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Square One Awarded $100,000 Mutual Impact Grant by MassMutual

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Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Square One has been awarded a $100,000 grant by MassMutual through the company’s Mutual Impact community-investment program. Mutual Impact is funded by MassMutual employees through the company’s annual employee-giving program and matched by the MassMutual Foundation, a dedicated corporate foundation established by MassMutual. This is the second year that Square One has received a Mutual Impact grant.

“We are so incredibly grateful to the MassMutual team for their belief in our mission and long-standing, generous support for our work,” said Kristine Allard, chief development & communications officer for Square One. “The funds we receive through this grant will support over 1,000 children and families who rely on Square One for innovative literacy programming.”

The Mutual Impact program is completely driven by MassMutual employees. Employees choose cause areas and nonprofit organizations to receive funding, make donations which are matched dollar-for-dollar by the MassMutual Foundation to fund grants, and volunteer in support of the organizations they select. Selected nonprofits have demonstrated excellence in their organization, volunteer opportunities, and community impact.

“Corporate responsibility and community involvement are part of our DNA, and we take great pride in helping people in the communities where we live and work secure a better future,” said Dennis Duquette, head of Community Responsibility with MassMutual and president of the MassMutual Foundation board of directors. “Square One tirelessly devotes time and energy in support of families in our local community, and we are pleased to support them through the Mutual Impact program.”

Mutual Impact grants were awarded to 21 nonprofit organizations for programs that fit within specific cause areas, including early-grade reading proficiency, food security, violence prevention, family economic self-sufficiency, returning veterans, successful advancement in school, child hunger, and education.

New HCC President Sees Growth Opportunities for Herself and Her Students

By
Education Sections

RoyalChristina Royal recently took the helm at Holyoke Community College. She brings with her a phrase, or saying, that she contrived and uses often as she talks about higher education and her approach to it: “it takes a village to raise a student.”

Before accepting the position of provost and vice president of Academic Affairs at Inver Hills Community College just outside the Twin Cities in Minnesota, Christina Royal first turned down an offer to become president of a school in Texas.

The stated reasons for that somewhat unusual career decision — many who have spent years working in higher education and believe they’re ready to apply for president positions yearn for that opportunity to lead their own school — speak volumes about Royal and her priorities. And also about the next school that would choose her to occupy the corner office: Holyoke Community College.

“I didn’t feel like it was going to be the best fit to get me the college experiences that I needed to prepare me ultimately to step into a college presidency and succeed,” she said in reference to job in the Lone Star State. “I’m a lifelong learner through and through, and when I look at my career to date, I tend to seek out positions where I see opportunities for growth and opportunities where I can make an impact.

“While it’s been helpful to be upwardly mobile in my career trajectory,” she went on, “it’s more important for me to feel that I can make a difference in that role and that I can learn something.”

Which says something about the provost’s job in Minnesota — and she did quite a bit of learning there, as we’ll see later — and also about the job she started on Jan. 9.

 

I really believe that having partnerships with business and industry and the community is essential for an institution of higher education to thrive.”

 

Starting with her visit to the campus on Homestead Avenue, she said she felt a “connection” — to the school, its mission, its current efforts to meet it, and the community as a whole. And the subsequent interviews and conversations with a host of constituencies, including students, faculty, and staff, only made the connection stronger.

At HCC, she saw an opportunity to forge an even stronger connection between the school and the community it serves, and thus make both stronger and more vibrant.

“I have a phrase that I’ve used often during my career — that ‘it takes a village to raise a student,’” she noted. “And I really believe that having partnerships with business and industry and the community is essential for an institution of higher education to thrive.

“Likewise, for a community with a community college to thrive, it needs to have a strong community college,” she went on. “I look at it as a bi-directional relationship and partnership.”

Royal arrives at HCC at an intriguing time for that school, community colleges in general, the ones in this state, and the four that serve this region. Indeed, those four institutions were chosen by BusinessWest as one of its Difference Makers for 2017, for their efforts to not only provide convenient, affordable access to higher education, but for becoming huge role players in regional economic-development efforts.

And, as that story goes on to note, the community colleges in this region have increasingly been working in collaboration among themselves and myriad other partners to address a host of workforce issues, including the skills gap plaguing virtually every sector of the economy.

Royal touched on some of these efforts when she talked with BusinessWest just a few days after her arrival — “nothing in this office is mine,” she said of what was in the credenza and on the walls — and noted that they fit right in with those basic criteria she was looking for in a move up the career ladder (and a college presidency) — opportunities to learn and grow professionally, and opportunities to make a difference.

As for community colleges as a whole, they are facing a host of common challenges, including enrollment — high-school graduation classes are getting smaller, and the economy is doing generally well, two factors that certainly don’t help drive individuals to community-college gates — and also financial pressures, and ongoing efforts to improve graduation rates, or ‘success rates,’ as many like to call them, because not all students are seeking a degree.

 

The $43 million renovation of HCC’s campus center

The $43 million renovation of HCC’s campus center is just one of many opportunities and challenges facing the school’s new president.

HCC is confronting these issues just as all schools are, said Royal, while it is also focused on some of its own specific challenges, including a soon-to-commence renovation of its campus center and a host of area workforce-development issues.

For this issue and its focus on education, BusinessWest talked at length with Royal about why she ultimately took this opportunity to become a college president, why she focused her career on the community-college community, as she called it, and what kind of learning opportunities she’s expecting at HCC.

Facing Stern Tests

Before getting into all that, though, Royal spent some time addressing the question often put to those putting ‘president’ on their business card for the first time — how and when did she know she was ready for that level of responsibility and challenge?

She said she recalls no specific morning when she woke up with that realization, but, rather, that it came with time, the accumulation of experience, the stockpiling of needed confidence … and confirmation from others in the industry that she was, indeed, ready to ascend to the top rung.

“I had a very well-rounded background, both in business and in higher education, that gave me a sense of the issues within higher education and the changing landscape of community colleges,” she told BusinessWest. “Given the number of college presidents that have been in these roles for many years and had started to retire, I was thinking this was a good time to be looking at pursuing one of those jobs.”

As for that accumulation of experience, it has come across the broad spectrum of higher education, starting in the private sector with CompUSA Inc. There, she provided instruction to more than 2,000 students for the Social Security Administration — and a host of other corporate clients — on various software-application programs.

From there, she went to the Beacon Institute for Learning in Florida, where, among other things, she was responsible for curriculum development, implementation, and assessment of technical training and certification programs for more than 20 colleges and universities, including Duke, Notre Dame, and Rutgers.

She then returned to her alma mater, serving from 2001 to 2006 as director of Technology-Assisted Learning in Marist College’s School of Graduate and Continuing Education in Poughkeepsie, N.Y.

In early 2006, she would take a job that would eventually inspire a career-path decision. It was executive director of Distance Learning at Cuyahoga Community College (CCC) in Cleveland, a massive school with four campuses, two corporate colleges, a $270 million budget, and roughly 52,000 credit and non-credit students. She would later become assistant vice president of eLearning & Innovation in 2010, a post she would hold until mid-2013.

It was during her tenure at CCC that Royal would first earn her doctorate in education (in 2007, at Capella University’s School of Education) a pre-requisite for most high-level jobs in higher education, especially president, and later achieve that aforementioned confidence and skill set also needed to ascend to those levels.

“My college president at the time said, ‘this is not for the faint of heart, but if you’re interested in this, then I’m going to send you to an executive-leader program focused on the job and the role of the president,’” she recalled. “She went on, ‘if you’re still interested when you come, let’s talk.’”

Christina Royal

Christina Royal says it take a village to raise a student, and this means more and stronger relationships between the college and the community.

 

She went, was interested when she came back, and the two did talk, she went on, adding that she considered herself ready for a presidency when there were “few surprises in the job,” and she had acquired a set of experiences that made her ready. She would cross that threshold at her next career stop — Inver Hills.

And it was also while in Cleveland, she said, that she began to focus on that aforementioned community-college community as her career ambition.

That mindset was only solidified at Inver Hills (which she chose over that Texas school), where she led a number of academic and workforce-development initiatives, including the South of the River Education Center, a workforce partnership with a host of other schools and economic-development-related agencies.

 

I had a very well-rounded background, both in business and in higher education, that gave me a sense of the issues within higher education and the changing landscape of community colleges.”

 

She told BusinessWest she has been looking at a number of president positions over the past several months, but made HCC the her main focus for a host a reasons, including geography (her family is still in the Albany area), but especially those aforementioned opportunities to grow professionally and make a difference — at the school and within the community it serves.

Grade Expectations

Since arriving on the campus during its winter intercession — students were not due back until late in January — Royal said she has taken advantage of that quiet time to meet with several of the constituencies she’ll be working with and beside.

These included staff and, later, faculty, as well as Holyoke Mayor Alex Morse, several state legislators, the school’s foundation, the Greater Holyoke Chamber of Commerce, and the other area community college presidents (through a photo shoot for the Difference Makers program).

She and Springfield Technical Community College President John Cook have already talked more than a few times, continuing a dialogue — and pattern of collaboration — forged by their respective predecessors, Bill Messner at HCC and Ira Rubenzahl at STCC, who retired within a few weeks of each other last summer. (You can read more about those collaborative efforts in the story on page A4).

Royal has also become acquainted with many of HCC’s current initiatives, and there are many of them, including:

• A $43.5 million renovation of the school’s campus center. The two-year project will change the look, feel, and orientation of the campus, and give it what administrators are calling “a new front door.”;

• The Mass. Casino Careers Training Institute, a joint effort among all the state’s community colleges to train people for careers at gambling facilities, including the $950 million MGM Springfield now taking shape in that city’s South End;

• The Cubit Building. That’s the name given to an old mill in downtown Holyoke that takes that shape. HCC will be moving its culinary-arts program into the first two floors of that structure, thus making it the anchor tenant in a building that will also feature market-rate housing and is touted as one of the keys to revitalization of the city’s Innovation District;

• TWO (Training & Workforce Options), a collaborative effort with STCC to provide training programs to help business sectors and individual companies close recognized skills gaps; and

• The school’s designation as an Hispanic Serving Institution, a federal designation from the U.S. Department of Education. Schools earn it when they have an enrollment of undergraduate full-time-equivalent students that is at least 25% Hispanic, a threshold HCC has reached. If it maintains that number for a year, it will be eligible to apply for certain grants that can be used to assist that specific constituency, Royal said.

As might be expected, Royal said one of her first priorities for the school will be to undertake development of a new strategic plan, which would be the first in decades, in her estimation.

She doesn’t expect that a new plan will yield many surprises in terms of recognized priorities, growth opportunities, and a specific strategic direction (although one never knows), but instead will provide needed affirmation of a host of agenda items.

These include the broad issues of access, enrollment, and how to grow it given the current, and lingering, challenges, and developing programs to improve students’ chances for success — whether they’re seeking a certificate, a two-year degree, or a pathway to a four-year degree.

And with that, we turn to what Royal wrote to the search committee that would choose HCC’s next president as she expressed her interest in the position.

“I have been intentional in my career about serving the community-college mission,” she said. “Growing up as a first-generation, low-income, biracial college student, I understand the community-college student and the challenges they face. Student success is most effectively achieved when an institution understands the unique support needs of students in two-year colleges.”

To further emphasize ‘unique,’ she would go on to discuss — with the search committee in that letter, and then, several months later, with BusinessWest — an initiative called the Mobile Food Pantry at Inver Hills.

As that name suggests, this program, created in partnership with a Minnesota-area nonprofit called Open Door, which has a mission to end local hunger, allows Inver Hills’ students in need of food support to receive healthy food on a bus that travels directly to the college.

And there were, and are, plenty of students in need, said Royal, adding that 60% of Inver Hills’ students were classified as low-income.

Whether HCC needs a mobile food pantry or something like it remains to be seen, said Royal, adding that it is merely one example of the ways community colleges can and should work to address the many obstacles standing in the way of students’ success.

“The reason programs like Food Pantry are important is that you cannot educate a hungry student,” said Royal in a firm, direct voice. “We do have students who are struggling, their food insecure, their housing insecure, there are transportation problems … these issues are real, and they impact their quality of focus as they try to concentrate on their studies and improve the quality of their life and the lives of their children.

“We have to look at how we’re able to address, or partner with someone who can address, some of these social-service issues that come with some of the students we serve,” she went on. “So I’ll be looking at community partnerships to address some of these issues.”

Food for Thought

As Royal noted, it takes a village to raise a student.

She is now in a leadership position within that village, and is intent on using that power and responsibility to make success less of a goal and more of a reality.

And, while doing so, she’ll be focused on creating more and different learning experiences — not only for the students, but for her as well.

That’s why she came to HCC, after all.

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

Building Permits

By
Building Permits Departments

The following business permits were issued during the months of December 2016 and January 2017.

AGAWAM

Bay State Elevator
275 Silver St.
$60,000 — Demolish and reconstruct dividing walls, rework sprinkler system

O’Leary-Vincunas No. Two, LLC
200 Silver St.
$2,000 — Erect a dividing wall between reception area and nurses station in medical practice

CHICOPEE

Meadow Chicopee 425-521 LLC
425 Meadow St.
$35,000 — Remove section of concrete floor, pour concrete floor and walls for new pit

Bernard Richard Jr.
19 C Ames Ave.
$49,000 — Frame metal walls for gym area and bathroom

EASTHAMPTON

Keystone Enterprises
122 Pleasant St.
$900,000 — Interior buildout for medical-marijuana facility

Rainbow Properties
61-63 Garfield Ave.
$2,600 — Attic insulation and air sealing

EAST LONGMEADOW

Go Graphix
31 Benton Dr.
$205,000 — Addition

Town of East Longmeadow
60 Center Square
$15,000 — Convert hearing room

GREENFIELD

278-308 Main St. LLC
278 Main St.
$22,500 — Roofing

Community Action of the Franklin, Hampshire, and North Quabbin Regions Inc.
154 Federal St.
$29,775 — Bring bathroom up to ADA code, handicap ramp

Hangar of Greenfield
30 Federal St.
$27,000 — Enlarge opening to bathroom, remodel bar, make room ADA-compliant

Sander Greenfield LLC
367 Federal St.
$35,000 — Construct two new accessible bathrooms, front doors and windows, back egress door, infill old windows and doors

HADLEY

Pyramid Mall of Hadley Newco LLC
367 Russell St.
$125,000 — Repair roof

HAMPDEN

Bagel Nook
34 Somers Road
$6,000 — Renovate interior of kitchen

LONGMEADOW

Willie Ross School for the Deaf
32 Norway St.
$4,255 — Replace sign

LUDLOW

JL Massa Collision
287 Miller St.
$126,000 — Commercial addition

So Cool Gifts
345 Holyoke St.
$7,300 — Illuminated sign

NORTHAMPTON

Academy of Music
274 Main St.
$500 — Install temporary pressure-treated landing steps over deteriorated steps until Spring repairs

First Church of Christ, Scientist
46 Center St.
$1,000 — Install temporary rear-exit door for First Night activities

Om Bhavya Inc.
100 Main St.
$115,247 — Tenant fit-out of half the first floor

Smith College
25 College Lane
$1,350,000 — Interior alterations and addition to existing boathouse, including new HVAC, plumbing, windows, handicap ramp

T-Mobile Northeast LLC
170 Glendale Road
$15,000 — Install three antennas on existing tower

World War II Veterans Assoc. of Hampshire County Inc.
50 Conz St.
$54,908 — Water damage: repair wiring damage, re-insulate, drywall, reset appliances

PALMER

Sanderson MacLeod Inc.
1199 South Main St.
$17,000 — Renovate cafeteria

SOUTH HADLEY

Steven Duval
549-553 Newton St.
$438,500 — Construct commercial office building

Riverboat Village Assoc.
Riverboat Village Road
$22,975 — Re-roofing on Building 6

Riverboat Village Assoc.
Riverboat Village Road
$22,975 — Re-roofing on Building 13

Town of South Hadley
153 Newton St.
$195,000 — Renovate entrance of South Hadley High School

SPRINGFIELD

405 Armory St., LLC
405 Armory St.
$103,997 — Take down existing wall partitions, floor, ceiling finishes

City of Springfield
50 Empress Court
$1,419,313 — Install replacement windows and doors, make accessibility upgrades at Mary M. Walsh Elementary School

Five Town Station LLC
270 Cooley St.
$635,000 — Interior buildout of existing space into an IHOP restaurant

Newport 555 State Street LLC
555 State St.
$220,000 — Alter 9,200 square feet for new retail tenant, Dollar Tree

Hampden Homebuyers
1344 Allen St.
$12,500 — Roofing, siding, windows

Holy Trinity Church of God in Christ
57 Bay St.
$36,186 — Install footings and bearing wall, lift up sagging floor

Pioneer Valley Surgical Center
3500 Main St.
$4,050 — Flood cut eight walls due to sewage backup

Ronald McDonald House
34 Chapin Terrace
$67,700 — Renovate bathrooms to make them handicap-friendly, finish upgrades in four bedrooms

Springfield College
258 Middlesex St.
$1,500 — Build partition wall to add office space

WARE

Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield
59 South St.
$56,000 — Accessible entrance and accessible bathroom at St. Mary’s Church

VH West Brookfield
33 Gilbertville Road
$1,750,000 — Ground-mounted solar project

WEST SPRINGFIELD

Food Bag
884 Westfield St.
$85,000 — Store remodel

Eighty Congress Street LLC
900 Memorial Ave.
$25,365 — Remove sheetrock wall to enlarge room, other renovations

Sunny’s Convenience
2260 Westfield St.
$4206.88 — Installation of steel security gates

Heka Health
242 Interstate Dr.
$320,000 — Erect 15,000-square-foot steel manufactured building

ATC
1201 Westfield St.
$80,000 — Installation of six antennas on existing cell tower for Verizon Wireless

WILBRAHAM

911 Stony Hill Road LLC
911 Stony Hill Road
$2,500 — Re-roof back dormer

2342 LLC
2342 Boston Road
$40,000 — Re-roofing

Dennis Duquette Rejoins MassMutual in Corporate Responsibility Role

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duquettefeature-0117a
Features

Making a Solid Return

 

massmutualduqettefacessigncroppedDennis Duquette left MassMutual nearly 30 years ago for what would become a variety of roles at Fidelity Investments in Boston, most all of them in the realms of community relations and corporate responsibility. He says he’s passionate about such work — passionate enough to quickly put aside any thought of retirement last year and agree to lead the team handling those assignments at MassMutual.

When Dennis Duquette returned to his hometown of Springfield last May after a nearly 30-year stint with Fidelity Investments in Boston, he was, at age 57, retired. Sort of.

He was retired from Fidelity, at least, and determined to “recharge a bit,” as he put it. The plan was to take the summer off, rest, travel around the region, and reconnect with some people here, and he did all of the above, while also trying to determine just how well retirement was sitting with him.

As it turned out, it wasn’t sitting well at all.

“Toward the end of the summer, I started thinking, ‘I have to start doing something; I have to start thinking about going back to work,” he told BusinessWest. “I figured out that I was too young to retire … I wasn’t there yet.”

With that question answered, there was now another one facing him. It didn’t concern where he would return to the world of work (he was back in Springfield, and he was going to stay here), but in what capacity; his first thoughts tended toward project work and consulting.

Instead, something much different came into his field of vision.

To make a fairly long story short, there were a few conversations with some colleagues in the financial-services industry that eventually led Duquette to interview for and then accept the position of director of Corporate Responsibility at MassMutual and president of the recently established MassMutual Foundation, succeeding Nick Fyntrilakis, who held that post for several years.

And in every respect, this was a logical move and proverbial perfect match — for both Duquette and the company. That’s because he’s certainly not a stranger to Springfield, the company, or the many duties involved with corporate responsibility.

Indeed, he started his career in financial services at MassMutual’s State Street headquarters in 1981 as a compensation analyst, eventually moving on to community relations specialist and associate director of Group L&H (life and health) Marketing during a stay that lasted more than eight years. And at Fidelity, he would hold a number of titles related to marketing, community relations, and related work, including his last one, vice president of Corporate Sponsorships, a role we’ll hear more about later.

In an interview soon after arriving back on State Street just before Christmas — his order of business cards had been placed, but they had yet to arrive — Duquette told BusinessWest that the phrase (and title) ‘corporate responsibility’ is somewhat new, but the concept certainly isn’t.

MassMutual

Dennis Duquette says the paradigm regarding corporate social responsibility has changed, and MassMutual is on the cutting edge of current trends.

He said major corporations like MassMutual, which employs roughly 7,000 people in Springfield — and even much smaller companies, for that matter — have always had a responsibility to serve the ‘community’ they call home, however that term is defined. In MassMutual’s case, such work within the community dates back to its earliest years in the 1850s.

However, he went on, what has changed, in some respects, is the manner in which these responsibilities are met.

“The model 30 or 40 years ago was … you write a check, and you get your name in support of something; that paradigm has changed, and I think for the better,” he explained, adding quickly that MassMutual does still write some checks. But in most all cases, money is accompanied by programming and direct involvement with the cause or program in question, usually in collaboration with other groups and agencies.

And the initiatives undertaken are part of a broad strategy to improve quality of life within the community, build financial security for families, and create opportunities for people of all ages, but especially young people, he said.

There are myriad examples of this, he said, before citing a few to get his points across, including MassMutual’s involvement with Valley Venture Mentors and the project to create an innovation center in downtown Springfield; the MassMutual Foundation’s awarding of $15 million to UMass Amherst over 10 years to further strengthen its world-class data-science and cybersecurity research and education programs; and the foundation’s launch just last October of free digital financial-education curriculum — part of its FutureSmart program — for middle-school students nationwide.

There are many other examples, he went on, all of which reflect a broad strategy with stated goals and clear objectives for meeting them.

For this issue, BusinessWest talked at length with Duquette about his decision to unretire, but especially about his new role — in which he serves as the unofficial face of MassMutual within the community — and the many ways MassMutual’s corporate responsibility is manifesting itself, in Western Mass. and beyond.

At Home with the Idea

While Duquette left Springfield and MassMutual in 1989 for Fidelity and the Boston area, he didn’t exactly leave his hometown completely behind him.

He still had family and friends in this area, and stayed in touch as best he could. “I read MassLive a lot,” he said with a laugh, adding that various media outlets (including BusinessWest) and contact with acquaintances kept him abreast of everything from the 2011 tornado and its aftermath — he’s a Cathedral graduate and donated money to the rebuilding of that school, which was destroyed by the twister — to the difficult financial times that visited the city over the past few decades, to some of the many recent forms of progress, including the arrival of MGM.

Taking stock of the city and what’s happening within it — something he’s been doing all along, but especially since returning home eight months ago — he said there are many signs that the city is truly on the right track.

“I drive around Springfield, and I walk around Springfield, and I see potential,” he explained. “I know the city has fallen on tough times in the past and has worked to dig itself out. There was a natural disaster that blew through the town, literally, but I think the mayor has done an outstanding job of leading the city back, obviously with the help of a lot of people.

“When you consider this city’s history, its location, the resources that it has — material and intellectual — there is a lot of potential here,” he went on. “It’s really just a matter of having the right leadership and vision, and I believe the mayor, the City Council, and city officials are super diligent about that. And I think we have a governor and lieutenant governor now who are very focused on helping the gateway cities, and Springfield is one of them. Overall, I’m very hopeful.”

Dennis Duquette says involvement in entrepreneurship initiatives, such as the innovation center on Bridge Street now under construction, fit into MassMutual’s broad CSR strategy.

Dennis Duquette says involvement in entrepreneurship initiatives, such as the innovation center on Bridge Street now under construction, fit into MassMutual’s broad CSR strategy.

He acknowledged that Springfield, and Western Mass. as a whole, haven’t seen anything approaching the explosive growth that Boston and the areas surrounding it did over the past few decades, but told BusinessWest that efforts to compare and contrast the two regions are neither warranted nor particularly fruitful.

“I don’t think Springfield has to be like Boston to be a successful city,” he explained. “There are some great things that Springfield can do that are unique to Springfield that don’t necessarily have to replicate Boston.”

With that, he acknowledged that he will now have a much better view of what’s happening across Greater Springfield and, through the many aspects of his new role, will be taking a direct role in helping to see that the region’s potential is realized.

And, as noted, he brings a good deal of experience to that role.

Indeed, at Fidelity he led a number of initiatives involving corporate sponsorships, education, employee volunteerism, and employee giving.

As one example, he cited development of a digital financial-literacy game in cooperation with New York-based Dopamine Inc. for middle- and high-school students, an initiative launched in support of Fidelity’s broader financial-literacy programs, in partnership with FidelityCares, the firm’s community-relations apparatus.

Another example is The Alzheimer’s Project. That was the name attached to a HBO series on the crippling disease, for which Fidelity Investments took a key sponsorship role.

In many respects, Duquette explained, Fidelity’s broad corporate-responsibility strategy, if you will, mirrors MassMutual’s in that many initiatives focus on young people, education, financial literacy, and overall quality of life.

And these initiatives involve partnerships, not simply check writing, he went on, adding that this same philosophy reigns at MassMutual, which has a 165-year history of giving back to the community and status as Springfield’s largest corporate citizen.

“MassMutual is an important community partner in Greater Springfield, not only by virtue of its size, but also by virtue of its legacy,” he explained. “I don’t see that changing, but what will change, potentially, is the way we do our partnerships; we have a great opportunity to continue our partnerships and build new ones, and I’m very excited about that.”

Paying Dividends

As he noted earlier, Duquette, upon deciding to ‘unretire,’ approached a number of people to solicit possible leads on landing spots, again, with the thought that consulting or project work were the most likely contenders for what would come next.

One of those people was Jennifer Halloran, MassMutual’s head of Brand and Advertising — only Duquette needed to be told this was what it said on her business card. He had worked with her at Fidelity for years, but was unaware that she had come to MassMutual. It was Halloran who alerted him to an opening at the company at the top of its Corporate Responsibility team.

Duquette was somewhat surprised by this news — he had recently been a spectator for the groundbreaking, or “wall-smashing,” as he called it, for the innovation center on Bridge Street and heard Fyntrilakis speak on behalf of MassMutual, a partner in the project. But he was also quite intrigued, because such work had come to define his career in recent years.

“I got really excited about this role,” he explained. “And I got excited for a few reasons. For starters, this is something I’m passionate about. I think the role of corporations in this country and around the world is changing — the impact corporations can have on the communities in which they’re based, and society in general, is immense.

“Secondly, and I think more importantly, my view had always been that MassMutual was really exemplary in this space,” he went on. “I say that as someone who left MassMutual in 1989, never thinking or intending that I would be back here, but over the years, I was taking note of things that MassMutual was doing when it came to corporate responsibility.”

Elaborating, he would summon the words ‘bold’ and ‘innovative’ to describe some of those initiatives, adding that, as he watched them unfold while working for a competitor, he would nod his head in approval.

“For me, as someone who cares about this work, to come into an environment that really supports it and champions it — and that goes right to the top of the house — this was a no-brainer for me to pursue this opportunity,” he said, adding that, just a few weeks in, he’s “pumped.”

He’s spent those few weeks doing more of that connecting he described earlier — he’s met with the leadership team at the Community Foundation of Western Mass., for example — but also on the road. Indeed, he spent his second week on the job in Phoenix, where the corporation also has a huge presence, becoming acquainted with various initiatives taking place there and on a national level.

There will be much more of all that in the months and years to come, he said, adding that creation of the MassMutual Foundation in 2015 is an important development when it comes to the shape and scope of corporate-responsibility initiatives at the company.

“It gives us guardrails and parameters through which we can do our corporate giving,” he said of the foundation, “and it also gives us a platform from which we can launch ideas and partnerships — that I think are deeper and smarter — with some of our critical nonprofit partners.”

Elaborating, he said the foundation provides a vehicle with which the corporation can work with a host of partners — locally, in other communities where it has a presence, and in markets important to the business — to “amplify the things we care about.”

With that, he returned to the FutureSmart program as one solid example. To make it happen, MassMutual partners with education-technology leader EverFi, which is building a network of relationships with school districts around the country to introduce financial-literacy curriculum.

“We work with them as a partner to get us into some of the markets we’re interested in, and build those local programs,” he said, adding that the broad goal is to reach 2 million students by 2020.

There are many other examples, he went on, adding that, to slice through his multi-faceted job description, the primary goal is to create more of these partnerships and continue to develop new and fruitful ways to invest in the community — literally and figuratively.

The work with VVM and other economic-development-related groups to encourage entrepreneurship and fund startup companies certainly falls into that category, he said. The various initiatives are in some ways unique for a financial-services company, he noted, but overall, such efforts dovetail with the major goals of the company’s broad corporate-responsibility strategy.

“If you look at that strategy, it’s all about securing and enabling economic security for families,” he explained. “We help people secure their futures through financial means, so as a community partner, we’re about getting in and supporting initiatives, ideas, and programs that will help build and sustain economic viability for communities that we care about.”

Elaborating, he said that, by providing various types of support to startups and the groups that mentor them — everything from capital for startups to technical support in an investment that totals $5 million — MassMutual is investing not only in those ventures, but in Greater Springfield itself.

