Stories
Police In Western Massachusetts Keep Knocking On Drug Users’ Doors Until They’re Ready For Help
Emily Ligawiec, 29, has to sign visitors in to her recovery program in a grand Victorian house run by the Gandara Center in Holyoke, Massachusetts. She’s been living there since getting out of a detox program last fall. She had to give up her phone for two weeks and only recently got car privileges. “We…
Read MoreAs deaths and new infections from the novel coronavirus rise, mainly in China, scientists are working as fast as they can to develop a vaccine that might stem the epidemic. Time is not on their side. If scientists are unable to create a vaccine before the virus spreads further and begins mutating, their efforts won’t be as effective…
Read MoreVaccine Exemption Debate Sparks Memories For Mainers Who Survived Polio
In less than two weeks, Mainers will cast their votes on a referendum that seeks to repeal a new law that removes religious and philosophical exemptions for vaccines. Rates of non-medical exemptions continue to rise in Maine, and they are currently more than double the national average. But whether successful or not, the repeal effort…
Read MoreA Beginner’s Try At Ice Climbing In Southern New England
The defiant spirit of climbers always appealed to me. And ice climbing seemed especially magical. The ropes, the picks, the intrepid hikers who bravely scale rocks transformed by the cold into otherworldly obstacles.
Each winter, area climbers are drawn to spots like the Catskills in New York or the White Mountains in New Hampshire. But there are pockets of good ice in southern New England, too.
Read MoreIce harvesting was a thriving industry in 19th century New England. Using large, jagged-toothed saws, workers would cut heavy blocks from frozen rivers, lakes and ponds, pack it in sawdust and sell it around the world. Then came electric refrigeration, and ice-cutting became all but obsolete. But there are still a few places where the…
Read MoreSome Vermont lawmakers have begun to take a closer look at the art that hangs on the walls of the Statehouse. What they’ve noticed, they said, is a troubling theme: Virtually all of the building’s framed portraits are of old white men. The Vermont Statehouse is where lawmakers conduct the people’s business, but it’s also…
Read More‘Must Love Dogs, Dancing and the Planet’: Climate Change Heats Up the Dating Scene
Valentine’s Day is a romantic time, a time to ask: Will you go out with me? Will you be mine? But a growing number of hopeful young singles are asking a different kind of question: How do you feel about… climate change? Sitting in a booth by the bar at Mahoney’s on Main in Buzzards Bay, 26-year-old…
Read MoreAfter Iowa Stumbles, New Hampshire Touts Smooth Voting Process
It wasn’t just the election results in New Hampshire that were under the spotlight on Tuesday – it was also the process itself. That’s in large part because of what happened a little more than a week ago in Iowa, where that state’s Democratic caucus collapsed in spectacular fashion. By all accounts, New Hampshire’s 6,000…
Read MoreIn Housatonic River Deal With GE, Towns Agree To Toxic Waste Dump In The Berkshires
After more than a year and a half of mediation, the U.S. EPA New England office, General Electric and cities and towns along the Housatonic River have agreed to dispose some toxic PCB sediment at a site near the Lee-Lenox line, about 1,000 feet from the river. But not all participants in the mediated settlement…
Read MorePortland is currently working through the long and contentious process of building a new emergency shelter where people who are homeless can access services and stay on a night-by-night basis until they are able to move on. But for about 20 percent of the homeless population emergency shelters or longer-term solutions that mandate counseling or sobriety…
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