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The Westfield News Serving Westfield, Southwick, and the surrounding Hilltowns
www.thewestfieldnews.com
VOL. 83 NO. 22
“Who never doubted, never half believed. Where doubt is, there truth is — it is her shadow.” — Gamaliel Bailey
MONDAY, JANUARY 27, 2014
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City celebrates decade of chilly dunks By Peter Francis Staff Writer WESTFIELD – Speakers blared Foreigner’s “Cold as Ice” and Van Halen’s “Jump” over the ice of Westfield’s Hampton Ponds Saturday, commemorating the tenth annual Penguin Plunge. What began as a small gathering of about 50 brave and crazy souls on Southwick’s Congamond Lakes has emerged into a much larger fundraising event for the Amelia Park Children’s Museum, and Saturday’s event was the biggest plunge yet, hauling in
around $25,000 to benefit the Museum. State Senator Don Humason, Jr. (R-Westfield) was awarded a golden plunger award as recognition for a decade of participation prior to following Tricia Knapik, wife of Westfield Mayor Daniel M. Knapik, into a large hole which had been cut into the pond and made all the colder by the afternoon air, registering around 31 degrees at plunge time. “I think I’m the only one who has plunged every year, and I can remember almost every plunge crystal clear,” Humason
said. “(Congamond) was nice but crowded, so then we went to the swimming pool on the Green and now Hampton Ponds.” Humason recalled the Green being among the coldest plunges, but said he also remembered a year when the air was about 40 degrees. Hundreds of participants came out for the largest turnout in the event’s history, from adults to small children, with local businesses and community members alike sponsoring the aquatic lunacy. “I don’t know how many, but I have heard that the online reg-
istration was unbelievable. It has grown tremendously,” said Mayor Knapik. Though he himself has never plunged, Knapik said that he was part of the original planners for the event and thanked everyone responsible for it’s continued success, especially the city’s Fire and Police Departments. “Without the Fire Department especially, and the Police Department, this would be a hard thing to pull off,” he said. Knapik’s wife was participating in the event for the second See Penguin Plunge, Page 3
Senior Center hearing continued By Dan Moriarty Staff Writer WESTFIELD – The Planning Board voted last week to continue the public hearing for the special permit, site plan and stormwater management plan requested for the Council on Aging Senior Center project, to its Feb. 4, 2014 meeting. The board acted to give the engineering and architectural consultants time to modify the plans to address issues raised Tuesday by board members. The 20,000-square-foot, two-story building is being designed by a team of two architectural companies, Dietz & Company Architects of Springfield which is teaming up with Courtstreet Architects of Newton with the Berkshire Design Group as the landscaping consultant. The facility will have footprint of a 15,000-square-feet and will be located on the 2.3 acre site on Noble Street. Construction is estimated at about $7 million. The board members made several suggestions to modify the plan, such as lowering the height of the raised sidewalk bisecting the parking lot to the lot grade to facilitate ease of access, in particular where it crosses driveways on the site. “I think it want well,” Council on Aging Executive Director Tina Gorman said this morning. “The Planning Board members asked some good questions. I think they did the right thing (in continuing the hearing) because we have a lot of issues we’re still trying to address as the design is finalized.” Gorman said that the hearing continuation “shouldn’t have any impact on the timeline.” “The plan all along has been to advertise the contract in late March or early April so we’d be able to go to the City Council in May or early June with a real number for the bond,” Gorman said. “We’re still on target for all of that.” The board asked about relocating a storm drain from the Ely-Dolan apartment complex, which currently is under the building site, to the north of the building footprint, then out to the city’s drainage system under Noble Street. Other issues included preserving or removing mature oak trees on the property; the on-site stormwater management, which include underground detention basins and system with oil/ water separators; pavement marking to help direct the movement of traffic within the site; and the building set-back required under the zoning codes. Building Superintendent Jonathan Flagg, who is the code enforcement officer and a member of the Senior Center Building Committee, said that See Hearing, Page 3
Participants enter frigid waters during the 10th Annual Penguin Plunge Saturday. See additional photos Page 8. (Photo by Frederick Gore)
Hampden County jobs, wages behind WAYNE MACBROWN
JUSTIN M. MACBROWN
ANDREW C. STENICO