“I’ve had prior experience with an incubator in Boston with MassChallenge,” he said, referring to the entity that describes itself as ‘the most startup-friendly incubator on the planet.’ “And I was excited to see that there was a vibrant incubator/entrepreneur community that was bubbling up here in Springfield.

“When you think of this particular region, where we’re located, the access to higher education in the Pioneer Valley and the surrounding areas, it’s a logical place,” he went on. “And it’s also a great place for people to come, young people in particular, and kick the tires on some new ideas and try their wares.”

Investments in the Community

Talk of the partnership with VVM brings Duquette back to his comments about how corporate social responsibility, or CSR, as it’s called, now goes well beyond simply writing checks.

“My approach to CSR is this — if we’re going to be working together and providing financial support to a nonprofit, that’s great, but I also want to understand what that group’s objectives are as a nonprofit,” he explained. “And then say, ‘here are my objectives as a representative of MassMutual. Let’s talk about how we can work together to build something that goes beyond the money. Let’s build something that’s really meaningful.’”

Working toward such ends is something Duquette is passionate about, and something that certainly propelled him out of retirement.

You might say he’s at home with his latest, and perhaps last, career stop — in every sense of that phrase.

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

Women’s Fund Leaders Attend White House Forum

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Sections Women in Businesss

Opening Doors

Elizabeth Barajas-Román visits the White House

Elizabeth Barajas-Román visits the White House during her recent foray to D.C. for a forum on cultivating economic opportunities for women of color.

Expanding opportunities for women is not just a regional issue.

As an example, Women’s Fund of Western Massachusetts CEO Elizabeth Barajas-Román and Program Officer Ellen Moorhouse recently joined stakeholders from the academic, private, government, and philanthropic sectors at the White House for a forum hosted by senior administration officials.

The forum, “Advancing Equity for Women and Girls of Color: Continuing Progress and Building Toward Change,” focused on developing strategies that break down barriers to success and create more opportunity for all Americans, including women and girls of color.

“This forum focused on women of color and how to be successful economically, education-wise, and in their daily lives,” Barajas-Román said. “The Women’s Fund has been working closely with the White House Council on Women and Girls in regard to our work here in the region with young women of color.”

She explained that the Women’s Fund has focused on economic security and prosperity for women of color, and the White House Council has been a strong resource for gathering data and unveiling some of the trends at play on a region-by-region level.

“We’ve been able to take a deeper look at our region, and one of the trends that stands out is how many young people are leaving the region right after high school; they’re going away to college and not returning — so much that the Census indicates Springfield and Holyoke have a statistical shortage of young people,” she told BusinessWest. “We know this means these people are not buying homes, not investing in the community. So much happens when we lose these people right when they’re starting to make a life for themselves.”

As part of the forum, Barajas-Román took part in a roundtable discussion with several national figures, including Tina Tchen, assistant to President Obama, chief of staff to First Lady Michelle Obama, and executive director of the White House Council on Women and Girls; Valerie Jarrett, senior advisor to President Obama, who oversees the White House offices of Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs and chairs the White House Council on Women and Girls; and Melissa Harris-Perry, editor-at-large for Elle magazine.

As one of about 20 women’s foundation leaders from across the U.S. who participated, she was able to talk about how organizations like the Women’s Fund are trying to make Springfield a model for raising the economic status of young women.

“It was a tremendous opportunity to be invited among organizations from New York City, California, these large areas — and interesting to hear their feedback,” Barajas-Román said. “Springfield really does look like the rest of the country, and they’re watching to see if we’re successful and it’s a model that can be taken to other areas that look like us. There were national funders in the room, national organizations that work with young people. It was a great opportunity to talk about all the ways Springfield is innovating, and we were hoping to not only bring back some additional ideas and partners, but to attract more attention to what’s happening here.”

The forum built on Obama’s efforts on behalf of women and girls, like the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, expanding fair pay and paid-leave protections, and convening the first-ever White House summit focused on building workplaces that support working families and business.

The White House Council on Women and Girls has identified five data-driven issue areas where interventions can promote opportunities for success at school, at work, and in the community. Continuing research in these areas and exploration of new efforts can help advance equality for women and girls of color.

Under Obama’s leadership, the Council on Women and Girls has worked to ensure government policies appropriately consider these kinds of challenges and persistent opportunity gaps faced by many disadvantaged, marginalized, or underrepresented girls. The council also aims to inspire the private sector to do the same, to ensure that everyone who aspires to get ahead has a chance to succeed.

“By representing Western Massachusetts at the White House, we can ensure that our collective voice is heard on important policy matters,” Moorhouse said. “Only by having a seat at the table can we work to safeguard the progress we’ve made, while simultaneously laying the groundwork for future policy and social change.”

—Joseph Bednar

Holyoke Facility Serves as a Unique Safety Net for Veterans

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soldiershomefeature-1216b
Health Care Sections

On the Home Front

Holyoke Soldiers’ Home resident Ted Dickson

Holyoke Soldiers’ Home resident Ted Dickson

Opened in 1952 to provide long-term care to those who served in the war to end all wars, the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke has continued to be a solid option to those who have served in all the wars since, and in peacetime as well. The 24/7 care is complemented by a unique environment that brings veterans together, recognizes them for their service, and gets them out into the community. Said its new superintendent, “every day is Veterans Day here.”

 

Bennett Walsh was searching for some words he thought he could sum up the purpose, or mission, of the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke and, more importantly, what it means to the veterans who reside there and their families.

He eventually summoned the phrase ‘safety net,’ and would use it several times in the course of a discussion about this state-funded long-term-care facility’s past, present, and likely future. And in many ways, that works.

“People come here because, for one of a variety of reasons, the family cannot provide the 24/7 care that their loved one needs,” said Walsh, a retired Marine lieutenant colonel who was named superintendent of the facility just before Memorial Day last May. “We’re a facility that can provide that. In many cases, a husband loses his wife, and she was the primary caregiver. Now that she’s gone, there’s no one in the family that can care for him 24/7. Every veteran here has a different story, but it all starts with a need that we can meet.”

But to those who call this facility home, it is much more than a safety net. For some perspective, BusinessWest talked with Ted Dickson, a submariner who served on the USS Snook, a nuclear-powered Skipjack-class vessel, during the Vietnam War. He suffered a brain aneurism two years ago, underwent surgery at Leahy Clinic, recuperated at several hospitals, and then spent some time in a local nursing home.

It was that last stop that he used as a launching point for his comments about the Soldiers’ Home, which he moved to roughly a year ago.

“I didn’t like that experience at all,” he said of his time in the nursing home before quickly changing the subject to his present surroundings. “It’s much different here … you have the freedom to do what you want, and there are so many activities. But you’re also surrounded by other people who served, and it’s great to be around these people.”

Elaborating, he said that, while the more than 250 veterans living at the facility share a number of common threads and can — and do — share many war stories (in this case, in a literal sense), that’s just part of the equation.

Other parts include the atmosphere, the camaraderie, the compassionate staff, the myriad activities the veterans can participate in —Dickson himself partakes in everything from photography to watercolor painting — and the many events, on site and off, that those at the Soldiers’ Home become part of.

Indeed, they don’t celebrate Veterans Day at the facility, said Walsh; instead, they commemorate what has become known as ‘Veterans Month.’

“Actually, every day is Veterans Day here,” said Walsh, adding that this mindset, or operating philosophy, if you will, is one of the reasons why the facility is a popular choice for those who have served, and their families.

“Every day in November, there was something going on — not only here at the home, but also out in the community that our veterans were asked to attend,” he said while trying to explain some of the many elements that set this facility apart. “It was heartwarming to see the amount of outpouring from all the different groups in the community; the message was clearly sent that our veterans are not forgotten.”

But while the Soldiers’ Home, opened in 1952, has a proud history, a mission that clearly resonates, and a seemingly solid future, there are challenges, said Walsh, whose successor left the facility due to what he considered weak support from the state, compared to what it provides to a much larger sister facility in Chelsea.

List of Home Care Options in the Region

Walsh believes the Holyoke facility is adequately funded — “could I use more money? Ask anyone that question, and they would say ‘yes’” — and that the challenge is to make the most of the resources it has and create greater efficiencies, especially since the facility is now nearly 65 years old and certainly showing its age.

“We have to do better and be smarter,” he explained, adding that this mindset has many components, including greater use of clean energy. “We need to ensure that we’re using every dollar properly because, while this facility has great bones and great structure, when it reaches this age, there are challenges.”

For this issue and its focus on healthcare, BusinessWest visited the Soldiers’ Home and talked with its new superintendent to gain some perspective on its unique mission and how it carries out that all-important assignment.

Branch Office

Walsh is in the process of having his office painted, and one of the first steps in that process is to take down much of the collection of plaques, pictures, awards, and other items he’s collected over the years.

Collectively, they tell quite a story, one of a 25-year career in the Marines that saw duty with each of that branch’s fabled divisions and in nearly all of the notable hot spots since the early ’90s.

Indeed, he was an infantry platoon commander in Mogadishu, Somalia and completed three tours of duty in Iraq and one in Afghanistan. He was stationed on Okinawa when a tsunami slammed into Northern Japan in 2011, and was among those troops assigned to aiding in the recovery from that disaster.

“I was stationed there for 30 days and could feel the aftershocks,” he recalled, adding that, when his time with the Marines ended early last year, he was faced with the often-challenging assignment of determining what comes next. As he looked back, he said that administering a long-term-care facility for veterans wasn’t exactly on his immediate radar screen.

Bennett Walsh

Bennett Walsh says the Soldiers’ Home has effectively served as a safety net for veterans for nearly 65 years now.

In fact, one of his first interviews was with MGM concerning a possible security-consulting assignment with the casino due to open in September 2018, and another concerned a similar assignment with United Technologies.

But upon hearing about the opening at the Soldiers Home, and with some prodding from family and friends, he decided to explore that option.

“I was actively interviewing for life after the Marine Corps — the next act, as I like to say — and I was approached about this position, which appealed to me because I would get to work with veterans,” said Walsh, who is now serving on the home front, in every sense of that phrase.

Since arriving, he’s spent the requisite considerable amount of time and energy needed to acquaint himself with everything from the staff of 300 to the veterans themselves (he knows most all of them on a first-name basis), to the facility’s rich history.

Relating some of the latter, he said the facility — a converted mental-health hospital built on a former apple orchard on a hill on Cherry Street with a commanding view of the Paper City — was built with the intention of serving the nation’s many World War I veterans, who, by the early 1950s, were likely in their 60s or 70s.

Over the years, the composition of the group residing in the home has naturally changed, and it continues to do so, said Walsh, noting that, while the bulk of current veterans served in World War II or the Korean War, there are a large number of Vietnam War vets, now in their early 60s at the youngest, as well. And there are many who served in peacetime in various locations around the world.

“Overall, it’s a very intriguing mix of people, and what they all have in common is that they served their country,” said Walsh, adding that the average age of the residents, as it is in most long-term facilities, is just over 80.

Most are from Western Mass., which is the unofficial service area of the Holyoke facility, he went on, adding that this means all four counties. But some are also from the central and eastern parts of the state as well.

The home, which serves more than 2,000 veterans a year through a host of inpatient and outpatient services, including dental and lab work and a pharmacy, is generally fully occupied, and there is a waiting list.

All branches of the service are well-represented, said Walsh, referring to the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, and Merchant Marine. And veterans currently in residence have taken part in a host of landmark battles and campaigns, including Pearl Harbor, the Battle of the Bulge, the Normany invasion, and the Manhattan Project that brought about the atom bomb.

“There is a lot of history represented here,” said Walsh.

Most veterans will spend two to three years at the facility, on average, he said, adding that veterans are charged $30 per day ($900 per month) to stay there, with most of the costs offset by veterans benefits.

Battle Plan

As noted earlier, the care provided at the Soldiers’ Home is 24/7 in nature, which makes the facility similar to a typical long-term-care facility.

But, given the unique nature of the client base, that is where most of the comparisons end, said Walsh.

Indeed, while each of the veterans living there has a story — both in terms of their service to their country and how they arrived in Holyoke — that is in some way different, there are those abundant common denominators, especially a desire to be among fellow service men and women and enjoy a host of programs and activities simply not available at a traditional nursing home.

‘Veterans Month’ is just part of that equation, Walsh said, adding that there are events all year, and a number of special programs (including successful efforts to make the home a voting place last November) designed to make sure that veterans and their service are not forgotten.

That includes those who fought in what some have come to call the ‘forgotten war,’ the one waged in Korea just as the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke was opening its doors.

“This year they marked the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War, and there were special pins made up for all our Vietnam veterans,” he explained. “But we made the decision that we didn’t want to forget the Korean War veterans, so we made up special pins for them as well and had a ceremony earlier this month.”

It was this unique environment and focus on veterans that certainly appealed to Dickson, 73, whose story, at least the the chapter relating to the Soldiers’ Home, began a few years ago, when, as he colorfully put it, “my wife thought I was acting a little wacky.”

Her instincts proved correct, because an MRI revealed an aneurism, which led to surgery at the Leahy Clinic that “took a chunk out of my head and pulled out the aneurism.”

As Dickson said, his stay in a traditional nursing home was not enjoyable, and an examination of options revealed that the Soldiers’ Home was one of them, and he took full advantage of that opportunity.

“It’s been a super experience — it’s nice to be in the middle of a group like that,” he said, adding that, while he’s receiving care, he likes to give back — to both those providing the care and the community at large, through everything from his photography to events for veterans in area cities and towns.

The goal moving forward, said Walsh, is to simply write more stories like Dickson’s, an assignment that comes with many challenges.

And that’s why another of Walsh’s first priorities is to create a long-term strategic plan for the facility, one that will ensure that it can live up to its unofficial operating slogan, “providing quality care with honor and dignity.”

“You have to look forward because, if you don’t, you’re not looking ahead,” he explained. “A big part of our five-year strategy is to make better use of our existing resources.”

Soldiering On

On the day he talked with BusinessWest, there was a Santa Claus suit hanging on a rack in the corner of Walsh’s office.

He acknowledged that, in his present role, he wears many different hats — and in this case, a red wool one, as he distributed gifts to veterans and their family members at the annual holiday party.

The Santa suit — not to mention the jacket and tie he wears most days — is quite a departure from the Marine camos he’s been wearing for more than half his life. But he sees it simply as service, or, to be more precise, as a continuation of service, to both the country and others who have answered the call.

Providing that service in the form of a unique environment featuring specialized 24/7 care is what the Soldiers’ Home is all about. And that’s what makes it a safety net, but also much more.

Just ask Ted Dickson — or anyone else who calls this place ‘home.’

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

Briefcase

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Briefcase Departments

November Unemployment Rate Drops to 2.9%

BOSTON — The state’s total unemployment rate dropped to 2.9% in November, marking the fifth consecutive month the rate declined, the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development reported Thursday.
The last time the state’s unemployment rate was at 2.9% was in January 2001. The unemployment rate in October was 3.3%.
In November, preliminary estimates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicate Massachusetts added 5,800 jobs over the month.  BLS slightly revised the October job estimates, reporting the state loss 5,400 jobs as opposed to the previously reported 5,500 job loss estimate. Year-to-date, December 2015 to November 2016, Massachusetts has added 67,200 jobs.
Massachusetts’ unemployment rate has remained lower than the national rate since April 2008. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the national rate at 4.6% in November.
At 2.9%, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate is down 2.0% over the year from 4.9% in November 2015. There were 68,100 fewer unemployed residents and 108,400 more employed residents over the year compared to November 2015.
“We are very pleased to see the unemployment rate consistently go down month after month,” said Labor and Workforce Development Secretary Ronald L. Walker, II. “Not only is the unemployment rate declining, but we have continued job growth in key sectors that drive the Massachusetts economy.”
In November, over-the-month job gains occurred in the financial activities; professional, scientific and business services; construction; information; ‘other services’; education and health services; and local government sectors.
The state’s labor force participation rate — the total number of residents 16 or older who worked or were unemployed and actively sought work in the last four weeks — is 64.7%, down 0.2 of a percentage point over the month.  Over the year, the labor force participation rate has increased 0.1 of a percentage point compared to November 2015.

MBTA to Place Second Order of Rail Cars with CRRC

BOSTON — The MBTA announced it will place a second order for new Red Line cars with CRRC, the company already contracted to build new train cars at a facility it is building in Springfield, the Republican reported. MBTA officials say it’s cheaper to pay $300,000 for each new car than to rehab aging trains. CRRC, the Chinese-owned world leader in rail-car manufacturing, won a contract in 2014 to build 152 Orange Line cars and 132 Red Line cars to replace aging trains. Under the new proposal, CRRC will start building an additional 120 Red Line cars in 2022 after completing the initial order of Red Line and Orange Line cars. The proposal includes an option to purchase 14 more.

State Adds More Than 6,300 Clean-energy Jobs

BOSTON – The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC) today announced that the Commonwealth added 6,317 clean- energy jobs and has surpassed 100,000 clean energy jobs statewide for the first time, currently 105,212. The figures, released as part of MassCEC’s 2016 Massachusetts Clean Energy Industry Report, show the Bay State clean energy sector maintained a strong growth rate of six percent between 2015 and 2016. The report also found that the number of clean energy jobs in Massachusetts has increased by 75% since 2010.
“The Commonwealth’s highly educated and well-trained workforce makes it an attractive place for innovative industries, including clean energy companies,” said Gov. Charlie Baker. “Massachusetts’ recently passed comprehensive energy diversification legislation will continue to build on the recent success of the clean energy industry by increasing opportunities for growth and advancement.”
“The Clean Energy Industry Report clearly shows that the booming clean energy sector is a pivotal jobs creator within the Commonwealth and a driving force for diversifying our energy sources,” said Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito. “The Baker-Polito Administration is committed to continuing our support of Massachusetts’ robust clean energy sector and making these benefits accessible to residents throughout the Commonwealth.”
The report found that clean energy is an $11.8 billion industry in Massachusetts, and represents 2.5% of the Commonwealth’s Gross State Product. Clean energy jobs represent 2.9% of the overall workforce in the state, the report found. The clean energy industry employs residents of every region in Massachusetts. Jobs grew over the past year in each of the state’s regions, with the largest growth coming in Northeastern Massachusetts (8.8%) and Southeastern Massachusetts (8.2%).
“The continued strength of Massachusetts’ clean energy industry continues to bring innovation, energy savings and environmental benefits to communities across the state,” said Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA) Secretary Matthew Beaton. “The Baker-Polito Administration will continue to work with our partners in the clean energy industry to reduce costs to ratepayers, usage and emissions as we work to achieve our Global Warming Solutions Act goals.”
“The clean energy industry in Massachusetts continues to see strong job growth while helping to drive the state’s vibrant innovation economy,” said MassCEC CEO Stephen Pike. “The clean energy sector is fueled by the economic activity of small businesses, universities, nonprofits, technologists and entrepreneurs hard at work on addressing our most pressing energy challenges.”
The report found that Massachusetts installed 25,390 renewable energy projects in 2016, adding an additional 374 megawatts (MW) of electric capacity in the process, enough to power 56,040 homes. The Commonwealth also remains first in the United States for per-capita early-stage clean energy venture investment, beating out California. Early stage investment in Massachusetts clean energy companies grew 166% over the previous year.
The report, prepared for MassCEC by BW Research Partnership, also found Massachusetts to be the national leader in early-stage clean energy investment. Overall, public and private investment in the industry exceeded $658 million.

State Treasurer Issues Report on Financial Literacy in Massachusetts

BOSTON — State Treasurer Deborah Goldberg recently unveiled a one-year progress report on her Office of Economic Empowerment’s financial-education initiatives. The review highlighted the advancements resulting from the 2015 Financial Literacy Task Force Report. The task force consisted of a diverse group of policymakers, educators, bankers and advocates, and convened last year to develop an action plan for Massachusetts residents to have access to the financial skills they need to attain economic stability. The report culminated with the release of 22 recommendations aimed at empowering residents with an understanding of how to budget their money, save for retirement, and understand the impact of economic decisions. “I am thankful for the many partners that share our vision and commitment to expanding economic security in Massachusetts,” Goldberg said. “We will continue to innovate and expand our programs through a digital delivery of financial education and partnerships throughout the state.” In one year, Goldberg’s Office of Economic Empowerment initiated 14 of the 22 policy recommendations provided by the task force, including: establishing $eedMA, a pilot program designed to help kindergarten families save for post-secondary education and training; creating the Women’s Economic Empowerment Series, a free financial-empowerment workshop series for women; and the relaunch of Operation Money Wise as a grant program for organizations to provide financial education and programming to the military, veteran, family, and survivor community.

Springfield Cultural District Releases Video Map

SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Central Cultural District (SCCD) launched a new video map to accompany the Downtown Springfield Cultural Walking Tour. The tour, first introduced in the summer of 2015, is a tool designed to be used by visitors or residents to learn more about the city’s architectural, historic, and cultural highlights. Printed maps are available at all downtown hotels, visitor’s centers, and cultural institutions, and is also available digitally on the SCCD website, springfieldculture.org. “Sometimes even residents are unaware of the beautiful assets we have throughout the Cultural District, and these videos are a living, breathing way for everyone to connect with the people at our historic and cultural landmarks, not just the buildings,” said Morgan Drewniany, SCCD director. The video map brings a new dimension to the walking tour. Viewers gain insight into the history of each location on the map and have the chance to learn an unexpected fact about the venue or building. Each video is presented by a member of the Springfield Central Cultural District on location, and is under two minutes, to allow viewing while out and about. There are 12 videos linked to the Walking Tour. Kay Simpson, president of the Springfield Museums; John Doleva, president and CEO of the Basketball Hall of Fame; Stacey Church, general manager of the MassMutual Center; and Peter Salerno, executive director of the Springfield Symphony Orchestra, are just a few of the highlighted speakers, among many others. The project was funded, in part, by a Springfield Cultural Council grant, and was produced by Focus Springfield.

BRP/Grenier Takes Clients Beyond the Bottom Line

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Banking and Financial Services Sections

Family Matters

 

Some of the team at BRP/Grenier

Some of the team at BRP/Grenier, from left: Kelly Landron, Pat Grenier, Kim Galinski, and Lindsey Arventos.

As one of eight children, Patricia Grenier says she really doesn’t need any more family. Yet, as principal at BRP/Grenier, her growing financial-services practice, she treats clients like family members — which often means helping them make tough decisions.

One client was transitioning into assisted living and needed $200,000 immediately, and wanted to take it from her investment account. But the market was down, so Grenier was loath to do that.

“Her response was, ‘I don’t care what you do, just find me the money,’” she told BusinessWest. “So I called an associate at a bank and asked him if we could coordinate an equity line for this woman.” They did, and six months later, she sold her home, paid off the equity line, and moved into the facility.

“Those are the kinds of things we think about,” she said. “If all we focus on is investments, we would not go beyond and start asking the appropriate questions that need to be asked.”

Another client called about wanting to buy a car, and asking about loan options. “I asked, ‘why are you taking out a loan? You have enough money invested. You can use your own money.’ She was elderly; there was no need for her to have debt.”

In short, BRP/Grenier is an investment-strategy firm that goes well beyond its advertised services, which run the gamut from financial planning and education savings to retirement strategies and estate planning. Grenier considers it all life planning, which encompasses far more than crunching numbers.

Clients want to protect what they have but also grow it, and helping them do so takes a comprehensive understanding of their lives and goals — what’s important to them, what their resources are, and what their challenges will be to get there. With close to $200 million under management, it’s a responsibility she takes seriously.

“There are all kinds of issues to resolve: do they need more cash flow? Maybe there’s too much liquid, too much invested. Do they have a will? We’ll prod them to do a will or trust, those kinds of things.”

Those are questions she and her firm are asking many more clients these days, following the acquisition of a practice in Wethersfield, Conn. (more on that later). Getting to know the ins and outs of those lives is a challenge Grenier embraces, because it’s key to helping them succeed.

“I try not to focus on what the market is doing currently,” she said. “It’s a long-term strategy, so I focus on your life — what will make your life better. Temporary moves in the market won’t make a big difference in the scheme of things.”

Getting to Know You

Grenier says her skills as a listener, problem-solver, planner, and fact-checker were developed at a very young age, as the family interpreter and liaison for her large, family of Ecuadorean immigrants. So she enjoys learning the details of clients’ situations to help them formulate a big-picture perspective.

“Some things that people might find daunting, we think are really easy to handle,” she said. “For example, they might not be able to make ends meet, and they’re charging monthly expenses on a credit card. We’ll work on cash flow, figure out how to reprioritize spending. Maybe it’s time to downsize their home, or buy things for less money.”

Pat Grenier

Pat Grenier says crafting a strategy for long-term financial security begins with fully understanding the goals, circumstances, and challenges of each client.

While many clients are concentrated around the pre-retirement years, Grenier said, she helps people in all stages of life — for example, young professional couples making enough to save but worried about mortgages and school debt and saving for their kids’ college education, and knowing they’re in an income bracket that isn’t making them rich, but won’t be a magnet for financial aid. So they need a strategy.

And young people don’t start out with the advantages past generations did, notably the idea that they’ll work for one employer and retire with a healthy pension that will see them through their retirement years. These days, young professionals expect to progress through several jobs, none of them offering pensions. So it’s up to them to navigate investment options like 401(k)s and other vehicles.

“It’s a dynamic process. Life isn’t black and white, and we have to adjust,” Grenier said. “If there’s a job change or an illness or a birth or a divorce, we have to make sure we can adjust their plan so that it’s a viable plan that works for them. Everyone’s different, so the plan is going to be different for everybody.

“We want to help them achieve their goals, and sometimes we have to be the reality check,” she went on. “We have to say, ‘no, you can’t do this; you don’t have enough money.’ And sometimes, we need to say, ‘yes, you can buy that home on the Cape; you can afford it.’ So it works both ways.”

After a while, she explained, as she gets to know clients better, they come to trust her and her team, and they’ll be more comfortable divulging personal matters.

“I feel like sometimes I know them better than their own family members. And sometimes I have to protect them,” she said. For example, one client was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and her nephew wanted power of attorney, but she didn’t feel he’d do a good job and recommended she pick someone else.

That said, Grenier can’t force anyone to make a financial decision.

“People have to be willing to cooperate. They have to want to be willing to make changes. If not, it’s not going to work. And sometimes it’s not going to work. Maybe they’re not willing to make the change. But it’s our job to explain, in our professional opinion, what they need to do to realize their goals.”

Not every decision is bottom-line based. One client was selling her business to family members and wanted to know how much she should get for it — not necessarily top dollar according to its value, but what she needed to strike a fair deal for her family, yet be able to live comfortably in retirement. “So we needed to make a projection about life expectancy and her needs, and once we figured that out, it was easy to come up with a number.”

Branching Out

Grenier was looking to expand her practice’s footprint when she learned that Joseph Connelly, owner of the Wethersfield Investment Center, was looking to retire. A few months after he and Grenier met, they agreed their cultures were a good match, and Wethersfield became a division of BRP/Grenier in September.

The Wethersfield office, which had previously operated under a different name, became the Wethersfield Investment Center in 2003 when Connelly assumed full ownership and became a Cadaret Grant-registered financial professional. The fact that Wethersfield and BRP/Grenier share the Cadaret Grant connection has made for a smooth transition, Grenier said.

“It’s in Connecticut, so it’s a different market, different laws, things like that, but a lot of the same principles apply,” she told BusinessWest. “I’m getting to know the clients, starting to delve into their lives, telling them, ‘you can count on us to help you with whatever you need help with.’ I know I have big shoes to fill. It’s a big challenge, but I love a challenge.”

All this makes for what she calls an exciting time in her business, but through the growth, she doesn’t want to lose track of the personal involvement that characterizes her relationships with clients. She began her career working for large houses where she had no time to get to know clients, and that frustrated her and drove her to become an independent advisor in 1990. And people welcome the sometimes necessary hand-holding it takes to help them navigate downturns in the market and, sometimes, in their own families.

“Maybe it’s my personality, but I tend to get way involved in people’s lives, maybe because I’m one of eight kids,” she said. “Every person who comes to me is treated as if they were my own family. And every person on my staff, that’s how they look at our clients, too.”

And it’s satisfying, Grenier said, to see financial strategies pay off in the form of peace of mind.

“In this business, we are so overregulated, and we have to love our business to be in it,” she said. “We want to retire people well, and it’s so gratifying to get a note from a client thanking me for what they currently have. I want to help people lead the good, comfortable life they’re accustomed to.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

State Treasurer Issues Report on Financial Literacy in Massachusetts

By
Daily News

BOSTON — State Treasurer Deborah Goldberg recently unveiled a one-year progress report on her Office of Economic Empowerment’s financial-education initiatives. The review highlighted the advancements resulting from the 2015 Financial Literacy Task Force Report.

The task force consisted of a diverse group of policymakers, educators, bankers and advocates, and convened last year to develop an action plan for Massachusetts residents to have access to the financial skills they need to attain economic stability. The report culminated with the release of 22 recommendations aimed at empowering residents with an understanding of how to budget their money, save for retirement, and understand the impact of economic decisions.

