to work with, and then, when they come here, they can see how we’ve solved some of those problems at our facility,” said Spitzer, adding that the center is one of only a few dozen ‘certified living buildings’ in the world, and is a classroom unto itself.

“It’s not only about net-zero in terms of energy use, but also water conservation, using non-toxic materials, being rooted in your place and conserving the land around you, and thinking about aesthetics as well as the functional aspects of your building.”

Among other things, the Hitchcock Center achieves net-zero energy through highly efficient building strategies and a 60-kilowatt rooftop solar array; achieves net-zero water through composting toilets (which never fail to fascinate young visitors), rainwater collection storage, treatment for drinking water, and grey-water filtration through a constructed wetland; uses only chemical-free and non-toxic materials; creates landscapes that use native species to promote greater biodiversity; and uses locally sourced, salvaged, recycled, and substantially harvested materials.

The center, funded by fees for its programs, grants, and a number of corporate sponsors, including several area banks, also carries out that mission through studies and programs within the community, such as an environmental-justice project studying the connections between air quality, climate, and health.

The Hitchcock Center provides a number of learning opportunities for young people.

Funding for that study, a $500,000 grant, was recently terminated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, making the Hitchcock Center one of countless nonprofits to see grants and other forms of funding cut by the Trump administration.

Spitzer said the EPA sent a letter stating that the grant was cut “on the grounds that the award no longer effectuates the program goals or agency priorities; the objectives of the award are no longer consistent with EPA funding priorities.”

The center will appeal that decision, he said, adding that roughly 400 other grants for projects across the country were terminated for the same stated reason.

“This is money that has been congressionally approved and appropriated, signed into law, and turned into grants and contracts signed between organizations like us and the federal government,” he said, adding that several other grants awarded to the agency are hanging in the balance. “It’s unprecedented to be doing anything like this — to stop all these projects already in motion.”

In the meantime, he said he’s rather proud that the agency is doing work that is in opposition to the priorities of the administration.

“This building, as a living building, is unique in that it’s really designed as a teaching building.”

“This is the kind of work we need to be doing — we need to be educating people about the environment, we need to be educating people who are disproportionately impacted, whether in its cities or in small towns, rural communities … this is the kind of work that a place like the Hitchcock Center should be doing and that the federal government should be supporting,” he said, adding that, while fighting to keep this grant and others that are imperiled, the agency will look for other sources of funding, including the state, foundations, and businesses.

For this issue, BusinessWest talked at length with Spitzer about the Hitchcock Center, its evolution over the past 60 years, and the many different ways its mission is carried out.

From the Ground Up

Chronicling the history of the Hitchcock Center, Spitzer said it can trace its roots to 1962 and a woman named Ethel Dubois, who brought children to her farm in Leverett to experience more of nature.

Seeking to formalize and perpetuate what she was doing, she created a nonprofit, called the Hitchcock Center, which, for a while, operated out of the trunk of its executive director’s car, said Spitzer, adding that the agency eventually moved to a physical site, an old carriage house owned by the town of Amherst.

A certified living building, the Hitchcock Center is visited by grade-schoolers and college architecture students alike.

By the early 2000s, that building was showing its age, and the agency had also outgrown it, so the center’s director and board commenced a search for a new site and found one on the campus of Hampshire College. The site search coincided with the determination that, if the agency was going to build a new home, it should be a sustainable building.

“They decided to go for creating the highest level of sustainability that you could,” he said, referencing the Living Building Challenge and the fact that only three dozen structures in the world have met that challenge, with a handful in the 413, including the nearby Curran Center at Hampshire College. “It’s not only about net-zero in terms of energy use, but also water conservation, using non-toxic materials, being rooted in your place and conserving the land around you, and thinking about aesthetics as well as the functional aspects of your building.”

Overall, there are seven different domains — energy, water, materials, beauty, health and happiness, place, and equity — in which a building must achieve excellence to achieve Living Building status, Spitzer noted, adding that $7 million was raised through a capital campaign, and the center opened in 2016.

The standards are rigorous. For example, the ‘materials’ domain — focused on creating a materials economy that is local, non-toxic, and ecologically restorative — requires, among other things, that 75% of materials be sourced within 1,000 kilometers of the site. The center achieved this with salvaged insulation from Framingham, white cedar wood from Quebec, PolyWhey wood finish from Hardwick, Vt., and planting-bed soil from Agawam.

“This building, as a living building, is unique in that it’s really designed as a teaching building — all of the aspects of infrastructure and features that make it a Living Building are on display; we interpret them and give tours about them,” he noted, adding that it is visited by grade-schoolers and college architecture students alike.

This and the many other forms of education provided at the center fit nicely into his own career goals, if you will, said Spitzer, who brings a diverse background to his role. Indeed, while earning a PhD in Oceanography from MIT and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, he concluded that he was interested in science education as much as he was interested in science.

“Instead of following a research career, I started learning about science education, and made my way to working at the New England Aquarium in Boston,” he said, adding that he worked there for more than 20 years, handing education programs and developing exhibits.

Drawn to the problem of climate change, Spitzer worked with others to develop a training program for educators and communicators in aquariums, zoos, science centers, and museums across the country, efforts that are ongoing.

Billy Spitzer says environmental education is the kind of work organizations should be doing — and the government should be supporting.

“I realized at some point that I wanted to spend the rest of my career working on climate education,” he told BusinessWest, adding that this realization — coupled with the Hitchcock Center’s work to develop programs consistent with the creation of a Living Building — drew him to the agency when it was searching for a new director.

Hands-on Education

He arrived in the late summer of 2021, an intriguing time for the center, which had made its way through the challenging first waves of COVID by essentially moving most of its programming outdoors, a trend that continues today.

And there are many constituencies that find their way to the property, from families to dog walkers to students from dozens of area schools.

“We provide semi-structured and sometimes unstructured outdoor-experience time, giving them a chance to do the things kids are meant to do, but often don’t get the opportunity to do as much as people did years ago,” he explained. “But we have also have kids doing joint projects, like building an igloo and imaginative play using mud and sticks and sand.”

There are lessons to be learned inside and out, said Spitzer, noting that a number of native species are planted on the grounds and tended to by a team of volunteer master gardeners. Meanwhile, the center’s staff works with young people to grow vegetables and herbs that are used in summer camp programs, making pesto, pizza, and more.

“One of the things that we focus on a lot in this building is ‘how can we be inspired by nature to build better things?’” he said. “And that’s something we also do with kids — help them understand how problems are solved in nature and how we can use some of those same principles to solve some of the problems we face.”

As an example, he cited the solar panels on the Hitchcock Center’s roof.

“One of the things this center does is capture sunlight to provide power, in the same way that trees capture sunlight on their leaves, and that’s how they power themselves,” he explained. “We have kids doing experiments with solar panels.”

Meanwhile, the center encourages outside groups to use its spaces, and many do, he said. “This is an inspiring place to work and also an inspiring place to visit, and we find that people want to do workshops here, retreats, meetings — we have groups from most of the Five Colleges come and do things here, other nonprofit groups, and more.”

The center is in the process of working on its next strategic plan, he said, adding that such planning is difficult at any time, but especially these times.

“The idea of a five-year plan doesn’t quite make as much sense as perhaps it used to, but it is really helpful,” he told BusinessWest. “If you’re on a ship, you want to have a destination, you want to have a course, a heading. But you also realize that you’re going to be affected by weather and the seas, and sometimes you have to tack this way and that way.”

This talk of tacking brings Spitzer back to that project funded by the grant cut by the EPA.

He said it’s an example of how the center moves beyond its physical building and the field trips and lectures on Japanese knotweed in efforts to improve quality of life in this region and beyond.

The project was undertaken with several other agencies, including the Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts, which had initiated a healthy-air network in response to high asthma rates in Springfield, Holyoke, and other area communities.

“We’d been working with them to expand an educational component of this project, which gets communities monitoring air quality, understanding what the problems are, and advocating for solutions,” he explained, adding that this is a three-year project that is about one year in, with 25% of the funding spent.

“It’s hard to imagine how a grant that’s focused on clean air is not consistent with EPA’s priorities,” he said. “And even in a fairly rural place like the Connecticut River Valley, we have air-pollution problems, whether they’re from vehicle emissions or industry or from local brush fires like we had last summer, or more distant sources like the Canadian wildfires.”

The ultimate goal of the project was (and still is) “getting young people involved in understanding the issues around air quality, what we can do to protect ourselves, what we can to improve conditions and make them better, and partnering with people in community organizations up and down the Valley, whether it’s libraries or public health departments or schools, to really get the word out about air quality, why it matters, and how it’s connected to climate and what can we do about it.”

In other words, education for a healthy planet. That work will go on, no matter the fate of this grant.

In Greenfield, Puzzle Pieces Are Coming Together

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Community Spotlight Special Coverage

Community Spotlight

Angela and Isaac Mass, owners of the Greenfield Garden Cinemas, one of many intriguing storylines in the city’s downtown.

Isaac Mass was in law school, looking for a job that would allow him to not only earn a little money but get in some studying for the bar exam as well.

He had experience working at movie theaters and remembered that life in the projection room (these were the days before everything went digital) would provide him what he was looking for.

“Once you started the movie, you had nothing to do for a couple of hours,” he said, adding that he called George Gohl, co-owner of the Greenfield Garden Cinemas, and before long, he had a job. And he wasn’t in it long before he started setting his sights higher when it came to that downtown landmark, opened in 1929.

Indeed, when Gohl and his partner, Bill Goebielle, were facing the high cost of converting to that digital technology, Mass, who by then had set up a law office in downtown Greenfield, came through with financing for that project — a deal that came with an option to acquire the theater should it come up for sale.

Which it did, in 2019.

Fast-forwarding our story a little, Mass and his wife, Angela (both are BusinessWest 40 Under Forty alumni) are now the owners of the theater, the only cinema in Franklin County. The pandemic hit just a few months after they took ownership, and that was a long and difficult storm to ride out. But they’ve done it, their operation is in the black, and they’re looking forward to a big summer, with a new Superman movie and other projected blockbusters.

“What we’re seeing right now is a kind of renaissance — a dynamic fusion of entrepreneurship, creative energy, and community investment that is strengthened by deep collaborations between business and municipal support organizations.”

Greenfield Garden Cinemas is just one of many intriguing storylines in Greenfield — others involve everything from a new Starbucks to some new housing initiatives to the anticipated start of work to reimagine the former Wilson’s department store — and just one reason why many see a surge in energy and optimism in the community.

“What we’re seeing right now is a kind of renaissance — a dynamic fusion of entrepreneurship, creative energy, and community investment that is strengthened by deep collaborations between business and municipal support organizations,” said Jessye Deane, executive director of the Franklin County Chamber of Commerce. “The city’s evolution is not just happening — it’s being shaped intentionally. Greenfield isn’t growing by accident; it’s growing because people believe in it. They’re investing here. They’re creating jobs, art, and experiences that can only happen in a place like this — where rural ingenuity meets downtown opportunity.”

Hannah Rechtschaffen, director of the Greenfield Business Assoc. (GBA), which recently moved into its own space on Main Street, agreed.

“Greenfield is in a lovely moment of revitalization,” she told BusinessWest. “A lot of pieces of the puzzle were here when I got here two years ago; they just needed a push behind the visibility, the story we’re telling, the partnerships we’re building, and getting Greenfield more visibility Valley-wide.”

While there is progress, many challenges remain, especially when it comes to the loss of manufacturing jobs, ongoing struggles to replace them, county-wide population loss, and the housing front, where some new units are in the pipeline (more on that later), but the issue of affordability is causing some concern.

Hannah Rechtschaffen shows off the new Greenfield Business Assoc. space on Main Street.

“Housing is becoming a particular issue, both in the lack of inventory and the cost,” said Tony Worden, president and CEO of Greenfield Cooperative Bank. “Rents have increased, but even more troubling to me is the cost of single-family homes. Greenfield has always been the affordable alternative here in Western Mass. People who were priced out of other areas — particularly Hampshire County — could find reasonably priced homes here in Greenfield, but that is increasingly becoming a thing of the past.”

For this latest installment of its Community Spotlight series, BusinessWest turns its lens on Greenfield, a community where many pieces of the puzzle are coming together to make an intriguing picture — not unlike the ones shown in the cinemas.

