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By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Ericilda Xiomara Herman, a superintendent of a school district in St. Croix, Virgin Islands, will be the next superintendent for the Amherst, Pelham and Amherst-Pelham Regional schools, pending successful contract negotiations.Citing...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A significantly higher bid for construction of an expanded and renovated Jones Library is causing Amherst officials to scrap plans for leasing a temporary location elsewhere in town, as well as raising worries about whether the new $97.5...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — The faculty of Amherst College is joining the college’s Student Senate in asking trustees to divest from corporations supplying military equipment to Israel in its ongoing war in Gaza.The divestment appeal, made last week, came with support...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Carefully holding and balancing his violin, 12-year-old Heedo Noh, a Fort River School sixth grader, gets a suggestion for positioning the bow so it runs straight across the strings as he practices G.F. Handel’s “Chorus from Judas...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A $97.3 million town budget for fiscal year 2025, maintaining municipal staffing and programs and promoting climate change and racial equity objectives, is being proposed by Town Manager Paul Bockelman, even as concerns are being raised that...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

PELHAM — An assessment for the town’s share of the fiscal year 2025 $35.27 million budget for the Amherst-Pelham Regional Schools, a final step in approving a three-community plan for electricity to be supplied by green sources, and purchase of a new...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

HADLEY — Filling the Hopkins Academy gymnasium with sounds from the Haitian tanbou — the traditional cowskin and goatskin-covered barrel drums — students jumped, waved and did push-ups as they learned various folkloric dances, movements and exercises...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

HATFIELD — A large indoor tennis and pickleball building, proposed to take up a portion of a nearly nine-acre business-zoned site just north of 253 West St., is raising concerns for neighbors about the potential neighborhood impacts.But the Planning...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Widening the existing track from six to eight lanes and rejuvenating the interior grass field appears to be the extent of renovations that can be done to Amherst Regional High School’s track and field because of limited funding.While the...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — An avid reader throughout her life, who often brought her three children to the North Amherst Library as they were growing up, Hilda Greenbaum saw the need to improve the 1893 building to ensure it would continue to serve future generations,...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — An ongoing feasibility study is examining how the area around the War Memorial Pool, a 2-acre site in downtown Amherst close to Amherst Regional High School, can be revitalized into a popular destination for families.While the pool was...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

HADLEY — A bylaw to allow stand-alone battery storage facilities in town, though prohibit them in the aquifer protection district, and spending that includes a $21.7 million fiscal year 2025 municipal operating budget were easily approved at annual...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A foundational skills reading program, known as Magnetic Foundations, is being piloted by eight teachers in the four Amherst and Pelham elementary schools as the focus of an elementary literacy curriculum review this school year.Mary Kiely,...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Responsible for $135,000 in student debt, Amherst resident Ian Rhodewalt observes that during the yearslong federal pause in making loan repayments during the pandemic, he and his family were able to get a vehicle, to replace a broken-down...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A new retail store carrying assorted Amherst College merchandise, as well as school supplies, tech accessories and snacks, is open at 45 South Pleasant St., as demolition of a building immediately to the south, and removal of an attached ell...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — Construction of a three-unit, 10-bedroom home behind an existing home at 98 Fearing St., in the North Prospect-Lincoln-Sunset Local Historic District is inappropriate for the neighborhood, according to a panel that reviews projects and...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — In September 2022, the Town Council committed to keeping the $46.1 million project to modernize and expand the Jones Library going, at least until it reached the construction bid stage.For Amherst resident Toni Cunningham, that decision...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A lone $42.7 million bid by a general contractor for expanding and renovating the Jones Library building, coming in more than $7 million over cost estimates, could be putting the entire project at risk.“We are disappointed to have received...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A fire station, possibly combined with a new community center, or an affordable housing development, are among the concepts unveiled for the front portion of the former Hickory Ridge Golf Course on West Pomeroy Lane, the 150-acre, town-owned...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

HADLEY — Significant capital investments that include a $9 million project to replace the Mount Warner and Mount Holyoke water tanks and $2 million to buy a ladder truck for the Fire Department, and adopting a bylaw to permit stand-alone battery...

By SCOTT MERZBACH

Editor’s note: The third of three finalists for the job of superintendent was interviewed Thursday. A decision could be made as soon as Monday. AMHERST — Collaboration, empathy and communication are being emphasized as traits Ericilda Xiomara Herman,...