“I am thankful for the many partners that share our vision and commitment to expanding economic security in Massachusetts,” Goldberg said. “We will continue to innovate and expand our programs through a digital delivery of financial education and partnerships throughout the state.”

In one year, Goldberg’s Office of Economic Empowerment initiated 14 of the 22 policy recommendations provided by the task force, including: establishing $eedMA, a pilot program designed to help kindergarten families save for post-secondary education and training; creating the Women’s Economic Empowerment Series, a free financial-empowerment workshop series for women; ande the relaunch of Operation Money Wise as a grant program for organizations to provide financial education and programming to the military, veteran, family, and survivor community.

Dora Robinson to Step Down at United Way of Pioneer Valley

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — United Way of Pioneer Valley (UWPV) announced that the organization’s president and CEO, Dora Robinson, will retire effective June 30, 2017, starting an orderly leadership transition over the next six months. The board of trustees named Jeffrey Ciuffreda as the organization’s interim president and CEO, effective immediately. Robinson will continue to serve UWPV as president emeritus.

Robinson’s decision will bring to a close a career of moren than 40 years of nonprofit leadership in the Greater Springfield community, the last seven with UWPV.

“We thank Dora for her years of service, celebrate her contributions, and are excited to build upon them,” said Bennett Markens, president of the UWPV board of trustees. “It is our sincere hope that she enjoys this well-deserved retirement.”

Added Robinson, “it has been an honor to lead this organization alongside our dedicated volunteers, staff, and board members. I look forward to working with Jeff, the board, and the management team during the six-month transition period.”

Robinson began with UWPV in 2009. Under her leadership, the organization launched several new strategies to diversify revenues contributing to education, homelessness, basic needs, and financial-security programs, among others. During her tenure, she co-founded the UWPV Women’s Leadership Council to engage local women leaders in supporting financial literacy and health initiatives for women and girls. She also led the effort to establish UWPV as a support organization for local and regional disaster-recovery efforts.

With Ciuffreda managing day-to-day operations, the board of directors will conduct an exhaustive search for Robinson’s successor. “As the search for a permanent replacement moves forward, we know that UWPV is in good hands and that there will be no interruption in the critical services we provide in our community,” said Markens.

Ciuffreda noted that “the United Way has been providing key support to families and organizations across the Valley for 94 years and has operated at a high level in this role. It is my hope to not only maintain the organization’s success, but also build upon it. I am honored to lead an organization with such an impressive legacy.”

Ciuffreda becomes interim president and chief executive officer of UWPV after his August retirement from the Springfield Regional Chamber of Commerce, where he served for 29 years, the last five as president.

Kick Open the Door — then Go Forward

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Opinion

Opinion

By Elizabeth Barajas-Román, Valerie Bassett, and Ann Bookman

As directors of organizations working to elevate women’s civic leadership, we salute Sec. Hillary Rodham Clinton on the historic and courageous campaign she led as the first woman to run for president of the United States as the nominee of a major political party.

But to come, are the highest stakes our nation has faced since its founding. How do we ensure the door of opportunity not only remains open — but opens wider — for women of color, LGBTQ people, and immigrants, as well as including low-income white and rural residents who feel left behind?

As the results of the recent election show, the majority of our elected officials do not look like the population they represent. In Massachusetts only 25.5% of the total seats on Beacon Hill are occupied by women. Throughout the history of the United States, 1,917 men have been elected to the Senate, whereas only 46 women have held this post; until now, only two of whom were women of color. In the 115th Congress, the overall number of women will remain the same, but nine new women of color, will enter Congress in 2017, three in the Senate and six in the House.

That’s why the work of our organizations is more critical than ever before. The Women’s Fund of Western Mass. fuels progress toward gender equity by funding the most promising solutions, collaborating with results-oriented partners, and by elevating the collective power of local women to take charge, and to lead with purpose. The Women’s Fund of Southeastern Mass. creates pathways for women to economic independence through funding and leading a regional agenda for change, advocacy, and education. The Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy at UMass Boston’s McCormack Graduate School has a dual mission:

• To advance the political leadership of women in both the public and nonprofit sectors, with particular focus on women of color; and

• To design and implement public policies that will advance economic security for all women and their families by raising the minimum wage, closing the wage gap, providing caregiving supports, and other critical issues.

Together, we are creating hope, higher expectations, and alliances among diverse women that are essential to helping create the America we believe in.

So where do we go from here?

Prioritize the work of organizations serving women. Organizations like ours have paved the way for significant milestones reached over the past year, including a new equal pay law. We’re also working at a direct service level to increase women’s access to financial literacy or negotiation training, building cross-sector partnerships at the community level that encourage solutions-orientated dialogue often with local businesses, and investing in research that can be used by advocates and policymakers to drive systems-level change. Organizations like ours amplify the power of women to transform their lives, and the lives of the people in their community.

Support policy advocacy efforts and train women to lead the way. Research shows that high-visibility political campaigns by women make girls think differently about their own futures: they begin to imagine they too, could one day lead. The goals for political leadership are broad: More women in elected office, appointed positions, and more women leading nonprofit organizations and grassroots campaigns. While progress on policies that impact women’s lives may be stalled on the federal level in the foreseeable future, we are optimistic about action and change on the state and local level.  In fact, state and local action — coordinated across New England — is now likely to be across the most fruitful avenue for policy change; and

• Invest in cross-racial, cross-class, and cross-gender alliances. Millions of women sit at the center of several overlapping and intersecting social identities – and they suffer the related systems of oppression, domination, or discrimination that come with the territory. Investing in the visibility and inclusion of all women is the only way to ensure success. We will go forward truly together or not at all.

We celebrate the wins and learn from the losses. We rest from the recent flurry of campaigning and retool for the campaigns and social change work ahead. Most importantly, we must continue to grow a broad and diverse coalition to fight for equity and economic justice for all. Count us in.

Elizabeth Barajas-Román is CEO of the Women’s Fund of Western Mass.; Valerie Bassett is executive director of the Women’s Fund of Southeastern Mass.; and Ann Bookman is director of the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy, and Clinical Professor, Department of Public Policy and Public Affairs, McCormack Graduate School.

Bay Path and Its President Take a Lead Role in Homeland Security

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Education Sections

Joining the Fight

Carol Leary

Carol Leary says women can, and must, play a lead role in efforts to stem violent extremism.

At first, Carol Leary thought the e-mail she received in September was spam, and was wondering why it didn’t go into that particular folder.

It was from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), she said, and was essentially an inquiry, with the sender alerting Leary, the long-time president of Bay Path University in Longmeadow, that she had been nominated for a position on the Homeland Security Academic Advisory Council, or HSAAC, and asking if she was interested in learning more and possibly serving.

This was an acronym that Leary admits she had never heard of — “I didn’t know this panel existed” — but now rattles off with great frequency and ease.

Indeed, after determining that the e-mail was, in fact, legitimate, and not junk or, worse, a virus spreader, Le ary did apply for that panel — because she immediately grasped the importance of its broad mission and the fact that sitting on it would be a great honor not only for her, but the school she’s led since 1994.

She was chosen to join seven others as the latest members of a panel that is essentially parked at the intersection of academia and DHS, which is becoming an ever-more-important spot on the map.

Through its six subcommittees, the HSAAC focuses on such matters as campus resilience, cybersecurity, international students, homeland-security academic programs, academic research and faculty exchange, and student and recent-graduate recruitment, and that list of assignments certainly helps explain why Leary received that e-mail mentioned earlier.

Indeed, Bay Path has put itself at the forefront of such issues and concerns, said Leary, through both graduate and undergraduate degree programs in cybersecurity and specific courses such as “An Introduction to Terrorism and Counterterrorism” and “The Path to Violent Extremism,” both offered by the American Women’s College and the One Day Program at Bay Path.

“I think these programs are what really attracted Homeland Security,” she told BusinessWest, “because the newest area they will focus on is countering violent extremism, and when they saw we had classes taught by someone with a great reputation in Great Britain on this subject, they knew we had an expert.”

That would be Bob Milton. He’s the retired commander of the London Metropolitan Police Service, New Scotland Yard; director of his own consulting company that specializes in counterterrorism consulting; and, as noted, professor of Criminal Justice and lead faculty for Counterterrorism at Bay Path.

He blueprinted many of the courses at the college, including the two mentioned above, and recently delivered a talk at the school, as part of its Kaleidoscope series, called “Countering Terrorism: The New Role of Women.”

This is a subject of particular interest to Leary — and the rest of the HSAAC, for that matter — because it represents an important, but far from fully tapped resource in the battle to identify and possibly defuse developing violent extremism.

“As we know, in our own country we have young people being radicalized,” she told BusinessWest. “Mothers are probably going to be the first to recognize this. The question then becomes, how do we reach women, not only in all communities, but particularly Muslim communities across our world, probably woman to woman? I think this is going to be a very important role for women to play in the field of countering extreme violence.

As we know, in our own country we have young people being radicalized. Mothers are probably going to be the first to recognize this.”

“We need to give them the tools, the techniques, and the impetus to do this,” she went on. “We need to show them they will be helping our country and helping the families in which students are being radicalized.”

Milton agrees. “You could say that the biggest threat to the U.S. is coming from within; the last few attacks have both come from within,” he said, citing incidents in Florida and California. “We need to put much more effort into identifying those people who are becoming radicalized and then putting in place measures to try and carry out intervention. And women can play a big role in this.”

For this issue, BusinessWest looks at Leary’s appointment to the Homeland Security panel, but also the developments that led to it — specifically the school’s rise to prominence in this field — and the many issues involved with combating violent extremism.

Front of Mind

As he talked about the many issues involved with countering radicalism and the importance of doing so on many levels, Milton recited a statement issued by members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army after it executed a nearly successful attempt on the life of then-British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1984 at the Grand Hotel in Brighton.

“It said, ‘you need to be lucky all the time — we only need to be lucky once,’” he recalled, adding that the note was received after Thatcher narrowly escaped the blast of a long-delay time bomb that left a gaping hole in the façade of the hotel. (Five others were killed in the attack, and 31 were injured).

Milton told BusinessWest that he recites that IRA message often in the talks and lectures that he gives in cities around the world, and probably not in the context that most people might think. Instead of agreeing with the gist of the missive, he says its thinking is inherently flawed.

To get his point across, he summons a quote often attributed to golfing legend Gary Player, among others, which goes something like, “the more I practice, the luckier I become.”

Whatever the exact quote is, and regardless of who actually said it, the message is clear, said Milton: the harder individuals, groups, and countries work to counter terrorism and violent radicalism, the more successful they will be.

This, in essence, goes a long way toward explaining the existence (and the mission) of not only the DHS, but the HSAAC as well — which is, in part, to practice hard at the work of recognizing and stemming radicalization.

“We need to work harder so we’re lucky,” said Milton, adding that this work constitutes a large, complex fight, started long ago and now waged on many fronts and in many ways. And it focuses on everything from working with, rather than isolating, underprivileged communities, to teaching others how to spot the many warning signs of someone being radicalized.

Milton said these include changes in behavior, being secretive, excessive amounts of time spent on the Internet, acquiring new friends, disappearing for long periods of time, and becoming angry, frustrated, even passionate about things they see on the news.

But spotting the signs is only part of the equation, he went on, adding that people, and especially mothers, need to know what to do when they see those signs.

Bob Milton

Bob Milton says individuals, agencies, and nations need to work hard to counter radicalization and essentially make their own luck.

“It’s my experience that it’s the families, and the women in the families, who are more likely to see the signs of radicalization earlier than anyone else,” he explained. “There have been so many cases in the U.K., particularly, where young women or men have become radicalized, and in some cases have gone off to fight and die in Syria, and yet their families — and particularly the women in those families — knew there was something going on and had nowhere to go.”

In short, he went on, women — especially those who are, for some reason, be it language issues or something else, isolated within their community — need to become less isolated and, therefore, more empowered to effectively deal with these situations.

And women, as noted, can play a huge role in this effort, said Leary, who, as she talked about this, drew an effective, even poetic analogy to the work carried out by women at Bletchley Park, the headquarters for Britain’s fabled code breakers during World War II, immortalized in countless books, TV series, and movies such as the recent The Imitation Game.
“The word we would use for it today is cybersecurity,” she said of those efforts to break the codes enciphered on Germany’s Enigma machines. “All the men were off fighting the war; it was the women trying to decode messages sent all across Europe. Fast-forward 70 years, and it’s clear that we again need more women in this field.”

Bay Path is certainly doing its part in this effort, she went on, adding that roughly 80 students are enrolled in its cybersecurity programs, and the number is growing every year.

The master’s-degree program in cybersecurity management graduated its first class in 2014, and there are now 30 (17 of which are women) currently enrolled in that program. Meanwhile, there are 50 students (almost all of them women) enrolled in the undergraduate program, which features concentrations in digital forensics and information assurance.

As noted earlier, though, the role to be played by women moving forward is multi-faceted and goes much deeper than taking jobs in this growing field. It entails work within and for the community to intervene and hopefully prevent individuals from resorting to violence in support of a cause or faith.

Getting the Message

Leary, named by BusinessWest as one of its Difference Makers for 2016 for her work at the college and in the community, acknowledged that she had more than enough to keep her busy before that e-mail arrived in September.

And while she has, indeed, learned to say ‘no’ over the years due to the sheer volume of requests she receives to donate her time, energy, and talent to a group or cause, that word never entered her mind when the DHS enlisted her help.

That’s because the group’s mission is so important, and also because Bay Path has made major investments — and major strides — toward become a recognized leader in cybersecurity and related programs.

And those investments can and will yield dividends at this critical juncture for the country — and the world.

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

Those Certainly Apply When It Comes to Year-end Tax Planning

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Accounting and Tax Planning Sections

Dollars-and-sense Fundamentals

By Kristina Drzal-Houghton, CPA MST

dolarssensetaxdpartTax planning can be a guessing game, especially in a year when new leadership in Washington could make significant changes to the tax code. But there are a number of basic strategies that businesses and individuals may put in play as year end approaches.

Tax planning for 2016 is significantly different than in recent years.

In late 2015, many tax provisions were made permanent, thus appearing to remove the many uncertainties that made tax planning much more of a guessing game in the past. This tax-planning article generally is oriented toward the time-honored approach of deferring income and accelerating deductions to minimize 2016 taxes.

Kristina Drzal-Houghton

Kristina Drzal-Houghton

Given that this is an election year, consideration should be given to the possibility of the new administration making changes to the tax code. Contrary to traditional thinking, in specific situations, you may decide it is most beneficial to pay more taxes now.

For individuals, deferring income also may help minimize or avoid AGI-based phaseouts of various tax breaks. Businesses, like individuals, should decide when and how to shift income and deductions between 2016 and 2017. Although C corporations will generally benefit from the deferral of income and the acceleration of deductions in the same way as individuals and pass-though entities, there are a number of special rules that should be taken into account.

Year-end tax planning for 2016 must take account of the many temporary ‘extender’ tax provisions still in the code. Extender provisions are business tax deductions, tax credits, and other tax-saving laws which have been on the books for years but which technically are temporary because they have a specific end date.

The majority of these extenders are in effect through 2016, presenting an opportunity to take advantage of them before year’s end when their continued renewal may be uncertain. However, some of these extender provisions are in effect through 2019. And, in a radical change from prior years, many of what were traditionally the most important extender provisions have been made permanent, allowing the opportunity for long-term planning in many cases. Most importantly, there are a number of these extender and other provisions that have been modified in various ways by late 2015 legislation that the taxpayer should be alert to.

Business Planning

Corporate rate planning. A C corporation is subject to the 39% ‘bubble.’ Corporate taxable income between $100,000 and $335,000 is taxed at the rate of 39% to phase out the benefits of the 15% and 25% brackets that apply to a corporation’s first $75,000 of taxable income.

Taxable income between $75,000 and $100,000, and between $335,000 and $10 million, is taxed at 34%. Taxable income over $10 million is taxed at 35%, except that there is also a 38% bubble that applies to corporate taxable income between $15 million and $18,333,333 to eliminate the benefit of the 34% rate.

List of Accounting Firms in Western Mass.

Many small C-corporation businesses utilize year-end bonus planning to maximize the benefit of the lower tax brackets. This can be a real balancing act with many items to consider, including the additional cost of Social Security and Medicare taxes, timing of the bonus payment to owners, and IRS rules on excessive compensation. When doing this planning, you must be careful to not run afoul of any bank-loan covenants.

Qualifying for the small-corporation AMT exception. The tentative minimum tax of a corporation is zero for any tax year that it qualifies as a small corporation meeting a ‘gross receipts test.’ A corporation will qualify if:

• The corporation’s average annual gross receipts for all three-tax-year periods beginning after Dec. 31, 1993 and ending before the tax year do not exceed $7.5 million; and

• The corporation’s average gross receipts do not exceed $5 million for the corporation’s first three-tax-year period taken into account above.

Thus, a corporation should consider deferring income to 2017 if necessary to keep average annual gross receipts for the three-tax-year period 2014 through 2016 at $7.5 million or less. This will preserve the AMT exemption for 2017.

Expensing deductions. Businesses that want to accelerate year-end deductions by buying machinery and equipment have a formidable array of tax tools to work with this year: generous expensing under Code Sec. 179, an expensing safe harbor under the capitalization regulations that has been liberalized for smaller businesses, and 50% bonus first-year depreciation for those eligible new assets that can’t be expensed under Code Sec. 179 or the regs’ safe harbor.

For qualified property placed in service in tax years beginning in 2016, the maximum amount that may be expensed under the Code Sec. 179 dollar limitation is $500,000, and the beginning-of-phaseout amount is $2,010,000. Besides taking advantage of the Code Sec. 179 rules, some businesses may be able to buy much-needed machinery and equipment at year-end and currently deduct the cost under a ‘de minimis’ safe-harbor election in the capitalization regs.

First-year depreciation deduction. Most new machinery and equipment bought and placed in service in 2016 qualifies for the 50% bonus first-year depreciation deduction. Bonus first-year depreciation has been extended through 2019 with a number of modifications, including a gradual reduction over that time (50% for qualified property placed in service in 2015 through 2017, 40% for 2018, and 30% for 2019).

Deduction for qualified production activities income. Taxpayers can claim a deduction, subject to limits, for 9% of the lesser of (1) the taxpayer’s ‘qualified production activities income’ for the tax year (i.e., net income from U.S. manufacturing, production or extraction activities, U.S. film production, U.S. construction activities, and U.S. engineering and architectural services), or (2) the taxpayer’s taxable income for that tax year (before taking this deduction into account). This deduction generally has the effect of a reduction in the taxpayer’s marginal rate and, thus, should be taken into account when making decisions regarding income-shifting strategies.

Net operating losses and debt-cancellation income. A business with a loss this year may be able to use that loss to generate cash in the form of a quick net-operating-loss-carryback refund. This type of refund may be of particular value to a financially troubled business that needs a fast cash transfusion to keep going. Also, a debtor who anticipates having the debt cancelled or reduced should consider steps to defer the resulting taxable income until 2017.

Accelerating or deferring income can save estimated tax requirements. Corporations (other than certain ‘large’ corporations, see below) can avoid being penalized for underpaying estimated taxes if they pay installments based on 100% of the tax shown on the return for the preceding year. Otherwise, they must pay estimated taxes based on 100% of the current year’s tax.

However, this 100%-of-last-year’s-tax safe harbor isn’t available unless the corporation filed a return for the preceding year that showed a liability for tax. A return showing a zero tax liability doesn’t satisfy this requirement; only a return that shows a positive tax liability for the preceding year makes the safe harbor available.

A corporation (other than a large corporation) that anticipates a small net operating loss (NOL) for 2016 and substantial net income in 2017 may find it worthwhile to accelerate just enough of its 2017 income (or to defer just enough of its 2016 deductions) to create a small amount of net income, and thus a small positive tax liability, for 2016. This will permit the corporation to base its 2017 estimated tax installments on the relatively small amount of tax shown on its 2016 return, rather than having to pay estimated taxes based on 100% of its much larger 2017 taxable income.

Also, by accelerating a small amount of income from 2017 to 2016, the corporation might be able to pay tax on that income at a lower rate — e.g., 15% instead of 25% or 34% — if doing so converts its 2016 NOL to a small amount of taxable income. However, where a 2016 NOL would result in a carryback that would eliminate tax in an earlier year, this income-acceleration strategy should be employed only if the value of the carryback is less than the value of having to pay only a small amount of estimated tax for 2017.

Individual Planning

Individuals who own pass-though entities such as S corporations, partnerships, or trusts should consider many of the above planning ideas in conjunction with provisions specifically applicable to the individual taxpayer.

Effective year-end tax planning also must take into account each taxpayer’s particular situation and planning goals, with the aim of minimizing taxes. For example, higher-income individuals must consider the effect of the 39.6% top tax bracket, the 20% tax rate on long-term capital gains and qualified dividends for taxpayers taxed at a rate of 39.6% on ordinary income, the phaseout of itemized deductions and personal exemptions when income is over specified thresholds, and the 3.8% surtax (Medicare contribution tax) on net investment income for taxpayers whose income exceeds specified thresholds.

While many taxpayers will come out ahead by following the traditional approach (deferring income and accelerating deductions), others, including those with special circumstances, should consider accelerating income and deferring deductions. Most traditional techniques for deferring income and accelerating expenses can be reversed to achieve the opposite effect.

For instance, a cash-method professional who wants to accelerate income can do so by speeding up his business’ billing and collection process instead of deferring income by slowing that process down. Or, a cash-method taxpayer who sells property in 2016 on the installment basis may realize a large long-term capital gain can accelerate income by electing out of the installment method.

Inflation adjustments to rate brackets, exemption amounts, etc. For both 2016 and 2017, some individuals will benefit from inflation adjustments in the thresholds for applying the income-tax rates, higher standard deduction amounts, and higher personal-exemption amounts.

Capital gains. Long-term capital gains are taxed at a rate of (a) 20% if they would be taxed at a rate of 39.6% if they were treated as ordinary income; (b) 15% if they would be taxed at above 15% but below 39.6% if they were treated as ordinary income; or (c) 0% if they would be taxed at a rate of 10% or 15% if they were treated as ordinary income. And the 3.8% surtax on net investment income may apply.

Strategies for matching capital gains and capital losses to make the most of these rules should be considered.

Low-taxed dividend income. Qualified dividend income is taxed at the same favorable tax rates that apply to long-term capital gains. Converting investment income taxable at regular rates into qualified dividend income can achieve tax savings and result in higher after-tax income. However, the 3.8% surtax on net investment income may apply.

Traditional IRA and Roth IRA year-end moves. One can convert traditional IRAs to Roth IRAs. And one can then ‘recharacterize’ (i.e., elect to treat a contribution made to one type of IRA as made to a different type of IRA) that conversion and can even, possibly, reconvert the recharacterized transaction.

Changes in an individual’s tax status may call for acceleration of income. Expected 2017 changes in an individual’s tax status, due, say, to divorce, marriage, or loss of head of household status, must be considered.

Alternative minimum tax (AMT). Watch out for the AMT, which applies to both individuals and many corporations. A decision to accelerate an expense or to defer an item of income to reduce taxable income for regular tax purposes may not save taxes if the taxpayer is subject to the AMT.

Time value of money. Any decision to save taxes by accelerating income must take into account the fact that this means paying taxes early and losing the use of money that could have been otherwise invested.

Obstacles to deferring taxable income. The code contains a number of rules that hinder the shifting of income and expenses. These include the passive activity loss rules, requirements that certain taxpayers use the accrual method, and limitations on the deduction of investment interest.

Charitable contributions. The timing of charitable contributions can have an important impact on year-end tax planning. Individual taxpayers who are at least 70½ years old can contribute to charities directly from their IRAs without having the amount of their contribution included in their gross income. By making this move, some taxpayers reduce their tax liability even more than they would have if they had received the distribution from their IRA and then contributed the amount distributed to charity. Some taxpayers, who could take advantage of this tax break for this year, should consider deferring until the end of the year their required minimum distributions (RMDs) for 2016.

Energy tax incentives. There are two different credits available for taxpayers who make qualifying energy-saving improvements to their homes. Tax credits are available for non-business energy property placed in service in 2016 (but not in 2017) and for residential, energy-efficient solar property placed in service before 2022 (but a gradual phaseout applies).

Bottom Line

Since tax planning can be vastly different from entity to entity or individual to individual, there is no standard checklist or formula that can be followed. Sometimes the benefits enjoyed today may not outweigh their effect on the future.  This is why careful consideration — in conjunction with your tax adviser — should be given to customizing your strategy.

Kristina Drzal-Houghton, CPA MST is the partner in charge of Taxation at Holyoke-based Meyers Brothers Kalicka, P.C.; (413) 536-8510.

TechSpring Succeeds in Connecting Technology with Healthcare

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techspringfeature1116a600x200
Entrepreneurship Sections

What’s the Big Idea?

 

Jill McCormick says TechSpring focuses on technology that’s practical, usable, and can be applied now to help Baystate Health succeed.

Jill McCormick says TechSpring focuses on technology that’s practical, usable, and can be applied now to help Baystate Health succeed.

When TechSpring opened two years ago in downtown Springfield, its leaders knew they were flying blind, at least at first. That’s how uncharted this territory was. But the concept — connecting technology companies, large and small, with the region’s largest health system to solve pressing problems — proved a compelling one, and today, TechSpring has numerous success stories to tell. It’s a conversation, they say, that needs to continue.

Eric Harry says genomics is one of those “sexy” areas of healthcare, and scientists are certainly engaged in exciting work to learn how genes influence disease.

“But we know for a fact,” he went on, “that zip code is a greater determiner of health outcomes than your genes. And we have a lot of high-risk patients at Baystate. There’s a lot of poverty here, a lot of patients at risk because of their zip code.”

Harry, community manager at TechSpring, Baystate Health’s technology innovation center in downtown Springfield, was talking with BusinessWest about a far different discipline than genomics: data analytics. When TechSpring opened two years ago, one of its partners, Dell, went to work in this area, trying to identify which patients are most at risk of becoming “high utilizers” of healthcare — or are, in other words, one major event from becoming very sick.

“What was their medical record like before they got sick, and who has those indicators now?” asked Jill McCormick, manager of the innovation center, adding that such studies are critical to the growing field of population health, which is critical at a time when hospitals must move away from the old, inefficient fee-for-service model into a value-based care model that seeks to keep people out of the hospital altogether.

“Our population will benefit if we make these changes,” she added — and analytics will be an important piece of the puzzle.

TechSpring, which opened two years ago in Springfield’s emerging downtown innovation district, matches private enterprises with partners and expertise from across the Baystate Health system to take on some of healthcare’s most difficult challenges. The goal is to create new technology solutions and products that could be used to improve health outcomes.

It’s a startup within a large health system, so you just have to start trying stuff. What works? What’s scalable? What can you do in that space?”

TechSpring owes its existence in large part to a $5.5 million grant from the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, an investment agency charged with implementing then-Gov. Deval Patrick’s 10-year, $1 billion Life Sciences Initiative that supports life-sciences innovation, research, development, and commercialization.

TechSpring offers partners flexible space to work and the ability to collaborate directly with providers from Baystate Health on their projects, assessing the needs to be met in today’s healthcare environment, and testing potential responses to those needs.

“We work closely with Baystate Health to identify problem areas, or where they are investing in problems that need to be fixed,” McCormick said. “For example, where do they see population health going?”

Eric Harry

Eric Harry says TechSpring partners first learn what Baystate’s needs are and then develop technology-based solutions.

One possibility is working with organizations like Partners for a Healthier Community on how to incorporate data on poverty and housing issues into patients’ health records, so a doctor recognizes that the housing situation is contributing to the person’s health status.

The idea, she added, is to arm providers with the data they need to empower patients to take more control of their own lives. The fact that TechSpring is located in a demographically diverse region is one of its strengths.

“Springfield is geographically interesting, between New York and Boston,” she said. “It has a great mix of rural and urban, and it has interesting economic challenges, that made this the ideal proving ground for technology solutions that represent what the U.S. market looks like, versus your Cadillac medicine or high-tech areas.”

Actually, McCormick added, TechSpring leaders tend to shy away from the word ‘high tech,’ focusing on how technology can solve problems in areas like population health, rather than on what’s new and hot in technology itself.

“It’s really about what is practical and usable and can be applied now in helping the health system succeed,” she explained, “by addressing the needs of the population and helping patients achieve better health outcomes.”

Free Falling

When TechSpring opened in late 2014, it had already lined up a number of partners — companies that were proven and experienced in the industry, including IBM, Premier Inc., Cerner Corp., Dell, Medecision, and Mainline Information Systems. But the goals were still ambiguous.

“It’s a startup,” McCormick said. “It’s a startup within a large health system, so you just have to start trying stuff. What works? What’s scalable? What can you do in that space?

“What does it mean to change the industry?” she went on. “What does it mean to drive positive change? What are you working on, what is Baystate working on, and how do we bring you together to actually do something, and do it in a way that’s designed for learning and proving, rather than sales and acquisition?”