Strong Arguments

It’s called the Strongest Towns Contest. This is a nomination-driven competition staged by strongtowns.org, with 16 communities competing in a bracket-style format similar to the recent March Madness.

Greenfield was one of those 16 towns, which are being measured essentially on how they’re faring against the complex problems facing cities and towns today. And it advanced to the Final Four, beating out Manchester, N.H. and then Silverton, Ore. to get there, with voters determining who will advance.

The city eventually lost to Harrisburg, Va., which went on to finals against Marion, Ohio, with the latter prevailing. Greenfield Mayor Ginny Desorgher was disappointed not to advance further, but buoyed by what the strong showing indicated — especially, in her view, unity and a sense of everyone pulling in the same direction when it comes to the city’s opportunities and challenges.

“People are working together,” she said, referring to everything from downtown cleanups and crosswalk-painting efforts to long-term economic-development initiatives. “So many things are citizen-led.”

Deane agreed. “Sometimes, rural communities fall into a scarcity mindset when it comes to economic development, but I’m seeing a fundamental shift in that mindset at the leadership level,” she noted. “We’re building bridges, not silos, which is critical in a county of 70,000 residents with a tax base that’s 75% residential.

“A business like ours relies upon a smart, educated workforce, and this cost of housing is worrying me for the future. Where are our employees going to live? Will there be a pool of qualified workers able to live in this area?”

“There is a palpable sense of alignment now,” she went on, adding that, last year, Greenfield secured a Massachusetts Downtown Initiative grant, which enabled the city, the GBA, the chamber, and the Crossroads Cultural District to explore opportunities for collaborative marketing and capacity building to enhance Greenfield’s regional profile.

Meanwhile, the GBA has initiated a roundtable series, which has effectively opened lines of communication between Greenfield stakeholders and re-engaged business owners and nonprofit leaders as local advocates, said Rechtschaffen, adding that these events have covered a wide range of topics, such as the return of a police substation to downtown.

“We recently started a property owners’ group to bring property owners together and get on the same page with them about new development that they’re looking to do, development that’s coming to Greenfield, best practices, lines of communication … we have a very active property-owners contingent.”

Along with this palpable sense of alignment comes several visible signs of progress, said Deane, noting, as one example, the expansion of Ja’Duke onto Main Street.

The Turners Falls-based provider of childcare services, performing-arts education (singing, dancing, and acting), and even driver education needed to expand, said owner Kim Williams, and chose a 25,000-square-foot space on Main Street in Greenfield, formerly occupied by Greenfield Community College.

Tony Worden says Greenfield has long been an affordable alternative in Western Mass., but times are changing, and it is becoming far less so.

“We’re excited … we believe this will be a catalyst downtown,” she said, adding that the facility, which will bring people of all ages to downtown Greenfield, is expected to increase vibrancy and stimulate economic growth. “Childcare is such a driver of economic development; if people have childcare, they can enter the workforce. Meanwhile, the arts center and drivers ed will bring more foot traffic, more vibrancy, more arts.”

Progress Report

There are other things happening in and around downtown, said Desorgher, including the reimagining of the former Wilson’s department store into a mix of street-level retail and housing on the upper floors, as well as new life for the historic Leavitt-Hovey House, the former home of the Greenfield Public Library.

The landmark, built in 1797 and vacant since the new library next door opened in the summer of 2023, was acquired by Greenfield Savings Bank, whose main office abuts the library, with the intention of housing its residential-lending program and wealth-management offices.

Meanwhile, there are some additional housing initiatives, said Desorgher, including units at the Wilson’s site and another 30 to 40 units at another site on Main Street. Meanwhile, the city is issuing an RFP for redevelopment of the Hope Street parking lot into additional housing.

That RFP has yet to be issued, but several developers have already expressed interest in the project, said Desorgher, adding that this is another indicator of positive energy in town and growing sentiment that Greenfield is a good place to land — for families, small businesses, and, increasingly, regional and national chains.

The arrival of Starbucks at the rotary off the I-91 exit — as well as the Aldi’s discount supermarket chain in that same area — provide more evidence, the mayor said.

“All this is indicative of what the future holds, and I can feel it in the fact that we haven’t even put out an RFP for the Hope Street parking lot for housing, but people have already reached out, indicating they’re interested. That’s a really good sign.”

As for the larger housing picture, she said studies indicate a need for several hundred additional units, and the projects in the pipeline will make only a small dent in overall need. But there is progress, especially downtown, which should provide a boost to existing businesses and also spark additional investment.

Greenfield at a Glance

Year Incorporated: 1753
Population: 17,768
Area: 21.9 square miles
County: Franklin
Residential Tax Rate: $19.56
Commercial Tax Rate: $19.56
Median Household Income: $33,110
Median Family Income: $46,412
Type of Government: Mayor, City Council
Largest Employers: Baystate Franklin Medical Center, Greenfield Community College, Sandri
* Latest information available

Still, there is general concern over the way home prices are rising and changing the equation in what has historically been an affordable community.

“My wife and I live in a neighborhood just off the Federal Street corridor — in close proximity to the Greenfield High School and Four Corners Elementary School — that has historically been known for its mid-sized homes and its affordability,” Worden told BusinessWest. “Over the past few years, we’ve seen a handful of homes on our street and adjacent streets sell for amounts that we used to expect from the Northampton and Amherst market.

“A business like ours relies upon a smart, educated workforce, and this cost of housing is worrying me for the future,” he went on. “Where are our employees going to live? Will there be a pool of qualified workers able to live in this area?”

Deane concurred.

“Like many communities across the Commonwealth, our growth is hindered by a shortage of available housing — and this is further exacerbated by aging infrastructure that requires significant investment,” she said. “At the same time, we’re seeing a real uptick in businesses and families looking to relocate here because the quality of life is exceptional, and at a glance, the cost of living is more manageable than in more urban markets. That growing interest is energizing, but we know we can’t grow sustainably unless we also address those foundational needs.”

Coming Attractions

As he talked about Greenfield, Bob Provost spoke with more than 75 years of experience. Sort of.

He’s the third-generation co-owner (with his sister, Robyn) of the general-contracting firm Mowry & Schmidt, which is handling the renovations of the Leavitt-Hovey House. He knows firsthand how the city has changed, and he has stories from those who managed the company before him.

“Greenfield was once a manufacturing hub back in the ’40s and ’50s, even up to the ’70s, but most all of those places have closed,” he said, adding that this has changed not only the employment equation, but the jobs mix for his company.

Indeed, Mowry & Schmidt did a good deal of work in many of the former mills — from exterior work to office renovations to millwright work, said Provost, adding that the portfolio has since shifted and now includes residential projects and more work for institutions such as the many banks in town, Greenfield Community College, Baystate Franklin Medical Center, and area private schools.

Overall, the city’s economy has largely shifted from manufacturing to service and the tourism and hospitality sector, with the latter becoming an ever-stronger force, said Deane, noting that Greenfield and Franklin County are growing as a destination, with Greenfield alone generating 6.7 million visits in 2024.

There are specific destinations and attractions, but also popular events such as the upcoming Bee Festival, during which the town celebrates its designation as the place where the beehive was invented, as well as the Green River Festival, a three-day celebration of music.

“Our marketing focus has shifted from generic outreach to specific, interest-driven storytelling — targeting Boomers who want to stay active, Millennials chasing Insta-worthy landscapes, and Gen Z looking for positivity and purpose,” Deane said. “We’ve also partnered with local event coordinators to promote bigger-ticket cultural and sporting events like Franklin County Pride, the Greenfield Winter Carnival, the Greenfield Triathlon, the Franklin County Fairgrounds, and the Green River Festival, with its great lineup of bands, coming in late June.

“Last April, the Franklin County Chamber launched an aggressive digital ad campaign promoting the Green River Festival and virtually introduced the fairgrounds and Greenfield to more than 2 million people,” she went on. “In large part to the success of this campaign, this year’s Green River Festival ticket sales saw a 13% increase over last year, with 25% of ticket buyers attending the festival for the first time.”

At Greenfield Garden Cinemas, Mass said people are going to the movies again — not quite as much as they did pre-pandemic, but the numbers are steady and even improving slightly.

And there is optimism for this summer — one of two busy times for movie theaters, with Christmas being the other — and later this spring as well. Indeed, in addition to a new Superman movie, there’s a live action Lilo & Stitch production, another Jurassic World offering, and a new Avengers movie, said Mass, adding that the cinemas cater mostly to seniors and families, so action movies don’t play particularly well.

But, overall, business is good at the cinemas, and across downtown Greenfield, where the coming attractions are, indeed, quite compelling.

Matt Waldrip

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Manager, Licensing & Permitting, Eversource: Age 36

Matt Waldrip

He calls it ‘Turtlepalooza.’

This is a program Matt Waldrip, manager of Licensing & Permitting for Eversource, now coordinates yearly. And, as the name suggests, it involves turtles — or turtle safety, to be more precise.

“We train our construction crews how to safely conduct their work when there are turtles present on site, so they can avoid direct harm to the species,” he explained. “And the way we do that is by training them and letting them know what to look for and methods they can use to move grass out of the way so they can see the turtles.”

That’s just one of many ways Waldrip works to bring construction and the environment together — in everything from his day job to his hobby, beekeeping.

A graduate of Westfield State University, where he earned bachelor’s degrees in environmental science and regional planning, and Fitchburg State, where he earned an MBA, Waldrip manages a team of 15 scientists responsible for licensing and permitting critical energy projects, everything from utility poles to lattice towers, to make the electric grid more reliable, resilient, and sustainable — work he finds rewarding on many levels.

“I find it interesting. I come from a family of scientists — my mom was a science teacher, and my dad is a farmer now, but he was a college professor,” he said. “I just came to realize how important the environment is, and I wanted to try to make a difference.”

He’s doing so on many levels, including in the community. He’s served, with others, as a captain for Eversource’s United Way campaign, as well as serving as an Eversource runner in a 5K race with Mass General Cancer Center and the Run for Boston Children’s Hospital.

He’s also a member of the Hadley Planning Board, chairs the energy resource committee for the Environmental Business Council of New England, co-chaired the 2025 annual conference of the Massachusetts Assoc. of Conservation Commissions, and coaches in the Amherst Youth Basketball Assoc., among other efforts.

As for the beekeeping … he had six hives, but unfortunately, a few died over the winter. He sells honey and wax to friends in what he described as an enjoyable side hustle inspired by his mother.

“She’s been a beekeeper for years,” he said. “I just got kind of hooked into it as I realized how beneficial bees are to the environment.”

—George O’Brien

Kerri Tichy

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Senior Director of Philanthropy, Shriners Children’s New England; Age 38

Kerri Tichy

Kerri Tichy doesn’t see her role as senior director of Philanthropy at Shriners Children’s New England as work, instead calling it a “passion.”

Actually, it combines two passions.

One involves philanthropy, and the other involves the Shriners, its many organizations, its children’s clinics, and especially the one in Springfield, where her daughter, Kelsi, is a patient.

“My father was a Shriner, and I grew up in the daughter organization called the International Order of the Rainbow for Girls, and from that, I went into the Ladies of the Oriental Shrine of North America — the ladies with the white fezzes,” Tichy said. “Shriner’s Children’s is my passion and my purpose; it’s part of who I am.”

As for fundraising, Tichy has made it a significant part of her career.

Indeed, she worked in the private sector — for Aero Fastener Co. in Westfield and also MassMutual and Babson Capital — before joining the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, managing more than 430 philanthropic funds and driving strategic donor-engagement efforts.

She enjoyed that work, but when there was an opportunity to join Shriners Children’s New England, she jumped at it. And since arriving in 2022, she has excelled, while also moving up in the ranks, from Development officer to associate director to director, and now senior director.

Last year, for example, she oversaw the team that raised just over $8 million, 272% above the goal of $3 million, an achievement she attributes largely to one large, anonymous $10 million donation split with the Boston clinic, but mostly to hard work.

“There were a lot of events, a lot of speaking engagements, and meeting with donors,” Tichy said, adding that she spends most of her days hitting the pavement and spreading the word about the organization’s mission.

“When you’re mission-oriented, that speaks authentically to the donors and engages them, so it creates a deeper impact all the way around,” she said. “The other key is building on that relationship. Yes, the dollar matters, but at the end of the day, if you don’t have the rapport and the relationship with the individuals, the money isn’t going to continue.”

