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By SAMUEL GELINAS

NORTHAMPTON — The first signs of green this spring were seen Monday at the Hotel Northampton for the annual Northampton St. Patrick’s Association’s Breakfast, where green sweaters, scarves, and shamrocks dominated ahead of next weekend’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade festivities in Holyoke.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — The Amherst-Pelham Regional School Committee is putting forward a $37.08 million fiscal year 2026 budget that would limit some anticipated staffing cuts at the middle and high schools, a proposal that would significantly increase assessments for the four member towns.

By Staff Report

NORTHAMPTON — Northampton firefighters put out a fully involved Toyota pickup truck on Interstate 91 Friday afternoon, a fire that caused significant traffic backups on the highway as spring break began at the local colleges and University of Massachusetts.

By CHRIS LARABEE

Budget season rolls on at the Frontier Regional and Union 38 school districts, with Sunderland, Deerfield and Conway elementary schools recently sharing their fiscal year 2026 budget proposals.

By SCOTT MERZBACH

AMHERST — A draft housing production plan with a series of strategies to ensure there are sufficient housing options in Amherst for people with a range of income levels is suggesting Amherst produce 265 to 715 new housing units by 2030.

By GARRETT COTE

AMHERST — On two separate occasions this winter, Mullins Center staff spilled onto Jack Leaman Court as soon as the final horn sounded to end a UMass men’s basketball game. They aren’t typically in a huge rush to break down equipment, especially if the next event to take place in the arena is another basketball game, but the Minutemen hockey team had a game about five hours later – they needed to change the hardwood to the ice in time for warm-ups.

WESTHAMPTON — The Hampshire Regional High School Drama Company will take to the stage this weekend for performances of the musical “Something Rotten.” Shows will take place on Friday and Saturday, March 21 and 22, at 7 p.m., and Sunday, March 23, at 2 p.m.

By EMILEE KLEIN

LUDLOW — A new regional energy manager will guide decarbonization and sustainable energy efforts for 15 communities in Hampshire and Hampden counties as part of a collaboration to bring down energy costs.

By Staff Report

LEVERETT — An outdoor maple syrup boil is being blamed for causing a brush fire that consumed about 3 acres of land near the intersection of North Leverett and Richardson roads on Friday afternoon, according to the Leverett Fire Department’s Facebook page.

By GARRETT COTE

LOWELL — South Hadley girls basketball head coach Paul Dubuc said his team didn’t show up to the Tsongas Center for a moral victory. That very well could be true, but the Tigers did one thing that no other team in Division 4 had done in the postseason: put up a fight against No. 1 Cathedral.

By BOB KATZEN

THE HOUSE AND SENATE: Beacon Hill Roll Call records local representatives’ votes on roll calls from recent debate on the House rules. There were no roll calls in the House or Senate last week.

By SARA WEINBERGER

Trump won the November election with a promise to deport millions of immigrants who crossed our southern border. He spewed propaganda, calling them drug dealers, invaders, violent criminals, rapists, murderers, illegals, terrorists; people who come to take our jobs, claim citizenship for the babies they birth within our borders; who deliver the fentanyl that kills American children.

By JOHN BIDWELL

Eight years after the end of our Peace Corps service, my wife Kris Holloway and I returned to Mali, West Africa. While there, we reunited with Madou Mariko, who trained with me to repair wells.

I write especially for friends who support President Donald Trump. Americans across the political spectrum despise censorship and threats to free speech. Now censorship threatens national security and our military personnel. Denial of obvious truths, suppression of data, and banning words and language are an affront and a threat to us all.

Members of the Amherst Regional indoor track and field team earned the opportunity of a lifetime thanks to strong showings throughout the season, as a handful of ‘Canes competed in the New Balance Nationals in Boston over the weekend.

By GARRETT COTE

LOWELL — It felt like history had repeated itself at the Tsongas Center on Sunday afternoon. A year ago, the South Hadley girls basketball team got off to a hot start before ultimately falling to No. 1 Cathedral in the MIAA Division 4 state championship game on the third Sunday of March.

By ALEXA LEWIS

NORTHAMPTON — Forbes Library will embark on an ambitious new enhancement to its outdoor community space later this month by breaking ground on a new outdoor performance stage.

By MITCH FINK

President Donald Trump’s return to office has raised questions about the future of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding Massachusetts secured for its West-East Rail plan with suggestions the administration may place a greater emphasis on birth and marriage rates and immigration policy.

By CHRIS LARABEE

BOSTON — As farmers prepare to head out to the fields for the season, Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources Commissioner Ashley Randle sent a letter to the new U.S. agriculture secretary expressing concerns over uncertain federal funding and other actions taken by the federal government.

Pulaski Park will receive a face lifting under a $15,000 matching funds grant from the Massachusetts Bicentennial Commission. Plans for the project include moving the Pulaski Memorial closer to Main Street, providing rest areas with new plantings and benches, improving circulation through the park and establishing a large, paved activities area adjacent to the Academy of Music.