GREENFIELD — The Andy’s family of stores is adding a new name and a new focus to their Deerfield Street furniture company.
Owners Joe Easton, Kate Finn and Elizabeth Moore announced that Bedrooms by Andy’s will open at 329 Deerfield St., Greenfield, in April.
“We have sold bedroom furniture for many, many years,” Kate Finn said. “But with the addition of mattresses a couple years ago, we have seen this portion of our business grow to the point that we needed to give it more room and more focus. It makes sense to bring furniture back to 329 Deerfield, where Andy’s operated for many years.”
Bedrooms by Andy’s will sell beds, mattresses, dressers, chests and nightstands in a variety of woods. Customization is available in stains, paint colors and hardware options. A selection of quilts, bedspreads and coverlets will also be available. The move to a separate bedroom store will allow the company to stock and show more bedroom options, Finn says, from bunk beds to king-size and everything in between.
Homespun by Andy’s, the curtain and rug specialty store which has been in business since 2005, will move down to the flagship location at 352 Deerfield St. The removal of beds and mattresses from the flagship store will mean the in-stock selection of upholstered furniture, dining and home office will grow.
Andy’s began in 1981 as a retirement “hobby” for Andrew Conti, Finn’s grandfather. Conti would build furniture during the week, and his wife Nellie would do decorative painting on some pieces. They would open for sales on the weekends out of the horse barn that is still the company’s workshop.
The Contis opened Andy’s Pine Shop at 329 Deerfield St. soon after, and the company grew with the addition of daughters Gloria Easton and the late Teresa Conti to the staff. The Oak Shoppe opened in 1995. Gloria’s husband Richard joined the company and eventually the ownership group.
Moore, Easton and Finn grew up working in the stores. The three, which operate as Easton Finn Moore, have owned the company since Dick and Gloria Easton retired in 2013.
Bedrooms by Andy’s can be reached by calling 413-773-3912. A grand opening will be planned to correspond with the stores’ 38th anniversary sale in May.
BOSTON — Almost three dozen nursing homes across Massachusetts are at risk of closing this year, threatening the ability of senior citizens to access needed care, an industry group warned.
In recent months, 20 facilities have shuttered, and another 35 could do so by the end of the year if lawmakers do not act to close a $360 million annual funding gap, according to the Massachusetts Senior Care Association.
MassHealth allocated an additional $25 million last fall to stabilize nursing homes, but the MSCA called for additional investment ahead of a Joint Committee on Elder Affairs hearing scheduled for Monday.
“It is crucial that we continue this important progress and address the growing nursing facility workforce and funding crisis, which impacts all nursing facilities — not-for-profit, for profit and family owned,” MSCA President Tara Gregorio said in a statement. “However, significantly more is needed in order to prevent many regions of the state from losing core facilities.”
Last month, Health and Human Secretary Marylou Sudders told lawmakers at a budget hearing in Needham that “additional closures” were expected at nursing homes, though she did not specify a number.
A combination of an aging population, greater interest in assisted living rather than nursing homes, and a decline in federal support has created a “perfect storm,” Sudders said. State officials at the hearing said Medicare funding for Massachusetts nursing homes has dropped about $300 million since 2011.
The MSCA, which represents more than 400 facilities, pointed to what the group described as deficiencies in the state’s model. Because MassHealth uses cost estimates from 2007 for reimbursements, the group said, homes are consistently underfunded. Each year, the gap between Medicaid funding and MSCA projections of the cost of quality care is about $360 million, or more than $1 million per home, according to the association.
The group urged lawmakers to support bills set to come up at the committee’s 1 p.m. hearing on Monday, H 610 and S 352, that would modernize the formula and grant additional support for nursing homes.
“We are advocating for an update in MassHealth nursing facility funding using more current 2017 resident care and labor costs in order to ensure that facilities have the necessary resources to ensure quality resident care,” Gregorio said. “This update would add just $70 million to the budget, and half of it would be funded by the federal government.”
Half of the communities in Massachusetts are at risk of being at maximum capacity if one facility closes, the association said, and 70 percent of nursing home residents rely on MassHealth to pay for their care.
BOSTON — Federal fishing regulators say catch quotas and regulations for Atlantic bluefish will be about the same this year as they were in 2018.
Bluefish is an oily fish that is popular with some seafood fans on the East Coast, where it is fished commercially. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says rules for this year are only experiencing minor adjustments, in part because no states exceeded their quota allocations last year.
Fishermen will be able to harvest more than 7.7 million pounds of bluefish from Maine to Florida this year. The states with the most quota are North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Virginia, Florida and Massachusetts.
Bluefish is also a popular sportfish. The possession limit of 15 fish per person is remaining the same, as well.