While doing all this, she is also active in the community, with organizations ranging from the PTO at her daughter Kelsi’s school to the Ladies of the Oriental Shrine of North America to Easter Seals of Western Massachusetts.

—George O’Brien

Davis Snow

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Program Supervisor, Hampden County Sheriﬀ’s Office: Age 37

Davis Snow

It’s called the Sheriff’s Shuffle.

That’s the name given to an annual run at Ashley Reservoir in Holyoke that has raised more than $200,000 to support the YWCA of Western Massachusetts and survivors of domestic violence.

Since 2019, Davis Snow, program supervisor at the Hampden County Sheriff’s Department, has been chair of the committee that oversees the event, handling a wide array of details and contributing in myriad ways to its continued growth and success. And that’s one of many reasons why he’s a member of the 40 Under Forty class of 2025.

The primary reason is his work at the Sheriff’s Department, where he has risen in the ranks and now supervises the Employment Program, part of the department’s larger All Inclusive Support Services. In this wide-ranging role, he oversees everything from Prison Industries (work training within the jail) to the work-release program to community-based programs facilitated by area community colleges to help inmates, and others, secure work at area businesses.

It’s a three-phase program, he said, adding that it involves employment readiness, such as work with résumés, cover letters, and interview skills; a job-search program, where interviews are arranged; and employment retention.

“Not only do we help individuals get jobs, we help them hold onto those jobs,” Snow explained. “We stay in communication with them once they start working, check in with them to see how everything’s going, and check in with employers, when it’s appropriate, to see how these individuals are doing.”

Much of his work comes down to networking within the business community, talking to HR directors, business owners, and operations managers, telling them about the program and the people it serves, and, ultimately, forming partnerships.

Indeed, many have been forged, he said, adding that employers across many sectors have become involved in the program, including Baystate Medical Center, Casella Waste Management, International Container, and others.

“Davis has devoted his entire life to helping others,” wrote Elizabeth Dineen, CEO of the YWCA of Western Massachusetts in nominating him for this award. “He’s constantly challenging himself to grow and learn more about why people commit crime and how his team can help inmates redirect their lives to become contributing members of society.”

When not working, or running the Sheriff’s Shuffle, Snow likes doing things outdoors — skiing, travel, hiking, or the beach — with his wife Emily, daughter Willa, and son Cody.

—George O’Brien

Nicole Taylor

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Senior Marketing Specialist, Trinity Health Of New England: Age 32

Nicole Taylor

Nicole Taylor’s primary influences come from the foundational values instilled by her family, faith, and life experiences.

While notable public figures have certainly influenced her over the years, her family gets the credit for molding her into the person she is today, guiding the way she serves her community.

Her journey began with a love for sports, earning her degree in sports and recreation management from American International College, where she also earned her MBA. Soon after graduating, she took on the role of Business Development & Special Events executive for the Springfield Thunderbirds, where she secured strategic partnerships, and, among other things, led the planning and execution of the team’s first sensory-friendly game.

In 2021, Taylor joined Trinity Health Of New England, where she serves as senior Marketing specialist. This is a broad role, involving everything from shaping the marketing strategy for both Mercy Medical Center and the Trinity Health Of New England network — particularly in the women’s health, cardiovascular, and cancer service lines — to building and sustaining high-value partnerships.

“I work on a variety of projects across these service lines, partnering with providers to thoughtfully promote their services to the community, with the goal of encouraging residents to choose Trinity Health Of New England as their preferred healthcare system,” she said.

“It’s important to be detail-oriented and have a strong understanding of people — that psychological piece of marketing,” she went on, adding that she’s applied lessons from sports and higher education to her current role.

And in this setting, as in those before it, she’s achieved results — such as marketing efforts that have led to 8,000 new patient leads, 5.5 million website visits, and 1.8 million earned media impressions.

“Nicole continuously leverages her expertise in digital marketing, community relations, and event planning to launch initiatives that not only drive business success, but also create meaningful, long-term impact,” wrote Amy Ashford, regional vice president of Marketing & Communications for Trinity Health, who nominated her for the 40 Under Forty award.

Active in the community, Taylor was instrumental in forging a partnership between Mercy Medical Center and Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority Inc. — she’s an active member of the Western Mass. alumnae chapter — to promote Black Maternal Mental Health Week in 2024. She has also spearheaded initiatives like Swim 1922, providing area residents with water-safety skills through instruction from Olympic silver medalist Maritza McClendon.

—George O’Brien

Kashawn Sanders

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

President and CEO, Follow My Steps Foundation Inc.: Age 29

Kashawn Sanders

Kashawn Sanders says the inspiration for the Follow My Steps Foundation, the nonprofit organization he co-founded and now serves as president, CEO, and board chair, came from an experience in a class he was taking during his senior year at UMass Dartmouth.

“The professor tasked us with going out and getting an internship. As soon as the words were out of her mouth, we could hear our fellow students say, ‘I’m going to reach out to this person, or my uncle, or my cousin’ … we didn’t have any of those connections,” he said, referring to himself and classmate Tyrone Williams.

To help ensure that future generations of young people would not suffer that same experience, Sanders, a Springfield native, and Williams, from Boston, created Follow My Steps, which is dedicated to empowering youth through mentorship, career readiness, financial-literacy programs, scholarships, and more.

Summing it all up, Sanders, a financial advisor by trade, said the agency, founded in 2020 during COVID when he and Williams were thinking about what to do next and how to give back, is about providing resources to those who simply don’t have as many as those who are more fortunate.

“We created a customizable mentorship program that centers around the youth and their aspirations,” he noted. “We also work with them when it comes to financial literacy, we make sure there’s a health component that addresses both physical and mental health, and we add on additional resources, teaching them the importance of networking, the importance of getting out there early and understanding that there are people in the community they can look up to and talk to.”

Dawn Creighton, Community Outreach officer for Liberty Bank, who nominated Sanders for the 40 Under Forty, has worked with him on the agency’s Cultural Steps event, which provides participants with a diverse range of foods and introduction to various cultures, as well as a Credit for Life course, a financial-literacy module through which students embark a simulated journey through life.

She also appreciates that the mission of Follow My Steps is “personal” to Sanders.

“Having personally navigated the same challenges his organization seeks to address, he brings a lived understanding of the systemic obstacles that underserved youth face,” Creighton said.

While doing that, he spends the rest of his time reading, working out, and spending time with his partner, Kenia, and son KJ.

—George O’Brien

Catherine Rioux

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Assistant Vice President, Commercial Loan Oﬃcer, Monson Savings Bank: Age 34

Catherine Rioux

Catherine Rioux is a textbook example, pun intended, of how internships, at both the college and high-school level, can not only introduce young people to careers, but help businesses keep talent in the pipeline.

Rioux interned in the Human Resources department at Monson Savings Bank (MSB) while in high school as part of a class in business and entrepreneurship, an initiative called ‘work-based learning.’

The experience left her intrigued by the financial-services sector, enough to make her want to stay at the bank, even though she wasn’t old enough to even work on the teller line.

“I continued to learn and just be a part of it, and earning a little bit of money was cool, too, when I was 15,” she said, adding that she answered phones and handled other duties after school. “My grandma would pick me up from school and drop me off for my shift, and either she or my mom or dad would pick me up.”

Rioux kept working at MSB through high school and again while earning a business degree at Western New England University, leaving the company for a short time her senior year. But when she graduated, she returned to MSB as a loan servicer receptionist, then worked her way up to her current role as assistant vice president and commercial loan officer.

“I don’t want to say it just happened,” she said of her career. “It was a lot of organic growth and organic learning; I always wanted to learn more and do more and stay busy. The bank gave me a lot of opportunities because I showed the initiative to take on projects, big or small.”

Active in the community, Rioux serves on the town of Monson’s scholarship committee and the Monson Free Library committee. She has also volunteered her time to build bikes for local disadvantaged youths, fill backpacks in support of the United Way’s Stuff the Bus campaign, and work with the Revitalize Community Development Corp. program known as #GreenNFit Neighborhood Rebuild. Previously, she served as a Lighthouse advisory board member for I Found Light Against All Odds, and with the Ludlow Rotary Club Charitable Foundation.

Rioux said she’s looking forward to bringing her son with her on a #GreenNFit assignment or some of her other work so he can get involved and understand the importance of giving back. That’s another thing she learned on that internship.

—George O’Brien

Kate Miniﬁe

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Farm & Food Products Program Director, Western Massachusetts Food Processing Center: Age 34

Kate Miniﬁe

Kate Minifie was candid when she talked about everything it takes to be an entrepreneur and bring an idea for a new food or beverage product from conception to the store shelf — and about how she doesn’t possess all those ingredients herself.

“I’m way too risk-averse,” she said with a laugh, adding quickly that, in her role as Food & Products Program director for the Western Massachusetts Food Processing Center at Franklin County Community Development Corp., she works closely with those who are not.

And she finds it quite rewarding to help these individuals navigate a broad array of challenges and issues — from recipe development to regulatory compliance to general business planning — to bring a product to the marketplace.

“I like working with entrepreneurs and being part of their story,” she told BusinessWest. “My favorite thing is that every day is different, and the other thing that’s really cool is seeing someone be successful over time, someone who comes to us with an idea, and three or five years later, you can find their products in stores all over the region.”

She cited several success stories, including a Greenfield woman who created something called ‘fire cider,’ what Minifie described as a “preventive medicine.”

Minifie graduated from UMass Amherst with a degree in public health, but soon decided she was more interested in food systems, and has since worked “across the supply chain,” as she put it, meaning farms, restaurants, and a farm-to-school program in Vermont.

She then moved on to the Food Processing Center, where she initially worked in the farm-to-institution realm, running a program called Valley Veggies, whereby local produce was sourced, then frozen and sold to schools across the region.

She progressed to her current role, in which she assists entrepreneurs with products across a wide spectrum — sauces, baked products, condiments, beverages, and more.

“These are early-stage businesses,” she explained. “We counsel on all the things they need to bring a product to market — legally, safely, and in a way that’s going to get them noticed.”

Active in the community, Minifie serves on the Board of Health in Colrain and has also co-chaired the Franklin County Food Council.

When not doing all that, she likes to run with her dog in the woods and enjoys outdoor activities with her husband, Ben, and children Maeve and Miles.

—George O’Brien

Liz Martinek

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

EMS Coordinator, Baystate Health: Age 34

Liz Martinek

Liz Martinek misses riding in the ambulance. Sort of.

She was an EMT and then a paramedic for many years, and thoroughly enjoyed that work, despite its physical and mental toll.

“I like being there for people on the worst day of their life because I want to make it better,” said Martinek, who has moved on to what is, in many ways, an even more rewarding role: that of EMS coordinator for Baystate Health.

This is a role with a lengthy job description that includes everything from coordinating internal and external quality-assurance and education initiatives to helping plan and execute Baystate Health’s EMS Week activities and Disaster Day, an annual event that partners Baystate Health physician residents with all-level first responders from local communities in a staged mass-casualty disaster.

“We bridge the gap between EMS agencies, whether they’re fire departments or private ambulance services, and the hospital side,” said Martinek, who is based at Baystate Noble Hospital and works with several different fire departments from area municipalities and even Six Flags New England. “We do a lot of overview of the pre-hospital medical care that is happening out in the field and make sure that providers are following the state protocols and the standards of that care, with an eye toward continuous improvement and patient safety.”

Martinek brings a wealth of experience to her current role, from her years as a paramedic to her work as ambulance coordinator for Baystate Health and as service quality manager for Alert Ambulance — as well as her experiences during the pandemic, when her role changed to include more outreach to patients.

Indeed, she was honored by her colleagues as a Pandemic Response Hero for her patient-assessment efforts at a Westfield assisted-living facility that led to the immediate transportation of six patients in need of an emergency-room evaluation of their COVID symptoms.

Active in the community, Martinek serves as Baystate Health’s medical captain for the IRONMAN competition in Western Mass. In that role, she recruits and oversees the volunteer services provided on site during the event by physicians, nurses, paramedics, EMTs, and other emergency responders.

With encouragement from her husband, Kreig, Martinek said she got into CrossFit and has fallen in love with it, giving her more energy for doing things with her two children, Lindsay and Matthew.

