New England News

Vermont's largest hospital will put off implementing the state's new aid-in-dying law, at least for now.

A U.S. Army soldier from the Berkshire County town of Dalton was among three killed Tuesday in an attack in Afghanistan.

According to military officials 24-year old Army Spc. Mitchell Kirk Daehling was killed along with fellow soldiers Spc. William Joseph Gilbert and Sgt. 1st Class Jeffrey C. Baker. The soldiers were killed by an improvised explosive device.

Daehling was a 2006 graduate of Wahconah Regional High School. On the school’s website a statement reads in part, “Mitch was a true "Warrior" in every sense of the word.” The school’s mascot is the Warrior.

A community forum focused on biking in the Northern Berkshires was recently held, where panelists discussed the challenges and future for expanding the potential for biking in the region.

Jonathan Butler, Adams Town Administrator, said that that the Ashuwillticook Rail Trail – an 11.2 mile railroad corridor turned bike path that runs from Lanesborough up through Adams – has had an impact on the town’s economy that he calls “nothing short of significant”.

A group of visitors from Sweden, students from Maine, and state workers from Massachusetts traveled to the Berkshires to get a first-hand look at some of the cooperative efforts underway to study and restore stream crossings in Western Massachusetts.

At a stream crossing in a wooded area on the outskirts of Pittsfield, Jane Winn, of the Berkshire Environmental Action Team shows a small crowd of students from the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine, and a group of Swedish visitors, a culvert running underneath a rural road…

In a 10-minute speech to four new ambassadors to the Vatican on Thursday, Pope Francis made scathing comments on the state of the world economy, calling for global reform that focuses on human dignity.

The owner of a crude oil pipeline that runs between Maine and Montreal, crossing a portion of Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom, wants Vermont environmental regulators to reconsider a ruling that determined if the company seeks to transport tar sands oil in the pipeline, it must receive approval under Vermont’s environmental review law know as Act 250.