Berkshire Bank Earns Top Marks in Corporate Equality Index
Berkshire Bank announced that it received a score of 100 on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s 2022 Corporate Equality Index (CEI), the nation’s foremost benchmarking survey and report measuring corporate policies and practices related to LGBTQ+ workplace equality. Berkshire joins the ranks of more than 840 major U.S. businesses that also earned top marks this…
Lee Moves Ahead with Key Municipal Projects
As the pandemic enters its third year of disrupting life as we knew it, the business community in Lee continues to manage the disruptions of COVID-19 and its variants with a good degree of success. Colleen Henry attributes that to one reason. “The local people here in Lee are strong supporters of our businesses,” said…
Local Manufacturers Still Grappling with Supply, Workforce Issues
In manufacturing, as in many industries, the story of the past year has been one of shortages and high costs — shortages of both materials and workers, and rising costs of supplies and wages as a direct result of those trends. As this story and the one on page 39 make clear, the problem isn’t…
Manufacturing Leaders Ponder the State of Their Industry
Manufacturing is a healthy industry, Bill Bither days, and demand for manufactured goods is soaring across all sectors. Meeting that demand is … well, a challenge. “The first half of 2021 was quite strong; we were actually averaging around 30% higher than we’ve ever seen since we’ve been collecting this data,” said Bither, co-founder and…
HCC to offer free childcare services for students
Holyoke Community College will soon offer free child-watch for parents working towards their college degrees. “Itsy Bitsy Child Watch” will open in March. The program will offer free, short-term care to children six weeks to 12 years old. The pilot phase is being funded through a 100,000 allocation in the 2022 state budget, secured by…
BusinessTalk with Tom Senecal, president and CEO of PeoplesBank
BusinessWest Editor George O’Brien has a lively, wide-ranging discussion with Tom Senecal, president and CEO of PeoplesBank. The two talk about everything from the regional economy and the forces that will determine its direction in 2022, to the pandemic and how it has inspired banks, and especially his institution to ratchet up their philanthropic efforts across…
Russian Ballet Theatre to Present ‘Swan Lake’ on Feb. 11 at Academy of Music
The Russian Ballet Theatre will present a new production of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake” at the Academy of Music on Fri., Feb. 11 as part of a tour that includes performances in 52 cities across the U.S., including Minneapolis, Dallas, San Antonio, Houston, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. This performance of “Swan Lake” includes…
Monson Savings Bank Team Members Donate $8,880 to Local Nonprofits
Monson Savings Bank’s team members donated $8,880 to various local nonprofits in 2021 through the bank’s Team Giving Initiative Friday (TGIF) program. “One of our most prominent principles here at Monson Savings Bank is supporting the communities that the bank serves,” said Dan Moriarty, president and CEO of Monson Savings Bank. “Western Massachusetts is not…
Amherst Railroad Hobby Show returns to The Big E fairgrounds
The familiar sounds of model railroading filled no fewer than the exhibition halls of four buildings on the Eastern States Fairgrounds Sunday. The 54th annual Amherst Railway Society Hobby Show attracted model railroading enthusiasts from throughout the area. There were hundreds of displays to dazzle even the most finicky enthusiast. “We have about 410 from…
TD Bank Center Sold to Newly Formed Real-estate Partnership
The 240,000-square-foot, class-A office complex located at 1441 Main St. in Springfield, known as the TD Bank Center, has been sold. The property, located at the corner of Main Street and Harrison Avenue, was sold by an affiliate of TD Bank to a limited-liability company comprised of the principals of Colebrook Realty Services and a…
HCC Offering Free Hotel Industry Training Starting Feb. 1
Interested in beginning a career in the hospitality industry? Holyoke Community College (HCC) is running a free, six-week hotel training program starting Tuesday, Feb. 1. The hands-on, in-person classes for hotel front-desk workers and hotel-room attendants will take place in HCC’s hotel-training lab on the second floor of the HCC MGM Culinary Arts Institute on…
Westfield Athenaeum and MOSSO to Launch Three-concert Chamber Music Series
The Westfield Athenaeum will present a three-concert chamber music series beginning Thursday, March 10 at 7 p.m., with Musicians of the Springfield Symphony Orchestra (MOSSO) providing the music. MOSSO violinist Beth Welty is bringing her ensemble, the Aryaloka Quartet, to the Athenaeum to kick off the series. Guy McLain, executive director of the Westfield Athenaeum,…