—George O’Brien

Sarah Lapolice

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Tax Department Manager, Burkhart Pizzanelli, P.C.: Age 37

Sarah Lapolice

While earning her MBA at Elms College, Sarah Lapolice says she was influenced by many of her teachers, but especially Julie Quink, then a partner and now managing principal of the accounting firm Burkhart Pizzanelli, P.C.

“There’s a certain presence about her, and I remember leaving my last MBA class with Julie … I called my mom — I called her every night — and said, ‘there’s something about this woman; I don’t want to stop learning from her.’”

And, in essence, she hasn’t.

The two have offices a few yards apart at the firm’s West Springfield headquarters, with Lapolice crediting Quink with providing the inspiration and direction to become a CPA and eventually advance to the role of Tax Department manager.

The two share a passion for building teamwork and providing support to team members whenever and however it’s needed.

Indeed, when asked to walk us through the life of a Tax Department manager, Lapolice started by saying the first thing she does is “check in with everyone at the office.”

She explained that “it’s important for me to get a sense for how everyone else is feeling, including outside of work, so you can gauge where they’re at and whether they need support. I check in with them on a personal level and then on the work front.”

That’s especially true during the height of tax season, which is when she talked with BusinessWest. It’s a stressful time, one during which, as a manager, she focuses on providing support in myriad ways.

This is part of a broad job description that includes everything from growing the firm’s client base to helping those clients optimize their tax strategies; from employee training and development to building client relationships.

Lapolice brings to these assignments, and many others, a management philosophy grounded in solid teamwork, lessons learned from playing a variety of sports — starting when she was young and continuing through college — and also from playing music in tandem with others.

While instilling the importance of teamwork, she also sets an example when it comes to work in the community. She is active with the nonprofit Girls on the Run and now serves on its board, and has served on the philanthropic services committee for the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, and has also served as a board member for Libertas Academy Charter School.

—George O’Brien

Brenton Jenkins

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Founder, Vision Entertainment: Age 30

Brenton Jenkins

Brenton Jenkins, better known to many as DJ Onyx, says he doesn’t remember what his first paid gig was.

He guesses it was a barbecue or birthday party for a friend or relative — he started DJing for events like that when he was 14.

His first big break, he said, came a few years later when he was fortunate enough to land several high-school graduation parties in Longmeadow, where he grew up.

“They’re a big deal in that town,” said Jenkins, who has gone on to much bigger deals in his career as founder and owner of Springfield-based Vision Entertainment.

These include being the resident DJ for UMass Athletics, starting in 2016; at MGM Springfield, starting in 2020; and at the Big E, where he opens for many of the major acts, since 2019, while also handling corporate clients, luxury weddings, and a wide range of large-scale events.

He’s also the entertainment provider for a long list of area schools, and an equally long list of nonprofit events and fundraisers ranging from Baystate Health’s National Health Week to Springfield’s Historic McKnight District’s annual block party, to the Holyoke Police Officers’ Ball.

As an entrepreneur, Jenkins, who earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration and management at Westfield State University, has steadily grown his business, consistently adding clients while also broadening the list of services to include photo booths, lighting, and other attractions.

He’s passionate about his work, but also giving back and sharing what he’s learned — about DJing, business, and life in general.

An active member of the Young Professional Society of Greater Springfield, Jenkins has become involved in several mentorship and apprenticeship programs in the region.

“Passionate about giving back to the next generation, DJ Onyx actively mentors and provides apprenticeships for local youth, introducing them to entrepreneurship and the events industry,” wrote Amie Miarecki, president of Junior Achievement of Western Massachusetts, as she nominated him for the 40 Under Forty award. “Through hands-on experience in DJing, event production, and business development, he equips young talent with the skills and confidence to pursue careers in entertainment and entrepreneurship.”

Added Jenkins, “when someone asks me what it means to be successful, I say that it’s about doing something you love and creating wealth for myself and the people around me. And that’s not material wealth — that’s the wealth of life, the wealth of experiences, the wealth of knowledge.”

—George O’Brien

Angela Hansberry

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Financial Planning Assistant, the Jamrog Group: Age 37

Angela Hansberry

For much of Angela Hansberry’s life, horses were the main focal point.

She got her first horse when she was 16 and later majored in equine business management at Johnson & Wales University. After graduating, she spent the next decade managing a horse barn in New Hampshire, working in equine rescue for the MSPCA, and teaching others how to ride.

But then … she was ready for a change, and a move back to Western Mass. And, long story short, while she still rides, her life has a different set of priorities, starting with her twins, Charlotte and Ryan; the latter suffers from autism and Williams syndrome, a developmental disorder that affects many parts of the body.

There’s also a new, emerging career as a financial planning assistant with the Holyoke-based Jamrog Group.

As Hansberry tells the story, a friend working at the Jamrog Group heard she was coming back to the region and asked if she was interested in an office job with the firm. She was, and in one short year, she progressed from receptionist to paraplanner.

“I enjoyed the work, so I decided I wanted to learn more about it; I started studying and taking exams and earning my life and health insurance licenses,” she said, adding that she earned additional designations enabling her to become a retired income certified professional.

While navigating her new career and Ryan’s early interventions, surgeries, and trips to specialists in Boston, she became focused on learning more about special-needs planning — for her own family as well as company clients — an earned the industry designation as a chartered special needs consultant.

“We’ve had a handful of families come to us who have children with special needs,” she said. “So it’s great to have that specialized training and be able to help them.”

Active in the community, Hansberry is a room parent at Meadowbrook School in East Longmeadow, assists with her daughter’s Girl Scout troop, and serves as a ‘parent buddy’ to Ryan as he plays baseball in the Miracle League of Western Massachusetts.

“Angela really is amazing, and an incredible role model for working mothers who prioritize their children and master the art of balancing it all,” said Amy Jamrog, CEO of the Jamrog Group, who nominated her for this award. “She is quiet, humble, and calm; I do not know what our team would do without her contribution to us and her clients.”

—George O’Brien

Koby Gardner-Levine

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Regional Manager, Office of Congressman Jim McGovern: Age 29

Koby Gardner-Levine

Koby Gardner-Levine describes his work as being a “jack of all trades.”

Indeed, as regional manager for the Northampton office of U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern, he handles everything from overseeing the needs of the 30 municipalities in the western portion of the massive district (most of them in Hampshire and Franklin counties) to assisting individual constituents with matters involving Social Security, veterans’ affairs, IRS matters, and more, to overseeing $8.5 million in Community Project Funding across the district in 2024.

Overall, it’s rewarding work, said Gardner-Levine, who has worked in McGovern’s Western Mass. office for six years, adding that, in many cases, but certainly not all, problems can be solved, and issues can be properly addressed.

“No day is exactly the same as the day before it,” he noted, adding that he often works with constituents one-on-one, but is also out in the community speaking to groups, as he did recently on Medicare policies. “I like being in a role where I’m able to give back to this community and really get a better understanding of the needs in this area.”

The Northampton office is generally busy with constituent calls and inquiries from officials in those 30 communities, he said, adding that the volume of calls has increased exponentially since the start of the Trump administration and its sweeping changes and executive orders.

“Our phones have been ringing off the hook since the new administration took office,” he noted. “We’ve certainly had a lot of constituent outreach on different federal initiatives coming out of the White House, and Congress as well.”

A Clark University graduate with a master’s degree in environmental science and policy, Gardner-Levine serves on the board of the Hitchcock Center for the Environment in Amherst, just one example of his involvement in the community. He also serves on the board of the United Way of the Franklin & Hampshire Region and is a member of the Hampshire Food Policy Council.

He also works closely with McGovern on food-security issues, and has served as a panelist in discussions hosted by the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, the Amherst Survival Center, and the Hampshire County Council of Social Agencies to discuss various topics, including last year’s White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health.

He has also worked in partnership with the African Heritage Reparations Assembly of Amherst, a group with a mission to study and develop reparation proposals for local people of African heritage.

—George O’Brien

Mo Freniere

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Deputy Director of Sales, Eastern States Exposition: Age 36

Mo Freniere

Mo Freniere brought a lot with her to her 40 Under Forty photo shoot, all to help capture everything that’s important to her.

There’s a promotional banner for her family’s Prospect Valley Farm in Westfield; a plaque that depicts a leadership award she won; some ribbons from Eastern States Exposition (ESE) won by her family, which has shown cattle and produce for four generations; a picture of her family; materials depicting the Westfield Fair, which she has served in many capacities; and more.

The photo captures the essence of Freniere’s life and career, which, in many ways, has revolved around agriculture, milking shorthorns, fairs, and especially the Big E, which she currently serves as deputy director of Sales.

In that capacity, she oversees the sales and administrative process for all non-fair events and manages the brick-and-mortar food and beverages service, including alcohol partners, during the Big E.

She’s responsible for growing revenue, expanding ESE’s non-fair event portfolio, and attracting new trade shows and events, and she has been successful in rebuilding that side of the Big E’s business since the difficult COVID years.

“We’re looking pretty good … it’s been a few years until these events have gotten back up to scale, but we’re steadily improving,” said Freniere, who earned a degree in animal science with a focus on agricultural finance at Cornell and worked for the Holstein Assoc. USA and briefly at Hampshire College before joining Eastern States Exposition in 2019.

A list of all she has done within the Western Mass. community — and beyond — also helps tell her story. She is or has been a member of the International Assoc. of Fairs & Expositions, an American Milking Shorthorn Junior Society advisor, a Wyben 4-H Dairy Club leader, Westfield Fair Assoc. secretary and Vendor and Concessions coordinator, a member of the ESE Ag & Ed advisory committee, an ESE milking shorthorn breed representative, and an ESE judging competition superintendent.

And while she doesn’t show cattle at the Big E any longer, because of her position with the company, her family does, and that’s just one of many forums for exhibiting their milking shorthorns.

“We travel all over the country showing our cattle,” she said. “Locally we do really well, regionally we do OK, and nationally we hold our own, so we’ve got room to grow.”

—George O’Brien

Chelsea Depault

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Vice President, Commercial and Municipal Lending, Greenﬁeld Cooperative Bank: Age 36

Chelsea Depault

Chelsea Depault says she got into banking “by default.”

As she explains it, the mother of an old boyfriend took it upon herself to help her secure a better job by submitting an application for her at Greenfield Cooperative Bank to be a teller.

That was in 2007. She got the job and has been there ever since (except for a two-year stint with Community Action of Pioneer Valley), rising in the ranks and securing a progression of titles, from accounting clerk to credit analyst; commercial loan officer to vice president, Commercial Operations officer, assuming a wide range of duties along the way.

During COVID, for example, she played a key role in helping install a manual process to train internal staff in the handling of PPP loan applications.

Today, her role as vice president, Commercial and Municipal Lending involves everything from handling loans for commercial customers, most of them small-business owners, to staffing the bank’s booth at Frontier Regional High School’s Teen Reality Fair, providing lessons in financial literacy.

These and other assignments are quite rewarding, said Depault, who earned degrees at Greenfield Community College and then the Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst and has also completed the prestigious ABA Stonier Graduate School of Banking program at the University of Pennsylvania. She especially likes working with business owners and guiding them through what can be a difficult process.

“No two businesses are the same, and no two deals are the same,” she explained. “Being able to help small businesses and big businesses achieve their goals — and those goals are always changing — is my favorite part of this job.”

Active in the community, she serves Community Action Pioneer Valley, a nonprofit that assists low-income residents with everything from fuel assistance to SNAP benefits, as treasurer. She also serves on the Northfield Recreation Committee (as treasurer, but also soccer and basketball coach), the Franklin County Community Development Corp. loan committee, Franklin County Community Meals, the Greenfield Public Library Foundation, the Franklin Regional Council of Governments, and more.

While doing all that, she finds plenty of time for family — husband, Doug, three children, Mason, Brody, and Ellie, and two dogs — and a wide range of outdoor activities and sports.

“All that keeps me busy,” she said. “But it’s a good busy.”

—George O’Brien

Olivia Calcasola

By George O'Brien April 24, 2025

Class of 2025

Tax Supervisor, Meyers Brothers Kalicka, P.C.: Age 27

Olivia Calcasola

Olivia Calcasola started her career in accounting at the Boston-based firm RSM US.

