EASTHAMPTON — Mayor Nicole LaChapelle has proposed a $48.5 million budget for fiscal year 2023, an increase of 5.75% over the current year.“This budget takes into consideration, as it always does, how to best stretch local dollars,” said LaChapelle at the May 18 City Council meeting. “And local doll...

Easthampton’s busy arts scene has gotten even busier over the last few months, as the city’s monthly Art Walk returned after a two-year pandemic hiatus, the Marigold Theater opened in a space that had most recently housed a tattoo parlor, and work began on turning the upper floor of Old Town Hall in...

Amid decay, there is life — but for how long?On a cool May morning by Lower Mill Pond in Easthampton, avian wildlife is thriving. Or so it seems. A pair of newcomers, mute swans, glide with balletic grace upon the surface, their brilliant white plumage stark against the tea-colored water. Disturbed,...

EASTHAMPTON — After fire broke out Sunday evening at a multi-unit building on East Street, residents sprang into action to help their neighbors, with one entering the smoke-filled dwelling and carrying an occupant, who uses a wheelchair, out to safety.Those efforts haven’t stopped, as neighbor Paul...

For Ryan O’Leary, everything began in Easthampton – specifically, in Lossone Arena.“My dad grew up playing hockey and he would always bring us to Lossone rink to just skate around. When we were five or six, that’s when we started Learn to Skate, and then down at the other end was Learn to Play,” O’L...

EASTHAMPTON — The drive-thru COVID-19 testing site at Millside Park is transitioning to a walk-up service via a kiosk starting Thursday.The transition comes as the city’s Parks and Recreation Department will begin to use the park more for summer events such as the Arts in the Park concert series hel...

Racism is prevalent throughout our communities and embedded in our national history, culture and origin story. My intention is not to speak to whether Easthampton Mayor Nicole Chapelle gets recalled, as much as to emphasize that we cannot think that removing one person will eliminate the racism in...

50 Years Ago■Easthampton High is one of only two high schools in Hampshire County to have batgirls. Coach Rick Konieczny has agreed to let three young ladies take over as batgirls for his Eagles. The three are Carol Poudrier, Ann Geryk and Chris Poudrier. They are all juniors and said they enjoyed...

EASTHAMPTON — The canopy over the parking lot at River Valley Co-op is helping to generate discounted solar energy for 100 low-income households in western Massachusetts.Through a partnership between the community-owned food cooperative and Co-op Power, a consumer-owned sustainable energy cooperativ...

EASTHAMPTON — Firefighters extinguished a building fire at 97-99 East St. early Sunday night that displaced several people, but it was the actions of a civilian that may have saved one occupant’s life.Fire Chief Christopher Norris said Monday he learned later that, before firefighters arrived, a...

EASTHAMPTON — After gaining input from residents on infrastructure improvements for the New City neighborhood, the city is again seeking feedback as it presents its findings and proposed plans at a public meeting on Saturday, May 21.From 10 a.m. to noon, the Planning Department, the Department of Pu...

EASTHAMPTON — The Chamber of Greater Easthampton is hosting a virtual and in-person professional development and leadership conference, “sheLEADS,” on Friday, May 20 at the Keystone Building in the Boylston Room. “This is a day of professional development with aims to provide tools, connections and...

For many of us, a morning jog is a means of maintaining good health, enjoying the great outdoors, or getting that daily dose of cardio. For James Chevalier, founder of the app CityStrides, running is a hobby that has become his life’s work.Founded in 2013, CityStrides is a running app promoting a un...

EASTHAMPTON — While many individuals in the creative sector across the state did their best to financially hang on amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Easthampton City Arts took the pause as an opportunity to re-evaluate and develop its cultural center by building up its arts infrastructure and introducing...

“Your cadence is a little, it’s … not white. You don’t talk like a white person. Right? And that’s fine.”            I can imagine the stunned silence when Easthampton Mayor Nicole LaChapelle recently made this inappropriate comment to an Easthampton High School student while analyzing that student...

EASTHAMPTON — The Pascommuck Conservation Trust is holding a spring plant sale on Saturday, May 7, in the parking lot of the city’s Municipal Building at 50 Payson Ave.From 8 a.m. to 1 p.m., the trust will have perennials, ornamental grasses, shrubs and more available for sale. Plant donations will...

EASTHAMPTON — After dedicating countless hours fine-tuning their civic understanding and constitutional knowledge, Easthampton’s We the People class headed to the nation’s capital and earned an 11th place spot in the country in the 35th annual We the People: The Citizen and Constitution National Fin...

EASTHAMPTON — Access to life-saving medication is now available in small, clear-colored boxes at several public locations across the city. Each box contains three nasal spray doses of naloxone — more commonly known by the brand name of Narcan — which is a medication designed to reverse an opioid ove...

EASTHAMPTON — The School Committee will vote on its proposed $18.45 million budget for next fiscal year a second time after Mayor Nicole LaChapelle raised questions about whether the committee followed proper procedures under the city’s charter. The proposed budget, which includes an increase of 7.9...

After allowing one run in the first inning, Easthampton pitcher Rosie Follet and the Eagles shut down Frontier for the remaining six innings on Wednesday. Follet threw all seven innings, allowing four hits and striking out nine batters, and the Eagles notched a 6-1 independent victory at Nonotuck Pa...

Mistake-making is part of what it means to be human, and as a white person who tries to work her way through her white privilege conveyed by systemic racism, I continue to make many mistakes. Sometimes real doozies. Instead of going at Easthampton Mayor Nicole LaChapelle’s mistakes repeatedly and ra...

EASTHAMPTON — Mayor Nicole LaChapelle is urging the School Committee to release a March 30 audio recording of comments she made to a high school student in a civics class that her fellow committee members have described as “racist and unacceptable.”“My remarks have been the subject of much debate an...

EASTHAMPTON — The School Committee is calling Mayor Nicole LaChapelle’s controversial remarks to a student in a high school civics class “racist and unacceptable,” and her use of profanity in a school as a public official “unprofessional,” according to an email the committee sent to parents and guar...

EASTHAMPTON — Plans for a new skate park in the city have hit a significant snag, as new environmental concerns for the proposed downtown location are making it likely that skateboarders won’t be “dropping in” there anytime soon.“Based on our initial conversation with our potential environmental con...

Colin Larson makes it easy to forget he’s just a sophomore.The Easthampton native committed to play college baseball at Boston College last week, securing a spot at a school he’s eyed most of his life. The Williston Northampton center fielder won’t step foot on campus in Chestnut Hill until 2025.“Gr...