The U.S. Department of Labor has found that the Northampton School Committee owes 15 female junior and senior high school athletic coaches some $8,700 in back pay over the past two years. The finding is the result of a complaint charging that female coaches did not receive pay comparable to that given male coaches.
The Northampton Board of Public Works voted unanimously last night to charge betterment assessments for all future extensions of the city’s sanitary sewer system. The BPW action means that when existing sewer lines are extended, owners of land abutting the extension, rather than all city taxpayers, will pay for the work.
Low unemployment, affordable mortgage rates and the attraction of Hampshire County, especially Northampton and Amherst, have contributed to today’s strong real estate market — a seller’s market. Real estate agents say those factors have led to a high demand for homes at a time when construction has not kept pace.
Thousands of boot-clad feet kept time with local and nationally acclaimed country stars at the area’s first Country Barnstormin’ Concert at the Northampton Airport Saturday. Concert promoter Tony Long estimated 7,500 country fans from all over the east coast attended the event.
Acclaimed poet James Tate, a distinguished professor in the English department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, died Wednesday evening after a long illness. He was 71. Tate is the author of more than 20 books of poetry, including “Worshipful Company of Fletchers,” which won the 1994 National Book Award.
Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School Superintendent Jeffrey Peterson would like the 282 acres of former Northampton State Hospital land leased to his school no longer to be known as the “dog park,” but would like it to remain available for dog walking and other forms of recreation. “Smith Vocational is about serving the community,” Peterson said Thursday.