Harry compared the experience to jumping out of a plane for the first time, but McCormick amended the analogy. “Actually,” she said, “we’re building the plane while we’re flying it.”

Whatever the comparison, Harry said, TechSpring was a risky venture because nothing like it had been attempted in the region, and it demanded a total buy-in from Baystate and its partners to succeed.

There have been 22 such partners so far, including a handful of large companies, about five tiny startups, and a dozen or so companies in the middle, size-wise.

For example, a company called Praxify is working to help doctors balance efficiency and patient satisfaction in the era of electronic health records, or EHRs. “Oftentimes, documentation gets in the way of direct patient care,” McCormick said.

Other projects have involved remote patient monitoring — and how to get recorded outcomes into medical records so providers can make care decisions between patient visits — and advanced clinical decision support, or ACDS, which aims to turn medicine into more science than art by establishing, through hard data, the right course of action in various clinical situations.

Originally, potential partners were bringing ideas to Baystate, and the health system was trying to fit their ideas into its framework. That has changed, however, into what Harry called a “marketplace.”

“Now we’re going into Baystate and talking to providers and figuring out where the problems are, really defining those problems, and then we go out and look for innovators, telling them, ‘here are the problems we’ve defined. Can you solve them?’ We’re creating a match-making process. We have a list of problems, well-defined, already sourced, and innovators submit a statement of interest to solve those problems, as opposed to saying, ‘hey, I have this solution. Can I work with you at Baystate?’”

The partners, interestingly, are not being paid for their work; in fact, they pay to access Baystate’s resources and human capital through TechSpring. But if they get to a point where a solution works, they have a direct line to become a successful vendor at Baystate and beyond.

“They’re developing a true solution, solving a real problem, and if they can do that here, they can do it anywhere,” Harry said.

That setup works well for large partners with significant financial resources, but perhaps isn’t as ideal for early-stage startups, so TechSpring is working to develop a model to improve access to companies that can’t afford to pay up front.

Boston-based CarePort Health, one of TechSpring’s initial partners, specializes in helping providers optimize post-acute outcomes and costs by guiding patients across the care continuum and tracking their recovery in real time. “They earned a commercial customer relationship with Baystate and had broad market success from there,” McCormick said, adding that the company was recently purchased by Allscripts, a major EHR vendor.

“When you finish working with TechSpring,” McCormick said, “it should either put you in a position to receive additional funding or propel your solution toward broad market success.”

Happy Employees

Meanwhile, a TechSpring partner called Imprivata works on the security side of healthcare, developing products like a badge that employees swipe at their computers to enter any program they have access to, instead of having to remember passwords for each one. Another current project is a biometric palm-vein reader. Each scan is recorded in a database, and physicians can then swipe anyone entering the ER and immediately pull up their medical records.

“We have a nice pipeline with Imprivata; they’re already popular and well-received in the hospital, and we get to work on what’s next for them,” McCormick ssaid. “They look for intersections between convenience and patient security. When I bring these solutions to the health system, they’re psyched because they know Imprivata is going to make their lives easier.”

Such solutions, however, begin with conversations — between providers and TechSpring partners, and between the tech companies themselves — and that’s another area where the innovation center excels, Harry said. “We’re really driving ecosystem thinking within healthcare.”

To that end, TechSpring also offers co-working, office, and event space in flexible month-to-month memberships for anybody working at the intersection of technology and healthcare. Meanwhile, a monthly networking event called Tap into TechSpring features networking and content-rich speaker programs, so various stakeholders get a sense of what everyone is working on, and sometimes new collaborations form.

“I’d say a lot of people in the healthcare sector are cynical about this type of thinking. ‘Show me the money’ is their way of thinking,” Harry said. “We’re helping people understand there probably is money, and a way that everyone can benefit, but until we get together, that can’t happen.”

Added McCormick, “it’s not that we’re just dreaming about what the future of healthcare could be. We’re actually executing against what we think the future of healthcare can be.”

At the end of the day, Harry said, TechSpring is about solving health problems — at a time of great shifts in the way care is delivered — and, ultimately, changing lives.

“Can everyone win?” McCormick asked. “We think so. Our bet is they can. And we’re taking all these opportunities to prove that everyone can win — especially patients.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Smartphone Apps Help Users Manage, Improve Their Lives

By
Sections Technology

Something for Everyone

Smartphones rule the world — or, at least, their users’ lives — but they wouldn’t be of much use without apps. And those apps are legion, appealing to individuals’ desire to manage everything from finances to fitness, to continually learn new things and find new ways to have fun. Here’s a roundup of some of the most popular and well-reviewed apps available today.

Say you want to more effectively manage your finances. Or get in shape. Or brush up on your math skills. Or just relax and have a good time.

As the old iPhone commercials used to say, there’s an app for that. Many, many more than one, actually. And they’re usually free, and available on both the iOS and Android platforms.

For this year’s roundup of what’s hot in technology, BusinessWest checks in on what the tech press is saying about some of the most popular smartphone apps.

Financial App-raisals

personal-capitalFor starters, smartphones have put a world of personal finance in people’s hands. For example, Personal Capital offers simple charts and graphs of the user’s income, spending, and investment performance so they can easily monitor their finances.

“Track your investments by account, asset class, or individual security, see how your portfolio compares to major indices, and find the exact percentage of each asset class that’s in your portfolio,” Investopedia explains. “A 401(k) fee analyzer and mutual-fund fee calculator show if you’re paying too much in fees. The Investment Checkup feature analyzes your portfolio and shows how much you stand to gain with a few changes.”

mintBusiness Insider reports that Intuit’s Mint gives users a real-time look into all their finances, from bank accounts and credit cards to student loans and 401(k) accounts. “It automatically tracks your spending, categorizes it, and alerts you when/if you approach your budget limit. You can even ask for custom savings tips within the app,” the publication notes. “Everything is shown in simple, intuitive graphs and charts, making it one of the most popular personal-finance apps in the world.”

goodbudgetMeanwhile, Business Insider also recommends GoodBudget, an app that brings the envelope-budgeting method into the smartphone. Users create ‘envelopes’ for each of their budget categories, such as groceries, transportation, and shopping, and pre-determine how much they want to allocate in each envelope. They can then record and track how much they’re spending from each envelope. “It may not be as sophisticated as some of the other apps, but Goodbudget offers a simple way to stick to your budget and keep your spending really disciplined.”

prosper-dailyWhat about financial security? Investopedia recommends Prosper Daily, a personal-finance security service that tracks spending and protects credit cards from fraud and errors. Users can quickly view balances and recurring charges across all their credit and debit cards.

“Prosper Daily creates an alert if a suspicious charge is posted to your account, allows you to report the charge and/or contact the merchant, and will help you get your money back from fraudulent, erroneous, or unfair charges,” the publication notes. “Data-breach alerts let you know when a data breach has occurred at a place where you’ve shopped.”

Healthy App-roach

What if physical wellness tops one’s priority list. No fear — there are countless apps for that, too, teaching users how to shop, all the facts on what they’re eating, how to exercise, and how to stay committed to better habits.

myfitnesspalOne of the most popular nutrition apps is MyFitnessPal, which offers a wealth of tools for tracking what and how much the user eats, and how many calories they burn through activity, explains PC Magazine. “Of all the calorie counters I’ve used, MyFitnessPal is by far the easiest one to manage, and it comes with the largest database of foods and drinks. With the MyFitnessPal app, you can fastidiously watch what you eat 24/7, no matter where you are.”

The app’s database of more than 6 million foods makes it easy to track a diet, or the lack of one, added the online magazine Greatist. “Whether you’re trying to lose weight or put on muscle, the app helps determine the best things to eat and meet your goals.”

nike-training-clubBut nutrition is only part of the story when it comes to fitness — exercise is the other key discipline. But where to start? One possibility is the Nike+ Training Club, which takes the concept to the next level, offering more than 100 workouts to choose from. Users can also opt for a customized, full-body, four-week plan. “A trainer leads you through the routines, plus you get instructional video clips of the moves,” notes Fitness magazine. “Don’t like burpees? The updated app lets you swap drills you hate for ones you love.”

strava-running-and-cycling-gpsFor those who prefer being outdoors to get in shape, Strava Running and Cycling GPS monitors running or cycling routes via GPS, notes Digital Trends. “It also gamifies your cardio workout and pairs with leaderboards, achievements, and challenges, bringing a competitive spirit to your routine.”

jefitFor a more comprehensive training assistant, Men’s Fitness recommends Jefit, which creates personalized workout routines by tracking and analyzing the user’s workout progress and diligently recording weight, reps, and time.

“Its data-heavy approach will appeal to stat nerds and workout obsessives alike. Jefit also packs the most robust library of exercises and maneuvers,” the magazine notes, including how-to videos with more than 1,300 exercises making up scores of workouts. The free version is limited, with some bare-bones workout routines and basic activity logs, while paid options are ad-free and unlock more features.

App-lied Learning

khan-academyCountless popular apps focus on education and learning for all ages. For kids, the Children’s MD blog recommends Khan Academy, which collaborates with the U.S. Department of Education and myriad public and private educational institutions to provide a free, world-class education for anyone.

“It’s incredibly easy to use, there are no ads, and it’s appropriate for any school-aged child that knows how to read,” the blog reports, noting that Khan Academy started as a math-learning site but has expanded to many other subjects, from art history to economics. “My kids will spend hours looking at computer-science projects that other kids have shared and incorporating ideas into their own programs. The Khan platform combines educational videos with practice problems and project assignments.”

photomathMeanwhile, Photomath focuses on, well, math, and does it well, Digital Trends reports. “For high-school students who just need a bit more guidance on how to isolate ‘x’ in their algebra homework, Photomath is essentially your math buddy that can instantly solve and explain every answer. Simply snap a photo of the question (you can also write or type), and the app will break down the solution into separate steps with helpful play-by-play, so that you can apply the same principles to the rest of your homework.”

duolingoFor language learning, Children’s MD recommends Duolingo, which provides interactive foreign-language education in 15 languages so far. It’s appropriate for both kids and adults, and one independent study found that a person with no knowledge of Spanish would need about 34 hours with Duolingo to cover the material in the first college semester of Spanish classes.

“It’s simple, user-friendly, and never boring,” the blog notes. “Install the app on your phone and get your language lessons done while you are on the elevator or waiting in line.”

nasa-appLearning means expanding one’s horizons, of course, and where better to do that than the NASA App, which aggregates a wide range of NASA content. “Space enthusiasts and curious minds will love how it packs a wealth of news stories, features, images, video, and information about the space agency’s activities into this one mobile app,” PC Magazine reports.

App-ealing Entertainment

spotifyLet’s face it, though — smartphone users want apps that are just plain fun as well. For music enthusiasts, it’s hard to go wrong with Spotify. Wired notes that users can access a huge catalog of music for a small monthly fee, creating their own playlists or enjoying the app’s curated stations.

Seven years after its debut, Mashable adds, “Spotify has tons of competition in the online streaming space, but the app continues to be one of the best ways to listen to music and podcasts on demand and on the go.”

espn-score-centerSports fans might dig ESPN Score Center, which allows users to check game progress from more sports than most other apps, PC Magazine reports, including baseball, basketball, football, soccer, ice hockey, cricket, rugby, and more.

big-ovenFor those whose idea of fun is improving their cooking skills, plenty of apps do the job. Digital Trends recommends two. Big Oven features more than 250,000 recipes, and provides grocery lists based on them, lets users add your own, and import recipes from friends. “If you like (or want to like) to cook, start with Big Oven.”

yummlyBut the publication also raves about Yummly, which offers access to thousands of unique recipes. “On top of recipe and grocery-list functionality, Yummly takes user preferences into account to provide recipe recommendations, for when you just can’t decide what to eat.”

action-movie-fxFinally, if the kitchen doesn’t provide enough action and adventure, Mashable recommends downloading Action Movie, the brainchild of Star Wars and Star Trek director J.J. Abrams. The app allows anyone with an iPhone introduce movie-level special effects to their short videos.

“Not only is it incredibly easy to use and completely addictive, it’s a huge crowd pleaser,” the site notes. “Filming a Thanksgiving dinner where a virtual car can unexpectedly crash across the dinner table is guaranteed to inspire roaring laughter. Action Movie is free, but smartly uses in-app purchases to sell you additional effects, all as good as the originals. It’s the rare app that has few competitors and has maintained a high level of quality.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Baystate Phishing Attack Serves as Wake-up Call for Companies

By
Sections Technology

Won’t Get Fooled Again?

The trouble with a phishing scam, Brendan Monahan says, is that only one person in an organization has to fall for it to put information at risk.

Or, in Baystate Health’s case, five.

“There is constantly a threat to businesses — including ours; we’re no different — from outside phishing attacks,” said Monahan, manager of Public Affairs, in the wake of a phishing attack in August that exposed the personal data of thousands of patients. “They’re often internationally based and geared toward handing over the keys to the kingdom to a hacker who, from what we understand from most experts, is looking for some financial gain out of it.”

That doesn’t seem to have occurred in this case, Baystate officials say, but the incident, which was made public late last month, is serious enough to trigger a re-examination of the system’s security protocols — and to serve as a warning to other employers in the region, both large and small.

Specifially, on Aug. 22, Baystate learned that a phishing e-mail had been sent to numerous Baystate employees that, if opened, allowed hackers to access those employees’ e-mail accounts.

Phishing is an electronic attempt to obtain sensitive information, such as passwords and credit-card information, by masquerading as a trustworthy source. Phishing e-mails may contain links to a site infected with malware, or directly load a program onto a computer that makes it contents accessible to the scammer. The Baystate scam e-mail was designed to look exactly like an internal memo to employees.

eric brown

eric brown

The best defense is to have a written information-security policy in place. Part of that is training in security awareness for employees. That way, employees can’t say, ‘I didn’t know,’ or ‘I don’t understand.’ That’s where the data risk is. It’s not from the outside; it’s from the inside, with mistakes, careless errors made by employees.”

Baystate’s investigation determined that five employees responded to the phishing e-mail, allowing the hackers to gain access to those employees’ e-mail accounts. Some of the e-mails in those accounts included patient information, including names and dates of birth, diagnoses and treatments received, medical record numbers, and, in some instances, health-insurance identification numbers. However, the e-mails did not contain Social Security numbers, credit-card numbers, or other financial information commonly used by scammers and identity thieves to enrich themselves.

“The [phishing] e-mail contained information that would be described as mimicking or mocking an internal Baystate Health HR memo. Five employees clicked on that e-mail, that immediately compromised their Outlook e-mail accounts into the hands of the perpetrator,” Monahan told BusinessWest. “Our computer research firm found exactly what was in the e-mails and what could have been looked at.”

The fact that no financial data was compromised may be small comfort for affected patients, that fact may mean the scammers have no real use for the information, and left it alone when they discovered they couldn’t profit. But that remains to be seen.

“In this case, there was no financial gain to be had from the patient information,” Monahan said. “That’s why we don’t know whether they went through the documents, but they could have.”

Still, he added, “while we have no evidence that any patient information has been taken or misused, we want to assure our patients that we take this incident very seriously.”

Next Steps

Upon discovering the breach, Baystate immediately took steps to secure the e-mail accounts and began an investigation, and also reported the incident to law enforcement.

But finding out what happened and trying to identify the perpetrators is only one step in the process of responding to the incident, Monahan said. Topping that list is ensuring — or at least trying to ensure — that such an incident won’t be repeated, and that begins with employee education and training regarding phishing e-mails and other scams.

“That was already going on beforehand, and I would say it’s being ramped up,” he explained, noting that employees can click a button at the top of any e-mail if they suspect it comes from a suspicious source, and someone from Baystate’s IT staff will come and determine if it’s dangerous or not. “We try and help them, to train them not to click on a suspicious e-mail, what a phishing attack looks like, and how to recognize it when it comes about.”

Frank Vincentelli

frank vincentelli

Unfortunately, they’re always a step ahead, and for those of us in the security industry, to prevent their success, we have to figure out what they’re doing. But if you present a soft, open belly, they’re going to dive right in.”

 

Frank Vincentelli, chief technology officer at Integrated IT Solutions in Westfield, and Eric Brown, the company’s vice president of Security Services, recently spoke about data security in the business world at the Western Mass. Business Expo, and discussed at length the critical role each employee plays in keeping a company safe.

“The best defense is to have a written information-security policy in place,” Brown said. “Part of that is training in security awareness for employees. That way, employees can’t say, ‘I didn’t know,’ or ‘I don’t understand.’ That’s where the data risk is. It’s not from the outside; it’s from the inside, with mistakes, careless errors made by employees.”

Vincentelli noted that a computer without access to the Internet or e-mail is generally safe, but not particularly useful, so businesses must strike a balance between safety and usability. “The very fact that you have access to these resources is giving the attackers a way into your system and your information.”

The entire security chain, in other words, is only as strong as its weakest link.

“Each individual user is an active part in the overall security strategy of the company,” he went on. “I’m sure all of us can think of a person in we work with who’s not necessarily technologically sophisticated, a person who usually gets a virus or is hit with CryptoLocker three or four times a year. That person is the best level of protection your organization has.”

Training every employee then, is critical, but companies must still maintain a robust firewall infrastructure, complete with early-detection capabilities to identify breaches when they occur. Still, Vincentelli said, “the most important component is the individual user.”

On Guard

Phishing scams are, unfortunately, more common in the healthcare realm than some might suspect. In recent years alone, according to data-risk consulting firm IDT911, a server operating under contract for DeKalb Health Medical Group in Indiana experienced a cyberattack that compromised more than 1,300 patient-information records; Baylor Regional Medical Center in Texas was hacked after doctors responded to phishing e-mails, exposing the patient information contained in their inboxes, including names, addresses, dates of birth, and even Social Security numbers; and Franciscan Health System in Washington was hacked in a phishing scheme that affected potentially 12,000 patients.

Norton, the developer of Internet security software, recommends several steps to avoid becoming the victim of phishing at work, including being wary of e-mails asking for confidential information; watching out for generic-looking requests for information, as fraudulent phishing e-mails are usually not personalized; and avoiding using links in an e-mail to connect to a website, instead opening a new browser window and typing the URL directly into the address bar.

“This is constantly a threat that we have to be wary of as employees, in part because we have a confidentiality policy and handle health information and other protected information,” Monahan told BusinessWest. “We have to be good stewards of that. There needs to be a sense of vigilance, and we have to enforce it. With almost 13,000 people who work here, there’s no one piece of software that will block this particular type of attack. It comes down to workforce training.”

The attacks can be subtle, and often play on human psychology — including people’s natural curiosity. Brown asked his audience at the Expo what they would do if they found a USB stick on the ground before answering his own question.

“Obviously, if you find a USB stick and don’t know who the owner is, you don’t want to touch it,” he said. “That is one way people get malware infections. If I wanted to infect a company, I’d take 30 USB sticks, put a virus on them, and toss them in a parking lot. I guarantee a half-dozen people would pick them up and stick them in their computers.”

Vincentelli called cybersecurity a cat-and-mouse affair, adding that “I’m not sure who’s who.” But it’s clear that hackers are constantly honing techniques to exploit security weaknesses, and when the target develops a defense, the hackers create a better weapon.

“Unfortunately, they’re always a step ahead, and for those of us in the security industry, to prevent their success, we have to figure out what they’re doing,” he said. “But if you present a soft, open belly, they’re going to dive right in.”

Baystate mailed letters to people who may have been affected on Oct. 21, who were directed to call a phone number staffed by an outside contractor hired by Baystate to walk patients through the process of learning if they had been victimized, Monahan said. In the meantime, the health system vowed to raise their level of awareness of threats that continue to evolve in sophistication.

“There are a million cyberthreats out there in the world, and this is one of them,” he said. “We are constantly working to train our workforce to recognize these threats and stay ahead of them — because the threat is always changing.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

A Meeting of the Minds

By
Opinion

Editorial

Years ago, the annual business trade show was a big deal.

It was a time to see the latest technology, find out what was new, discover what was trending, make some connections, and let people know your business could provide valuable products or services.

Well, times have changed somewhat — you don’t need us to tell you that — but the business show can still be a big deal, and this year’s edition of the Western Mass. Business Expo  certainly fits that description.

It will enable exhibitors and attendees to see the very latest technology — from robots to virtual reality to drones used in marketing; to find out what’s trending in everything from employment law to motivating Millennials to closing the dreaded skills gap; to make introductions; and to create some of those all-important connections.

And it’s this desire to generate connections that prompted BusinessWest to inject new energy and life into the Springfield Chamber’s annual business-to-business show, give it a new focus, and take it to a much higher level.

Indeed, while there are many networking opportunities on the calendar each year, none approaches the Expo in terms of both the size of the room and the depth of the opportunities.

Getting back to those connections, they are still needed in the business world today, but real, face-to-face connections are fast becoming as ‘old’ as the fax machine.

It seems that people communicate by e-mail and text these days, using the phone when something a little more personal than those options is required. Seeing people and shaking their hand … well, not so much. People rarely even go out to lunch anymore, preferring their desk or the conference-room table and solitude.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

But to do business and understand what’s happening in the business community, people need to get out more. And because there isn’t much time, they need to maximize their opportunities when they do get out. That’s not the official motivation behind the Expo, but it might as well be.

This year, attendees can go back to their offices better informed about:

• Innovation districts and efforts to create them;
• Millennials — what drives them, what motivates them, what keeps them at your company instead of looking for opportunities elsewhere, and much more;
• The skills gap and the many initiatives being undertaken to close it, including ongoing work to inspire young people to pursue STEM careers by conceptualizing, designing, building, and then competing with robots;
• Virtual reality and how to generate and then realize opportunities to seize the tremendous potential of what is being described as disruptive technology;
• Inspiration and perseverance, such as that displayed by a Boston Marathon bombing survivor who found the courage and determination not to let horrible injuries get in the way of her life and her dreams;
• Stories of entrepreneurship talking place across the region, through both a pitch competition and a ‘Where are They Now?’ program created to showcase the progress made by several startups;
• Marketing strategies, why they work, and why they might not; and
• Big Data, the cloud, drones, SEO (search-engine optimization), computer security, and many of the other high-tech developments and trends shaping business today.

Add it all up, and it yields one giant opportunity — to see, be seen, learn, become inspired, and inspire others.

In short, it’s an opportunity not to be missed.

Doing Business As Certificates

By
DBA Certificates Departments

The following business certificates and trade names were issued or renewed during the months of September and October 2016.

Amherst

Balcony Booking
26 Mill Lane
Connie White and Greg Kendall

Deepening Roots Farm and Food
793 Bay Road
Heather Ernst and Andrew Korza

LiLi’s Chinese Restaurant
197 North Pleasant St.
Li Jia

Momo
23 North Pleasant St.
Jamyang Wangchuk

Tea Cups
230 West St.
Gladys Siqueira

Berkshiretown

Barking Bubbles Inc.
119 Federal St.
Angela Gaj

Cottage Industry
10 Cottage St.
Deborah Harbison

Dednor Wine Consulting
16 Old Bay Road
William Dednor

HIC
20 Hancock Hollow
Wayne Versace

P&L Machine
382 South Washington St.
Paul Barrows

Rocket Internet Security
191 North Washington St.
Glenn Murphy

Scenic Candlescape Designs
185 Summit St.
Lacie Banks

Chicopee

CJF Canvassing Specialists
17 Falcon Circle
Christopher Frappier

MJK Cleaning Co.
97 Arnold St.
Magdalena Guzek

New England Keratoconus Consultants
Dr. David Momnie
113 Center St.

Raczkowski Home Improvement
67 Pendexter Ave.
Jerzy Raczkowski

Easthampton

Amber Barlow Enterprises
98 Oliver St.
Amber Barlow

Comics N’More
31 Union St.
Christian Reader

David Chu Webworks
25 Lyman Ave.
David Chu

Greenbark Bookkeeping
24 Knipfer Ave.
Marcie Cormier

Heart-Connected Living
22 Knipfer Ave.
Judith Grupenhoff

Icarus Massage
181 Northampton St.
David Richardson

Nadeau Insurance Agency
186E Northampton St.
Joshua Nadeau

Tuman Design
116 Pleasant St.
William Tuman

Wastefield Entertainment
13 Golden Dr.
Joshua Konopka and Jason Mateo

Greenfield

ACD Women’s Fitness Center
368 High St.
Debra Kelly and Angelique Menard

Dawn’s School of Dance
88 Hope St.
Dawn Morin

The DuMont Co.
289 Wells St.
Pilot Precision Holdings, LLC

Lundgren Honda of Greenfield
409 Federal St.
Forza Autogroup Inc.

Hampden

LDS
59 Wilbraham Road
John Lynch

Lucky’s Construction
16A Somers Road
Elizabeth, Keith, and Stephanie Lemelin-Bliss

Holyoke

B. Drew Construction
21 Longwood Ave.
William Drew

Complex Painting Services
24 Labrie Lane
Paul Whelihan

D&M’s Variety
522 South Bridge St.
Diana Morales

Lularoe
470 Hillside Ave.
Manhar Lalchandani

Pat’s Liquors
7 Cabot St.
Juan Diaz

Yucky Studios
286 Essex St., 2L
Christopher Daniele

Longmeadow

Nexus Leaders, LLC
109 Yarmouth St.
Christopher Casey

Steven A. Koltz EA
381 Wolf Swamp Road
Steven Koltz

W.M. Realty
702 Longmeadow St.
John Wallace

Ludlow

Bob St. Jacques Home Improvement
125 Main Blvd.
Robert St. Jacques

Complete Pest Control Service
248 Kendall St.
Stanley Knappe

Hair by Yvette at Hair West Designs
322 West Ave.
Yvette Charbonneau

Northampton

A and H Auto Repair
222 North King St.
Louis Robinson

Brinkerhoff, McCorkle, Roberts & Drane
96 Straw Ave.
James Roberts

A Door in the Wall Hypnosis
98 Main St.
Kristen Hatch

Leather & Lace Hairstyles
9 North Main St.
Heather Wright

M & M Cleaning
377 Florence Road
Ashley Mizula

Southwick

Calabrese Farms LLC
249-257 Feeding Hills Road
Thomas Calabrese

Haas Hauling
241 College Highway
David Haas

Mark Oliver Carpentry Services
30 Tannery Road
Mark Oliver

Sophisticated Productions
648 College Highway
Melissa Tessier

Tastefully Tan
610 College Highway, Suite 13B
Patrick Smith

Springfield

Armor Bearer Sports LLC
731 Sumner Ave.
Prince Taylor

Blvd Lash Co.
715 Bay St.
Bolanle Tokunbo

Clean Break in Your City
162 Quincy St.
Luz Marquez

Good Groove Entertainment
6 Inglewood Ave.
Waltiko Fludd

HB Fashions International
309 Bridge St.
Noemi Souza

Interpreterlink
193 Westbrook Dr.
Madeline Cruz

J & V Environmental LLC
483 Berkshire Ave.
Jorge Ortiz Vasquez

J3t-Set Design Group
1500 Main St.
James Cicerchia

KJ Transportation
65 Pinevale St.
Angel Bermudez

Lenceria
25 Carlton St.
Patricia Cristina

Liberty Mobile
737 Liberty St.
Mark Centeno

Main Kitchen
1343 Carew St.
Bun Chan

MK Creative Home Innovations
55 Bryant St.
Melissa Vanderburgh

My Window Butler
61 Dorset St.
James O’Hara

NCTI
595 Cottage St.
American Medical Response

Optical Expressions Inc.
135 State St.
Sheila Gibbs

P.D.S.
32 Sterling St.
Philip Panidis

Preene
90 Marlborough St.
Yolanda Princess

Presley Law PLLC
1 Federal St.
Denise Presley

Superior Cakes
1594 Carew St.
Manuel Colon

Town Towing
100 Wait St.
Kelvin Lopez

Valley Automotive Inc.
160 Taylor St.
John Lizak

Witconn Enterprises LLC
15 Monrovia St.
Richard Connery

Your Buddies Convenience
526 Sumner Ave.
Thomas Lamont Waters

Zyana’s Market
11 Dorset St.
Michael Perez

Westfield

The Batter’s Box, LLC
170 Lockhouse Road
The Batter’s Box, LLC

Evolve
948A Russell Road
Jonathan Imbriglio

Hurricanes Softball Club
66 Glenwood Dr.
Tyson James

King’s Cleaners
282 Southampton Road
Sook Kim

Weidler Logging
579 Pochassic Road
Christopher Weidler

West Springfield

Affordable Auto Glass Inc.
806 East Elm St.
Joseph Esile III

Dandy Enterprises
82 Garden St.
Brian Dandy

Mariflor Joya
43 Rogers Ave.
Maria Rodriguez

Rey’s Used Appliances
246 Memorial Ave.
Reynaldo Placencla

Union Mart LLC
529 Union St.
Joshua Ayala

Wilbraham

3D Plastez
5 Lodge Lane
Zbigniew and Elizabeth Kielczewski

Core Construction Products
524 Wilbraham Road
Marty Baron

F.L. Roberts Wilbraham #04071
2788 Boston Road
Tony El-Nemr

J.B. Crafts
21 Railroad Ave.
Jeannie Babineau

Lularoe by Anika Jacque
424 Soule Road
Anika Jacque

Melluzzo Property Maintenance
12 Addison Road
Bryant Melluzzo

Oh So Pretties Handcrafted Gifts
2341 Boston Road
Sherry Coulis

Preco Power Equipment Supply
2460 Boston Road
Gregory, Carla, Christopher, and Dalia Wurszt

Riverbend Medical Group Inc.
70 Post Office Park
Dr. Richard Shuman

Scibelli Construction and Remodeling
42 Brainerd Road
Mario Scibelli

Wilbraham Wine & Spirits
2771 Boston Road
Alan Fetter

Amy Royal Receives Recognition as New England Super Lawyer

By
Daily News

NORTHAMPTON — Royal, P.C., a woman-owned, boutique, management-side labor and employment law firm, announced that Amy Royal, principal and founding partner of the firm, has been honored with selection as one of New England’s Super Lawyers and has been included in the 2016 issue of New England Super Lawyers magazine.