That was in November 2019. Just a few months later, COVID hit, and, like almost everyone else at the firm, she was sent home to work, and did so for the next two years.

This was a difficult, trying stretch, she said, adding that she, like other young accountants, missed out on the mentoring and camaraderie that comes with being in an office every day.

But she believes that, ultimately, that experience has made her a better accountant and worker.

“You had to sink or swim — I pretty much had to teach myself everything that I would have learned in person or learned with a mentor,” she said. “I didn’t have what I have now — the ability to go talk to someone and knock on their door.”

Those experiences have made Calcasola even more determined to be a mentor and foster professional development.

And she does this in her role as tax supervisor at Meyers Brothers Kalicka, P.C. (MBK), where her day job involves everything from overseeing the preparation and review of complex individual, corporate, and partnership returns to managing client relationships; from conducting tax research to staying current on changes in tax laws, regulations, and rulings.

“We all have designated mentors here, but we all try to mentor each other,” she said, adding that this is one of the reasons why she enjoys what she does and loves going to work every day — even at the height of tax season.

Calcasola, a graduate of UMass Amherst’s Isenberg School of Management and one of two young professionals from MBK named to the 40 Under Forty class of 2025, is also actively involved in many of the firm’s efforts to give back, especially through its community-service events and initiatives.

She has spearheaded an event for HCS Head Start — a drive to collect winter coats for children — while also working on the United Way of Pioneer Valley’s Stuff the Bus program, which collects school supplies, among other efforts.

Through the firm’s Community Outreach Program, she has participated in events to support groups ranging from the Springfield Boys and Girls Club to the Gray House; from Girl Scouts of Western Massachusetts to Better Together Dog Rescue.

While doing that, she finds plenty of time for her fiancé, Jon, and Siberian husky, Gunner.

—George O’Brien

Golf Enjoys ‘Stickiness’ in Post-COVID Times

By George O'Brien April 11, 2025

Sports & Leisure

Round Numbers

John Thomas says the recently opened Max’s Swing Lounge is off to a solid start, attracting individuals of all ability levels, high-school teams, and corporate outings as well.

As he talked about golf in March and how many of the Bay State’s courses were able to open for business for large stretches of that month, Jesse Menachem first lamented that February was an almost total loss.

The fact that he even brought up February was a sign of recent times — for golf and the climate in New England. Indeed, area courses have enjoyed a prolonged run of golf-season-extending weather, with earlier starts, later finishes, and mostly decent weather through the season.

And this run of good weather has perhaps played a small role in the game becoming “more sticky” since enjoying a surge during COVID, when there was little else to do, and becoming “cool again,” said Menachem, president and CEO of the Massachusetts Golf Assoc. (MGA), who acknowledged that he gets paid to promote the game, but is genuinely optimistic about what he’s seen and what he projects for this season and beyond.

“We are again bullish about participation numbers and membership numbers,” he said, adding that all signs point to another solid year. “People are fitting golf into their daily lives and their daily routines in a different way than they did a few decades ago.”

Meanwhile, another aspect of golf’s surge has nothing to do with climate, other than being an antidote for bad weather. Yes, we’re talking about simulators, which continue to grow in popularity, with many private courses now adding such facilities to allow members to keep clubs in their hands 12 months a year — while also providing a boost to the food-and-beverage side of the house.

But there also more such facilities not tied to clubs, such as the recently opened Max’s Swing Lounge at Max’s Tavern at the Basketball Hall of Fame.

John Thomas, general manager of Max’s Tavern, part of the Max Restaurant Group, said the facility, which opened last November in an underutilized banquet room, provides users with opportunities for everything from basic practice to playing iconic courses like Pebble Beach and Cypress Point, and is off to a solid start.

“We’re seeing everyone from toddlers to retired people who are picking up golf for the first time,” he said, adding that the facility features nine bays using Trackman simulation technology. “We see people who play two or three times a week, we see pros, we see people just getting into the game, and people just out to have a good time.”

As for facilities that are dependent on the weather, many area courses were open by the end of March, and some were open before St. Patrick’s Day. That continues a trend that covers the past several years, and it’s a positive development in that it extends the revenue-generating season to weeks, or even months, when overhead is much lower than at other times of the year; Menachem calls this “bonus time.”

Jesse Menachem

“We are again bullish about participation numbers and membership numbers.”

The longer seasons comprise one of many bright spots for the golfing industry that still share space with a host of challenges — from the rising cost of just about everything to ongoing workforce struggles. All these issues, in both categories, are visible at clubs large, small, and even very small, such as Quaboag Country Club in Monson.

Celebrating its 125th anniversary this year, the semi-private club has nine holes, maintains a stable but older-than-normal membership of about 125, and has enjoyed growth in play since COVID, said General Manager Dale Swanson, a 71-year-old who described himself as a jack of all trades.

That’s his way of saying there’s a very small staff at the club, and he does whatever is necessary, including work in the kitchen, the 19th hole, getting carts ready for the season, and the pro shop.

As he does all that, he said a new greenskeeper — evidence that the course is in the best shape it’s been in for this time of year — general optimism about the state of the game, and a milestone anniversary have the club primed for what should a good year.

“We’re optimistic, and we’re already off to a good start,” Swanson said, adding that the course had a soft opening in late March with reduced greens fees. “COVID brought a lot of people into the game, and they’re sticking with it.”

For this issue, BusinessWest looks at the state of the golf business and the outlook for the year ahead.

Out of the Rough

As he talked with BusinessWest on March 29, a Saturday that was predicted to be a total washout, Ted Perez Jr., the head pro and co-owner of East Mountain Country Club, was in the pro shop checking in a few groups trying to steal a round before the weather rolled in.

“I think the forecast scared most of them away, but we had a few groups come out,” said Perez, whose course is known across this region — and well beyond — for being open pretty much whenever there is no snow on the ground.

Which means it’s been open almost year-round since the pandemic, said Perez, noting that February was, indeed, a total loss, making 2025 the first year since 2020 when East Mountain will not be open at least a part of all 12 months.

Still, this season officially started earlier than most, he said, noting that the course opened March 8, two or three weeks before most others, getting 2025 off to a decent start, again, at a time when there are minimal expenses to cut into the revenues.

Dale Swanson says Quaboag Country Club, like most courses in the area, has enjoyed early starts and, overall, growth in play since COVID.

“My father used to say that golf this early in the year is like finding money on the street,” said Perez, whose dad, Ted Perez Sr., designed and built the course in the early ’60s. “That’s because it costs you almost nothing to be open; you’re not mowing greens, you’re not changing cups, you’re not fertilizing … there’s zero expense other than gas for the carts.”

These early starts — and later finishes, at least the past few years — have certainly played a role in overall business growth at most area courses, said Perez and others we spoke with. But the bigger reason has been the surge in participation prompted by the pandemic, and strong evidence that many of those who took up the game then, or went back to it after leaving for any of several reasons, have stayed with it.

Whether golf is now ‘cool’ — the word Menachem chose — is a matter of debate, there’s no doubting that the game is more popular than it was 10 to 15 years ago, when its cost, lengthy time to play, and other factors were leaving empty lines on tee sheets and private clubs with dramatically lower membership numbers.

“Now, most private clubs have waiting lists for membership,” said Menachem, adding that there are other barometers for measuring the game’s comeback, from consistently higher numbers of rounds logged statewide to a slowing in the number of course closings; from an impressive list of courses open by mid- to late March to strong early signups for the major tournaments staged by the MGA each year, including the Massachusetts Amateur, which this year will played on a local course, GreatHorse in Hampden, and is already sold out.

Swanson agreed, noting that Quaboag has enjoyed limited but steady growth in overall play since the pandemic, a trend he expects will continue in 2025 with the gaining of new members as some courses, such as Leominster Country Club, have closed.

“I just signed up one that was at Leominster, and he said he’s going to bring some of his buddies with him,” said Swanson, adding that, while membership is up slightly, public play has increased as well.

Meanwhile, simulators provide additional opportunities for courses to extend the season and perhaps generate more food and beverage revenue.

“There’s all sorts of different options to outfit indoor space for simulators and keep clubs in people’s hands,” Menachem said, acknowledging that these facilities don’t do as well when the weather improves. Still, they have become a solid addition to the amenities offered by many clubs, and, overall, they have become an intriguing new aspect of the business, with perhaps the most visible example being TGL (Tomorrow’s Golf League), the tech-infused 3-on-3 golf league composed of PGA Tour golfers that drew solid audiences for matches broadcast on ESPN.

Those matches showed how far simulation technology has come and how it will be a big part of the game, said Thomas, noting that Scott Smith, president and CEO of the Max Restaurant Group, became inspired to create the swing lounge in Springfield after seeing a successful, 11-bay facility in Wallingford, Conn.

The chosen site is a banquet facility that had seen declining use since COVID, said Thomas, noting that retrofitting the location for golf simulation and a sports bar began in early 2024.

“When you walk in, it looks like a golf club,” he noted. “And we designed it to be more of a restaurant or golf club than a bar and swing lounge.”

He said the day he spoke with BusinessWest was typical, with Wilbraham & Monson Academy’s golf team coming in for practice that afternoon and a corporate function slated for the evening.

He acknowledged that, once the weather turns nicer and area courses are open, demand for simulators declines. Still, he noted, there is enough business — from corporate outings to players trying to stay sharp — to make this a successful year-round business.

Drive Time

Swanson said Quaboag has a few 125th-anniversary celebrations on tap for this year.

There’s a two-day tournament slated for Memorial Day weekend, and another competition set for August that will take participants back in time. Indeed, there were originally six holes when the course opened in 1900, he said, adding that six of the current nine will be chosen for a tournament that will feature the original yardages and some loaned persimmon clubs that will give players a taste of older equipment and keep them from driving the greens with their titanium and composite drivers.

There will likely be some participants in period outfits as well, he noted, adding that, while the club celebrates its past, it will press on with matters of the present and future, which look bright, but, like the game itself, come complete with a full set of challenges and issues that, like the weather, cannot be predicted.

Anthony Gulluni Strikes Balance Between Fighting Crime, Building Community

By George O'Brien April 10, 2025

Features

Law and Order

Anthony Gulluni

The ‘young jokes’ have stopped.

Well … there are fewer of them, anyway.

Indeed, Anthony Gulluni is still the youngest person in the room — by maybe 15 years, by his estimate — when the Massachusetts District Attorneys Assoc. gathers for its monthly meetings and an annual conference to discuss “whatever the crisis of the day is,” such as Rule 14, which puts greater burden on prosecutors and police departments to furnish discovery more quickly.

“It’s no fun; it’s not a good thing,” said Gulluni, 44, Hampden County’s DA, who has been the youngest person in that room for a full decade now, a milestone — there’s a handmade sign in his office congratulating him on that anniversary — that presents a time to pause and reflect on his tenure and what he calls its primary, overarching goal, then and now: “to build a safer community in Hampden County.”

This represents work in progress, noted Gulluni, who told BusinessWest that it’s difficult to quantify just how much safer area cities and towns are a decade after he took office. But he can qualify progress on several levels, everything from the ongoing fight against drugs to efforts to solve cold cases, while also stressing a need to continually improve.

“Ten years provides an opportunity to look back, look forward, and say, ‘what can we do better?’” he said. “And that’s a daily pursuit for this office because the work is so important. We’re serving the public, not unlike other public officials, but we’re working with people who have been victimized, people who have experienced some of the worst things imaginable and things they never expected.”

Overall, building a safer community involves a broad spectrum of programs, initiatives, and simply getting tough on crime and criminals, said Gulluni, adding that efforts at education, prevention, and providing second chances — everything from flag football to 3-on-3 basketball; from Stop the Swerve safe-driving events to the Emerging Adult Court of Hope — and imposing harsh sentences on offenders are not mutually exclusive.

“It’s not ‘lock them up and throw away the key,’ or ‘we want to be progressive and rehabilitate everybody.’ We can combine the two, we can be moderate, and we can be in the middle, and we’ve achieved that.”

“What I’ve tried to do is operate on the principle that we can do progressive things in this law-enforcement space and criminal-justice space,” he noted. “And it doesn’t prevent us from also upholding the law and understanding that there are violent people and repeat offenders who hurt people and need to be incarcerated.

