Easthampton Select Board Accepts State Offer to Fund Southampton Rail Trail Design

Select Board · Meeting of July 28, 2026

Easthampton Select Board accepts state offer to fund Southampton Rail Trail design and permitting at no cost to the town. Kurt Gartner, Assistant Secretary of Environmental Policy at the Massachusetts Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, presented a plan alongside consultants from Stantec and Brown, Richardson & Rowe to close the nine-and-a-half-mile gap between Women's Temperance Park in Westfield and the existing Southampton Rail Trail terminus — with preliminary design work valued at $115,000 fully covered by the state through the Gateway City Parks Program. The board also heard from Town Clerk Lucille Dalton, who advised against holding a concurrent special election for the board's vacant fifth seat on November 3, saying, "I don't want to" — leaving the vacancy question unresolved and likely deferred to the May 2027 annual election.

In other action, the board voted 4-0 to hire Brian Foy of Southampton as a part-time COA van driver at $19.98 per hour fully reimbursable under a FRIDA grant, approved a shared part-time administrative assistant job description for the Board of Health and Building Department, accepted first reads of revised FMLA and bereavement leave personnel policies, and approved FY26-FY27 warrants totaling $4,035,581.56.

In the full story:

• Who Was There
• Organizations And Documents Referenced
• The complete report — 3,569 words

Source: the Select Board meeting of July 28, 2026, reported from the official video recording and transcript.