Taunting texts trigger tumult By Carl E. Hartdegen Staff Writer WESTFIELD – There’s a country song in the story behind an apparently shocking broad daylight assault on the grounds of a city housing project Thursday. Three men have been arraigned on charges which include home invasion and two confederates are sought by city police after a woman transferred her affections to a new man who was apparently unable to resist taunting and challenging her former boyfriend of seven years until violence erupted at Powder Mill Village. Sgt. Paul R. Beebe, the police street supervisor, reported Thursday afternoon that he responded to a report from the emergency dispatcher of an assault in progress at the Union Street subsidized housing project along with officers Harry F. Sienkiewicz, John Barnachez, Joseph Stoyak, Terry Manos, Steven Carrington and Brendan Irujo. The initial response which triggered the major police reaction was that five men armed with knives and baseball bats were assaulting another man. Sienkiewicz reports that as he approached apartment complex he was flagged down by a man holding a hammer. Sienkiewicz, who knew the man from previous encounters, reports the man surrendered the hammer and said that it had been used to assault him. He said he had taken it to prevent it from again being used against him. The victim told Sienkiewicz that he had been at a cousin’s apartment in the complex when five men burst in yelling that they were going to do him bodily injury. As the officer was speaking with the victim, his girlfriend walked to join them in a parking lot at the complex and said that she, too, had been assaulted by the men. While the male victim said that he could only identify one of the intruders, his girlfriend said she knew them all and identified them as her former boyfriend, Justin MacBrown, his brothers, Shane and Adam MacBrown, their father Wayne MacBrown and her half brother, Andrew Stenico.
The duo explained to the officers at the scene while their injuries were tended by Westfield firefighters, and in subsequent interviews and statements, that they had been together with a resident of the apartment, the male victim’s cousin, when the incident erupted. The woman said that she has not been staying at her Connor Avenue home since she broke up with her boyfriend of seven years “4 or 5” days earlier because the man is there and said she had been at the home of her friends where she began a relationship with a cousin of theirs, the male victim. She told Det. Todd Edwards when he interviewed her that, about 1:30 p.m. Thursday, she had been in the apartment with her friend and her new boyfriend when she saw her former boyfriend and the others arrive at a nearby parking lot in two cars. She said that it looked as if the men were looking for the apartment where they were but, when they had not found them after 15 minutes, she thought the men had left. But the men appeared outside the rear sliding door, she said, and forced it open without knocking and all ran in “threatening to kick (the victim’s) ass.” Wayne MacBrown was armed with a small knife with a black blade, she said, and another was armed with “a wooden club or stick that appeared like a handle from a snow shovel.” She said that she tried to get between them and her new boyfriend but her former boyfriend “grabbed her and threw her on the tile floor with enough force where she slid about 5 feet into the front door.” She said that she was then trampled by the intruders when they chased after the male victim who had fled out the door she had slid into. She said that she saw Wayne MacBrown throw the knife he had in his hand at the male victim but does not believe he was struck with the knife. The young man residing at the apartment told Det. Anthony Tsatsos when he was interviewed that he too recognized all five See Texts, Page 3
By Peter Francis Staff Writer BOSTON – Counties throughout the Commonwealth of Massachusetts have reported gains in employment numbers, according to data released last week by the New England Information Office of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, along with increases in average weekly wage. Yet in Hampden County, wages have not seen an increase over the past year, despite eight of the Commonwealth’s largest counties seeing second quarter increases in 2012. With wages remaining stagnant in western Mass., and with legislation currently pending review on Beacon Hill regarding a potential minimum wage increase, the board of directors of the Affiliated Chambers of Commerce of Greater Springfield (ACCGS) voted to take a position opposing the legislation on the minimum wage legislation. “Given the sluggishness of the economy and the high cost of doing business in the Commonwealth, the ACCGS See Wages, Page 3
American Legion gives funds to pantry By Hope E. Tremblay Staff Writer SOUTHWICK – American Legion Post 338 is helping families in the area with a sizeable donation to Our Community Food Pantry in Southwick. Post Adjutant Michael Sullivan and other members of the Legion gave Pantry Coordinator Sally Munson a check Jan. 25 for $5,000. Sullivan said the money was made available through new Moto-Cross owner Michael Grondahl. “Mr. Grandahl gave money to us to distribute the way we saw fit,” said Sullivan. “We gave some to American Legion charities, the Holyoke Soldiers’ See Pantry Funds, Page 3
Sally Munson of Our Community Food Pantry in Southwick accepts a $5,000 donation from American Legion Post 338 Adjutant Michael Sullivan Jan. 25 while members of the Legion look on. (Photo by Hope E. Tremblay)
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