■State Rep. John W. Olver, a candidate for state Senate in the Franklin-Hampshire district, announced today he will refile this week a package of legislation that will lower the legal age of adulthood to 18. The proposed package would extend many rights to 18-year-olds, in addition to ones already granted, including the right to vote and marry.
■William A. Burke, president of the First National Bank of Northampton, and Ronald R. Findlay, president of the First National Bank of Franklin County, jointly announced today that the board of directors of each bank had approved, in principle, their affiliation in a new regional bank holding company.
■From the chief down to the firefighters, the Northampton Fire Department must remake and modernize itself to become an “effective emergency organization,” according to a consulting firm’s report released yesterday. The report calls the Fire Department organization “antiquated.”
■The wine glasses were filled with milk to toast the launch of the Pioneer Valley Milk Marketing Cooperative today. The first cartons of milk with the label Our Family Farms of Western Massachusetts will hit the shelves of small local grocery stores and the Big Y, which holds an exclusive supermarket contract on the milk for its first month on the market.
■This week artists from around western Massachusetts will challenge the assumption that chalk is just for kids. The third annual Northampton Chalk Art Festival, which will be held during the city’s monthly Arts Night Out on Friday, will feature work from nine artists chosen through a juried selection process.
■The University of Massachusetts must replace and dispose of 900 windows contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) at the Lederle Graduate Research Center, an estimated $3 million project that is expected to take 15 years, according to a settlement the university reached with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.