With 2025 now behind us, The Westfield News looks back at some of the biggest stories in Westfield over the past 12 months.
Overflowing crowd attends ribbon cutting for Westfield River Elementary School
Hundreds of residents, young and old, attended the ribbon cutting for the new Westfield River Elementary School on Jan. 18, which was hosted indoors in the foyer, with the ribbon on the stairs leading to the second floor.
Many of the families in the overflowing crowd waited to get in, among them second grader Mazon Cartagena, formerly of Abner Gibbs, who brought his father Jose Cartagena to see his new school. Asked how he liked Westfield River, Mazon nodded, saying, “There are bigger spaces to do stuff.” Westfield River Elementary opened for the first time on Jan. 6 to 404 students from the former Franklin Avenue and Abner Gibbs elementary schools.
Superintendent Stefan Czaporowski welcomed everyone to a celebration of the “first new school in Westfield in 25 years.”
He said the project began when George W. Bush was president in 2008. He spoke about his first visit to the Massachusetts School Building Authority with Purchasing Director Tammy Tefft, former Mayor Brian Sullivan, School Committee member Cindy Sullivan, who was present at the ceremony, and then Business Administrator Ron Rix. “We are seeing the results of that meeting,” he said.
Czaporowski said the shovels went in the ground in April 2023.
The total estimated cost of the school was $60.7 million. Legislation passed in 2023 allowed the state to increase its reimbursement for construction per square foot, and the MSBA contributed a total of $36.2 million toward the school.
Company withdraws application for BESS in Westfield
At an April 25 noon press conference, Mayor Michael McCabe, joined by state Sen. John Velis and Community Development Director Peter Miller announced what he said would be good news for the residents of Westfield and surrounding communities.
“After months of communication and consideration, I am very pleased to announce that Jupiter Power has withdrawn their proposal for a battery energy storage site in the city of Westfield,” McCabe said.
The Streamfield Battery Energy Storage Site proposed by Jupiter Power overlapped the Barnes Aquifer, which has a recent and costly history of PFAS contamination. The project caused an outpouring from residents in Westfield and neighboring communities, who voiced their opposition to the plan at meetings and in other public forums.
The mayor said he had received a brief statement from the company that morning that also followed a recent meeting he had with Miller, Velis and Jack Godshall, chief financial officer of Jupiter Power, that he shared at the press conference.
“Jupiter Power has a broad portfolio of projects in active development across the United States, and is consistently evaluating which projects to continue to invest in and advance. While we know that the Streamfield project would bring many economic and grid resiliency benefits to the region, and are of course disappointed with the outcome, Jupiter Power has now made the business decision to terminate the Streamfield project and focus development efforts elsewhere,” the statement from Godshall read.
McCabe said he had been impressed in that final meeting with the company at how much they had listened to Westfield.
Velis said before the last meeting with Jupiter Power, he had expected “a full-on brawl. I give them credit. They listened in a collaborative manner and were cognizant of Westfield’s history.”
Velis said he was also impressed by the number of emails and phone calls his office received on this matter, and the people who came together in opposition.
“In my 40 years in public service, I never saw an issue like this that was unanimously panned. Nobody was in favor, they were 100% opposed,” McCabe said.
Former mayor voted to council, another ousted in Westfield election
Nearly 20% of 29,308 registered voters, made their voices heard in Westfield’s municipal election where there were contested races for mayor, at large City Council and Ward 2 City Council.
Mayor Michael McCabe earned a third two-year term with 4,041 votes to 1,478 cast for challenger Andrew Mullen.
The biggest upset of the night was in the at large race, where challenger and former Mayor Daniel Knapik earned one of the seven available seats. Bumped from the City Council was incumbent and former Mayor Richard Sullivan Jr.
Top vote-getter in the at large race was Dan Allie with 2,983 votes, followed by Nicholas Morganelli Jr. with 2,914, James Adams with 2,809, Brent Bean II with 2,793, Kristen Mello with 2,758,Cindy Harris with 2,706 and Knapik with 2,699 votes, all of whom were elected.
Not elected were challenger Robert Parent, who was in the eighth spot with 2,600 votes, followed by Sullivan with 2,572, Christopher McCrary with 2,119 and John Bowen with 1,845 votes.
