Take My Council, Please: The Time Has Come to Be Blunt…
SPRINGFIELD—With a lighter agenda on Monday compared to recent weeks, the City Council dispensed with a series of financial orders and legislation before the home stretch of the election.
Tag Archives: Jesse Lederman
Analysis: Sleepy Springfield Election Will Have an Impact, but a Subtle One…
SPRINGFIELD—With no prelim of its own this year, the general election for municipal races in Springfield is taking off after all other Western Mass preliminaries conclude. The lack of a preliminary here has not happened in two decades.
The 413’s Umbrella Labor Group Speaks on 2021 Municipal Races…
Overwhelmed first by hot vax summer and then the coronavirus encore, municipal elections in the region have not exactly take center stage. Into this relative quiet, the Western Mass Area Labor Federation, the umbrella group for labor in the Pioneer Valley, has announced its preferences in some of the most important contests.
Take My Council, Please: Supersize That Permit Review!…
SPRINGFIELD—This week the City Council revisited a troubled revision to a drive-through special permit that had hit the skids earlier this year amid an abutter’s complaints. The item has still not achieved passage amid a sluggish review. Frustratingly, the once-complaining neighbor has been MIA, leaving councilors to straighten things out alone with the applicant.
Briefings: Chang-Diaz is First Sitting Pol to Enter Gubernatorial Fray…
The Democratic field for governor expanded again Wednesday morning as sitting Boston Senator Sonia Chang-Diaz leapt into the fray. A stalwart of the State Senate’s left since her upset victory over an incumbent in 2008, Chang-Diaz brings the race to three major contenders. Ever looming is Attorney General Maura Healey, but the growth of the field could also begin to smoke a decision out of her.
Springfield Set to Adopt Its First Budget As COVID Recedes…
UPDATED 4:30PM: An earlier version of this post indicated the Springfield City Council will vote to approve the budget this week. That vote will actually be later in June.
Springfield is set to emerge from the pandemic in relatively fiscal good shape as the city’s various organs come together to approve the budget.
Take My Council, Please: Time for Encore Performances…
SPRINGFIELD—In what may have become a pattern, the City Council here held a second regular meeting in sequential weeks. This occurred in March, too. Its May 10 meeting consisted of financial orders and leftovers from the prior week. Thus, the meeting sped along an unusual
Take My Council, Please: Consider the Wards of the City…
SPRINGFIELD—The wards were the highlight of Monday’s City Council virtual meeting. Early on, the Council considered a crush of utility petitions that received an unusual amount of scrutiny. Oddly most of these items happened to fall within Ward 2. Its councilor, Michael Fenton, raised the
Take My Council, Please: Have You Had Your Legislative Break Today?…
SPRINGFIELD—The City Council considered and passed a plethora of legislation at its Monday meeting this week. Action commenced on a pair of historic districts—each were at different stages of passage. The ordinance banning the sale of non-shelter animals at pet stores also passed the Council.
Briefings: Pols, Activists Mark a Triumph in Nigh-Eternal Battle against Biomass…
SPRINGFIELD—City Councilors, state legislators, community activists and a United States Senator took a victory lap at City Hall after the state cut off the air for the ever-lingering biomass project. On Friday, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection pulled the air quality permit Palmer Renewable