Letter: Time to retire Maryland's third senator

09:30AM / Tuesday, August 04, 2026Print Story | Email Story

To the Editor:

Time to retire Maryland's third senator

Sen. Chuck Grassley visits all 99 Iowa counties every year (not every six years) as does his colleague Sen. Joni Ernst. The media has dubbed this tour "The Full Grassley."

Sen. Amy Klobuchar goes to all 87 Minnesota counties annually and Sen. Chuck Schumer shows up in all 62 New York counties each year.

Our junior senators from Ed Brooke to Paul Tsongas to John Kerry all made it a point to get to each and every part of the Commonwealth.

We have 14 counties (one of which – Nantucket - is a single town) and yet there are dozens of communities from the hilltowns of western Mass to North Quabbin and the Blackstone Valley that Sen. Ed Markey can't be bothered to set foot in. Since joining the US Senate in 2013, he's never visited almost all of the rural towns in the five western counties. This is unacceptable.

The fact that he spends more time in his Chevy Chase mansion rather than in Cheshire, Chesterfield and Charlton is why he's earned the disparaging moniker as Maryland's third senator.

Markey also doesn't answer his constituent mail. Looking to know where he stands on an issue or if he'll co-sponsor a piece of legislation? Well, good luck waiting for a reply to your query.

Markey voted for NAFTA which resulted in the loss of 185,000 good-paying manufacturing jobs (43 percent of this sector's employment) between 1994-2002 in Massachusetts.

Markey was the deciding vote in 1998 to repeal the Glass-Steagall Act. This sellout to Wall St. and unwise degregulation helped pave the way for the 2008 financial collapse where approximately 60,000 homes were foreclosed on in Massachusetts between 2007 – 2011. To make things worse, Markey voted in 2008 to throw $700 billion of taxpayer money to bail out these financial firms who gave hefty bonuses to their CEOs and top executives. Markey voted for big bank bailouts and Bay State homeowners and businesses went bankrupt.

On Sept. 1, please join me in voting for Rep. Seth Moulton.

Matt L. Barron

54 Stage Road, Chesterfield, MA

413-446-5228

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Recent E. Coli Detection in Pontoosuc Lake Confined to Lanesborough

By Brittany PolitoiBerkshires Staff
05:05AM / Tuesday, August 04, 2026

PITTSFIELD, Mass.— Only Lanesborough's portion of Pontoosuc Lake had a bacterial exceedance last week.

During the Lake Management Commission's second meeting on Thursday, members received an update on the situation.

On July 22, the Lanesborough Board of Health closed the Sunrise Street and Narragansett Avenue beaches due to high E. Coli levels. They have since cleared.

"We didn't have any bacterial exceedance in Pittsfield, so there's no concern at all last week for any E. coli concerns in Pittsfield,” Parks, Open Space, and Natural Resources Manager James McGrath reported.

Regular monitoring for bacterial exceedances at swimming beaches across the Commonwealth is required. Pittsfield's Board of Health tests Pontoosuc and Onota Lake weekly on Wednesdays throughout the summer.

Lanesborough also conducts weekly testing through its Board of Health, and an exceedance was reported to the state at Sunrise Beach, at the very north end of Pontoosuc Lake.

McGrath noted that he did not see Narragansett Beach on the state's dashboard.

"The City of Pittsfield was made aware of the bacterial exceedance and we, of course, were concerned,” he said.

"Our weekly testing happened the next day on Wednesday. Our results were returned Thursday morning. We did not have a bacterial exceedance at Pontoosuc Lake Park, where we test off of the wall on the north side of the channel, and also proximate to the boat ramp, at this point in time.”

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