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By EMILEE KLEIN

For the last two years, the Hitchcock Center for the Environment has aimed to help more than 1,000 third graders in Springfield Public Schools envision themselves as scientists and engineers.

Garden report: the pulminaria has bloomed as has the dandelions. I planted radish seeds in a raised bed. The bugs are back, saw a mosquito and wasp and other flying winged creatures.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — With planned improvements to modernize and make accessible the Simeon Strong House at 67 Amity St., along with anticipated disruptions from the expansion and renovation at the neighboring Jones Library, Amherst Historical Society operations will be relocating to a downtown commercial building this spring.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — More than 100 residents at Applewood Retirement Community made their voices heard on the Saturday morning before Easter, appealing to preserve democracy and fight against actions by the Trump administration during a “No King” protest.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Creation of a 6th Grade Academy inside the Amherst Regional Middle School, coinciding with the opening of the new elementary school building on South East Street, will be supported by $450,000 in capital spending.

By CHRIS LARABEE

SOUTH DEERFIELD — Over the last year, an energy storage solutions research and development company focusing on supercapacitors has been settling into its new facility off routes 5 and 10.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A yearly event to promote energy efficiency, recycling, electric and hybrid vehicles and solar power is being held on the Town Common Saturday, alongside the Amherst Farmer’s Market.

By JOHANNA NEUMANN

Humans are great at building things, but it’s also beginning to dawn on us that these impressive and sometimes magnificent structures also impact the other creatures that we share this earth with.

By TOM WASKIEWICZ

Small family farms are more than businesses; they are a way of life, shaped by generations of experience, sacrifice, and resilience. Every field plowed, every seed planted, every harvest gathered carries with it the wisdom of those who came before. But there’s no handbook for passing down this knowledge. Instead, it happens in the quiet moments — side by side in the fields, in conversations at the kitchen table, in the habits formed over years of hard work.

We have always been in favor of the Jones Library renovation and expansion. We think the improvements to the HVAC system and teh climate controlled space for Special Collections alone make it a worthwhile project. The addition of dedicated children’s and tenn space, in addition to the expanded ESL space and teh new display space for teh African American Civil War tablets, speaks to those citizens in our community whose interests and needs can be easily overlooked. The fact that the renovation doesn’t use fossil fuels and advances the building to a net-zero structure gives it another great advantage over the current structure. 

As pro-democracy protests spread across Massachusetts and the nation, many still overlook a primary ailment of our broken democratic system: in today’s elections, the candidate with the most money almost always wins. Campaign finance reform seems impossible, especially since the 2010 Supreme Court decision, Citizens United, which ruled corporate spending limits unconstitutional. As a result of Citizens United, political power in America has shifted dramatically towards wealthy corporations and billionaires. Americans on all sides of the aisle have lost trust in our democratic process — a February poll found that 72% of Americans see money in politics as a “very big problem,” more than any other issue polled.

U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern’s complacency and inaction felt less like a personal failure and more like a symptom of the Democratic Party itself. Instead of providing clarity or hope, the recent town hall at UMass Amherst on Wednesday seemed to be just another reason to disengage from the dire state of American politics completely.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Amherst will be seeking a new finance director, as Melissa Zawadzki leaves the position overseeing the town’s financial team later this spring, less than a year after her appointment, to return to work at the University of Massachusetts.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Amherst Town Council is allowing the Jones Library expansion and renovation project to continue moving forward, nixing a measure that could have rescinded the borrowing authorization to pay for the work.

Here are the funding sources for the Jones Library expansion and renovation, which is slated to cost $46.14 million.

By STEVE PFARRER

Several years ago, Mattea Kramer, an Amherst writer and researcher who’s studied and written about the federal budget as well as drug policies at state and federal levels, spent time interviewing a number of women in the Greenfield jail who were part of a recovery program for substance use.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — After a contentious debate, the Town Council agreed last week to recommend the town spend nearly $422,000 more on schools next year than originally recommended.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Several Amherst Regional High School students recently had the opportunity to travel to the State House to offer testimony to the Joint Committee on Ways and Means hearing, explaining to legislators why funding formulas for state aid to local school districts should be revised.

Easter greetings to all our Christian friends and neighbors.

In today’s news is announced widespread elimination of an “alphabet soup” of divisions and programs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Georgia. When government agencies and scientists are categorized as alphabet soup, I know ignorance is on parade. Eliminated has been the Division of Violence Prevention, part of the injury center at CDC. I know the people wielding power do not know, nor do they care, about the leadership of this division across all forms of violence from suicide to elder and child abuse, domestic abuse, sexual violence.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Both mixed-use and apartment-style developments will be allowed along a half-mile section of University Drive, under a new zoning overlay district.