Super Lawyers consists of attorneys throughout New England who are nominated by their peers as outstanding lawyers; the nomination then goes through an extensive selection process.

With more than 16 years of experience, Royal has successfully defended employers in both federal and state courts as well as before administrative agencies in a variety of areas of employment law, including employment discrimination and sexual harassment, unfair competition, breach of contract and wrongful discharge claims, workers’ compensation, and Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), and Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) violations, with a special emphasis in wage-and-hour class actions.

Royal regularly advises non-union clients on maintaining a union-free workplace and performs other preventive work such as wage-and-hour law compliance, record-keeping audits, drafting of employee manuals and affirmative-action plans, and management training. In addition, she assists unionized clients during contract negotiations, at arbitrations, and with respect to employee grievances and unfair-labor-practices charges.

Royal’s accolades also include Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly’s 2012 Top Women of Law award recognizing her as a top female lawyer in Massachusetts, as well as BusinessWest’s prestigious 40 Under Forty award, recognizing her for outstanding leadership in the Pioneer Valley business community.

AIC Campus Security Officer Honored by G4S Secure Solutions USA

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — G4S Secure Solutions USA, the provider of campus security services for American International College (AIC), recently recognized 21 outstanding employees from across the country for their service and commitment to company values, including teamwork and collaboration, customer focus, expertise, performance, integrity, and safety first in 2015.

Among those honored for their performance was Custom Protection Officer Omar Aljanabi, who serves on the AIC campus. Aljanabi reports to the G4S Hartford office. In March 2015, he was on foot patrol when he observed a vehicle crash and heard a man yelling for help. Aljanabi radioed campus police dispatch to call the Springfield Police Department while he ran to offer assistance. The driver informed Aljanabi that passengers in the vehicle had suffered serious personal injuries.

Three additional custom protection officers arrived on the scene, and, working as a team, they secured the area and assisted the injured individuals. Aljanabi’s quick reaction to this situation and his immediate response to provide aid in an unknown emergency scene demonstrated his courage and professionalism.

According to Chief of Campus Police David Kuzmeski, “while the AIC campus police serve the college community as their top priority, we have an investment in the greater community and are happy to assist our neighbors where we can in partnership with Springfield Police Department. We’re proud to have Officer Aljanabi with us at AIC.”

G4S operates across six continents in more than 100 countries and employs more than 600,000 people. G4S North America employs more than 56,000 individuals.

Haunted Attractions Are Scaring Up Huge Crowds

By
Sections Travel and Tourism

The Fright Stuff

Brennan McKenna says Warner Farm aims to provide scares for all ages each October.

Brennan McKenna says Warner Farm aims to provide scares for all ages each October.

Haunted houses and other Halloween attractions are nothing new, but they’re enjoying somewhat of a renaissance in America today, generating, by one estimate, more than $1 billion in revenues annually. Some are kid-friendly, while others are extreme enough to issue guests a safe word in case they need an early exit. But they all feed off people’s natural attraction to an often-intense adrenaline rush that’s totally safe — even though it might not feel that way at the time.

 

Brennan McKenna started working at Warner Farm at age 14, manning the strawberry stand. He returned every summer during high school and college, and started helping out with the farm’s renowned, artistic corn mazes in 2004; that year’s design was George W. Bush and John Kerry.

He’s had other jobs since, but he takes pride in his current role — pressed for a title, he came up with ‘haunted events manager’ — at the Sunderland farm.

“I tell people, ‘my job this week is to figure out how to scare people in the most efficient way, using some piece of farm equipment.’”

He’s not kidding — one scene in the haunted cornfield depicts an executioner’s chamber, where one poor character (not real, fortunately) is being chopped apart by — well, McKenna isn’t sure what it is, except that it’s an old farm implement stamped with the year 1875.

Adjoining this walk-through attraction is Mike’s Maze, an annual corn-maze attraction first created by farm owner Mike Wissemann and an artist neighbor 16 years ago; the theme for this year’s maze is “See America,” a tribute to the National Park Service. That remains a draw throughout each fall for visitors who enjoy navigating it by day and, with flashlights in hand, by night.

The neighboring haunted maze is a more recent addition, first developed three years ago. The farm has since added Zombie Night Patrol, where guests ride a wagon through a creepy village and shoot mounted paintball guns at the zombies who charge the vehicle.

“That’s a thrill,” McKenna said as he gave BusinessWest a tour of the village — like the haunted maze, silent during the day but ready to spring to life (or at least some undead state) thanks to a gaggle of paid actors in costumes and makeup. “Kids can do this and not get overly scared. The haunted corn maze is much scarier because walking through corn thinking someone’s going to pop out is inherently scary.”

See: Area Tourist Attractions

The Halloween attractions at Warner’s, collectively called Mike’s at Night, have been a boon for the farm, which aims for a complete family experience, complete with concessions, live music, and a children’s play area with slides, a jump pad, and pedal cars.

It’s also an example of how Americans have increasingly embraced the fun and pageantry of Halloween in recent years, evidenced by a proliferation of haunted houses and other spooky attractions.

Jeremie LaPointe and David Spear recognized that trend when they launched DementedFX in Easthampton two years ago. The haunted house they created drew 19,000 visitors over two seasons, and now they’re aiming higher with a new, much larger space on Main Street in Holyoke, with more room for the walk-through and an indoor bar area, serving beer and wine, that wasn’t possible before. But it wasn’t simply the need for more space that brought them to the Paper City.

“We went into this business venture thinking we wanted to get as close to the Five College area as possible,” LaPointe said. “We thought this was our demographic, but we came to find out, it really wasn’t.”

David Spear, left, and Jeremie LaPointe

David Spear, left, and Jeremie LaPointe say they don’t forbid kids from entering DemetedFX, but the intense scares are geared for adults.

The reasons aren’t totally clear, but he suggests a lack of money — today’s high-school and college students are struggling with a very difficult market for the kinds of jobs people their age used to have — may be a factor. Whatever the reason, the post-college crowd dominated the queue in Easthampton, with more sales to 36- to 50-year-olds than to the 14-to-18 crowd.

As a result, the revamped DementedFX is geared more toward adults, with some strong language, violent scenes, and ‘anatomically correct’ props, though nothing that could be considered sexual content. Children aren’t turned away, but their parents are warned, and refunds aren’t given if they decide to cut short their trip (which runs about 18 minutes, on average) by using a safe word.

“We don’t want to pander to the kids because we realized they’re not our demo,” LaPointe said. “My son’s 9, and I wouldn’t let him come here. But I’m not going to parent for people. We had a group of 5-year-olds go through with their parents the other day — and we’ve also had grown men cry.

“A lot of it has to do with your own level of anxiety, what your own fears are,” he went on. “We try to hit a lot of those fears. We use smells, which a lot of people find unpleasant. We use temperature changes, claustrophobia, light sensitivity — and it’s really loud. By the time you’re done, your anxiety level is high, so when you finally finish, it’s a moment of celebration, which is fun to watch.”

In other words, he said, getting scared is fun. Increasingly, people seem to agree.

Catching Fire

The Haunted House Assoc., an industry group, draws a distinction between Halloween attractions (hayrides, corn mazes, pumpkin patches) and haunted houses, but reports that, together, these destinations bring in more than $1 billion in revenue per year — and help keep many family farms afloat.

McCray’s Farm in South Hadley offers both types of attractions, thanks to Dan Augusto, a man who, a quarter-century ago, turned a love of Halloween and a collection of holiday-themed props into one of the region’s true seasonal success stories.

Seeking a place to display his collection, Augusto approached farm owner Don McCray, who was intrigued with the concept — originally, a simple hay-wagon ride out to the fields, into a heavily wooded area, where about 15 scary scenes were laid out, populated with both props and actors. “We probably had 30 volunteers — friends and friends of friends,” Augusto said.

There was only one problem — what was then a very limited parking area. “I told Don, ‘we need more parking; we’ll have vehicles up and down Alvord Street.’ He laughed and said, ‘settle down, city slicker.’ By the third weekend, I hopped off the wagon, and he came over and hugged me, smiling, saying, ‘Dan, I don’t know where we’re going to put these cars. You were right.’ But, at the time, it was a good problem to have.”

The second year, Augusto was paying the actors, and the event became more of a real business, with a payroll and workers’ compensation and liability insurance. Animatronic displays were added as well, and the path expanded as well to include more displays. “Every year, we said, ‘let’s try to put more and more into this space.’”

In the late 1990s, Augusto converted a large carport into the property’s first haunted walkthrough, which in recent years has become known as Massacre Manor, a full-blown haunted house, filled with animatronics and actors. This year, he added a second walk-through attraction, cheekily called DON — in reference to Don McCray, and also an acronym for Diagnostics Operation Nexus. “It’s a genetic research facility that’s had…” — here he paused for effect — “…some issues.”

DON is important in the evolution of what collectively has become known as Fear on the Farm, he explained, because now there’s truly something for everyone. The hayride aims to scare, but there’s security to be found in a big group aboard the wagon (and for those too young even for that, the farm offers milder daytime attractions for children). Massacre Manor increases the fright with a more close-up experience, and DON, aimed squarely at an adult audience, ramps up the intensity even higher.

Even the hayride is customizable depending on the crowd, and the actors will occasionally, and discreetly, break character to comfort a child or, better yet, give him a glowstick and tell him lighting it is the only way to keep the monsters at bay and save his parents — essentially, giving a sense of control back to a kid who might otherwise feel overwhelmed. Older riders don’t get the same treatment; the actors delight in targeting obviously frightened adults.

“I’ve seen some attractions where, if they see a kid crying and screaming, the actors will attack that poor kid,” Augusto said. “There’s nothing creative there; you’re terrorizing a little kid. We try to entertain that kid by going after his parents and the other people on the wagon.”

Rising Terror

As Halloween attractions have gained a greater following across the country in recent years, a strain of extreme terror experiences have popped up as well, like the popular Blackout haunted houses in New York and California, where guests are handled — often roughly, sometimes with a sexual connotation — and subjected to actual abuse. (One year, Blackout actually waterboarded people.)

Others have taken the concept further. Blackout requires a liability waiver, but also issues a safe word for those who want out immediately (and many do). San Diego’s McKamey Manor offers no safe word — and is known to last several hours, inflicting, by some accounts, real trauma on people who begged to be set free.

Dan Augusto

Dan Augusto, creator of the Fear on the Farm attractions at McCray’s, says he has long loved Halloween, a time when anyone can be anything they want.

The traditional haunted-house industry frowns on this trend, Augusto said. “It’s not creative. We might have a prop brush your leg, and your imagination runs with it. But physical touch is something I’m not interested in doing.”

LaPointe agrees, noting that DementedFX also has a no-touching policy.

“I want to classically scare you without physically touching you. It’s a lot harder. If I wanted to scare the s— out of you, I’d bind you up, take you to the basement, and throw you in a hole. That’s not what we’re trying to do here. We’re trying to get a clean scare out of you without going down that road.”

Augusto is also appalled that clowns have become associated with terror of the not-so-fun kind, thanks to myriad sightings in recent weeks that have law enforcement on edge. “One of the guys in the industry said it best: ‘if you want to dress up and scare people, come see us, and we’ll give you a job, rather than risk getting shot or arrested.’”

To maintain safety inside DementedFX, cameras are positioned in every area, constantly monitoring and recording. But there’s a second rationale behind those cameras.

“It deters people from doing malicious things, but we also watch the scares. We see if they’re successful or not. And if they’re not successful, we’ll demo out the whole thing and change it all. Using this scare knowledge, it keeps getting better and better,” said LaPointe, adding that he and Spear plan on adding another 2,000 square feet of currently unused space to the walk-through next year. “I never want to get stagnant. I’m not going to change everything out, but I want to continuously grow, bigger and better.”

Spear recalled the ‘spider house’ from DementedFX’s first year in Easthampton, a room that featured a mechanized spider that came shooting across a table. “The concept was incredible — it looked real — but it didn’t scare a lot of people,” he said. “So we got rid of it and changed the whole room over. That’s why we have the cameras, to see if people are getting bang for their buck. If we don’t like what we see, we change it. That kind of sets us apart. We’re not going to throw something together and just be happy with it. We always want to improve and be better.”

LaPointe, who noted that he and Spear conceptualize and build many of the props and animatronics (others are purchased), said they’re not making money off the undertaking — all revenues, after paying the actors, security, and other staff, are reinvested into the attraction — but they expect to be profitable within a few years. Meanwhile, they hope this year, with the big move complete, will allow them a little more family time away from what is, essentially, a year-round enterprise on top of their day jobs. “I can’t tell you how many soccer games, dance classes, dinners, Saturday and Sunday nights we missed because we were here.”

McKenna said improving Mike’s at Night each year is his goal as well, and he attends the TransWorld Halloween & Attractions Show, an annual trade event, to learn about trends and gather ideas. He also encourages changes mid-season if something isn’t providing the necessary scare. “We trust our actors to improvise and adapt to different groups. If something doesn’t work, change it and try to make it scarier.”

October Surprises

LaPointe and Spear make no bones about their goal to scare every guest, and they don’t tone it down for kids — they simply discourage them from coming. “I’ve seen kids leaving, and they’re just traumatized, and I feel bad for them,” Spear said. “But we ask them up front, ‘do you really want to do this?’”

For most guests, though, scary equals fun. Traditionally, about 1.5% of DementedFX ticket buyers opt for the safe word and an early exit — the percentage is running a touch higher this year — but most crave the adrenaline rush of facing their fears, making it all the way through, and exiting into the chill October air with smiles and shouts of relief.

“People don’t come to haunted houses looking for problems,” LaPointe said. “They’re here to have a good time.”

Augusto has also spent a lifetime embracing the fun of the season. He grew up poor in Holyoke, he said, but it never mattered on Halloween, the one day anyone could be anything they wanted for a few hours. That love of the holiday stayed with him into adulthood, when he wanted to give people a richer experience than the haunted houses that proliferated in the 1970s, “just black walls and no fire safety and cheap rubber masks. But it was still fun to do.”

Many of the actors have worked at McCray’s each October for the past 15 to 20 years, and have become a sort of family — and appreciate being able to provide an experience and memories that will stick with the families who dare to be scared.

“Every year, we lose more and more Americana,” Augusto said, adding that he hopes haunted houses and hayrides don’t go the way of the drive-in theater. He is encouraged, though. “Halloween, every year, is gaining on Christmas. Christmas is still the biggest money-generating holiday, but Halloween is right there. You see more houses decorated than ever before. America’s embracing it.”

McKenna agreed, adding that families regularly drop $30 or more on movies and popcorn, and welcome something a little different.

“Here, it’s real; it’s in person,” he said. “I think it’s the nature of the human psyche — they want the thrill, and knowing it’s a thrill that’s safe.”

Well, except for that poor guy caught in the antique farm implement. He didn’t look particularly thrilled. Or safe. Sweet dreams.

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Some Timely Advice on How to Get Back on Your Feet

By
Insurance Sections

Recovering from a Disaster

By John E. Dowd Jr.

John E. Dowd Jr.

John E. Dowd Jr.

Change in the business environment is expected. From regional landscape shifts and government regulations to emerging technologies, international competition, and more, it’s important to consider all the reasons why and how to insure your business.

And while some changes are predictable, others are not, but there are ways to plan for both.

What if you went to the office one morning to find nothing there? A flood, hurricane, tornado, or terrorist attack made it impossible to conduct business as usual. It’s not a purely academic question: thousands of business owners have confronted this very problem across the eastern seaboard in the wake of recent hurricanes, including Sandy, which devastated the New Jersey and New York shorelines with storm surges up to 20 feet high, and Matthew making headlines more recently. And it wasn’t hypothetical for New Orleans businesses in areas destroyed by the Katrina flooding, nor for dozens of businesses that had significant operations in the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. In the latter case, tragically, many businesses not only lost their offices, but people as well.

How would you get back on your feet? The odds, unfortunately, are against you.

According to research from the University of Texas, 43% of businesses affected by catastrophic disasters like 9/11, Sandy, and Katrina never open their doors again. Another 51% shut down within two years. Only 6% survive and go on to prosper.

The key, as with so many things, lies with preparation. Your chances of pulling your business out of a severe catastrophe are largely determined long before the catastrophe strikes.

Here are some of the types of insurance coverage business owners should consider to safeguard the future:

Liability Insurance: From medical or legal fees to damages a business may be held accountable for in the event of a disaster, liability insurance covers the day-to-day uncertainties of managing a business.

Workers’ Compensation Insurance: Employees who have sustained a work-related injury may be entitled to workers’ compensation. Not only is their contribution missed by your team, but the costs can be a burden if your business does not properly plan for their untimely absence.

Property Insurance: Did you skimp on flood or fire insurance? Do you store records in fireproof cabinets, or do you house them in a basement or low-lying, ground-floor storage that is prone to flooding? From weather-related disasters to fires and theft, property insurance is essential.

Life Insurance: Have you considered key-person insurance policies to have in place that could provide a cash cushion as your business deals with the death or disability of a partner or key employee? It’s important to consider the value that each staff member brings to your business and to have a plan in place if they were temporarily or permanently unavailable to continue work.

Cyber-liability Insurance: In the digital era, mother nature is not the only source of disasters. Most businesses handle some degree of sensitive customer information, and a data breach could be catastrophic. Cyber-liability insurance is essential to protect against a data breach and may help with legal defense, court-related costs, judgments, settlements, and costs involving crisis management, such as credit monitoring and public-relations services. Another type of cyber-liability insurance regards third-party defense and liability. This may produce liability coverage for electronic media, which could include copyright infringement, network security, and privacy liability issues.

An important note for small businesses is that they are frequently targeted for data breaches because they rarely have the resources such as a robust IT department to prepare and defend against cyber attacks. It is important to remember that general liability policies often exclude cyber liability and related costs. Any company that handles sensitive customer information must be aware of their vulnerability. If your company processes payments with credit cards, has access to customer bank-account numbers, Social Security numbers, or any medical data, you may be particularly at risk.

Have you gone through a formal process to determine your insurable risk in the event of a catastrophe? Generally, from the point of view of a business interruption insurance underwriter, your insurable risk is the amount of lost revenue due to the disaster, plus your monthly business overhead, times the number of months your business will be disrupted by a potential disaster. Whether your business is large or small, coverage choices can be complicated and intimidating. It makes sense to look to the experts in the field to make the process of examining your personal needs easier, and ultimately develop a plan that is customized and responsive to whatever may be in your future.

Finally, does your company have a formal overall disaster plan that would kick into gear after experiencing a serious catastrophic event? If not, your insurance agent/broker should be able to help you develop a plan that will make sure you are prepared for any situation that comes your way.

Taking the time to review this plan now before an event occurs makes very good business sense.

John E. Dowd Jr. is president and CEO of the Dowd Insurance Agencies, LLC. He represents the Dowd family’s fourth generation in the agencies, founded by his great-grandfather in 1898. Additionally, he holds several professional credentials and is an Accredited Advisor in Insurance (AAI) and a Licensed Insurance Advisor (LIA); (800) 542-0131; dowd.com

Doing Business as Certificates

By
DBA Certificates Departments

The following Business Certificates and Trade Names were issued or renewed during the month of September 2016.

AGAWAM

Ayre Investments
648 Main St., 1st Floor
Timothy Ayre

Brick Road Consulting
105 Autumn St.
Ryan Wood

Bussolari Landscaping
124 Mill St.
Christopher Bussolari

Feeding Hills Sunoco
2 South Westfield St.
NEC OPCO 1 Inc.

F.L. Roberts Agawam
6 Lealand Ave.
NEC OPCO 1 Inc.

The Gadgeteeria
499 Meadow St.
Lola Foote

Henry’s Painting
15 Melrose Place
Matthew Henry

Palazzi Painting
64 Barry St.
Aldo Palazzi

AMHERST

Amherst Associates, LLC d/b/a Hawkins Meadow Apartments
370E Northampton Road
JCSK Holdings, LLC, Jonathan Rosen, and JCSK Properties Corp.

Clearpoint Communications
72 Pelham Road
Eddy Goldberg

Equinox Video
145 University Dr., #2443
Leslie Mason

Quantum Breakthroughs
401 Main St.
Deborah Maclin

CHICOPEE

Agwood, LLC
17 Naomi St.
Arkadiusz Gajda

East St. Cleaners
423 East St.
Sun Choi

Joe’s Remodeling
36 Montvue St.
Joseph Smith Jr.

LulaRoe
142 Mountainview St.
Angela Taal

Murray Automotive
102 Old Fuller Road
Michael Murray

Holyoke

Hibiscus
427 South Elm St.
Yonghe Chen

RBW Painting
50 Sycamore St.
Bruce White

Rent-a-Center East Inc. d/b/a Rent-a-Center #01551
2253 Northampton St.
Felicia Jackson

NORTHAMPTON

Allies in Recovery
69 Prospect St.
Dominique Simon

Bellows Group
33 Longfellow Dr.
Michaela O’Brien and Nathaniel Reade

Pixel Shrub Bioinformatics
54 Audobon Road
Jessica Rain Grant

Sweeties Fine Chocolate
68 Main St.
Charles Burke

SPRINGFIELD

Acquisition Advisors, LLC
471 Trafton Road
Kathleen Zizik

Belliveau Home Improvement
906 Bradley Road
Marc Belliveau

Charron’s Hair Care Services
460 Main St.
Mabel Charron

Foreclosure Cleaning
24 Ellen St.
Crystal Quiles

G.H. Berlin Woodward
85 Carando Dr.
BWE LLC

Highland Farm
560 State St.
Iqbal Shahid

Hilltop Veterans Assoc.
1105 Worthington St.
Gilbert Dillard

J.C. Quick Supply
26 Kenwood Terrace
Julio Casado

Joe Potito Electrical
142 Shawmut St.
Joseph Potito

Make It Happen Maintenance
148 Benz St.
Ralph Manzi

My Wide World Productions
966 Sumner Ave.
Scott Coen

Pham Insurance Agency
433 Belmont St.
Hung Pham

South Bay Community Services
146 High St.
Michael Pelletier

Springfield Trampoline Sports
1250 St. James Ave.
Robert Doty

The Law Office of Thomas J. McCormick
293 Bridge St.
Thomas McCormick

Tito’s Barber Shop
855 Berkshire Ave.
Tito Lewis

WESTFIELD

Alex’s Auto Care
11 Bartlett St.
Aleksandr Yurovskih

A.R. Deliveries
18 Margerie St.
Anatolie Reznicenco

C & C Home Improvements
23 Day Ave.
Joshua Cotugno

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

Controls & Integration
56 Overlook Dr.
Craig Brown

ENA Consulting
36 Loomis Ridge
Emily Nissen Amanti

Express Your Way To Wholeness
74 Putnam Dr.
Linda Coffin

Game City
77 Elm St.
Game City

Gomes Designing Homes
10 Harrison Ave.
Matthew Gomes

Martyn Transport
16 Squawfield Road
Vadim Martynyuk

Maura Bonavita Skin Care
154 Wild Flower Circle
Maura Bonavita

NE Christian Homeschool Academy
297 Russell Road
Samantha and Ron Gulsvig

Same Day 6
70 Court St., Suite 6
Dmitriy Shlemanov

WEST SPRINGFIELD

ADT Security Services
76-78 Capital Dr.
ADT LLC

Alex Auto Paint
74 Wayside Dr.
Alex Rudenko

Audi West Springfield
434 Memorial Ave.
Damon Cartelli

Convenience Mart
7 Chester St.
Mohammad Ishaq

DP Transport
105 River St.
Dmitriy Primakov

Marsupicool Design
14 Dewey St.
Katherine McClelland

Qualified Plans LLC
131 Wayside Ave.
John Massey

Riverdale Street F.L. Roberts
1130 Riverdale St.
Tony El-Nemr

Sherwin-Williams Co.
47 Roanoke Ave.
Cheryl Lebron

West Springfield F.L. Roberts
518 Memorial Ave.
Tony El-Nemr

Westfield Street F.L. Roberts
735 Westfield St.
Tony El-Nemr

Westfield Street Sunoco
2667 Westfield St.
Tony El-Nemr

Zenex Central Vacuum Systems
857 Elm St.
Jeffrey Novak

Briefcase October 3, 2016

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Briefcase Departments

LIPPI Featured in National Storytelling Platform

EASTHAMPTON — The Women’s Fund of Western Massachusetts’ Leadership Institute for Political and Public Impact (LIPPI) was one of several featured programs that launched Tuesday during the rollout of a new national storytelling initiative unveiled by the Women’s Funding Network (WFN) at the Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting. The uniquely interactive digital tool seeks to bring attention to a leading challenge facing women in the U.S. and around the world — economic security — and lift up the vital work of women’s foundations that are addressing this issue. “Telling the story of local women on a national scale is crucial to the work we do. If we want our communities to thrive, we must ensure the economic security of women,” said Elizabeth Barajas-Román, CEO, of the Women’s Fund. This year, Barajas-Román was invited to represent Western Mass. on the national board of the Women’s Funding Network. The launch highlights the story of the Women’s Fund LIPPI program, a unique leadership institute developed in response to a shortage of women in civic leadership positions, in public office, and serving on boards. The coursework equips women with the tools and confidence to become civic and political leaders. More than 250 participants are now leaders in their local communities; 22 have run for elected office, one received a gubernatorial appointment, one graduate is the first female police chief of Northampton, one ran a successful race for mayor of Pittsfield, and two graduates are serving in executive cabinet positions. Many more continue to serve on various boards and commissions, organizing grassroots campaigns, and raising their collective voices on issues that impact women and families. The Economic Security Digital Storytelling Platform is a data-driven, yet narrative, evidence of women’s foundations’ ongoing commitment to ensuring women’s economic prosperity. The platform gives users the opportunity to explore the data alongside the powerful stories of the women, programs, and organizations making an impact on this issue, breathing life into facts and figures. The responsive and flexible format encourages user engagement and learning by featuring links and downloadable files throughout, as well as links to social media to make these important stories easy to share. WFN’s Economic Security Digital Storytelling Platform can be previewed at economicsecurity.womensfundingnetwork.org.

State Nets $2.5M Grant to Help People with Disabilities Find Jobs

BOSTON — Massachusetts was one of only six states awarded $2.5 million this week by the federal government to help people with disabilities find employment. The grant will target youth and young adults, ages 14 to 24, in Hampden County and the Greater Lowell area by expanding access to credential-based education and training. The U.S. Department of Labor yesterday announced $14.9 million in grants to six states as part of the Disability Employment Initiative. “We know that, unfortunately, people with disabilities face much higher rates of unemployment, and we have been developing plans to tackle that problem for over a year now. One of the first executive orders I signed was to create a task force to look at ways to help people with barriers to employment find and keep jobs,” Gov. Charlie Baker said. “This award from the federal government will help us continue that important work, and create more opportunities for young people with disabilities to find fulfilling careers.” According to the U.S. Department of Labor, people with disabilities make up only 19.8% of the nation’s workforce. In Massachusetts, it is estimated that 15% of people with disabilities are unemployed. The grant is expected to serve more than 350 youth and young adults with disabilities. In Massachusetts the funds will also be used to create partnerships with local employers to increase hiring opportunities for young people with disabilities, and expand short-term subsidized work programs. The grant will provide job-retention and placement services to young people who have difficulty finding work due to their disability. “This is the first initiative where we will completely focus on youth and young adults with disabilities in order to help them find and keep employment,” Labor and Workforce Development Secretary Ronald Walker II said. “We are thrilled to be one of only a few states to receive this grant, and it will enable us to continue the work started by the task force for people facing higher employment.” The other states to receive grants were Connecticut, California, Idaho, Minnesota, and Maryland. While Massachusetts’ unemployment rate is lower than the national average, at 3.9% in August, certain populations face chronically higher rates of unemployment, including African-Americans, Hispanics/Latinos, people with disabilities, Native Americans, and recently returned veterans.

