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The Westfield News Serving Westfield, Southwick, and the surrounding Hilltowns
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“Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, and riches take wings. Only one thing endures and that is character.” — Horace Greeley
75 cents
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2015
VOL. 84 NO. 032
Board to review restaurant project
Social media pays digital dividends for Westfield detectives By PETER FRANCIS Staff Writer WESTFIELD – We live in a day and age when social media platforms have changed the world as we know it, in all facets of life, from the way we socialize to the way the law is enforced. Local, state and federal law enforcement agencies have all begun to utilize new and burgeoning social media platforms to make announcements and solve cases. In Westfield, the Detective Bureau of the city’s Police Department launched a Facebook page in the fall of 2013, a development that has paid big dividends. “It gets a lot of information for us,” said Det. Brian Freeman. He said it has garnered over 2,000 “likes” and he posts frequently to those followers. “Some of the first uses we used it for were store surveillance or when we had photos of people we’re looking to identify,” Freeman said. He said that posting images of suspects often spurs followers to share the pictures on their own Facebook pages, which in turn generates feedback from people living in the community who may or may not also follow the Detective Bureau on social media. “We can monitor how many times it gets shared, so after we post it, we can see how many people are sharing it and how many
WPD DETECTIVES FACEBOOK PAGE people have viewed it,” he said. allegedly been beaten on a city sidewalk, “Sometimes it just explodes and reaches when in reality he had merely slipped and thousands of people.” fallen. While posting to the page is generally “People were calling in everyday asking one of the last things detectives will do ‘Is it true that so-and-so got beat up?’ So, when investigating a reported crime, the one of our captain used it to dispel that prevalence of Facebook has worked to the rumor,” said Freeman. department’s advantage and has helped its The anonymous nature of writing to the detectives immensely, according to bureau through a private Facebook mesFreeman. sage has helped in instances where a wit“It is usually just something we do after ness to a crime may have been hesitant to we’ve exhausted other avenues,” he added. come forward in the past. “But a lot of cases would go unsolved if “They don’t have to face us this way. we couldn’t get people’s identities. They can just write a message and we’ll Sometimes we’ll get 10 people calling in write one back usually,” he said. “Everyone to report an identity.” has their phone in their hand all day scrollWhile reports have been known to be ing and when something comes up that incorrect on occasion, Freeman said that piques their interest, they pick up on it.” the bureau welcomes all the information it While Westfield is a city of over 40,000 recieves. residents on paper, at times it can feel like “We also use it to dispel rumors,” he a small town and Facebook’s ubiquitious said, citing an incident which occurred several years ago in which a man had See Social Media Detectives, Page 3
By DAN MORIARTY Staff Writer WESTFIELD – The Planning Board will conduct a public hearing tonight on the proposal to construct a restaurant on the site of a former East Main Street automobile dealership. The petitioner, 99 Restaurant & Grill, is seeking permits needed to demolish the former dealership building and construct a new structure and parking area at 342 East Main St. The Planning Board will hear details of the proposed project, which includes seating capacity of about 248 patrons in a 5,688-squarefoot one-story restaurant facility that the restaurant chain plans to open next fall. The board will assess the petition for site plan approval, as well as the proposed stormwater management plan which limits the volume of stormwater leaving the property. The project proposal is being presented by R Levesque Associates, Inc. on behalf of the restaurant corporation. The project will also be reviewed next Tuesday by the Conservation Commission because the site is located in a flood plain. The property is located in a Business B zone and is a by-right use for construction of the See Restaurant, Page 3
Area gets second snowday in a week By PHILIP MARCELO and DENISE LAVOIE Associated Press BOSTON (AP) — Boston scrambled to dig out yesterday from the second major winter storm in a week and delayed a celebratory Super Bowl parade, and forecasters from Philadelphia to Portland, Maine, warned that “flash freezing” could make roads dangerously slippery. Officials said a Massachusetts woman was run over and killed by a snowplow, and New York state police said two people were killed in a multivehicle crash on an interstate in Rye. Here’s the
latest on the storm: A DEADLY TOLL Fifty-seven-year-old Cynthia Levine was struck and killed by a snowplow just before 10 a.m. yesterday in the parking lot of a condominium complex in Weymouth, south of Boston, the Norfolk district attorney’s office said. In New York, state police said they were investigating a twovehicle crash on Interstate 95 in Rye when a third vehicle lost control on the highway and hit the two vehicles from the first crash, killing two people. The cause was not immediately
known, but the crash occurred as snow and freezing rain hindered travel throughout the region. Officials in Ohio, where the storm hit before slamming into the Northeast, said a Toledo police officer died while shoveling snow in his driveway Sunday and the city’s 70-year-old mayor was hospitalized after an accident that may have occurred while he was out checking road conditions. The officer, who was not named, died of an apparent heart attack. Doctors say Mayor D. See Snowday, Page 3
A plow operator drives along College Highway this morning clearing the snow from a nearby intersection. (Photo by Frederick Gore)
Gov. Baker eyes capital gains tax revenues to close budget gap By STEVE LeBLANC Associated Press BOSTON (AP) — Gov. Charlie Baker is eyeing capital gains tax revenues to help close an estimated $765 million budget gap for the fiscal year that ends June 30. Baker said he’s planning to ask lawmakers for permission to divert the revenues that would typically go into the state’s rainy day fund. He wants to use the money to help plug the gap instead. The Republican governor said he’ll file his budget-balancing plan today. “It includes a variety of revenue, as well as a variety of spending reductions and some other sorts of reforms,” Baker said yesterday after a private meeting
with legislative leaders. Democratic House Speaker Robert DeLeo and Senate President Stanley Rosenberg, who participated in the meeting, said they were open to the capital gains tax idea and would act quickly to close the budget gap. “It’s one-time money and it’s a one-time problem so there is an alignment,” Rosenberg said. “It’s a fair proposal and we’ll review it carefully and I’d be inclined to think that it’s not a bad idea. Otherwise there’s going to be significantly deeper cuts.” Baker wouldn’t put a dollar amount on how much money the capital gains tax revenue would generate. He suggested last month that $200 million in capital gains tax revenue earmarked for the state’s rainy day fund could be
diverted — with legislative approval — to help close the budget gap. Andrew Bagley, director of research and public affairs for the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, said at the time that he believed only $122 million in capital gains taxes would be available for deficit reduction. Baker said he’s not looking to siphon any additional money from the rainy day fund. “We’re still basically working on the theory that the stabilization fund should not be part of the solution here,” he said. Baker is hoping to plug the budget gap by March 4. That’s the deadline for him to file his Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)
See Baker Budget, Page 3
Noble Medical Group and The Noble Health Network | NobleHealthNetwork.com
Expanding to Meet the Needs of Our Community
Noble Primary Care
Arthur King, MD
Elizaveta House, NP
Ira Nathanson, MD
Gary Jacobson, DO
Ramachandran Kuppuswamy, MD
Laura Gioiella, MD
Noble Medical Group is pleased to welcome nine new Physicians and Practitioners, formerly of Hampden County Physician Associates.
Viktoria Madden, PA-C
Serving patients from the following location:
Serving patients from the following location:
800 College Hwy. Southwick, MA (413) 569-2257
57 Union Street, Westfield, MA (413) 572-6050 Michelle Barnett, MD Roger Beneitone, MD