“We can do both things,” he said, adding this has been his goal since he first campaigned for the office. “It’s not ‘lock them up and throw away the key,’ or ‘we want to be progressive and rehabilitate everybody.’ We can combine the two, we can be moderate, and we can be in the middle, and we’ve achieved that.”

Elaborating, he said his office has not “run from the enforcement stuff — taking drugs off the street and locking the person up for as long as possible because this person is killing people.”

Anthony Gulluni speaks at a ceremony marking the five-year anniversary of EACH, the Emerging Adult Court of Hope.

But it has also broken new ground with programs like the Commonwealth’s only Emerging Adult Court of Hope (EACH) — a name he came up with — which provides second chances to young offenders and brings graduates into careers, not merely entry-level jobs that most often fail to prevent recidivism.

“Each person matters; each person should have hope,” he told BusinessWest, adding that the program is designed to break the cycle whereby young people become repeat offenders essentially because there is no real alternative. EACH was designed to help such individuals earn a viable alternative.

There are many other initiatives as well, involving everything from preventing dating violence to internet safety to FLOS (Future Lawyers of Springfield), which seeks to identify young students who aspire to be lawyers and guide them into a career in the legal system. In short, his first decade has been guided by a desire to be tough on crime and creative with ways to build community.

For this issue, BusinessWest talked at length with Gulluni, who has been honored by the magazine as a 40 Under Forty honoree and Alumni Achievement Award winner, about what has been accomplished over the past 10 years, and the hard work that remains.

Coming to Terms

As he talked with BusinessWest on the last day of March, Gulluni was coming off a hard week.

Indeed, he was just a few days away from press conferences announcing charges related to a motor-vehicle accident on an I-91 off-ramp in West Springfield that killed three construction workers, and a hit-and-run incident in Springfield where a motorist struck and killed a pedestrian walking his bike across an intersection.

“This was tragic stuff, but this is what we do — it’s really about public safety, helping people be safe, and helping people make good decisions,” he said, adding that incidents like these help emphasize all aspects of his office’s work, from prosecuting offenders to helping to prevent such tragedies in the future.

“One of the points of frustration over my 10 years, and it’s become more acute and frequent, is the results in court.”

Such press conferences are one of the more visible aspects of a job where far more goes on behind the scenes, in offices spaced across four floors of Tower Square — after Gulluni ordered his staff out of the Roderick L. Ireland Courthouse amid growing health concerns — but in many different settings as well.

That move to Tower Square is one of many bold steps taken over the past 10 years, all aimed, in one way or another, at achieving that broad goal of making communities safer.

Others include everything from adding prosecutors (bringing the number from 61 to 90 over the past decade) and staff to bring the Hampden County DA’s office, among the busiest in the state, more in line with others in the Commonwealth, to ‘specializing’ those prosecutors.

“We’ve taken many of our most experienced and most talented prosecutors to work on cases involving children in our special-victims unit, domestic-violence cases, and homicide cases,” he said, adding that this region has led the state in homicides per capita, reflecting the demographics of a region with four gateway cities.

Overall, there have been several important initiatives undertaken over the past decade, said Gulluni, including a focus on cold cases that has brought charges — and, in some cases, resolution — to crimes committed decades ago.

“That was one of my initial focal points and something we talked about during the campaign, something we acted on immediately, and over the past 10 years we’ve had a great deal of success,” he said, citing the recent instance of an arrest involving a double murder on Route 5 in West Springfield 47 years ago.

Elaborating, he said cold cases require time and resources, factors that make it difficult to address them. But he has made such cases a priority.

“It’s all about focus,” he explained. “We’ve tried to, and we have, dedicated people to work on unresolved cases. I created a unit, I have a coordinator, I have an advocate, I have a prosecutor, and I have two, soon to be three, investigators working exclusively on these cases. You can’t throw a 30-year-old case at a prosecutor who has 50 other cases and expect her or him to really dive into that case.”

Court of Opinion

Meanwhile, some initiatives fall more into the category of prevention, community building, promoting healthy lifestyles, and even inspiring young people to join the legal profession.

“We’ve approached our work with a preventive lens — how can we get in front of issues; how can we identify things that metastasize and become worse?” he said, adding that his office devotes considerable time and resources to what it calls its Community Safety and Outreach Program.

Anthony Gulluni speaks with an attendee at the recent Stop the Swerve event at the Basketball Hall of Fame.

Anthony Gulluni speaks at 94.7 WMAS for its Radiothon for Baystate Children’s Hospital.

It includes more than a dozen initiatives, such as Stop the Swerve, a presentation (the latest staged last month) that addresses the dangers of impaired and distracted driving; Hoop Up Springfield, a 3-on-3 basketball tournament; a Youth Advisory Board consisting of student representatives from high schools across the county who identify issues facing youth today and provide recommendations on how best to address them; and a recent addition, a youth flag-football tournament, staged in partnership with Excel Sports Academy of New England.

The first such tournament was staged last June, and it will return this summer, said Gulluni, adding that, in addition to competition on the gridiron, it features several nutrition and wellness sessions.

Then there’s FLOS. Undertaken in partnership with Western New England University School of Law, it’s designed to inspire young people to enter the legal profession and bring more diversity to the legal community.

“Diversity is important, for our office and for the bar here in Hampden County,” he told BusinessWest. “We thought about how we can encourage and support young people, especially young people of color, to go down the road toward law school and become lawyers.”

As for the Emerging Adult Court of Hope, it is perhaps the most unique and ambitious initiative of Gulluni’s tenure.

Designed for those between ages 18 and 24, it gives individuals a chance to turn an arrest into a positive step forward, he said, adding that participants are carefully screened and, if chosen, assigned a team that includes a judge, service providers, assistant DAs, probation officers, case managers, and case coordinators.

“They come to the court, and it’s entirely different than any other court session anywhere,” he said, noting that the judge, probation department, and ROCA provide resources to make sure participants get needed support.

“Because a lot of these young people started their lives off in a very disadvantaged position — they started their lives off with horrible examples around them, no support, poor parenting, traumatic situations — and they set them adrift, it set them on a bad path.

“Look at the parole hearings … just over the past six months or year, the Parole Board is letting everybody out. There’s a pendulum that swings back and forth, and the pendulum is swinging, and has swung, a little too far, in my view, in the wrong direction.”

“And this is an opportunity for them to accept a hand up, not a handout,” he continued. “It’s not a slap on the wrist, and it’s not a gift; it’s an opportunity to change their lives with their own hard work and their own commitment to themselves.

“I talk to these young people extensively, and on the front end, I’m saying, ‘this court is about you. It’s about giving you an opportunity, but you have to work for it; it comes with a lot of small failures, ups and downs,’” he went on, adding that there have been seven graduates of the program, and another 15 individuals are working their way through it.

Full Sentences

While creating and expanding progressive initiatives in the broad realm of education, prevention, and rehabilitation, Gulluni said he and his staff have also been focused on the other half of that equation he mentioned earlier — upholding the law and punishing those who break it.

And as the discussion entered this area, he didn’t attempt to hide his dissatisfaction with current trends and patterns when it comes to how judges and parole officers are carrying out their work.

“One of the points of frustration over my 10 years, and it’s become more acute and frequent, is the results in court,” he said. “There’s been two or three rounds of criminal-justice reform over my tenure going back to [former Gov.] Deval Patrick early on and recently, over the past few years. The Supreme Judicial Court and other courts have continued to orient toward ‘how is the system wrong, and how can we provide more opportunities for defendants?’

“You look at the parole system, you look at medical parole … systemically, there’s a movement toward defendants’ rights, and that’s extraordinarily important; don’t get me wrong,” he went on. “The system operates rightly on the axiom that it’s better to let 100 guilty men go free than imprison one innocent man — that is the essence of our system, and that’s how it should be.

“But our sentencing practices across our courts, how we’re treating violent offenses, how we’re treating serious drug-trafficking and drug-dealing cases that have poisoned our communities and killed thousands of people through addiction, how we’re treating those who commit crimes against children, domestic-violence abusers, the worst of the worst, has really changed, even in the spectrum I’ve had over the past 10 years.”

The result, he went on, is that violent offenders and repeat offenders are not being held to account.

“That’s a point of great of frustration. Look at the parole hearings … just over the past six months or year, the Parole Board is letting everybody out,” he said, adding that he can’t pinpoint why, but conjectures that it could be everything from overall philosophy to appointments to the board. “There’s a pendulum that swings back and forth, and the pendulum is swinging, and has swung, a little too far, in my view, in the wrong direction.”

Elaborating, he said there are some cases in which those in his office will agree that someone should be granted parole. “But for most of these cases, we’re saying, ‘this person killed someone, took someone away from his or her family, and the sentence is a life sentence, and that’s what it should be.”

Work to help that pendulum swing back the other way is one of many focal points for Gulluni and his team. With this issue and others, it is difficult to measure success, he said, but added that he’s seeing progress on several fronts — and more momentum in the many efforts to build a safer community in Hampden County.

Amherst Is College Town with ‘Metropolitan Vibe’

By George O'Brien April 10, 2025

Community Spotlight Special Coverage

Community Spotlight

John Page describes Amherst as a “cultural college town.”

John Page calls it a ‘retail incubator.’

That’s the unofficial name given to a facility — still very much in the planning stages — designed to bolster retail in downtown Amherst and bring more balance (and more reasons to visit) to an area more known for its arts, culture, and restaurants.

“It’s a small location for retailers — people who are online, they’re artists, they do things at farmers markets — who are not quite ready to make the jump to a brick-and-mortar store, which is high-risk and quite complicated, said Page, executive director of the Amherst Business Improvement District (BID). “We’re hoping to make a half-step, where folks can start to test their concept out and learn more about being a brick-and-mortar retailer.”

The retail incubator (more details to come later this year, he said) is one of myriad initiatives in various stages of development in Amherst — a town where there is almost always a lot happening — that cross a wide spectrum, from housing to education; from new restaurants to new retail. That long list includes:

• A new elementary school that will be 100% carbon-neutral and ready for occupancy in the fall of 2026;

• Several new housing projects that include everything from market-rate apartments to home-ownership opportunities (much more on these later);

• An extensive, $46 million renovation and expansion of the Jones Library;

• A new restaurant, the Amherst Oyster Bar, which will bring much-needed new life to an historically vibrant spot, site of the former Judie’s restaurant on North Pleasant Street;

• An enhanced presence for both UMass Amherst and Amherst College downtown, with UMass Amherst recently opening UMass Downtown, a multi-purpose retail, event, and meeting space on North Pleasant Street, and Amherst College having opened a campus store on South Pleasant Street;

• Conversion of a former VFW post into a homeless shelter and supportive housing for veterans;

• The continued success story that is the Drake, a live-performance venue in the heart of downtown;

• The planned arrival of another cultural attraction downtown — Ancestral Bridges, an organization that celebrates the history of contributions of Black and Afro-Indigenous families in Amherst; and

• A reimagining of the space called North Common, a former a parking area that has become a popular gathering place downtown.

City officials and business leaders alike are enthusiastic not only about these individual developments, but how they will — and, in many respects, already are — working together to create more foot traffic and vibrancy in the downtown area.

“We’re between Boston and New York, and in such an academically driven area, you get a lot of people from those areas, and they’re looking for something they expect from a city vibe. That’s certainly new to Amherst, but that’s the direction we want to push things in.”

Indeed, the new housing units are bringing more residents to support the full spectrum of businesses downtown, said Page, adding that cultural attractions like the Drake and Amherst Cinema are bringing people to restaurants and bars before and after shows. Meanwhile, new retail, like Aster & Pine Market and the two college stores, are broadening the mix of things to do and reasons to come to the downtown.

“We have a lot of housing in our downtown, and that’s been very helpful to us because we have more people; those people go out to lunch and for coffee, and they spend money,” said Page, who referred to Amherst as a “cultural college town.”

Alden Peotter shows off the recently opened Amherst Oyster Bar.

“Meanwhile, with Amherst Cinema and the Drake, we encourage people to enjoy a meal before or after, or maybe a cocktail, so that there is that stickiness — people linger and enjoy the downtown.”

Paul Bockelman, Amherst’s long-time town manager, agreed.

“The Drake, along with the Amherst Cinema, has made a huge impact in bringing people downtown to live events,” he said. “And once they’re there, they stay and they support other businesses.”

