CHP Welcomes New CEO

03:01PM / Thursday, August 03, 2023Print Story | Email Story

GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass. — Community Health Programs Inc. (CHP) has named Bethany Kieley as its new chief executive officer.

She joined the countywide healthcare network effective July 17.

Kieley was most recently chief operations officer at Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center, a federally qualified health center serving 55,000 patients in greater New Haven, Conn.

At CHP Berkshires, she will oversee a $30 million budget and approximately 240 employees. The network's primary care, dental care, OB/GYN care and extensive family support services care for more than 30,000 Berkshire region residents, including patients in Vermont, Connecticut and New York.

Previously, Kieley worked for nearly 12 years with ProHealth Physicians, a large medical practice network in Connecticut. At ProHealth, she advanced through the ranks from her first role as a regional manager to the position of vice president in practice operations, programs and services.

Kieley also worked as chief operating officer for Women's Care Florida, and in her earlier career held operational roles at medical practices in New Hampshire and Western Massachusetts.

"Bethany brings an impressive leadership background to CHP, along with a true passion for the work of federally qualified health centers like ours, which provide health care for all," said Brian Drake, president of the CHP board. "She will be a strong asset to CHP, Berkshires, and to the wider Berkshire community as we move forward."

Kieley earned her master's degree in business administration from Plymouth State University and completed a healthcare executive leadership program at Stanford University. She earned her bachelor's degree in music and business from DePaul University.

Prior to relocating to the Berkshires, she was an active volunteer tutor and board member for Literacy Volunteers of Southern Connecticut.

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Lee Wants Bioremediation in Housatonic River Vernal Pool Study

05:24AM / Thursday, September 03, 2026

LEE, Mass. — The town has asked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and General Electric to include PCB bioremediation in its vernal pool study on the Housatonic River.

Lee officials are urging the EPA to require GE to add a bioremediation treatment arm to the vernal-pool study or provide the public with a clear explanation for why such testing is being excluded.

"This is exactly the kind of question EPA and GE should be asking before final remedy decisions are locked in," Select Board Chair Bob Jones said in a statement released to the press. "The town is not asking to slow the cleanup. We are asking EPA and GE to make the cleanup smarter, less destructive, and more protective over the long term."

An open house was held in Pittsfield earlier this summer for the Vernal Pool Pilot Study on Reach 5A of the Housatonic River, a five-mile stretch between the river's confluence and Lenox border.

EPA has required GE to conduct a Vernal Pool Pilot Study as part of the Housatonic River Rest of River remediation, comparing excavation and restoration with activated-carbon-based treatments, including a product called SediMite and powdered activated carbon, the town said.

Ten vernal pools will be cleaned of polychlorinated biphenyls in total, five with excavation and five with active carbon, and seven additional vernal pools will be monitored as controls. Construction will be complete around October, but the pools will be left to their natural processes and monitored with surveys and sampling for three years.

The Lee PCB Advisory Committee wrote a letter calling for the 21st-century approach it said could reduce long-term toxicity, avoid unnecessary destruction of sensitive habitats, and improve the effectiveness of the cleanup.

It states that Lee supports the study's purpose and agrees that EPA and GE must understand how cleanup activities affect sensitive vernal-pool ecosystems.

"The current pilot includes 10 treatment pools and seven control pools, while local officials understand that roughly 100 vernal pools may occur in the broader remediation corridor," the Aug. 27 letter reads.

"That makes the pilot study consequential: the methods tested now could shape how many sensitive wetlands are excavated, reconstructed, treated, or left with PCBs managed in place."

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