The only contested ward race was for Ward 2 on the City Council, where incumbent Ralph Figy defeated challenger Jessica Britton in a close decision, with Figy receiving 342 votes to Britton’s 299.
Running unchallenged and elected for another two-year term on the City Council was Karen Fanion in Ward 1, Bridget Matthews-Kane in Ward 3, Michael Burns in Ward 4, John Beltrandi, Jr. in Ward 5 and William Onyski in Ward 6.
Incumbent Kathleen Hillman received the most votes for School Committee with 3,475 votes, followed by Kick Sullivan with 3,402 and Jeffrey Gosselin with 3,177 votes. All three were elected to fill the three open four-year terms on the committee.
Elected for two-year terms on the Municipal Light Board in uncontested races were Thomas Fanion in Ward 1, Ray Rivera in Ward 2, Dawn Renaudette in Ward 3, William Parks in Ward 4, Robert Goyette, Jr. in Ward 5 and Robert Sacco in Ward 6.
Also elected for a six-year term as a Westfield Athenaeum trustee was Kathleen Knapik.
Westfield agrees to seek settlement in wage theft lawsuit filed by police officers
The city of Westfield and 17 current Westfield Police Department officers who are suing it alleging they should have been paid “regular wages” when attending police academy have agreed to try and mediate the case being heard in Hampden County Superior Court.
“We’re trying to resolve the matter,” said Springfield-based attorney Jeffrey Morneau with Connor & Morneau who has been representing the officers who filed the lawsuit against the city in September 2024.
Morneau said he and the attorneys defending the city, Boston-based firm Seyfarth Shaw, have been having ongoing settlement discussions for the last several months.
“We agreed to hold off on any further action in attempt to reach a settlement,” Morneau said Monday about the joint motion filed on Nov. 11.
According to the joint motion: “After engaging in discovery and engaging in preliminary party-to-party settlement discussions, the parties have agreed to attempt to informally settle this matter, including in conjunction with related wage-and-hour case with the same counsel.”
The “related wage-and-hour case” is a lawsuit filed by Westfield Police officer Efrain Luna in U.S. District Court alleging the city had violated the federal Fair Labor Standards Act by not paying him overtime.
On Oct. 6, Luna, who is also represented by Morneau, and the city filed a joint motion to stay the federal case pending mediation, which was granted by U.S. Magistrate Judge Katherine A. Robertson two days later.
The judge hearing the Superior Court case has yet to rule on the joint motion filed by both parties to stay the lawsuit pending settlement negotiations.
The September 2024 lawsuit filed by the 17 officers against the city had three separate complaints referred to as counts.
Count 1 alleged that officers attending the police academy should have been paid the same wages as regular officers since they had been “appointed” to the position of “Police Officer” and the city was “obligated” to pay regular wages.
Count 2 was that the city didn’t pay the officers while they were attending the academy regular wages earned within seven days of the end of the pay period, which was essentially asking the court to find that the officers attending the academy should have been paid at least $21 an hour instead of $19 per hour while enrolled at the academy.
And in Count 3 the officers alleged the city was obligated to pay them because they provided “valuable services were provided to the city” — it is called a claim for quantum merit. Count 3 also includes the officers had a “reasonable expectation” of compensation for services, the city accepted the services provided by the officers, and a reasonable person would have expected compensation.
The city, through Seyfarth Shaw, denied the allegations in Count 1 — that the city was obligated to pay the officers regular wages — by questioning the legal conclusions used in the lawsuit.
For Count 2, the city again denied failing to pay the wages earned within seven days of the end of the pay period and denied the officers were entitled to damages.
For Count 3, the city denied that the officers had provided “valuable services” to the city because the allegation was “vague” and that the officers were paid what was owed to them.
The city also said it acted in good faith and with reasonable grounds to believe it was not violating the law.
It also made a motion to dismiss the officers’ lawsuit, which was denied last May.
Luna also filed his lawsuit in U.S. District Court in September 2024. In it, he alleged the city hadn’t paid him “time and a half” rates for work in excess of 40 hours in one week since July 2021.