As for the Oyster Bar, it has been a long time coming. Its grand opening had been pushed back so many times that the eventual date, April 1, was taken by some as an April Fools joke, said Alden Peotter, operations manager for Amherst Innovative Hospitality, which also operates the nearby Protocol bar and restaurant.

He spoke with BusinessWest the day after a soft opening late last month, and said that both the Oyster Bar and Protocol, which opened as a bar but has evolved into a popular restaurant drawing people of all ages, provide what he called a “metropolitan vibe,” something he believes young people, and some not so young, are looking for.

“We’re between Boston and New York, and in such an academically driven area, you get a lot of people from those areas, and they’re looking for something they expect from a city vibe,” he said. “That’s certainly new to Amherst, but that’s the direction we want to push things in.”

For this, the latest installment of its Community Spotlight series, BusinessWest looks at the many forms of development and progress in Amherst, a college town that is so much more.

Building Momentum

For Page, who took the helm at the BID last October, his new job is a return to downtown Amherst.

Indeed, he worked at the Amherst Regional Chamber of Commerce, which shares space with the BID in an office on South Pleasant Street, handing marketing and membership, before taking a job at UMass Amherst working on large events like commencement.

“I wanted to get back involved with the town of Amherst and all that was happening downtown,” he said, adding that he was inspired to seek the BID job after doing consulting work for the agency on its summer concert series.

“It reignited my passion for that economic-development work,” he said, adding that, since arriving, he’s continued the BID’s work in tandem with the chamber to promote the downtown and generate more vibrancy in the central business district, which has made a nice recovery after being devastated by COVID — but with changes.

Indeed, while food and beverage taxes are exceeding 2019 levels, there are still fewer people going out, overall, with restaurants still doing strong takeout business. One goal — at the BID, the chamber, and with new destinations like the Oyster Bar and Protocol — is to get them back out.

Amherst at a Glance

Year Incorporated: 1759
Population: 39,263
Area: 27.7 square miles
County: Hampshire
Residential Tax Rate: $17.82
Commercial Tax Rate: $17.82
Median Household Income: $48,059
Median Family Income: $96,005
Type of Government: Town Council, Town Manager
Largest Employers: UMass Amherst; Amherst College; Hampshire College
* Latest information available

“Our real view on downtown Amherst is promoting not just nightlife, but getting people out of their house, getting people to form these communities that have really been missing due to COVID and what came after; we want to give them that location,” said Peotter, who described both establishments as “that third place.” By that, he meant it’s not home, and it’s not work — “it’s another place to be.”

Page said one of his focal points is what would be considered traditional, brick-and-mortar retail. The downtown has some, he said, and the goal is attract more, while also retaining what exists, through initiatives like the planned retail incubator, a site for which has yet to be determined.

“It’s a difficult industry,” he said, adding that Amherst is not known as a retail destination, but could become one. “You need critical mass — you need other retailers so that people view you as a shopping destination.”

Jacob Robinson, executive director of the Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce, agreed.

“Fortunately, downtown Amherst isn’t experiencing a significant vacancy issue, but there’s strong interest in attracting more retail to diversify the mix of businesses and further enhance the pedestrian experience,” he said.

“Of course, retail-space turnover is a normal and expected part of any dynamic downtown. As business owners retire, pivot, or evolve their offerings, it naturally creates opportunities for new entrepreneurs to bring fresh ideas and energy into the community. We’re seeing that play out in Amherst, with some beloved businesses closing for personal or planned reasons — often after years or decades of serving the community — and new ventures preparing to take their place. It’s a sign of a living, breathing local economy that continues to adapt and grow.”

Among the relatively new retail offerings are the Amherst College Store, which opened a year ago in the former A.J. Hastings space at 45 South Pleasant St., and UMass Downtown, which opened its doors in February at 108 North Pleasant St., in space most recently occupied by Greenfield Savings Bank.

The latter is a multi-purpose retail, event, and meeting space, said Nancy Buffone, associate vice chancellor of University Relations, who spoke with BusinessWest at the facility.

She said a downtown presence for the university has been talked about for many years, and it became a priority for Chancellor Javier Reyes when he arrived in 2023.

“This is truly about bringing UMass and the community together,” she said, adding that the facility will host both UMass events, such as lectures slated for this spring, and community events, such as registration for the Big Brothers Big Sisters Daffodil Run.

UMass Downtown has seen steady volumes of foot traffic, said Buffone, adding the numbers are expected to move higher as the weather improves and especially for commencement week and ‘destination days,’ when those students who have been accepted to the university, and their parents, are invited to take in the school and the town.

Developing Stories

Bockelman calls it the “mixing middle.”

He was referring to the broad segment of housing involving homeownership opportunities for segments of the population that might otherwise not break that barrier. This middle area is being addressed in a project on Ball Lane, undertaken by Valley Community Development Corp.

“We’re seeing a lot of apartments being built, but what has been largely missing has been homeownership opportunities, which is why the Ball Lane project is so exciting,” he told BusinessWest, adding that plans call for 30 units on an eight-acre tract.

The project is one of many housing initiatives, public and private, in various stages of development in town, and they address a critical need for new housing.

Other projects include two public projects totaling 78 apartments, 31 at the former East Street School and 47 at 70 Belchertown Road, said Bockelman, noting that these will be a mix, with varying levels of affordability. The developer, Way Finders, expects to have both sites developed and occupied by 2028.

On the private side, developer Barry Roberts is forwarding two projects, a large (but scaled-down) initiative at the corner of Amity Street and University Drive that will involve retail on the ground floor and apartments above, and the other at the former Hastings site. Meanwhile, Archipelago Investments LLC is set to break ground on a five-story, 68-unit project at Olympia Drive, a dorm-like building that will rise on the site of the former Iota Beta chapter of the Chi Omega sorority, which Archipelago acquired several years ago.

Archipelago has also been named designated developer for a project to create 140 residential units on a large tract of land owned by Hampshire College, adjacent to Atkins Farms.

These projects and others in different stages of development will make a large dent in the overall need for housing across the spectrum, said Bockelman, adding that such projects are needed to help seniors stay in town, young professionals to move there, and employees at many types of businesses, especially the hospitality sector, to afford to live in town.

Robinson agreed. “Housing remains a key issue,” he told BusinessWest. “While Amherst is actively exploring strategies to create more diverse and affordable housing options, it’s clear that housing supply directly affects workforce retention, talent attraction, and the overall economic vibrancy of the region. Our businesses need access to a stable workforce, and that depends in part on people being able to afford to live and thrive here.”

Is the Commonwealth Losing Its Competitive Edge?

By George O'Brien March 27, 2025

Features Special Coverage

State of the Bay State

“The success of Massachusetts’ economy has historically been driven by a number of key strengths: a strong quality of life, an educated and engaged workforce, and economic sectors that adapt to changing conditions and are at the vanguard of innovation. However, these strengths are no longer as unique to Massachusetts, nor are they guaranteed to continue in perpetuity, and in recent years, national demographic shifts and increased mobility for people and employers have threatened to degrade Massachusetts’ competitive edge when attracting residents, businesses, and investment.”

That’s the introductory, summary paragraph in a note from the Massachusetts Taxpayers Assoc. (MTF) as it introduced something it calls its Competitive Index, which was first released last fall and will now be conducted annually. And it effectively sets the tone for the document, which compiled 26 different metrics — from grade-8 math test scores to energy costs; from international migration to commute time — that clearly and concisely measure how the Bay State is stacking up. (The full report can be found at masstaxpayers.org.)

The bottom line is that is that, while the state still has several strong attributes, it is not as competitive as it has been historically. Or, put another way, other states, such as California, Florida, North Carolina, and Texas, have become more competitive. And now, thanks to the pandemic and the advent of remote work, it has more competitors, including other New England states.

“Massachusetts has a number of real strengths; the fact that we are the most highly educated state in the nation and have been for a long time, the fact that we have the best K-12 school system, at least on average, and higher education is such a strength, bodes well for us,” MTF President Doug Howgate told BusinessWest. “But at the same time, there are lot of things that we can and do need to do better — we’re either lagging behind the standards we’ve set for ourselves, or we’re lagging behind other states.”

“One of the reasons why we wanted to look into some of these issues within the competitive index is that, during the pandemic, we started to see that location choices became a little more flexible — not for everyone, but for some people,” he went on. “And that has real impacts for the long-standing proposition that Massachusetts has for its residents in terms of what you gain from living here and what the costs are.

“There are lot of things that we can and do need to do better — we’re either lagging behind the standards we’ve set for ourselves, or we’re lagging behind other states.”

“If people became a little less sticky and had a little more ability to move around — the same with employers — was that going to be a competitive advantage or disadvantage for Massachusetts?” he continued. “And at least in the very short term, it appeared to be a net competitive disadvantage as we saw these big surges in domestic outmigration — not everywhere, but certainly in higher-cost areas.”

Since the release of the report, compiled with researchers at the UMass Donohue Institute and with the support of the Massachusetts Competitive Partnership, it has been the subject of discussion and debate — about what the state has lost when it comes to its historic competitive edge, to whom it has lost that edge, and, perhaps most importantly, how it might get that edge back.

Howgate has spoken at several forums about the Competitive Index and the issues related to it, including the Outlook lunch staged by the Springfield Regional Chamber earlier this month.

Doug Howgate

“If people became a little less sticky and had a little more ability to move around — the same with employers — was that going to be a competitive advantage or disadvantage for Massachusetts?”

At those forums, and in a wide-ranging interview with BusinessWest, he stressed that the Commonwealth can no longer take its historic advantages — and, again, there are several, from educational attainment to its ability to attract international immigrants — for granted, because other states are gaining ground in those realms.

In the meantime, several factors, such as the rising cost of everything from housing to energy to childcare, as well as the so-called ‘millionaire’s tax’ and the rise of remote work, have contributed to the state losing population — and talent — to other states, although some, if not most, of these losses have been made up through international immigration.

As he talked about the index and what the numbers mean, Howgate said it suggests at least five key areas for policy focus: creating a competitive roadmap, stemming outmigration, growing the labor force, incorporating cost considerations into policy conversations, and fostering and supporting the relationship between the state’s education system and the economy.

We’ll get into each in more detail as we examine the Competitive Index and how it serves as a call to action as the state, which is still very competitive when it comes to businesses, jobs, and talent, faces the hard reality that it must take steps to remain that way.

Moving Targets

As he sliced through the numbers in the index, Howgate reiterated that the Commonwealth still has several competitive strengths.

Indeed, it is ranked at or near the top in such areas as population age 25 and over with a bachelor’s degree or higher, average weekly wage, research and development funding as a share of gross state product, and even life expectancy at birth.

But these strengths are counter-balanced by many weaknesses, with the state ranked at or near the bottom nationally in income inequality, energy costs, overall cost of living, commute time, childcare costs, housing cost burden, and even average unemployment insurance tax amount per covered employee.

In many ways, these weaknesses are now taking their toll, and this is showing up in domestic migration, with the state losing workers to regional competitors such as Maine and New Hampshire, and especially Florida, California, and New York.

This disconcerting trend is what prompted MTF to “look under the hood,” as Howgate put it, and determine if and where the state was losing some of its edge.

“We started looking at questions related to where are we a leader or a laggard, and a lot of the places where we’re a laggard are places where the costs are borne by wealthy folks,” he said, referring to the millionaire’s tax but also other factors. “But also, a lot of the costs make it a challenging place to live for working families, which is another huge challenge for the Commonwealth moving forward.

“What we talk about in the report is that people are more sensitive to cost than they used to be,” he went on. “So that heightens some of our long-standing competitive disadvantages. The fact that childcare costs are higher, housing costs are higher, unemployment insurance taxes … we continue to fare very poorly in those areas, and they’re at the core of where people can afford to live.”

Statistics show that, while outmigration is occurring most in the higher income brackets, especially $250,000 in annual income and above, it is also happening with other groups, such as those in the $75,000-$100,000 range, said Howgate, adding that this speaks to, respectively, people who can afford to relocate and those who can’t afford to stay. And in both cases, the trends started before the pandemic.

“And the factor that’s kind of marbled throughout that is that we’re seeing increasing evidence that it’s our younger professionals who are leaving,” he said, adding that this reality has deep ramifications for the Commonwealth and its businesses, large and small.