Unemployment Rate Drops to 3.9% in August

BOSTON — The state’s total unemployment rate dropped to 3.9% in August from 4.1% in July, and preliminary estimates show the state gained 5,900 jobs over the month, the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development reported. The last time the state’s unemployment rate hit 3.9% was in August 2001. At 3.9%, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate is down 0.9% over the year from 4.8% in August 2015. There were 30,300 fewer unemployed residents and 73,000 more employed residents over the year compared to August 2015. Massachusetts’ unemployment rate remains lower than the national rate of 4.9% reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The state added fewer jobs over the month in July than the Bureau of Labor Statistics originally estimated, gaining 5,800 jobs compared to the previously published 7,300-job-gain estimate. Year to date, December 2015 to August 2016, Massachusetts has added 61,000 jobs. In August, the largest over-the-month job gains occurred in the leisure and hospitality, education and health services, and other services sectors. The state’s labor force participation rate — the total number of residents 16 or older who worked or were unemployed and actively sought work in the last four weeks — is 65.0%. Over the year, the labor-force participation rate has increased 0.2% compared to August 2015.

State Releases Detailed Report on Opioid Epidemic

BOSTON — The Baker-Polito administration released an in-depth analysis of the state’s opioid-related deaths from 2013 to 2014. The findings reveal that opioid-related deaths have increased by 350% in Massachusetts in 15 years and marks the first time data from multiple state agencies has been linked to give a comprehensive overview of deaths associated with the opioid epidemic. “We are pleased to unveil this report to combine state resources and aggregate data in an innovative way to better understand the drivers behind opioid and heroin-related overdoses,” Gov. Charlie Baker said. “We are hopeful that new information will help us better understand the contours of this public-health crisis as we continue to work on prevention, education, and treatment in our communities to combat the opioid crisis in the Commonwealth.” Added Marylou Sudders, secretary of the Executive Office of Health and Human Services, “in 2013 and 2014 alone, opioid-related deaths were recorded for two-thirds of the cities and towns in Massachusetts. In the face of this crisis, we must continue our efforts to battle this epidemic that continues to take a record number of lives.” The analysis, performed by the state Department of Public Health, reviewed opioid-related deaths in 2013 and 2014 by analyzing data from multiple government entities including the Department of Public Health, the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the Department of Correction, MassHealth, and the Center for Health Information and Analysis. The Commonwealth’s technology agency, MassIT, facilitated integration work to bring the various streams of data together. The report, which was released at a reconvening of the Governor’s Opioid Working Group, chaired by Sudders, is part of continued efforts to improve the collection and release of data examining the impact that opioids have on Bay State communities. Earlier this year, Baker signed landmark opioid legislation into law to address the deadly opioid and heroin epidemic plaguing the Commonwealth. “Opioid-use disorder is a chronic disease, and this epidemic is a complex and persistent problem that will not be solved through a single solution,” said Department of Public Health Commissioner Dr. Monica Bharel. “This data will be leveraged to allocate resources more efficiently and effectively to help us save lives.” In 2015, the Governor’s Opioid Working Group released recommendations and a comprehensive action plan aimed at curbing the opioid epidemic. These short- and long-term recommendations focus on prevention, intervention, treatment, and recovery support. Approximately 93% of the initiatives in the governor’s action plan are complete or underway.

Five Colleges Inc. Breaks Ground for Library Annex

HATFIELD — At a brief ceremony on Sept. 15 attended by campus officials and developers, Five Colleges Inc. broke ground on for its Library Annex on a site it purchased in Hatfield. When complete, the 35,000-square-foot building will provide shelving for up to 2.5 million items from the libraries of the campuses of the consortium — Amherst, Hampshire, Mount Holyoke, and Smith colleges and UMass Amherst — freeing up space for new materials and other academic needs. In addition, it will serve as a temporary home for much of the collection of Smith College’s Neilson Library while it undergoes a major renovation. “This facility will help Smith greatly in coming years. It’s a great example of how the institutions help each other,” said Susan Fliss, Smith College dean of Libraries. Added Chris Loring, the recently retired director of libraries at Smith College and a driving force behind the development of the annex, “this will become another library for us.” The 12-acre parcel is at the junctions of the Interstate 91 exit 22 ramp, West Street, and Plain Road in Hatfield. Five Colleges paid $925,000 for the property, which had been owned by Lynda, Martin, and Sharyn Holich. Site preparation work began on May 17, and work is expected to be complete in May 2017. With climate-controlled conditions for long-term preservation of print materials, the annex will house a part of the Five College library repository collection, which already preserves nearly 600,000 items for its member campuses.

Annual ERC5 Golf Tournament Slated for Sept. 30

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Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — The East of the River Five Town Chamber of Commerce’s (ERC5) 14th annual Golf Classic will be held on Friday, Sept. 30 at the Country Club of Wilbraham.

Presented by ERC5 with support from Gaudreau Group, Proshred Security, Advanced Drainage System, Life Care Center of Wilbraham and supporting members, the tournament will kick off with registration at 11 a.m., followed by lunch sponsored by Polish National Credit Union at 11:30 a.m., then a shotgun start at 12:30 p.m.

Golfers will enjoy a hole in one competition as well as a putting contest with a cash grand prize and a wide array of auction prizes. The day will conclude with a reception, also sponsored by Polish National Credit Union, catered by the club, complete with buffet stations, cash bar, and awards.

Sponsorship levels for every budget are available. The tournament entry fee is $500 per foursome, including greens fees, cart, lunch, and reception. Proceeds from this tournament benefit the ERC5 Scholarship Fund for the Minnechaug Regional High School and Business Community Connections Program.

For information on sponsorship opportunities, contact Nancy Connor at [email protected] or (413) 575-7230. To register for the tournament, visit www.erc5.com.

bankESB Sponsors Nuestras Raices’ Community Garden Project

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Daily News

EASTHAMPTON — Matthew Sosik, president and CEO of bankESB, announced the bank’s sponsorship of Nuestras Raices’ Community Garden project in Holyoke.

Founded in 1992, Nuestras Raices started with one community garden. The organization had a goal of building cultural pride among Holyoke Latinos while addressing food-security issues, creating healthy eating opportunities and revitalizing neighborhoods.

Gardeners can grow whatever they want, and many take their family’s favorite vegetables into consideration. Aji dulces, a specialty kind of sweet pepper, is grown in many of the community gardens, as they are used in the traditional Puerto Rican dish of sofrito. The food grown in the gardens is typically used by the gardener’s family or extended family.

bankESB is sponsoring the purchase and installation of new signs at 12 community gardens throughout the city. “We are excited to participate in this unique, community-focused program that brings residents of Holyoke together in a positive way,” Sosik said.

Added Holyoke Mayor Alex Morse, “bankESB is having an ever-increasing presence in Holyoke, driving the financing behind some of the largest projects in the city. We are looking forward to a mutual partnership for years to come, starting with their physical branch location.”

The new branch is planned on a lot currently owned by the city of Holyoke at the corner of Sargeant Street and Beech Street, adjacent to CVS and the newly built Holyoke Senior Center.

For many years, Holyoke has been in bankESB’s top 10 communities for deposits. The bank currently services almost 1,000 customers from Holyoke with $18 million in deposits and $28 million in loans. bankESB also has a long history of providing monetary contributions, sponsorships, and volunteers for important community events and projects like this one. Most notably, a recent $50,000 contribution was made to the Holyoke Public Library.

“bankESB is proud to continue our support of local organizations as part of our mission as a community bank,” Sosik said.

Women’s Fund Program Featured in National Storytelling Platform

By
Daily News

EASTHAMPTON — The Women’s Fund of Western Massachusetts’ Leadership Institute for Political and Public Impact (LIPPI) was one of several featured programs that launched Tuesday during the rollout of a new national storytelling initiative unveiled by the Women’s Funding Network (WFN) at the Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting.

The uniquely interactive digital tool seeks to bring attention to a leading challenge facing women in the U.S. and around the world — economic security — and lift up the vital work of women’s foundations that are addressing this issue.

“Telling the story of local women on a national scale is crucial to the work we do. If we want our communities to thrive, we must ensure the economic security of women,” said Elizabeth Barajas-Román, CEO, of the Women’s Fund. This year, Barajas-Román was invited to represent Western Mass. on the national board of the Women’s Funding Network.

The launch highlights the story of the Women’s Fund LIPPI program, a unique leadership institute developed in response to a shortage of women in civic leadership positions, in public office, and serving on boards. The coursework equips women with the tools and confidence to become civic and political leaders.

More than 250 participants are now leaders in their local communities; 22 have run for elected office, one received a gubernatorial appointment, one graduate is the first female police chief of Northampton, one ran a successful race for mayor of Pittsfield, and two graduates are serving in executive cabinet positions. Many more continue to serve on various boards and commissions, organizing grassroots campaigns, and raising their collective voices on issues that impact women and families.

The Economic Security Digital Storytelling Platform is a data-driven, yet narrative, evidence of women’s foundations’ ongoing commitment to ensuring women’s economic prosperity. The platform gives users the opportunity to explore the data alongside the powerful stories of the women, programs, and organizations making an impact on this issue, breathing life into facts and figures. The responsive and flexible format encourages user engagement and learning by featuring links and downloadable files throughout, as well as links to social media to make these important stories easy to share.

WFN’s Economic Security Digital Storytelling Platform can be previewed at economicsecurity.womensfundingnetwork.org.

STCC’s Youthful New President Embraces His Stern Challenge

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STCCcookFeature 0916b
Education Sections

A New Test

John Cook

John Cook

John Cook, who only recently became ineligible for BusinessWest’s Forty Under 40 program, took the reins at Springfield Technical Community College last month. Beyond youth — he’s not that much older than many students on this historic campus — he brings energy and a leadership style grounded in being a good listener.

As one passes through the ornate main entrance to Springfield Technical Community College, to the right is a small parking lot with a few reserved spaces. John Cook’s name is on one of them.

Well, not literally, but there is certainly a spot set aside for the president of the institution, a title Cook assumed just a few weeks ago. But he has made up his mind that he won’t be using it.

Instead, he might, like some of the college’s students themselves, try to find a spot reasonably far up the steep Pearl Street hill, several hundred yards away from that choice space, and walk through the campus to the main administration building.

He fully understands that this is a symbolic gesture, and one that certainly won’t impact the school’s persistent parking issue/challenge/problem — whatever one chooses to call it — in any significant way.

But he nonetheless considers it an important gesture because it indicates how he intends to manage — by listening closely and responding to what he hears. Far more meaningful answers to the parking situation will eventually become reality, he told BusinessWest, and in the meantime, he intends to be part of the solution is some small way — and also do some more listening while getting from Pearl Street, or wherever he finds a spot, to Garvey Hall.

“During the interview process, people asked about my style, my approach, and for me that’s a very difficult question,” he said while answering essentially the same question when put to him by BusinessWest. “Because for me, a lot of that approach is demonstrating appreciation for others and being a good listener. And it’s hard when you’re asked the question and are asked to respond, because what I really want to do is go around and ask questions of other people and give them a chance to be heard.”

The young Cook — he only recently became ineligible for BusinessWest’s Forty Under 40 program — has been doing plenty of listening for the past six months or so, through that interview process and then during his first few weeks on the job, and he’s intent on continuing that habit.

In fact, he has already put in motion some plans to open the lines of communication between himself and a host of constituencies — and keep them open. One involves blocking off time each week for open office hours — they started last week — while the other entails scheduling what he calls ‘town-meeting’ sessions.

The former, as the name implies, is time when his office door is open, literally and figuratively, to anyone who wants to go through it. That includes faculty, staff, students, and “the community,” he said, adding that he’ll make himself available from noon to 1, but also in the early evening (5:15-6:15) for those who would be on campus those hours.

From left, John Cook, state Sen. Eric Lesser, and STCC trustee Eric Hagopian

From left, John Cook, state Sen. Eric Lesser, and STCC trustee Eric Hagopian, president of the Mass. Center for Advanced Design & Manufacturing, tour ‘Building 19,’ the future home of STCC’s Learning Commons.

As for the town meetings, these will involve the entire college community, he explained, and will feature an open, interactive format, one where he will share the microphone and welcome input.

“Rather than having me stand and deliver for a period of time,” he explained, “we’ll have our vice presidents up there giving updates on critical projects, and we’re going to take questions.”

Cook, most recently the vice president of Academic Affairs at Manchester (N.H.) Community College (MCC), takes the helm in Springfield during a milestone moment in the school’s history — a year-long 50th anniversary celebration. And while acknowledging that this might be a good time to look inward and set new goals, he said this occasion is better suited for reaffirming established goals and recommitting the institution to its simple, but at the same time complex, mission statement: ‘STCC supports students as they transform their lives.’

I didn’t look at many schools, and in my search, this was the only one where there seemed to be an early match, an early fit. I’m lucky that STCC and I found one another.”

Support comes in many forms, obviously, but mostly in the realm of helping students arriving at the historic campus — carved out of the Springfield Armory — see their way through to graduation or whatever goal they set when they enrolled.

For this issue and its focus on education, BusinessWest talked at length with STCC’s new president about new his career challenge and the start of the school’s proverbial next 50 years.

Setting the Scene

To say that Cook’s office on the second floor of Garvey Hall takes on a Granite State look and feel would a large understatement.

Parked against one wall is his first pair of skis (they’re wooden and considerably older than he is, although he doesn’t know exactly how old). Meanwhile, photos of snow-capped peaks adorn other walls, and a map of New Hampshire, where he had spent the sum of his professional career, hangs behind his desk.

“It provides a sense of place,” he said of this collection. “Where we went to college matters, and where we grew up matters. These are little reminders of where I’m from.”

But while his office speaks of where he’s been personally and professionally and provides that sense of place, he says he feels right at home with what he can see outside his windows, as well.

And by that, he was referring to everything from the community college atmosphere, to the similarities between MCC and STCC (more on those later), and even to the century-and-half-old buildings that give the school its unique flavor.

“I have a real healthy appreciation for historic structures,” he explained with a laugh, using those words in reference to both architecture and the high cost of upkeep. “Because I’ve helped to renovate two antique houses, both dating to the late 1700s. These buildings (at STCC), they’re oldies, but goodies; you just can’t build that kind of character any more.”

These were just some of the many motivating factors that prompted Cook to zero in on STCC as an attractive landing spot as he initiated his quest for a college president’s job — a search that began only a year ago, or just after the ink was dry on his doctorate diploma, earned at the University of New Hampshire. (A Ph.D. is considered almost a pre-requisite for presidents’ jobs today).

Elaborating, Cook said that while he wasn’t sure if his next career challenge would (or should) be a chief academic officer’s position at a larger institution or a presidency, he certainly felt qualified — and ready — for the latter.

Especially at a community college, because of work in everything from new-degree-program development to efforts to forge pathways — from high school to college, and then from MCC to four-year institutions.

Those are just some of the accomplishments listed on his resume, which notes that upon graduating from St. Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y., and then earning a master’s degree in community/social psychology at UMass Lowell, Cook started his career at Granite State College, part of New Hampshire’s public university system, as a research and evaluation coordinator in 2000. He would later become faculty coordinator at the school, and eventually serve as assistant dean of Faculty.

In 2012, he became vice president of Academic Affairs at MCC, a small community college (at least when compared to STCC) with just under 3,000 students and 55 full-time faculty.

At MMC, he took a lead role in the development of a number of new dregree and certificate programs across several academic realms, including Health Science, Life Science, Robotics, and Cyber Security. He also collaborated with a number of parties to create early-college pathway programs for high schools, encouraged faculty to embrace STEM pathways, and worked to build a culture that, as he put it, “embraces data and an analytical approach to decision-making.”

With this background, buffeted by that aforementioned doctorate, as well as some strong encouragement from MCC President Susan Huard, Cook began looking at college president positions. And as things turned out, he didn’t have to look very long or hard before coming across an opportunity that seemed worthy of that adjective ‘perfect,’ both professionally and personally (this job allows him to remain very close to his two young children from a previous marriage, who are still living in New Hampshire).

“I feel very fortunate — people who have been there, people who have been presidents of multiple institutions tell me that often, you’re looking for months, sometimes years, for the right institution,” he told BusinessWest. “I didn’t look at many schools, and in my search, this was the only one where there seemed to be an early match, an early fit. I’m lucky that STCC and I found one another.”

By that, he meant that he identified the school as the focal point of his quest for a president’s job, and the search committee, following an intense, six-month exploratory and interview process, deemed him the best candidate to take it into the next half-century, following the 12-year tenure of Ira Rubenzahl, who succeeded Andy Scibelli, who spent 21 years in the president’s office.

Those two leaders have taken the school to new and lofty heights, said Cook, adding that he considers it his responsibility to continue and build upon this legacy.

Course of Action

Looking back on the lengthy search process for STCC’s next president, Cook said he was asked a number of intriguing questions during several interviews — and, as might be expected based on what he said earlier, he had several for those on the other side of the table.

STCC during its 50th anniversary

John Cook takes the helm at STCC during its 50th anniversary, a time, he said, to recommit to its message of helping students succeed.

One of them was a rather direct query about what members of the search panel were looking for in the next leader of the school. Words and phrases that came back repeatedly were ‘accessible,’ ‘approachable, ‘forward-thinking,’ and someone willing to be a “champion” for the school and community colleges in general.

He intends to be all of the above with actions that go well beyond giving up his parking space.

For starters, he noted his open office hours and planned town meetings, as well as that leadership style of listening and demonstrating appreciation.

Through such initiatives, and with such skill sets, Cook feels he’s ready and able to lead efforts to address the many challenges facing the school moving forward and outlined in a recently drafted strategic plan. They include:

• That aforementioned parking problem. It’s not exactly a recent phenomenon, in fact the challenge is in many respects as old as the school. But it remains a constant and is always a consideration with the next item on the list;

• Enrollment. It soared during the Great Recession, as it did at all area public schools, but has retreated since, for reasons ranging from a vast improvement in the economy to smaller high school graduating classes;

• The ongoing restoration and renovation of the structure known as Building 19, a huge, 700-foot-long former storage house for the Armory that is being converted into a campus center that will host a wide array of offices and programs. Conceived and nurtured by Rubenzahl, the project will reorient the campus and shift most activity from the main administration building to ’19,’ as it’s called, on the north side of the campus;

• Continuing the collaborative efforts between STCC and Holyoke Community College, forged by Rubenzah and his counterpart at HCC (now also retired) Bill Messner. Formerly, and in many ways still, rivals (at least when it comes to enrollment and athletics), the schools have come together on many projects in recent years, especially the TWO (Training and Workforce Options) program that has helped area companies develop talented workers and close a recognized skills gap. Cook said it will be one of his priorities to continue the collaborative efforts and initiate new ones.

But the broader, overriding assignment will be to certainly carry out the school’s mission and help students succeed, he said, adding there are many elements to this equation.

Indeed, the college needs to not only help students with academics and put them on a track to success, but keep them on it.

“Some of it, in fact a big part of it, is life — how do we help students with those issues, not just education,” Cook explained, noting that many STCC students cannot be described with that industry term ‘traditional.’ “They’re working a lot, they’re raising families, there’s transportation issues; all those things influence our students, regardless of their age.”

Cook said that the recently announced Commonwealth Commitment program would certainly help with this assignment.

The initiative incentivizes individuals (through rebates on tuition and fees and a $30,000 cap on the cost of a four-year degree) to enter a community college, graduate in two and half years or less, move on to one of the state universities or UMass campuses, and wrap up a baccalaureate degree in no more than four and a half years.

“This really helps incentivize students to not just go part time,” he explained. “If you can find the wherewithal to go full time, you’re going to earn that associate’s in two years, tuition has been frozen for you, and that really helps see them through to that bachelor’s.”

Thus, the program also further escalates the role community colleges are playing in preparing individuals for today’s technology-based economy, he noted, adding that these institutions are ready for, and well-suited for, this heighted responsibility.

“One of the things community colleges, and especially STCC, have is the ability to respond quickly and nimbly to changing needs within the community,” he explained. “If a community college partner says ‘we have a need,’ we can help with that assessment, and sometimes, in a short time, have a training program ready for them.”

Hot Spot

Returning to the matter of where his car will reside, Cook acknowledged, again, that his gesture was not intended to solve the problem.

“We’ve got creative an innovative ways to put that spot to better use,” he explained. “It’s one spot for our hundreds of staff and faculty and thousands, but it’s not much for me to park on Pearl Street and walk on over.”

By doing so, he gets to demonstrate his sensitivity to the issue, and, more importantly, do something he likes much more than answering questions: Asking them.

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

Millennials Are Committed to Building Retirement Savings

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RetirementFeature 0916b
Retirement Planning Sections

Taking a Long View

Siobhan Matty

Siobhan Matty says Millennials understand their financial challenges, from a shaky job market to high college debt to uncertainty about Social Security, and are planning for the future accordingly.

Older generations hold quite a few negative stereotypes about the youngest cohort in the workforce. If surveys and statistics are to be believed, however, Millennials may be doing better than their predecessors at getting an early start on retirement savings. Much of this is simply a response to a barrage of anxieties thrown their way, from skyrocketing college debt and a sluggish job market to the disappearance of pensions and uncertainty about Social Security. Increasingly, young professionals understand that building a secure retirement is their responsibility — and the sooner they start, the better.

“They’re quite aware of what they’re going through.”

David Bowie’s famous observation about young people from “Changes,” illuminating the generation gap he observed, is still applicable 45 years after the song was written.

Take, for example, the issue of saving for retirement. If the older generations have an image of Millennials — the generation now between ages 16 and 36, and numbering more than 75 million — as flighty and irresponsible with their financial strategy, the raw numbers tell a different story.

According to the Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies, in its 2016 survey titled “Perspectives on Retirement: Baby Boomers, Generation X, and Millennials,” today’s Millennials started saving for retirement at a median age of 22, and 72% are currently saving through a company-sponsored 401(k) or similar plan, or a plan outside the workplace.

Perhaps more strikingly, 40% of Millennials actually increased their contribution to a 401(k) or similar plan in the prior 12 months, compared to 30% of Gen-Xers.

The numbers don’t surprise Siobhan Matty, a Millennial herself who works with numerous clients in her peer group as a relationship manager at St. Germain Investments in Springfield. She says young professionals are anxious about the solvency of Social Security — according to the Transamerica Center survey, 81% of Millennials believe the entitlement will not be there where they retire — as well as a difficult job market, the near-disappearance of company pensions, and what happened to their parents’ savings in the financial crash of 2008.

Quite aware, indeed.

A keen interest in retirement savings, Matty said, “goes hand in hand with the anxiety about not having a pension or the Social Security income their parents or grandparents may have gotten. They understand they can’t necessarily rely on the government to secure that kind of funding in retirement.”

Jean Deliso, principal at Deliso Financial and Insurance Services in Agawam, said it helps to understand the unique burdens Millennials are strapped with.

“The job market is terrible,” she said. “They’ve got crazy educational costs; they’re coming out of college with more debt than ever. It’s like a mortgage. And that puts more pressure on them to wait on housing. I feel bad for them.”

Deliso also noted the issue of Social Security, and the prospect of it not being available to today’s young workers when they retire decades from now. But there’s a silver lining to this cynicism because it forces Millennials to think more deeply about what they need to do to secure their own future.

Millennials get a bad reputation for being slackers, for not particularly having a good work ethic. But they came out of college into a weak job market, and they understand the importance of establishing savings, or at least working toward that goal.”

“They say, ‘I need to think more about myself because Social Security is not going to be stable,’” she explained. “Plus, the companies their grandparents worked for, and maybe their parents, had pensions; they worked for 35 years, then got a pension, plus Social Security, and they were safe. But a pension is hard to come by anymore. Millennials have some real challenges. So, what should they do about it?”

To help answer that question, several investment experts spoke with BusinessWest about what a 20- and 30-somethings should be considering as they ponder a retirement that isn’t as far away as it may seem.

Savings First

Matty’s simplest advice is to save as much as possible. But that takes discipline, and is easier said than done.

The stock market may be prone to short-term volatility, she said, but young people can feel confident of the longer-term view when considering whether to invest.

“The other thing would just be contributing to whatever plan you have at work,” she said. “We don’t usually have pension plans available to us, so if you can do anything in your workplace to contribute to a plan, that’s important to establishing that savings habit. If you have a habit in place, it’s a lot easier to continue doing it.”

One benefit of automatic deductions is psychological, she noted. “If you don’t see it, you can’t touch it. Then, you can look at what you need to pay your debts. After that, work on what else you can safely put away, and make a budget for what you can spend. Luxuries are great, but that’s what they are, luxuries; they’re not necessities.”

Jean Deliso

Jean Deliso says a key savings strategy — not just for Millennials, but for everyone — is to “pay yourself first.”

Deliso said any financial plan for young people — or anyone, really — begins with one basic step: “pay yourself first.” In other words, savings should be the first expense to come out of one’s earnings.

“Get into an employer-sponsored plan as soon as possible,” she said, “and if there’s a match, get that match, so you’re not losing free money.” Another option would be to open an IRA, preferably with a Roth component ensuring that withdrawals later in life aren’t taxed.

Millennials understand the importance of these vehicles; according to the Transamerica Center survey, 55% of them expect such self-funded accounts to be their primary source of retirement income, and 75% would like more information from their employers on how to achieve their retirement goals.

Deliso noted that people don’t keep one job anymore, but may hold seven, 10, or even more over a lifetime, and it’s important to keep rolling employer-sponsored plans into new plans as they change jobs.

The next step, after contributing to retirement savings, is to determine what bills must be paid each month and what expenses can be trimmed, and that takes budgeting and self-control, she went on. “The bottom line, and the most important thing for Milliennials or anyone else, is to live within your means. Don’t take an apartment that takes 75% of your income. You want to have positive cash flow, because that allows you to have savings, and that brings financial success.”

List of Financial Services/Brokerage Firms in Western Mass.

Positive cash flow can begin with the simplest of steps, Deliso added, such as not spending $4 on coffee four times a week. “Put that $15 in your 401(k) plan. Put it in right from your paycheck, and you’ll never miss it. Say, ‘I’m going to pay for my future first.’ Many people’s greatest fear is that they’ll run out of money. You don’t know how long you’re going to live. But you can push that fear away if you plan accordingly.”

It shouldn’t be a hard sell, said Kate Kane, managing director and wealth management advisor with Northwestern Mutual, who cited research showing that 25- to 34-year-olds are cautious, yet confident, and, more importantly, future-focused and resourceful. So while investment professionals need to take into account their short-term goals and the challenges of their current financial situation — which often include significant college debt — they also need to demonstrate how solid planning can positively impact their life both now and years in the future.

A starting point, she noted, addresses how saving and planning begins with a budget and eliminating debt. Then, moving forward, they can address mid- and long-term goals.

“Since most Millennials came of age or began their careers at the time of the Great Recession,” Kane added, “they tend to be more financially risk-averse than previous generations and are very connected to the idea of planning as a means to manage risk.”

The debt issue is a key one, she added. According to Bankrate, just 40% of Americans age 18-29 pay off their entire credit-card bill each month, compared with 53% of those 30 and up. Some of that may be chalked up to experience: a survey by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority reveals that only 30% of older Millennials (ages 27 to 34) and just 18% of younger ones (ages 18 to 26) have an understanding of basic financial concepts, including how to manage their saving and spending.

Running Out of Time

To be sure, retirement savings are not a Millennial issue; they’re a problem for everyone. And ‘problem’ is the right word. According to a recent Economic Policy Institute survey, the median total retirement savings among the 56-61 age group is just $17,000. For the 50-55 group, it’s less than half that, $8,000. Americans simply aren’t saving enough — not even close. Millennials have a chance to start earlier and do a better job.

“Moreso than prior generations, Millennials experience more pressure to save,” Matty said. “Obviously, corporate pension plans don’t exist anymore, and there are questions as to whether Social Security will exist, or at what ages they’ll be able to take from it or how long they’ll need to work for it.”

But Millennials were also jolted by the crash of 2008, which occurred, for many of them, during their teen years. It was sobering for them, even though they weren’t yet in the work world, and established a foundation of mistrust in the entire economic system.

As a result, she said, Millennials are more likely than past generations to continue living at home into their mid- to late 20s — not because they’re lazy, but because they want to build a base of savings instead of piling more debt on top of their exorbitant college loans.

“It’s an interesting change,” Matty said. “Millennials get a bad reputation for being slackers, for not particularly having a good work ethic. But they came out of college into a weak job market, and they understand the importance of establishing savings, or at least working toward that goal.”

According to the Transamerica Center report, 22% of Millennials say they “frequently” discuss saving and planning for retirement with family and friends, compared with just 10% of Generation X and Baby Boomers — a counterintuitive statistic, to be sure. Indeed, starting the conversation too late has put many a 40-something worker — by now dealing with mortgages and college expenses for their own children — well behind the savings they need to achieve.

In this new world, Matty said, there’s no replacement for making — and sticking to — a plan.

“People don’t necessarily have the same career for 40 years anymore, and they don’t have the same pension they once had,” she reiterated. “In your mid-20s, you have 40 to 50 years to retirement. Start planning while time is on your side.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Arrha Credit Union Forges a Path of Smart Growth

By
Banking and Financial Services Sections

What’s in a Name?

Mike Ostrowski

Mike Ostrowski says Arrha’s new name and logo reflect the concepts of trust and strength, two qualities that appeal to its members.

