■After Sept. 1, Northampton area residents will be able to go into at least one local savings bank to open an account which will closely resemble a checking account but still will draw the interest of a savings account. The new items have been labelled “negotiable orders of withdrawal,” but are better known by their acronym, NOW, according to Richard Covell of the Northampton Institution for Savings.
■Hampshire District Court Judge Luke Ryan ruled that a 25-year-old former student at UMass who was convicted of possession of marijuana in 1968 could have his criminal record expunged. The decision, made possible by a new state law which went into effect July 1, may have wide, but as yet uncertain, implications for other persons in Hampshire County.
■Judge W. Michael Ryan has been named to the top judicial post in Northampton District Court, succeeding Alvertus J. Morse, and taking the job once held by his own late father, Judge Luke Ryan. Ryan, 50, said becoming presiding justice has been a long-held goal.
■The co-chairwoman of the JFK Middle School Council this year says one reason she wants to now serve on the School Committee is to make sure that that body listens better to school councils. Karen Bercovici, 55, a single mother with a daughter who will be in the eighth grade at JFK this year, is the third announced candidate for the two at-large school board seats. Incumbent at-large members Jay S. Fleitman and James D. Dostal both have declared they will run again.
■Civil unions for gay couples in Vermont must be treated as “the equivalent of marriage” in Massachusetts, the highest court in Massachusetts ruled Thursday. The Supreme Judicial Court ruled that a couple who enters into a civil union in Vermont must dissolve that union before either person can marry a third party in Massachusetts.
■As fruits and berries ripen around the Valley, farmers are watching warily for a tiny pest that could be a big problem for their fruit. A non-native subspecies of fruit fly called the Spotted Wing Drosophila was spotted in the area for the first time this month.