In Greenfield about 60 people attended a rally to call on Biden and congress to stop funding Israel's war in Palestine. The November 4 rally was organized by a group that has a web site at www.traprock.org.

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Thanks to the work of environmental and affordable housing activists, 15 new apartments will soon be for rent in downtown Brattleboro. The apartments are at 47 Flat Street.

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In a union victory, people who were at a Northampton rally in September are celebrating. In Northampton about 110 people were at a union rally on September 21. “I was very pleased with the turnout,” Ellyana Stanton told the Valley Post in a voice phone interview on September 28. She was one of the organizers, and she is a member of the actors' union. Stanton grew up in Amherst and lives in the Pioneer Valley town of Belchertown, Massachusetts. The union has a web site at www.sagaftra.org.

“I joined the union as a freshman in college. It helped pay my way through college,” Stanton said. “I'm 35 now and I still work as an actor, and as an on-set medic in movies, TV and commercials. We're fighting for protection against artificial intelligence. Acting should resonate with human emotion. We're not fighting so Tom Cruise can get an extra million dollars on his next movie. Most of our members are working class people, like background actors. Some of us make less than we would working at McDonald's.”

Actors won their nationwide strike on November 8. Union leaders approved the deal; a membership vote is needed for it to be done.