When Springfield Teachers Credit Union, after almost 75 years of exclusively serving teachers, decided to extend membership to anyone who lives or works in Hampden, Hampshire, or Franklin county, the institution’s leaders, led by then-President and CEO Gary Fishlock, shortened the name to STCU Credit Union.

It wasn’t enough, Michael Ostrowski said.

When he took the reins from Fishlock as president and CEO in early 2011, STCU had been accepting non-teachers as members for almost a decade, and the move had proven to be a wise one, growing the institution’s assets. But the name still didn’t reflect the wider community, he told BusinessWest. So he pushed for a more dramatic rebranding.

“When I got here, the board of directors expected me to make this place grow and thrive, but I was still hearing from lenders and staff that people thought you had to be a teacher to be a member,” he said. “They understood we needed a name change to better reflect what was going on.”

So STCU enlisted Cardinale Design, a Ludlow-based creative marketing firm, to rebrand the company. After considering dozens of possibilities, the leadership decided on Arrha, one of the oldest English words, meaning “money or other valuable things given to evidence a contract; a pledge in earnest.”

“It’s absolutely perfect,” Ostrowski said of the name change, which became official last year. “It says exactly what we do. I’m surprised no one picked up this name sooner. It’s an odd name, edgy, but not over the edge, and that’s what we wanted — something memorable, describable, but not over the top.”

The new logo — a stylized pyramid — is intended to convey strength and power over time, while its purple color reflects wealth, leadership, and trustworthiness. “These were all words that came back on member surveys. And ‘trust’ is one of the biggest words in banking. You have to trust where your money is,” he said.

“We want to tell a story,” he added, “and this is a great way to tell the story.”

It’s a story that begins at the dawn of the Great Depression, when many sector-specific credit unions planted roots. In 1929, 31 teachers — perhaps sensing the rough economic waters ahead — pooled their resources in an attempt to ensure their financial security. They named their institution the Springfield Teachers Credit Union and incorporated in late 1929 with just $2,160 in total assets.

For many years, the credit union operated out of a Commerce High School classroom, then purchased property on State Street in downtown Springfield. Again outgrowing its space, it purchased property on Industry Avenue in 1988 and moved its operations there the following year.

“They started in a room in Commerce and combined their assets and petitioned the government,” Ostrowski said, pointing to the original state charter hanging on his office wall. “My job is to protect that charter.”

From those roots has risen one of the larger credit unions in the region, with $127 million in assets, more than 11,000 members, three branches — in Springfield, Hadley, and the just-opened office in West Springfield — and an eye toward further growth driven by an ever-increasing public awareness of the role of credit unions in an age of big-bank consolidation.

Fueling His Fire

Ostrowski is a veteran of the region’s financial scene, but his lengthy career in banking came about by accident. He was fresh out of Springfield College, pumping gas on the Mass Pike, when Bud Doble, then president of United Co-operative Bank, pulled up. They chatted a bit, and something in Ostrowski’s demeanor impressed Dobel, who handed the young man a business card and asked him to call him. Ostrowski did, and was offered a job as a management trainee.

The problem was, he was making more money at the pump than the bank initially offered. When he told his father, the elder Ostrowski explained the difference between a job and a career, and told him to take the plunge.

As careers in banking go, it’s been a wide-ranging one, including stints at Ludlow Savings Bank, Multibank, and Pioneer Financial Co-operative Bank. He also spent nine years as vice president and chief lending officer at Freedom Credit Union in Springfield, and, more recently, senior vice president of lending at Barre Savings Bank.

With that much experience in what could collectively be called community banks, he knows a thing or two about what draws customers to those institutions, as opposed to, say the Bank of America or Santander type of institution. And credit unions like Arrha, he said, fill a similar role, though they have historically been “the best-kept secret in the Pioneer Valley.”

Still, the benefits are obvious to Ostrowski. “Our motto is ‘people helping people’ so our rates for loans are typically lower than at a bank, and deposit rates are higher,” he explained, noting that not having to answer to stockholders gives Arrha more freedom in those areas. “But we have our own difficulties — banks can go out and sell more stock to raise capital; we have to earn it on the job, which is a lot more difficult.”

But their ability to balance robust lending power with a community atmosphere is becoming more evident as so many smaller banks in the Northeast continue to merge with larger institutions, most recently Westfield Savings Bank’s acquisition of Chicopee Savings Bank.

“So many small, mutual banks that started in Massachusetts — Chicopee Savings, Ludlow Savings, Barre Savings — are gone now,” he said. “They were all great, small hometown banks where people went and trusted. Now they’re being taken over. Hopefully, Arrha is filling that void.”

Room to Grow

Most of Arrha’s programs are targeted at retail consumers, but the credit union plans to hire someone in the next six months to oversee an expansion of what, up to now, has been a limited portfolio of commercial loans. Like many credit unions, it sees plenty of opportunity in the small to mid-sized business customers that the larger banks neglect in their pursuit of $4 million and $5 million accounts.

“That’s not who we are,” Ostrowski said. “That’s not our niche. We want to help the smaller person succeed, with car loans, personal loans, student loans … we do excellent at home mortgages, with the lowest closing costs and rates in the Greater Springfield area. We have checking accounts that are dirt-cheap and don’t rip anyone off with fees. We’ve built a good foundation on those things.”

The foundation is fertile soil, he said, to grow the commercial-lending side over the next few years.

“We’re doing really well. We want to expand, but in this day and age, that’s very difficult. Do you build branches or build software? We want to have a few branches, but we don’t want to be inundated with buildings. Everything is electronic, and that’s where the money is, but we still need a physical presence, a few locations. Overall, the bank is very healthy and thriving.”

That progress puts Arrha at a sort of crossroads, he went on, but one marked by opportunity.

“We want to fill the void of the small, mutual savings banks people loved to go to. I’m positive we are doing that, but whether we can sustain it over the next five or six years and keep up with the Bank of Americas, that’s to be determined. I think we can find our niche, though. We always do.”

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]

Pioneer Valley Montessori Receives MassMutual Foundation Grant

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Pioneer Valley Montessori School (PVMS), a not-for-profit organization cultivating children’s natural desire to learn, has received a $10,000 grant from MassMutual Foundation Inc. PVMS is one of only 17 organizations nationally to receive an award as part of a national Community Service Award (CSA) program. The MassMutual Foundation made the grant as a tribute to the volunteer efforts of Erik Skar, financial professional with Charter Oak Insurance and Financial Services Co.

“Our Community Service Awards program aims to encourage and recognize those financial professionals who are active members of their community,” said Alison Mathias, MassMutual’s director of Charitable Giving and vice president of the MassMutual Foundation. “Erik’s volunteer work reflects our steadfast commitment to supporting organizations in the communities where MassMutual financial professionals live and work.”

Skar, who currently serves as president on PVMS’s board of directors, has dedicated countless hours of his time and talent to help the school grow and flourish. His passion and advocacy for the mission of PVMS inspires others to do the same. He has championed the efforts of the staff and volunteers, and has done everything for the organization from strategic planning to maintaining the facility to directing traffic at events.

“I am delighted that my work with PVMS has been recognized by the MassMutual Foundation,” Skar said. “This grant will provide much-needed funding to continue its improvement efforts after the tornado of 2011.”

PVMS provides Montessori early childhood and elementary education to children between the ages of 18 months and 12 years. The school enrolls students from 21 towns in Massachusetts and Connecticut, with approximately half of its students living in the city of Springfield. PVMS will put MassMutual’s grant to work by providing permanent shade structures to replace the trees it lost in the 2011 tornado, and to replace flooring and security doors.

Cocchi: The Clear Choice for Sheriff

By
Opinion

As a general rule, BusinessWest does not routinely endorse candidates for political office like daily newspapers do. We do so when we think a race is so consequential that our voice should be heard.

And that is the case in the upcoming race for Hampden County Sheriff. This is a vitally important contest for the Greater Springfield area, and for many reasons. Chief among them is the fact that this election will decide a new sheriff for the first time in more than four decades. More importantly, though, it will decide who will be given the unenviable task of trying to fill the shoes of the office-holder since 1977 — Michael Ashe.

This past March, BusinessWest presented Sheriff Ashe with its coveted Difference Makers award (he’s the first politician to be so honored) for his work to revolutionize corrections and put the focus on rehabilitating prisoners, not simply warehousing them. These efforts have brightened the fortunes of those prisoners, the business community (many companies are currently employing such individuals), and area cities and towns alike by making their streets safer.

It is imperative that these programs are continued and that the tremendous sense of momentum in the Hampden County correctional system be maintained.

And for that reason, we strongly endorse Nick Cocchi, the deputy chief of security at the Hampden County’s Sheriff’s office and a 23-year veteran of that department in next month’s Democratic primary. He has helped Sheriff Ashe stay on the cutting edge of correctional rehabilitation, and he is by far the best candidate to continue this tradition.

… we strongly endorse Nick Cocchi, the deputy chief of security at the Hampden County’s Sheriff’s office and a 23-year veteran of that department in next month’s Democratic primary. He has helped Sheriff Ashe stay on the cutting edge of correctional rehabilitation, and he is by far the best candidate to continue this tradition.

We endorse Cocchi not only because of his managerial skill set but also because of his competition, especially his opponents in the Democratic primary, who are simply career politicians looking for more power, a fatter paycheck, and a much bigger pension.

This is especially true of former Springfield Mayor Michael J. Albano, currently on the Governor’s Council, an individual who certainly should not be trusted with running a correctional system with an $80 million budget, 1,000 employees, and up to 1,800 inmates.

The last time he was trusted with such responsibility, he sent the City of Springfield into receivership and a deep state of decline that required a decade to fix, not to mention many of his appointees and closest confidants going to prison in the process.

We find it ironic that Albano is demanding — and decrying a lack of — transparency, accountability, and honesty from that sheriff’s department as he campaigns. Sadly, those were qualities sorely absent from his mayoral administration, and the city paid an enormous price for his failed leadership.

The talents most required of the sheriff are those of hiring a competent team and then providing the leadership to manage it. Albano has shown that he is incapable of either.

Meanwhile, Springfield City Councilor Tom Ashe, no relation to the current sheriff, has shown that there’s seemingly no seat he won’t seek — whether he’s qualified for it or not, with the latter usually being the case, especially in this instance.

Ashe also needs to explain the child support and tax levies listed in his campaign account. If he can’t manage his own financial affairs, how can he be trusted to manage our correctional system? If accurate, these tax and child support levies disqualify Tom Ashe from being sheriff because there are or have been inmates serving time for doing exactly that — not paying child support.

As we said, Cocchi is the clear choice for Hampden County sheriff. We cannot leave the public’s safety to an unqualified career politician who will only have their own interests in mind. That’s why Sheriff Michael Ashe has endorsed Cocchi, and we wholeheartedly agree that he is the best person to serve as our next sheriff.

MCAD Gets Entrusted with ‘Sex,’ ‘Gender,’ and Other Key Issues

By
Employment Sections

Defining Issues

By Peter Vickery

Peter Vickery

Peter Vickery

At the end of June, the Mass. Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) was the subject of a report by the state auditor that criticized the agency’s delays, accounting practices, and security controls. Nevertheless, in July the Legislature decided to entrust the MCAD with the task of drafting rules and regulations around the Act Relative to Transgender Discrimination (commonly, and somewhat disparagingly, known as the Bathroom Bill).

But it chose not to make the MCAD the starting point for complaints under the new Pay Equity Act. Both pieces of legislation will affect employers in Western Mass., as would any changes the MCAD makes to its operating procedures in response to the audit report. But first, an overview of a recent decision from the agency’s Boston office that may influence the way employers across the commonwealth handle temporary disabilities.

MCAD & Carta v. Wingate Healthcare Inc.

The MCAD recently awarded a formerly full-time employee $25,000 for emotional distress in part because her employer had done such a good job of accommodating her need to work part-time. When the employer argued that keeping a part-time employee in a job that needed a full timer was an undue hardship, the hearing officer pointed to the fact that the company had coped well enough for five months and could show no loss of revenue or operational burden. The employer may regret having accommodated the disability so effectively.

One might think that the MCAD would want employers to create financially viable workarounds and reward them — or at least not punish them — for providing reasonable accommodations that do not hurt the bottom line. Instead, if this case is anything to go by, an employer’s success in accommodating a temporary disability can count as a strike against it.

The case, MCAD and Carta v. Wingate Health Care Inc., is the decision of a single hearing officer, not the full commission, but it provides insight into the agency’s thinking.

Cecelia Carta was the admissions coordinator for Wingate Healthcare. During 2010, she was off work for health reasons for one week in August and then from September to December. She returned to work part-time Dec. 6, working four hours a day, initially three days a week and later four days a week. On May 12, 2011, Wingate terminated Carta’s employment, telling her that the company needed a full-time admissions coordinator.

They asked her stay in touch and suggested she apply for her old job if and when she could return to full-time work. But they had not warned her (or, rather, presented no evidence that they had warned her) that unless she returned to full time she would be let go. This was an important omission.

Perhaps the HR people were worried that if they told Carta that the company really needed a full-time admissions coordinator as opposed to a part-time one, their words could be construed as in some way discriminatory. Whatever their reason, the lack of notice carried a price tag of $25,000.

The hearing officer did not order Wingate to pay lost wages because Carta had received $116,000 in workers compensation and $181,000 from two injury-related lawsuits. But Carta was entitled to $25,000 for the emotional distress of being terminated without having been warned that her employer would like her to resume work on a full-time basis some time in the not too distant future.

Why did Wingate terminate Carta? The company’s decision-makers seem to have thought that the medical documentation put them on solid ground. After all, at the end of April, Carta’s primary care physician had cleared her to return to full-time work “from a medical perspective.” The doctor deferred to her orthopedic surgeon for orthopedic clearance, and the May 10 orthopedic opinion stated no date for a return to full-time work.

After accommodating the disability for five months, and with no medical opinion showing that Carta could ever return to full-time work, plus the knowledge that Massachusetts anti-discrimination law does not require an employer to keep a disabled employee’s job open indefinitely, Wingate’s decision seems reasonable. But the hearing officer deemed the termination precipitate.

How long should Wingate have continued to employ Carta part-time? According to the MCAD:

“At the very least, [Carta] should have been permitted to complete her physical therapy over the course of the next month, and if then there was no definitive prognosis for improvement, and no anticipated return to full duty, [Wingate’s] obligation to continue providing an accommodation in the form of a part-time schedule would likely have ceased.”

Terminating Carta in the month of May rather than waiting until June cost Wingate $25,000.

State Auditor’s Report

Just before the Fourth of July holiday, the state auditor published an official report on the MCAD. In addition to noting the commission’s four-year backlog and revealing the usual, garden-variety problems that bedevil state agencies (e.g. mismanagement, inefficiency, and poor book-keeping) it confirms a long-harbored suspicion: The MCAD asserts jurisdiction where it has none.

The statute that governs the MCAD clearly states: “Any complaint filed pursuant to this section must be so filed within 300 days after the alleged act of discrimination.” Nevertheless, the state auditor’s report reveals that in the three-year period of the audit (2012-2015) the MCAD processed more than 100 cases where it lacked subject matter jurisdiction because the applicable statute of limitations had run its course:

“[D]uring our audit period, MCAD accepted 123 complaints beyond the 300-day timeframe for complainants to file their complaints. MCAD regulations allow for this 300-day timeframe to be extended under certain conditions, but there was no documentation in the case files to substantiate that any of these complaints met those conditions.”

Out of curiosity I asked the state auditor’s office how they determined this fact. It turns out they simply had to review the data in the MCAD’s case-management system. Perhaps if the MCAD confined itself to cases over which it does have jurisdiction, it would not have a four-year backlog. In any event, employers charged with discrimination should check the calendar and take steps to preserve their objections on the grounds of late filing. Having the case dismissed on jurisdictional grounds may offer little consolation if the dismissal only occurs after four years of investigation.

Act Relative to Transgender Discrimination

This is the statute that opponents dubbed the Bathroom Bill. After much brouhaha, the Legislature passed it and Gov. Baker signed it into law. It provides:

“An owner, lessee, proprietor, manager, superintendent, agent, or employee of any place of public accommodation, resort, or amusement that lawfully segregates or separates access to such place of public accommodation, or a portion of such place of public accommodation, based on a person’s sex shall grant all persons admission to, and the full enjoyment of, such place of public accommodation or portion thereof consistent with the person’s gender identity” (emphasis added).

So what exactly is gender identity? The statute defines it as follows: “‘Gender identity’ shall mean a person’s gender-related identity, appearance or behavior, whether or not that gender-related identity, appearance or behavior is different from that traditionally associated with the person’s physiology or assigned sex at birth.”

Perhaps aware that the foregoing does little more than restate the term “gender identity” rather than actually defining it, and mindful of the potentially ticklish nature of proving any given individual’s gender identity, the Legislature chose to delegate the task of crafting evidentiary standards to a state agency. It selected one with an imaginative and expansive approach to statutory definitions, namely the MCAD. The report is due Sept. 1.

Pay Equity Act

Together with the Act Relative to Transgender Discrimination, the Legislature enacted the Pay Equity Act, which prohibits employers from discriminating upon the basis of gender. The previous statute declared that “no employer shall discriminate in any way in the payment of wages as between the sexes.” The new version provides: “No employer shall discriminate in any way on the basis of gender in the payment of wages.” So out with ‘sex’ and in with ‘gender.’

But isn’t gender the same as sex? No, not any more (see below).

As well as differing from the old equal-pay statute, the new law also differs from the Fair Employment Practices Act (Chapter 151B). Unlike employees bringing complaints under Chapter 151B, employees who wish to charge their employers with violations of the pay-equity statute will not have to start at the MCAD. They can go straight to court. Another novelty is that the new law encourages employers to conduct regular reviews of their pay practices.

If an employee sues, and the employer can show that it undertook a good faith self-evaluation of pay practices within the preceding three years (and made progress in remedying any discrepancies) it will have an affirmative defense. With an affirmative defense, the burden is on the party raising it, i.e. the employer. So with an eye to future lawsuits, employers may wish to keep in mind the need for persuasive evidence sufficient to prove that the good-faith evaluation took place.

But what exactly does the law prohibit? It forbids pay discrimination on the basis of gender, a word the Legislature chose not to define and whose legal meaning has changed over the past 20 years.

In 1996 the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit was saying nothing controversial, let alone heretical, when it held that in Title VII cases the words ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ were interchangeable. Although the court observed that “some academic writers” were asserting “that ‘gender’ connotes cultural or attitudinal characteristics distinctive to the sexes, as opposed to their physical characteristics” and that the distinction might be useful “for some purposes,” it decided to stick with the practice of treating ‘gender’ as a synonym for ‘biological sex.’

A dozen years later, the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit took a more flexible approach, noting that “gender, to some people, is a fluid concept.” After acknowledging that gender is “rooted in science and means sex — male or female — based on biology (chromosomes, genitalia)” the court noted that “the usage of the word is changing in some circles as a result of social and ideological movements that find the scientific meaning to be unsatisfactory or not sufficiently inclusive.” That usage is catching on.

Last year, Judge Mastroianni of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts stated that the statutory prohibition against discrimination “on the basis of sex” prohibits discrimination not only on the basis of “biological sex” but also on the basis of a “gender identity.”

As authority for this proposition he cited a First Circuit Court of Appeals decision from 2002 and a Supreme Court decision from 1989 that used the words ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ as synonyms, concluding that by using the words interchangeably those courts had interpreted ‘sex’ to encompass ‘gender identity.’ Of course, using the words interchangeably had led the Fourth Circuit to precisely the opposite conclusion, i.e. that the word ‘gender’ had its scientific meaning, namely biological sex. But that was way, way back in 1996.

Nowadays law must pay less heed to science, with its pettifogging attention to such trifles as chromosomes and genitalia, and more to the “social and ideological movements” that deem the scientific terminology “not sufficiently inclusive.” Therefore, so far as the judges are concerned, if a statute says that it prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex (a matter of biology) what the statute really prohibits is discrimination on the basis of gender (a matter of identity).

And what of a pay-equity statute prohibiting discrimination on the basis of gender (not sex); what does it forbid? We shall have to wait and see.

Peter Vickery practices employment law in Amherst; (413) 549-9933.

Briefcase

By
Briefcase Departments

Governor Signs Bipartisan Pay-equity Legislation

BOSTON — Gov. Charlie Baker signed a bipartisan pay equity bill last week, passed unanimously by both legislative branches, to ensure equal pay for comparable work for all Massachusetts workers and equal opportunities to earn competitive salaries in the workplace. The governor was joined by Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito, Senate President Stanley Rosenberg, Speaker of the House Robert DeLeo, Treasurer Deb Goldberg, State Auditor Suzanne Bump, state Sen. Patricia Jehlen, state Rep. Ellen Story, state Rep. Patricia Haddad, and members of the Legislature at a signing ceremony in the State House to enact S.2119, An Act to Establish Pay Equity, which will go into effect on July 1, 2018 for Commonwealth employers and employees. “I am pleased to sign bipartisan legislation to create a more level playing field in the Commonwealth and ensure that everyone has the opportunity to earn a competitive salary for comparable work,” Baker said. “I thank the Legislature for unanimously passing this bill and working closely with the business community to support women and families across the state.” Added Polito, “this legislation is an important step toward advancing more equal, inclusive, and thriving workplaces throughout the Commonwealth for women and families.” The new law will prevent pay discrimination for comparable work based on gender. The bill allows employees to freely discuss their salaries with coworkers, prohibits employers from requiring applicants to provide their salary history before receiving a formal job offer, and authorizes the attorney general to issue regulations interpreting and applying the expanded law. Under the new law, employers are permitted to take certain attributes of an employee or applicant into account when determining variation in pay, including their work experience, education, job training, or measurements of production, sales, or revenue. “This new law is an important step toward ensuring economic security for Massachusetts women and families. It makes vital updates that reflect our modern economy and balance the needs of workers and the business community,” said Attorney General Maura Healey, adding that “pay equity is not only a women’s issue, it’s a family issue, and with this new law on the books, we are closer to closing the pay gap in our state.” The statute of limitations laid out currently under the equal-pay statute will be expanded from one to three years, and employees will no longer be required to pursue a general claim of intentional discrimination at the Massachusetts Commission against Discrimination before filing a separate equal-pay claim in court.

ABA Bringing Franchise to Springfield This Fall

SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Sting will be the first American Basketball Assoc. (ABA) team to call Springfield, the birthplace of basketball, its home when it commences play in November. The organization will boast top talent from the Greater Springfield area and beyond. The Sting will join the ABA’s Northeast Division for the start of the 2016-17 season, alongside teams in Boston, Providence, New York, Long Island, and New Jersey. The franchise will be owned by Zach Baru of Longmeadow. Baru’s past experience in sports and entertainment includes the Springfield Spirit of the National Women’s Basketball League, the Greater Springfield Pro-Am Basketball League, the Springfield Falcons of the American Hockey League, and the Miami Dolphins of the National Football League. Dr. Steven Sobel has been hired as the team’s first general manager and head coach. Sobel, a former Division II star at the University of Hartford, has spent more than 40 years coaching collegiate and professional basketball teams and players. During the offseason, he helms the Springfield Slamm of the Greater Hartford Pro-Am Basketball League. Sobel is also a nationally recognized motivational speaker and author of The Good Times Handbook: Your Guide to Positive Living and Exciting Life. “We are excited to bring professional basketball back to the city of Springfield. With Dr. Sobel at the helm, and potential supporters already reaching out, the possibilities for success here in the community are endless,” Baru said.

Free Legal Assistance Available to Small Businesses

SPRINGFIELD — The Western New England University Small Business Legal Clinic is now accepting applications from entrepreneurs and small-business owners seeking legal assistance for the fall 2016 semester. Under faculty supervision, law students assist clients with legal issues, including choice of entity, employment policies, contract drafting, regulatory compliance, and intellectual-property issues relating to trademark applications and copyright. This is a free service available to local businesses that would not otherwise have the resources to obtain these types of services. The Small Business Clinic at Western New England School of Law has assisted more than 300 small businesses. By using the clinic’s services, businesses can avoid problems by getting legal issues addressed early and correctly. It also provides students with an opportunity to get real-world experience. The Small Business Legal Clinic asks small-business owners to submit their applications by Monday, Aug. 15. Applications received after that date will be considered if additional resources are available. Students will begin providing services in September. For more information, call the clinic at (413) 782-1469 or e-mail [email protected].

Governor Signs Bipartisan Pay-equity Legislation

By
Daily News

BOSTON — Gov. Charlie Baker signed a bipartisan pay equity bill yesterday, passed unanimously by both legislative branches, to ensure equal pay for comparable work for all Massachusetts workers and equal opportunities to earn competitive salaries in the workplace.

The governor was joined by Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito, Senate President Stanley Rosenberg, Speaker of the House Robert DeLeo, Treasurer Deb Goldberg, State Auditor Suzanne Bump, state Sen. Patricia Jehlen, state Rep. Ellen Story, state Rep. Patricia Haddad, and members of the Legislature at a signing ceremony in the State House to enact S.2119, An Act to Establish Pay Equity, which will go into effect on July 1, 2018 for Commonwealth employers and employees.

“I am pleased to sign bipartisan legislation to create a more level playing field in the Commonwealth and ensure that everyone has the opportunity to earn a competitive salary for comparable work,” Baker said. “I thank the Legislature for unanimously passing this bill and working closely with the business community to support women and families across the state.”

Added Polito, “this legislation is an important step toward advancing more equal, inclusive, and thriving workplaces throughout the Commonwealth for women and families. We thank the Legislature for their collaboration with the Commonwealth’s employers and their commitment to creating more opportunities for Massachusetts skilled workforce.”

The new law will prevent pay discrimination for comparable work based on gender. The bill allows employees to freely discuss their salaries with coworkers, prohibits employers from requiring applicants to provide their salary history before receiving a formal job offer, and authorizes the attorney general to issue regulations interpreting and applying the expanded law.

Under the new law, employers are permitted to take certain attributes of an employee or applicant into account when determining variation in pay, including their work experience, education, job training, or measurements of production, sales, or revenue.

“This new law is an important step toward ensuring economic security for Massachusetts women and families. It makes vital updates that reflect our modern economy and balance the needs of workers and the business community,” said Attorney General Maura Healey, adding that “pay equity is not only a women’s issue, it’s a family issue, and with this new law on the books, we are closer to closing the pay gap in our state.”

The statute of limitations laid out currently under the equal-pay statute will be expanded from one to three years, and employees will no longer be required to pursue a general claim of intentional discrimination at the Massachusetts Commission against Discrimination before filing a separate equal-pay claim in court.

Briefcase

By
Briefcase Departments

UMass Vaults to Top 30 in Patents Awarded in 2015

BOSTON — In the latest display of its R&D firepower, the University of Massachusetts vaulted to 30th globally in the Top 100 Worldwide Universities Granted U.S. Patents in 2015. Winning a record 62 U.S. patents arising out of faculty inventions, UMass placed third in Massachusetts and New England and was tied for 24th place among American universities. “Our faculty continues to shine with cutting-edge research and innovation that places us in the top tier of universities in the world. They lead us to new frontiers of human understanding, and their work opens the door to a more prosperous economic future,” President Marty Meehan said. “We’re proud of this accomplishment because today’s patent is tomorrow’s job-creating startup technology company.” The patents awarded are based on UMass research in areas as diverse as gene silencing, high-technology textiles, polymers, and nanotechnology, according to Abigail Barrow, interim executive director of the university’s Office of Technology Commercialization and Ventures. The 62 patents represent a 55% increase over the 40 awarded to UMass in the previous year and is the highest number issued in a single calendar year since UMass began its technology-transfer program in 1995, she added. UMass is also a national leader among universities in licensing income earned on its patented inventions. “Congratulations to the University of Massachusetts for making the Top 100 again this year and for an impressive increase,” said Paul Sanberg, president of the National Academy of Inventors, which produces the rankings along with the Intellectual Property Owners Assoc. One of the UMass patents relates to Geckskin, a super-strong adhesive discovered at UMass Amherst that can be used multiple times without losing effectiveness. This year’s top 10 ranked universities worldwide were: the University of California system, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, the University of Texas, Tsinghua University (China), California Institute of Technology, Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University, and University of Michigan. The rankings are calculated using data from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. UMass is on pace to match or modestly exceed its record 62 patents in the next report, Barrow said. “Our impressive patent numbers reflect the rapid growth and influence of UMass’ research enterprise and the discovery going on at all of our campuses.” UMass shares the number-30 spot with the University of Utah Research Foundation and the Research Foundation of the State University of New York. The National Academy of Inventors is a nonprofit organization of U.S. and international universities and governmental and nonprofit research institutions with more than 3,000 members. The Intellectual Property Owners Assoc. is a trade association of owners of patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets. This is the fourth year they have collaborated to issue the rankings report.

