■Auto mechanics from Amherst Regional High School and Smith’s Vocational School in Northampton will be out to demonstrate their automobile know-how in the Plymouth Trouble Shooting contest May 20 at Canton. This is an annual event in which auto mechanics students find and fix several malfunctions deliberately hidden in new cars.
■A strike this morning of more than 400 painters throughout western Massachusetts will affect major construction projects currently under way at the University of Massachusetts and the Hampshire Regional High School in Westhampton, but contractors are unable to assess what the strike will mean in terms of actual delay.
■Restaurants in Northampton, Amherst, South Hadley and all towns in between are preparing for the deluge of diners that accompanies graduation weekends in the pioneer Valley. Those who haven’t made reservations for dining out over the next two weekends may find their choices limited, as many area restaurants are booked solid.
■For the first time in eight years, the City Council has agreed to resolve an issue its president calls “so hot that no one wants to touch it.” The council last night vote 8-0 to raise Mayor Mary L. Ford’s salary, which since 1988 has been $45,000 a year.
■The last of the city’s video stores is facing an uncertain future, with its retail space up for sale and its business in decline. Pleasant Street Video, an anchor at the corner of Pleasant and Armory streets for 25 years, has survived a wave of video store closings in recent years. But the independently owned store now confronts a similar fate, particularly if the retail space it occupies changes hands.
■Despite some residents expressing concerns about the suitability of the old landfill on Belchertown Road in Amherst as a site for a large-scale solar farm, Town Meeting on Monday overwhelmingly gave its support to continue moving forward with the project.