Meanwhile, he acknowledged that this challenge does in some ways present opportunities for this part of the state, where some of these costs, especially housing and childcare, are not as burdensome.

Indeed, opportunities exist to convince people, and even businesses, to move to different parts of the Commonwealth rather than to another state, he said, adding that, due in large part to remote work possibilities, some areas, such as the Cape and the Berkshires, are gaining population.

Behind the Numbers

Howgate noted that one of the many lessons from the pandemic, a once-in-a-lifetime happening that altered many aspects of life, is that things can change quickly.

“Just like you don’t want to assume that things are going to go right back to the way they were before the pandemic in a couple of months or a couple of years, you also don’t want to assume that the way things looked in June of 2023 is what they’re going to look like forever,” he told BusinessWest. “One of the points with the competitiveness index is to say that, as we find a new normal — and what ‘normal’ is is always changing — how do we start to create these baselines for ourselves about what we’re doing well and not doing well?”

And with this baseline, Massachusetts can continue to track how it’s faring, he said, adding that overall competitiveness is something that the state and its leaders should continually gauge — and work to improve.

It hasn’t been this way historically, he went on, and this is perhaps one of the reasons why some of its edge has been lost.

“You don’t want to overreact as a policy maker, but at the same time, we have some compelling data that something has altered how people are making location decisions,” he said. “So we need to be more mindful of the fact that people aren’t going to just stay because this is where they’ve always been; there has to be more to our argument than that.”

This brings him back to some of those suggested key areas of policy focus and the overall need to emphasize competitiveness as an economic-development priority for the state.

Action, and change, is needed on several fronts, Howgate said, especially housing and what he called the “nexus between transportation and housing.”

“If people can’t afford to live in a place that gets them to where they want to go conveniently, you have a big problem on your hands,” he told BusinessWest. “And that is something Massachusetts has a real crunch on — both accessible and efficient transportation options and affordable housing.

“While there are other things that absolutely matter as well, such as childcare costs,” he went on, “I think that we started to focus more and more, as others have as well, on what are some of the smart things we can do on transportation and housing to get people more quickly to places with inexpensive housing, like Central Mass. and Western Mass., and then also, what can we do on the production side to boost housing so people are able to afford where they want to live?”

The Commonwealth is certainly not alone with these challenges — many other states and urban areas are dealing with sky-high housing costs and transportation issues, he said, adding that some are being more proactive, and effective, in dealing with them and issues such as zoning and land use.

When asked to project ahead five or 10 years to where the Commonwealth might be from a competitiveness standpoint, Howgate said this is difficult because of the profound pace of change. But he did say the state cannot afford to leave anything to chance.

“We know what our demography is, that we’re an aging population, like other Northeast states, and we know that we’re a high-cost area,” he said. “At the end of the day, irrespective of where you are ideologically, it’s in all of our best interests to incentivize people to stay in Massachusetts, and move to Massachusetts, because we’re not going to have that level of growth if we just sit here and do nothing.”

Town of Palmer Has Progress in Its Sites

By George O'Brien March 27, 2025

The former Thorndike School will be converted into 12 to 18 units of market-rate housing.

Community Spotlight Special Coverage

Community Spotlight

The former Thorndike School will be converted into 12 to 18 units of market-rate housing.

When it comes to Palmer’s much-anticipated new train station and the return of passenger rail service after a half-century absence, there is no timetable in place yet.

There are several hurdles still be cleared, from design to the huge matter of funding — for this train station and the state’s much larger east-west rail project. Town officials can only speculate that it will be a few years, and likely more than a few — one said it will be at least 2029 — before the facility is up and trains are stopping there.

But this lack of a go date isn’t tamping speculation, both positive and negative — especially since the state has now chosen a site for the station, an open field at 1099 South Main St., south of Palmer Yard, land owned by wire brush manufacturer Sanderson MacLeod (more on that company later) and adjacent to its plant.

To the disappointment of many in the community, this site is not downtown — and, more specifically, not the site of the former, historic train station, now home to the popular Steaming Tender restaurant.

In fact, a group calling itself the Central Rail Passenger Coalition is not entirely ready to give up on the downtown site, even though the state Department of Transportation has deemed it inadequate for several reasons, and town officials are accepting the state’s decision.

“It’s a chance for the town to assess current land use in the area and begin laying some groundwork to really encourage and enable transit-oriented development in that area.”

Scarlet Lamothe, general manager of the Steaming Tender and member of the Central Rail Passenger Coalition, has been outspoken — at public meetings and other forums — about how the South Yard location, known as ‘Site B,’ will not bring real economic benefits to the downtown or the community as a whole, pointing to the example of Windsor Locks, Conn., which built a new train station outside of the central business district, didn’t see much economic development, and is now moving its station downtown.

“Site B is not located in the downtown district, and it will show no benefit to the town,” she said, adding that she, other members of the coalition, and other Palmer residents are trying to gather support for an ordinance that would require that a passenger rail depot and related facilities need to be zoned in the downtown district.

“Also, you won’t see as much ridership at Site B because you won’t have that north-south connection,” she went on, adding that behind the historic station is a diamond junction, permitting rail service in all four directions; Site B would only accommodate east-west service.

Town Planner Heidi Mannarino acknowledged some disappointment concerning the state’s choice of location, but said the site is only a half-mile from downtown, and, overall, it could benefit existing businesses and prompt additional development.

“There is potential to unlock more development in that area,” she said, adding that, while the next steps in this process play out, the town should be looking to maximize the development opportunities from this potentially groundbreaking development, one that could return the community known as the Town of Seven Railroads to its roots.

“It’s a chance for the town to assess current land use in the area and begin laying some groundwork to really encourage and enable transit-oriented development in that area,” Mannarino said, adding that this includes everything from new housing opportunities to businesses catering to those getting on and off trains to creating safer alternatives for multi-modal transportation.

The state’s selection of a site for the new rail station tops the list of developing stories in this community, but there are several others, including plans to convert the former Thorndike School, built in 1910, into 12 to 18 units of market-rate housing, $1.6 million in infrastructure work (from sidewalks to fire hydrants), a new strip mall on Route 32 near the turnpike exit that is nearing the finish line, and a spike in interest in Palmer in the wake of remote work and hybrid schedules.

The Liberty Plaza project on Thorndike Street is nearing completion.

Indeed, this dramatic change in how people work has made the commute from Palmer to Springfield, Worcester, and points east of Worcester far more attractive than when people were going to the office five days a week, said John Latour, Palmer’s director of Community Development, adding that there are other incentives.

“There’s quality of life, there’s a grocery store and other amenities, but the housing here is more affordable than going further east,” he explained. “You can get a really nice house here for considerably less than you would, say, in the Shrewsbury area, so you’re seeing more people driving into Worcester and the Boston area from Palmer.”

For this latest installment of its Community Spotlight series, BusinessWest turns its lens on Palmer, where many forms of progress are, well … on track.

Train of Thought

Latour noted that, while there is, indeed, some disappointment concerning the state’s choice of a location for the new train station, there is still a buzz surrounding the east-west rail project and how it could change the fortunes of a community that is roughly halfway between Springfield and Worcester, but often (and until recently) considered too far from either for a commute or any economic benefit.

Remote work and hybrid schedules have changed some attitudes about Palmer, he said, noting that this is reflected in growing interest in housing within the community and rising prices, with the median price now exceeding $300,000.

And east-west rail could change the equation further by making the commute easier and thus more palatable, he said, adding that there are many examples of communities that have benefited, in many ways, from being a rail stop.

Mannarino agreed, noting that, in addition to spurring residential growth, a rail stop can benefit existing businesses in the broad hospitality sector and foster new ventures as well. And the chosen site for the station can do both, she added.

“Currently, on the other side of the track from the site, there’s already Seven Roads Brewery and other existing businesses that will shine. It’s going to be a matter of making sure that the rail stop is connected to those businesses in a safe way while also laying the groundwork so that it can be attractive for other business opportunities on the south side of the tracks as well.”

Overall, she said rail service will make Palmer’s location, already attractive because of its turnpike exit and close proximity to the state’s second- and third-largest cities, even more appealing to the development community.

While anticipating — and preparing for — a future with passenger rail service, Palmer is also coping with the present and developments on several fronts.

At the top of that list is housing, which is key to any residential growth and the benefits to be derived from it, said Latour, adding that, at present, there is little in the way of new construction of homes or subdivisions.

But the Thorndike School project is a small step forward, he added, noting that the new units will make a small dent in overall need. Conversion of the former Converse Middle School into 55-and-over housing, a project the town has been pursuing, will make another dent.

Other developments include Liberty Plaza, a strip mall taking shape just a few hundred yards from the Big Y on Thorndike Street (Route 32). The plaza will be home to a Starbucks and a Jersey Mike’s, as well as additional tenants, said Latour, adding that this project will hopefully inspire additional commercial development in that area just off the pike exit.

Palmer at a Glance

Year Incorporated: 1775
Population: 12,448
Area: 32 square miles
County: Hampden
Tax Rate, residential and commercial: Palmer, $18.15; Three Rivers, $18.23; Bondsville, $18.98; Thorndike, $18.28
Median Household Income: $41,443
Median Family Income: $49,358
Type of government: Town Manager; Town Council
Largest Employers: Baystate Wing Hospital; Sanderson MacLeod Inc., Camp Ramah of New England; Big Y World Class Market
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Meanwhile, the town has been awarded a $430,000 grant to design a new sewer infrastructure for a stretch of Thorndike Street, a project intended to alleviate a “ticking time bomb,” Mannarino said, and one that could unlock new development, both commercial and residential, in that area.

The overall price tag for that project will be $4 million to $6 million, she noted, adding that the town will be pursuing other grants to cover that cost, and there is no timeline for the initiative.

Making It Happen

Mark Borsari, president and CEO of Sanderson MacLeod, or SanMac, as it’s known colloquially, sidestepped questions about the rail station and east-west rail, noting that both are matters well beyond his control.

He preferred to talk about what is in his control, meaning his company, and its focus, which, technically speaking, is on making twisted wire brushes, but is really on creating an environment where people want to work and can thrive, and also on creating a model for other manufacturers, most of them facing the stern challenges of coping with retiring Baby Boomers and attracting and retaining young talent.

“We can’t control the weather, but we might as well see if we can be as creative as possible internally — we’re having a good time, we really are,” he said, adding that the company is firmly focused on making investments in the next generation of workers and, at the same time, “making it cool,” with ‘it’ being the overall experience.

It does this through everything from food trucks making regular stops at the plant to a cornhole tournament; from one of the company’s operating slogans — “you’ve got to be a little twisted to work here” — to an elaborate employee-appreciation day called Brushes, Blues, and Barbecue, which tells the whole story.

Such initiatives are part of a two-pronged approach at SanMac, said Borsari, adding that the first is to work with area schools to educate young people about the many attractive benefits to careers in manufacturing, while the second is to implement programs that demonstrate how valued employees are and encourage them to grow with the company, be part of the growth process, and encourage leadership.

“You do have to make it cool — I’ve always said that you have to look at through the eyes of someone who’s 18 or 19 years old and create an organizational place that they find cool to be in,” he explained.

“And that means you have to be creative. You make it cool by making the cafeteria a ’50s diner, you make it cool by putting bus wrap around the inside of the factory so you can put colorful graphics up, you make it cool by bringing in food trucks, you make it cool by having fun with the different ways that we work together, by focusing on people and rewarding them.”

Overall, it comes down to treating people as individuals where one size does not fit all, and “pointing out what the big picture is,” he added.

“When young people go out into the real world, they enter the workplace with an enthusiasm that’s a little naive, but it’s potent because they want to prove themselves,” Borsari said. “If they’re not handled properly by an organization, or they just get cast away after putting out 100%, it cuts the knees out from under them. You can only do that so many times to someone, especially if they’re young, before they say, ‘this is ridiculous — I’m just going to find a place where I can make as much as I can by doing as little as I possibly can,’ and that’s leadership’s fault.”

Through leadership that doesn’t take this approach, that truly values employees, SanMac has become not only a standout in the twisted wire brush industry, but a true leader in a changing manufacturing sector — and an economic driver in a changing Palmer, where even more promise may be chugging down the tracks.