By: WWLP Digital First, Sy Becker

Posted: Oct 21, 2021 / 03:26 PM EDT / Updated: Oct 21, 2021 / 06:58 PM EDT

GREENFIELD, Mass. (WWLP) – Franklin County is so proud of the diversity of its courthouse personnel, they celebrated with a Cultural Appreciation Day.

It’s not every day you hear the Libro Azul Latin Jazz and Salsa band playing on the lawn of the Franklin County Justice Center, providing food and acrobatics and welcoming an audience of passersby. Northwestern District Attorney David Sullivan told 22News, the criminal justice system in Franklin County has much to be proud of.

“I’m just thrilled there is a band in front of the courthouse that welcomes people and that it’s a Latinex band that celebrates our diversity not just the court system, but the whole community. How has the court system adapted to this new age diversity? I think they’ve done a great job, and they’ve made a point that we have members of all communities that also work here,” said Northwestern District Attorney David Sullivan.

Over several hours, courthouse personnel celebrated through music and other forms of positive courthouse interaction.

Massachusetts Trial Court Chief Justice Paula Carey was joined with Massachusetts Trial Court Administrator John Bello, and Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Associate Justice Serges Georges, Jr., with other community and youth speakers.

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Hilltown Recovery Theatre will be offering aerial arts demonstrations as well. Community organizations offering resources and information at the event include:

• Center for Human Development
• Children’s Advocacy Center of Franklin and North Quabbin
• Greenfield Community College
• Hilltown Recovery Theatre
• Massachusetts Department of Mental Health
• North Quabbin Community Coalition
• Office of Northwestern District Attorney David E. Sullivan
• Opioid Task Force of Franklin County and the North Quabbin Region
• Recovery Connection Centers of America
• Stone Soup Café
• The RECOVER Project

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By CHRIS LARABEE
Staff Writer, Greenfield Recorder
Published: 6/18/2021 2:38:32 PM

GREENFIELD — Local family-serving agencies and volunteers attended a three-day training session at The RECOVER Project last week to learn about the Strengthening Families Program.

The program, run over seven weeks, focuses on building family relationships through topics such as stress, communication and love. Parents and teens ages 10 to 14 participate together once a week in two-hour sessions where they participate in activities and discussions.

[…]

The Strengthening Families Program has been shown to be effective at reducing youth drug and alcohol use by strengthening family relationships, according to a press release from the Communities That Care Coalition.

The six trainees and additional volunteers that participated last week are now able to bring the program back to their agencies and provide its benefits to the community at large. Agencies might not implement the program right away, but Allen said The Brick House Community Resource Center in Turners Falls and The RECOVER Project in Greenfield are eager to add it to their summer services.

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Amie Hyson listens during a rehearsal for “What Our Voices Carry”, Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2019 at Shea Theater in Turners Falls.

 

By ANITA FRITZ

Staff Writer

Published: 10/8/2020 6:00:49 AM

…Amie Hyson, who has served as a peer counselor at the RECOVER Project, followed him, reading an original piece. “I’m a woman in long-term recovery,” she said before she started to read. “I was addicted to opioids. I facilitated my own healing through writing.”

Today, she works with women in the Franklin County Jail running a writing group.

“It has been a good, long time since this old familiar voice felt an impeding sense of dread,” she continued.

She read a piece that talks about her “dis-ease” and how she learned to “silence thoughts that had haunted” her. Hyson says she is now comfortable with herself. She also talked about how alone she has felt through the pandemic — just like everyone else — and that the old demons tried to return during this time of COVID, but the fear passed and she returned to gratitude…

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Luminaries with the names of local people lost to the effects of addiction for International Overdose Awareness Day on Monday evening outside the RECOVER Project on Federal Street.

By ANITA FRITZ

Staff Writer
Published: 9/1/2020 4:07:44 PM

GREENFIELD – Sarah Ahern stood on Federal Street with several others on a recent cool summer night, clutching a large folder to her chest and mourning the loss of more than 70 people who have died of overdose or addiction-related complications in Franklin County over the past few years.

“In the first quarter of this year, we saw a significant increase in the region,” Ahern said Monday night at the RECOVER Project vigil. “Isolation does that, it feeds the disease.”

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