■Trash barrels on Northampton’s playgrounds this summer will have a new look as Marty Finn, a Recreation Department employee, has been putting his artistic abilities to work. The brightly colored barrels have various cartoon characters and other contemporary symbols painted on them asking everyone to use them for litter.
■Alexander W. Borowski & Co. has announced that Mrs. John G. Colgan of Florence is the winner of the Real Estate Contest sponsored by A.W. Borawski & Co. for the first quarter of the year. Mrs. Colgan has been a real estate agent with the firm for five years.
■Teachers and their supporters, about 200 strong, marched from Northampton High School to City Hall Thursday afternoon to protest the lack of a contract. “Northampton: A great place to live, but lousy to teachers,” read one sign, referring to a recent article in Parenting Magazine that named Northampton one of the four best places to raise a family in the nation.
■Over 15 area police officers gathered at the Northampton Airport yesterday, where they watched and participated in a demonstration of the Stinger Spike System, a tire-deflating device used by police departments across the country. “We absolutely need to have something to help us with pursuits,” said Sgt. Robert Nicol, who helped coordinate the demonstration.
■Are corporations people, and should they have the same rights as citizens in the eyes of the law? Those questions will be debated when the Northampton City Council meets April 19 to decide whether to adopt a resolution calling for an amendment to the U.S Constitution to take away so-called” personhood” status from corporations.
■Several groups expressed interest in the entire Northfield Mount Hermon campus during a tour Tuesday. The six groups with designs on the full 217-acre campus range from a Bible college with about 40 students to a private Christian university with an enrollment of more than 50,000, including online and on-campus students.