Springfield Regional Chamber Seeks Super 60 Nominations

SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Regional Chamber is seeking nominations for its annual Super 60 awards program. Now in its 27th year, the awards program celebrates the success of the fastest-growing privately owned businesses in the region, which continue to make significant contributions to the strength of the regional economy. Each year, the program identifies the top-performing companies in revenue growth and total revenue. Last year, total-revenue winners combined for revenues of more than $1 billion, with only-third of winners exceeding revenues of $30 million. All winners in the revenue-growth category had growth in excess of 20% while one-third experienced growth in excess of 65%. To be considered, companies must be based in Hampden or Hampshire county or be a member of the Springfield Regional Chamber, produce revenues of at least $1 million in the last fiscal year, be an independent and privately owned company, and have been in business for at least three full years. Companies are selected based on their percentage of revenue growth over a full three-year period or total revenues for the latest fiscal year. Companies may be nominated by financial institutions, attorneys, or accountants, or be self-nominated. Companies must submit a nomination form and provide net operating revenue figures for the last three full fiscal years, signed and verified by an independent auditor. All financial information must be reported under generally accepted accounting principles and will be held and considered confidential and not released without prior approval. Nomination forms are available here or by contacting Kara Cavanaugh at [email protected] or (413) 755-1310. Nominations must be submitted no later than Friday, Aug. 12. The Super 60 awards will be presented in partnership with the East of the River Five Town Chamber of Commerce at the annual luncheon and recognition program on Friday, Oct. 28 from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at Chez Josef in Agawam.

Springfield Launches Futurecity Massachusetts

SPRINGFIELD — On Friday, July 15, the Springfield Central Cultural District (SCCD) will be one of three statewide districts to launch Futurecity Massachusetts, a new approach to transforming cities that puts art, culture, and creativity at the center of redevelopment and revitalization. Futurecity Mass is a joint initiative of the Massachusetts Cultural Council (MCC) and the Boston Foundation. Futurecity Massachusetts will work with mayors, urban planners, and arts and business leaders in Boston, Worcester, and Springfield on key real-estate projects in state-designated cultural districts in the three cities, targeting areas ready for development and job growth. It is the first U.S. effort to advance the strategies of Mark Davy and his London-based Futurecity, which has created more than 200 partnerships across the globe that reposition cultural assets from community amenities to marketplace drivers. Futurecity has been immersed in cultural placemaking projects for more than a decade, and Davy believes Futurecity Massachusetts will secure the Commonwealth’s global position as a cultural leader. Davy will visit Springfield on July 15 to meet and workshop with local cultural and economic-development leaders. He will take knowledge from a walking tour of the Cultural District, an extensive workshop, and a general reception back to his UK team to review. In October, Futurecity will return to present a strategy to the Springfield public. The MCC hopes to eventually expand the program statewide. A press event will take place at 9:30 a.m. on Friday with Davy, MCC Executive Director Anita Walker, Mayor Domenic Sarno, and SCCD Executive Director Morgan Drewniany on the steps of City Hall. Both press and the general public are invited to attend. The Springfield Central Cultural District, which encompasses an area of the metro center of Springfield, is membership-based, involving many of the downtown arts institutions. Its mission is to create and sustain a vibrant cultural environment in Springfield.

Local Business Volunteers Bring JA to Fairview School

CHICOPEE — Junior Achievement of Western Massachusetts (JA) and 33 volunteers from area banks, businesses, and colleges teamed up to bring Junior Achievement programs to all 436 students at Fairview School in Chicopee for last month’s JA in a Day event. “This is the sixth year that Chicopee Savings Bank Foundation has sponsored JA in a Day for these students,” noted Jennifer Connolly, president of Junior Achievement of Western Massachusetts. “The students and teachers look forward to ending their year with JA, and Junior Achievement looks forward to ending our year with this terrific school. Nowhere else are our JA Volunteers treated to a final assembly with hundreds of cheering students and handmade cards and notes. It is an amazing event.” This year, JA volunteers from Chicopee Savings Bank, Bank of America, Santander Bank, Westfield Bank, Webster Bank, TD Bank, Babson Capital, Elms College, UMass Amherst, and Lead Yourself Youth brought Junior Achievement programs to students in grades K-5 at Fairview School. Carlos DeLeon, a Chicopee Savings Bank volunteer, noted, “the students had a good understanding of how a city runs. They had a great understanding of a savings account, and we talked about how taxes help the city rebuild.” Erika Eisnor, a Santander volunteer who taught JA Our Region in a fourth-grade class, noted that “JA is so much fun and a great learning experience.” Added Kidon Gebersadik from Bank of America, “it’s never too early to learn about good money habits. These exceptional students are learning about building blocks that will lead to more stable financial lives down the road, making our communities and local economies stronger.” Tim Dominick, a teacher at Fairview School, explained that the program “further offered the students a chance to explore their creative thinking process. The students benefited from the teamwork and problem solving the program offered.” JA programs empower students to make a connection between what they learn in school and how it can be applied in the real world, enhancing the relevance of their classroom learning and increasing their understanding of the value of staying in school. Each year, JA reaches more than 10 million students worldwide and helps them develop successful financial-management habits, empowering them to explore the potential of becoming an entrepreneur and providing them with the skills necessary to succeed in a global workforce. Locally, Junior Achievement of Western Massachusetts reaches more than 11,000 students.

Baker Signs Transgender Anti-discrimination Law

BOSTON — Gov. Charlie Baker signed into law an anti-discrimination bill, previously passed by the state House and Senate, that gives transgender people the right to use public restrooms and locker rooms consistent with their gender identities, regardless of their sex at birth. The Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination will adopt policies to enforce its provisions, a statement from the governor’s office said. “No one should be discriminated against in Massachusetts because of their gender identity,” Baker said, according to CNN. “This compromise legislation extends additional protections to the Commonwealth’s transgender community, and includes language to address the public-safety concerns expressed by some by requiring the attorney general to issue regulations to protect against people abusing the law.”

Area Business Leaders to Head to Capitol Hill

SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Regional Chamber will hold its biannual Washington Symposium on September 21-23 hosted by U.S. Rep. Richard Neal. This popular event brings the region’s business leaders to Washington, D.C. to listen to and question some of the country’s most influential leaders, including members of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, top federal policy makers, and members of the Obama Administration in its last months in office. Past speakers have included political strategist Stan Greenberg, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, U.S. Rep. John Lewis, U.S. Sen. Edward Markey, House Ways and Means Chair David Camp, U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisors Jason Furman, and Ireland’s Ambassador to the U.S. Anne Anderson. Registrations are limited and include air transportation, airport parking, hotel transfers, hotel accommodations at the Phoenix Park Hotel within walking distance to the Capitol, breakfast and lunch each day, and welcome and closing evening receptions. The reservation deadline is Friday, Aug. 5, and no refunds will be granted after that date. The all-inclusive cost is $1,395 (single) or $1,270 (per person, double occupancy) if made by Friday, July 15. Reservations made after July 15 will increase to $1,495 (single) or $1,370 (per person, double occupancy). Sponsorship opportunities are also available and include complimentary attendance. For reservations or more information, visit www.springfieldregionalchamber.com or e-mail Nancy Creed at [email protected].

BTCF HousingUs Initiative Issues RFP

SHEFFIELD — Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation’s HousingUs initiative is soliciting proposals from nonprofits, community organizations, and public agencies to plan and convene outreach activities that bring residents together to explore the interrelated issues of affordable housing, economic development, and town-center vitality. Grants of up to $10,000 will be available for projects that result in action-oriented community-development strategies or create broader public awareness of the elements of healthy and resilient communities, including the availability of affordable housing. Only collaborative proposals with one lead applicant and at least one other partner will be considered. Organizations serving Berkshire County, Mass.; Columbia County and Northeast Dutchess County, N.Y.; and Northwest Litchfield County, Conn., are eligible. The deadline for submitting proposals is Friday, Aug. 26. For more information, visit www.berkshiretaconic.org/housingus.

AMA Recognizes Benefits of Paid Sick Leave

CHICAGO — The American Medical Assoc. (AMA) recently adopted new policy recognizing the public-health benefits of paid sick leave and other discretionary time off. Citing a growing body of evidence that lack of access to paid sick leave results in the spread of infectious diseases, as well as delayed screenings, diagnoses, and treatment, the new AMA policies support paid sick leave, as well as unpaid sick leave, for employees to care for themselves or a family member. “With both dual-earner and single-parent households on the rise in the United States, it is increasingly challenging for workers to juggle family and work,” said former AMA board chair Dr. Barbara McAneny. “Workers without paid sick days are more likely to work sick and are more likely to delay needed medical care, which can lead to prolonged illness and worsen otherwise minor health issues. Lack of paid leave also has a ripple effect across a worker’s family. Paid sick leave has been shown to aid children’s health, shorten hospital stays, and reduce the risk of disease transmission by allowing parents to stay home with sick children. Paid sick leave keeps our homes, offices, and communities healthier while ensuring the family’s economic security.” The U.S. is the only industrialized nation without a federal family-leave law that guarantees workers may receive pay while taking time to care for themselves or their family. Although the Family and Medical Leave Act mandates that companies provide leave, the law does not require that it be paid. The AMA also reaffirmed existing policy supporting voluntary leave policies that provide employees with job security and the continued availability of health-plan benefits in the event that leave becomes necessary due to medical conditions.

Rep. Neal Releases Rail Study for Northern New England

SPRINGFIELD — U.S. Rep. Richard Neal, dean of the New England congressional delegation, held a press conference in Springfield last week to release the Northern New England Intercity Rail Initiative (NNEIRI), a study funded by the Federal Railroad Administration and requested by Neal and former U.S. Rep. John Olver to identify and improve rail service in the region, including Springfield to Boston. NNEIRI is a conceptual planning study that examines the benefits, opportunities, and impacts of adding more frequent and higher-speed inter-city passenger rail service on two rail corridors, the inland route and the Boston-to-Montreal route. The inland route would run between Boston and New Haven, Conn. via Springfield. The Boston-to-Montreal route would run between Boston and Montreal, Quebec via Springfield. The two routes would share the trackage between Boston and Springfield. The combination of these two rail routes defines the study area that is collectively identified as the NNEIRI Corridor. “More than 2 million people live within three miles of a station along this corridor,” said FRA Administrator Sarah Feinberg. “For everyone to move safely and efficiently, this region needs a robust rail system, and this blueprint will help achieve that goal.”

Report Details State Residents without Insurance Coverage

BOSTON — The Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation released a new report, “Massachusetts Residents without Health Insurance Coverage: Understanding Those at Risk of Long-term Uninsurance.” Massachusetts currently has the lowest uninsurance rate in the nation, and as part of the individual mandate to carry health insurance coverage, the state collects detailed information through its tax-filing process about the health-insurance status of more than 4 million residents. This report analyzes 2011 and 2012 state-tax-filer data and provides new information about Massachusetts residents who are prone to remaining uninsured over consecutive years. The findings can help inform stakeholders who want to maintain the state’s low uninsurance rate and strive to lower the number of individuals without health-insurance coverage. Prepared by Michael Chin of UMass Medical School and Audrey Gasteier of the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority, the analyses in this report represent the first time that tax-filer data is being used to quantify the state’s uninsured population over a period of two consecutive calendar years. No other state has such detailed information on its residents’ insurance status.

Anteris Solutions Welcomes Christopher Buono to Team

By
Daily News

LENOX — Christopher Buono has joined Anteris Solutions Inc. as chief information officer. As CIO, he joins the executive team and also helps clients navigate the critical process of aligning technology decisions with organizational goals by identifying current needs while targeting a vision for the future.

Buono has worked in the information-technology field for more than 20 years, including 12 years in leadership roles. He holds a bachelor’s degree in management information systems from the University at Albany Business School and attended the MBA program at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lally School of Management. He holds numerous legacy technical certifications, including Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer, Certified Novell Engineer, Certified Information Systems Security Professional, and Cisco Certified Network Administration. He serves on the board of directors for WAM Theatre.

“We are thrilled Chris agreed to join our team,” Anteris CEO Tobias Casey said. “His experience with and enthusiasm for technology will equip Anteris to better serve both our own and our customers’ strategic needs.”

Anteris Solutions was founded in 2002 to serve a variety of nationwide businesses by providing them complete IT solutions, including strategic planning, proactive management, security and hardware monitoring, and ensuring software and regulation compliance.

Financing an ESOP

By
Banking and Financial Services Sections

The Relationship Between Lender and Company Is a Key Factor

By Steve J. Schwartz, Esq. and David K. Webber, Esq.

Steve Schwartz

Steve Schwartz

David Webber

David Webber

In the May 13, 2013 issue of BusinessWest; we penned an article titled “A Primer on the ESOP.” This is an extension of that article that specifically focuses on financing an ESOP, or employee stock- ownership plan, and informs the reader of the lender’s concerns in making a loan as part of the structure of a leveraged ESOP.

In the prior article, we described an ESOP as follows: an ESOP is a qualified defined-contribution retirement plan established under §§ 401(a), 409, and 4975 of the Internal Revenue Code. Unlike other qualified plans, an ESOP is designed primarily to invest in shares of a closely held corporation, referred to in the code as ‘employer securities.’ The sponsor company may transfer the shares of common stock as a qualified contribution, or the ESOP may purchase shares from shareholders or the sponsor company. In a ‘leveraged’ ESOP, the company takes out a bank loan to fund the purchase, then lends the funds to the ESOP to finance the purchase of shares. A 100% sale of shares to an ESOP may require a series of smaller transfers because 100% bank financing is unlikely.

The selling shareholder may receive cash as partial or complete consideration for the shares. In the alternative, or in addition to cash, the selling shareholder may self-finance a portion by accepting a note as partial payment. As the note is paid off in installments, the plan trustee transfers shares to each of the employees’ accounts, eventually vesting all the stock in employee accounts in accordance with the terms of the plan.

The lender has its usual concerns in making the loan, which will eventually be used to purchase shares by the ESOP. The considerations do not vary much between financing an ordinary loan and financing an ESOP. The lender’s customary due diligence is utilized to assess the credit worthiness of a borrower. If the company is a customer of the lender, it will normally have a relationship with the current management.

If the ESOP is part of an exit plan and there will be a change of control, the lender will be concerned with the capacity of the new management team to manage the business. It is important that the new management team be involved in dealing with the lender in obtaining the loan. In the event there is not a change of control, it will also consider this issue for the future in case there is a change of control due to death or disability or part of a future plan to vest control in new management. Hopefully, the lender will have experience in dealing with an ESOP transaction.

It is important for the company to prepare a financial plan for the period of the loan so that its needs for financing are included in its request for financing. It is also important that working capital and other financial requirements are included in the request. The company’s request should consider any contingencies.

The lender will analyze the company’s financial circumstances, including the security for its loan and the ability of the company to make the loan payments. The lender will also consider the company’s other financing requests.

As part of the ESOP planning process, the company shall be required to engage an independent appraiser to determine the value of the shares to be sold as part of the ESOP.  The lender will review the appraisal carefully in its approval process. It will provide the lender with an independent view of the company and its prospects.

The terms of the loan should be keyed to the ability of the company to generate profits. However, there are limitations on the term. An ESOP is a retirement plan and must comply with applicable laws; the internal note and pledge agreement from the ESOP to the company will be subject to federal government scrutiny. A term that is too long, or an interest rate greater than market rate, is suspect because it could unduly favor the selling stockholder over the employees.

Shares are released to the employees’ individual accounts on the payment of the loan. A longer term would affect the release of shares to the ESOP participants: the longer the term, the slower the release of shares. The term and interest rate of the note should therefore be reasonably short (fewer than 10 years) in order to mitigate excess scrutiny from the IRS and Department of Labor.

The loan normally will be secured by all the assets of the company. It is not unusual for the lender to request the personal guaranty from the stockholders. Also, it may be necessary for the proceeds of the sale to be pledged as additional security for the loan. The lender may agree to reduce the additional collateral as the loan is repaid.

If the company has existing loans or new loans with the lender, there will be cross-collateralization, cross-default, and cross-guarantee agreements. If any loan is in default, the default will apply to all the other loans. In the event a stockholder is owed money by the company, the lender may require that the stockholder subordinate the obligation to the lender and restrict the payment terms of the obligation to protect the company’s cash flow. The lender may require life insurance on the management team to be assigned to the lender as additional collateral for the loan.

As with any loan, there will be annual reporting requirements, financial covenants, and other performance metrics. The terms should be clearly set out in the commitment letter. The lender may have other requirements such as insurance, landlord’s consent, mortgagee’s consent, and collateral control agreements if some of the assets are not on the premises of the company.

The loan from the company will be documented by a separate note and security agreement to be signed and delivered simultaneously with the loan to the lender. In addition, there will be a stock-purchase agreement between the ESOP and the seller(s) of the shares.

The lender will require that the proceeds of the ESOP loan must be used solely to purchase shares in the company.  The ESOP will be able to repay the note from company contributions to the ESOP or from dividends paid to the ESOP from the company.

In summary, the relationship between the lender and company is a significant factor in the establishment of the ESOP, financing the purchase of company shares and the future of the business.  Even if a lender is initially skeptical, the lender can become an invaluable part of the business-succession team once the plan has its blessing.

We want to thank Vicky Crouse and Frank Crinella of TD Bank, N.A. and L. Alexandra Hogan, Esq. of Shatz, Schwartz and Fentin, P.C. for their assistance in preparing this article.

Attorney Steven J. Schwartz, of Shatz, Schwartz and Fentin, P.C., concentrates his practice in the areas of family business planning, mergers and acquisitions, corporate law, and estate planning; (413) 737-1131; [email protected]. Attorney David K. Webber, of Shatz, Schwartz and Fentin, P.C., concentrates his practice in the areas of closely held business, corporate law, real estate, trusts and estates, and bankruptcy; (413) 737-1131; [email protected].

Sarno Issues Sanctions Against Show Bar

By
Daily News

SPRINGFIELD — Following a hearing held June 28, and upon the recommendation of Licensing Director Attorney Alesia Days, Mayor Domenic J. Sarno, who holds statutory authority over entertainment licenses, has issued severe sanctions against Show Bar.

The establishment received a suspension for a period of 60 days, with 15 days to serve from July 1-15, 2016. The balance of 45 days will be held in abeyance for one year. If there are additional violations committed by Show Bar during the period of abeyance, the 45 days would be served in addition to any penalty imposed as a result of any new violation.

In addition to the suspension, Sarno has ordered that the licensee is required to submit an application for approval for a new manager of record and security plan to the License Commission prior to reopening on July 16. Upon Show Bar reopening on July 16, Sarno further imposed a rollback of hours to closure at 1 a.m., as opposed to its regular closing time of 2 a.m., for a period of 30 days.

The adult entertainment club, located at 240 Chestnut Street in Springfield, was found in violation of various charges resulting from an assault that occurred on March 18.  Show Bar is also facing charges relating to a pending complaint involving the club’s hiring of an underage dancer. That matter is being reviewed by state and local Law Enforcement agencies and a hearing will be held once such a review is complete.

The License Commission will hold a special hearing regarding Show Bar today (June 30) at 4:30 p.m. in Room 220 at City Hall.

Due Diligence Required to Conduct Successful Job Interviews

By
Employment Sections

Careful Culling

John McGlew

John McGlew says the best predictor of future success on the job is past behavior, which can be gleaned during the interview process and by checking references.

Interviewing job candidates is an art and a science that many small and mid-size employers don’t have the time to perfect. But knowing what to ask job candidates and how to interpret their answers is important, because hiring the wrong person is a waste of time and money and can lead to difficulties later on.

John McGlew says it’s critical for employers to do their homework before they sit down and begin interviewing job candidates.

The director of Employment and Employee Relations for the Sisters of Providence Health System noted that he was interviewed by 21 people before he was hired, and he has developed a program for his managers that teaches them how to use behavioral questions to find the person most suited for a particular job.

“Good interviewing practices and thorough vetting of candidates is critical to any business trying to hire the right person,” he explained. “It includes getting proper references and employment information, but you need to do a lot to get prepared for the actual interview.”

Michele Cabral, who hired many employees in her former position as CFO and COO of Farm Credit Financial Partners in Agawam and now helps employers with the process through her company, CFO On the Go, agrees that the work should begin long before applicants are actually interviewed.

“Most companies have a culture, but they fail to take it into account when they write a job description,” said the Holyoke Community College professor of Business, explaining that it is important for new hires to be invested in a company’s success as well as its mission.

McGlew agrees, and considers this so important that he tells managers to convey the Sisters of Providence mission to candidates and explain how the job advertised will relate to it, and says every business should have a clearly articulated mission statement that it shares.

Shannon Levesque concurs, but adds that interviewers also need to have a list of clear and measurable goals that get conveyed to everyone they interview.

“The person not only needs to be a good cultural fit, but you need to be realistic, honest, and up front about what will be expected to eliminate any surprises for the candidate,” the director of talent acquisition for Baystate Health told BusinessWest. “A small or mid-sized business also needs to know what makes the company attractive; an interview is a two-way street, and if you want to hire talent, it’s important to sell your company.

“Good people always have options, and even more so if they are already working, so there has to be an incentive,” she continued, noting that this may mean taking on a new challenge or having the ability to use newly acquired education. In any case, the interviewer needs to understand what is driving the candidate to apply for the position.

Experts say it’s not difficult to assess someone’s technical skills, but knowing how well they work in a team environment and how they will handle difficult customers, people, or situations can be equally or even more important.

“The best predictor of future success is past behavior. But in order to get this information, you need to be able to elicit responses about how the person has behaved in workplace situations in the past,” McGlew said.

For this edition and its focus on employment, BusinessWest looks at methods that seasoned interviewers use in their own hiring, so business owners can employ them and assess a candidate’s ability to do a job.

Essential Measures

Although there are many ways to conduct an interview, Cabral says most people fail to ask the right questions.

“The wrong candidates are often hired because the interviewer didn’t dig deep enough during the interview,” she noted.

Michelle Cabral

Michelle Cabral says people applying for managerial positions should to be able to inspire others and have standards in place, while employees at lower levels need to be able to manage their workload.

She measures five core competencies: leadership, management, communication, technical skills, and analytical skills, or the ability to solve problems, and says interviewers need to assess each of these areas while the candidate is in front of them.

“At the highest level, you need someone who can create a vision, understand the environment they are working in, and navigate their way through it. The person needs to be articulate verbally and in writing,” she said. “At the lowest level, the new employee needs to understand the vision, but interpret it for themselves as it relates to their job. They also need to know when to use different communication skills, such as e-mailing versus speaking to someone.”

She added that people applying for managerial positions should be able to inspire others and have standards in place, while people at lower levels need to be able to manage their workload. They should also be able to identify problems, come up with ways to solve them, and be able to discuss these options with their manager.

She suggests conducting a 15-minute phone interview with candidates whose résumés align with job requirements, and recommends getting people out of their comfort zone right away.

For example, if someone says they answer the phone frequently at their current job, the interviewer should ask them to cite an example of how they handled a customer who was rude to them.

“The phone interview helps you determine how articulate the person is and also assess their listening skills and whether they answer questions appropriately,” she said.

McGlew agrees that asking a person how he or she dealt with a challenging customer or phone call, as well as what steps they took toward service recovery, can reveal how they will handle stressful situations in the future.

“You want someone who takes steps to effectively resolve a difficult situation and restore the relationship for the company,” he noted.

Indeed, experts say the ability to communicate can be more important than technical skills, because most people can be taught to do new things. “But they need to be able to communicate when they are struggling and not be too embarrassed to ask for help,” he said.

Levesque told BusinessWest that problems sometimes arise because interviewers fail to differentiate between what is needed and what is preferable, which should be clearly defined in the job description. And if no one in the company has time to spend to help a new hire become proficient in a new skill, it may be a moot point.

“If you are taking a chance on someone’s potential to learn something, you need to structure training in a way that gets them up to speed quickly,” she said.

McGlew says interviewers should write down the qualifications the applicant must have before conducting the interview. In addition to technical skills, requirements can range from the ability to complete work within a given time frame to the ability to collaborate well, be knowledgeable about cultural diversity, or anything else that is pertinent to the job.

These things are important because, if soft skills are missing, a new hire’s interactions can become problematic. “It may be important for a security officer to know the law, but if the person has a brusque way of dealing with others, their interactions may become a problem,” Levesque said.

McGlew tells managers to come up with 20 to 25 behavior-based questions and then prioritize them. Although they are unlikely to get through all of them during an interview, asking candidates the same questions evens the playing field and allows interviewers to compare their answers.

But the candidate should do most of the talking. “You need to spend twice as much time listening as you do asking questions,” Levesque said.

Her interviews begin with a welcome, followed by behavioral questions. And there is always a defined closing, with time allotted for the candidate to ask questions and for her to assess their interest.

She said some interviewers aren’t used to using open-ended questions and may need to practice interviewing team members. But it makes a difference because open-ended or behavioral questions require candidates to give examples that include details related to their past performance, which allow the interviewer to understand the situations they have encountered, what their response was, and what they learned.

“You have to probe; it’s absolutely essential, but you also have parrot back what you heard and ask for elaboration,” Levesque said.

However, interviewers should avoid asking candidates to talk about their strengths or weaknesses. “They have already done their bragging on their cover letter and résumé,” Cabral said.

More useful questions can include, “if I called your manager today, what would he or she say about you?”; “tell me about a time when you were communicating a message and you were misunderstood?”; “tell me what gets you out of bed in the morning?”; and “tell me about a time when your employer needed you to stay late at work and you couldn’t?”

“You need to remain quiet after the person’s initial response,” Cabral advised. “And once they start sharing, you need to keep digging. If they couldn’t stay late when their boss needed them to, you want to know what happened and how they handled the situation or got the work done.”

Details That Matter

Although some employers seek well-rounded employees who can bring unique perspectives to problems, lifestyle can play a role in determining whether a candidate is suitable for a job. For instance, if the person says they love to ski and do so every weekend, it is appropriate to ask if it will present a problem if they are occasionally asked to work weekends.

Shannon Levesque

Shannon Levesque says interviewers need to know which technical skills are critical and which ones are preferable and can be learned after the person is hired.

And although young candidates may not have a job history or be able to provide examples of handling difficult workplace situations, they can be asked what led them to believe the job they are applying for is the right career, Cabral said, adding that gauging a candidate’s honesty is important. They can also be asked to supply references that include professors, members of the clergy, or people at places where they have volunteered.

Obtaining proper references and an employment history does play a role in choosing a new hire, but experts say busy interviewers can hire an outside service to do this.

However, McGlew suggests asking the person for past-performance appraisals. They may need to give their supervisor permission to share the information, but it can prove invaluable.

People conducting interviews who are not familiar with employment law also need to brush up on what they can and can’t ask.

“Don’t get into the person’s personal life. If someone starts talking about their family, change the subject,” Cabral advises.

Salary or hourly pay should also be discussed. Although it doesn’t need to be definitive, it’s important to divulge how much the organization or business is willing to pay a new hire.

McGlew told BusinessWest that, if the person won’t or can’t accept the dollar figure, it is a waste of time to continue the interviewing process.

“You also have a duty to give people a clear idea of the benefits you plan to offer,” he went on. “Salary and fringe benefits are definitive economic decisions, and if you don’t meet a person’s requirements, they may choose to keep looking or stay at their present position.”

Levesque agrees, and says there is nothing more disappointing to both parties than to offer someone a job, then find out they can’t afford or are unwilling to accept the pay. And when an interview nears the time allotted for it to end, it’s important to identify and set expectations about what will happen next.

“You should ask about their job search and whether they have any offers pending; an employer needs to know where a candidate is in the process,” Levesque said. “We have an obligation to treat job seekers with respect and understand their goal is to find gainful employment that is rewarding, challenging, and fits their career goals. Nothing is more painful to a candidate than to be in a black hole and not know where they stand or what to expect.”

Cabral understands that employers can get exhausted looking through hundreds of résumés, but warns against taking short cuts simply to fill a vacancy with someone.

“Some rush to get a job filled when they know in their gut they are hiring the wrong person,” she explained. “But if a new hire is not working out, you need to have an honest conversation. It’s OK to provide a soft landing and give them several months notice, but if the job is not getting done, you need to find the right person for it.”

However, experts say that situation can be tempered by hiring a person on a probationary basis. “But the person really needs to understand that there will be a formal assessment period,” McGlew said, adding that, when a person is being interviewed or hired, the words “permanent position” should never be used.

Instead, the interviewer should refer to a job as a “full-time opportunity,” which can prevent legal problems later on, he said, even though the Massachusetts Employment at Will statute allows employers to terminate an employee at any time, barring a contract.

Final Decisions

Cabral says hiring is an art and a science, and employers need to know the art is important in helping them make a decision. “At the end of the day, 80% of a decision is based on gut feel and attitude.”

McGlew agrees. “A lot is subjective and has to do with judging whether the person’s values and priorities are in line with the organization’s values,” he said. “But there is no foolproof methodology to interviewing, and sometimes the person who shows up for work is not the person you interviewed.”

Still, knowing what to ask and being well-prepared goes a long way toward keeping that from happening.

“It can be difficult to separate personality from competency, but if you ask questions in the right way, you will be surprised what people tell you,” Levesque said. “Good interviewers accept what they see, then probe for validation. And it’s a win-win if you get it right.”

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