Pet- Palooza featuring DockDogs, August 3 & 4
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Handmade art meets man’s best friend at Assembly Row in Somerville,  Pet-Palooza and the ASSEMBLED art market come together on Saturday August 3.

~Photo by Lauren C. Osterberg

The OPENAIR Circus will again amaze and amuse audiences this weekend. This year, the big top will be at Conway Field, halfway between Union Sq. and Porter Sq. on Somerville Ave. Performances cap off 6 weeks of summer classes offered by the circus in three Somerville parks. Over 200 children, teens, and adults have been learning and perfecting skills like stilting, juggling, acrobalance, and more.

East Somerville residents took part in a planning session aimed at providing opportunities for interested parties to have a say in how the future of their community may unfold.
– Photo by Douglas Yu

By Douglas Yu

In a civically engaged city like Somerville, people have an opportunity to point out which parts of the city should be redesigned. They are also free to join discussions with their neighbors to come up with ideas for better urban development.

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries of The  Somerville News belong solely to the authors of those commentaries and  do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville News, its staff  or publishers)

By Tim Talun

It was once believed that the harm caused by building the elevated McGrath highway was justified by the collective benefit it would provide.  Today it has been agreed that this overpass will be torn down and reconfigured to fix this mistake, but a few hundred feet down Washington Street an even more questionable argument has been made that the collective benefit provided by a housing development is more important than the concerns of those that live around it.

– Photos by Bobbie Toner

Seize the Summer, the July installment of the city’s seasonal SomerStreets festival took place Sunday, July 29 between Walnut and Cedar Streets on Highland Ave.

Show opens next week at Assembly Row
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A Cavalia crew member rests after scaling one of the 10-story-high peaks of the “big white top” to plant the Odysseo flag yesterday. – Photo by Elizabeth Sheeran.

By Elizabeth Sheeran

Five dozen horses. More than 100 semi-trailer trucks. And the largest big top tent of its kind. Cavalia has arrived in Somerville with the kind of fanfare reminiscent of the days when everything shut down the day the travelling circus came to town.

Last Thursday’s multi-unit fire on Calvin St. brought firefighters from surrounding communities in to help battles the blaze that had the potential to do a lot more damage than it did. – Photo by Teresa Hohenstein

By Harry Kane

A large fire broke out in Somerville, burning down a pair of three-decker houses, and damaging neighboring homes on Calvin Street and Beacon Place last Thursday, July 25. There were no casualties.

The Somerville Chamber monthly “After Hours” is this Thursday night. Join members and guests from Aflac, Cambridge Savings Bank, Chase, City of Somerville, Commonwealth Financial Group, Community Action Agency of Somerville, Law Office of Richard DiGirolamo, Eastern Bank, Langton & Douglas, Laurenz Financial, Legal Shield, Life Line Business Consulting, Daniel Maher Stained Glass, Misujo Realty, MIT, New York Life, Pinctada Banquet & Event Center, Redbones, Respond, Rockland Trust, Sav Mor Spirits, Smiles by Rosie, Somerville Homeless Coalition, Union Square Main Streets, Walnut Street Center, and Winter Hill Bank at the Chamber’s next Business After Hours. 5:00 to 7:00 p.m., Thursday, August 1, at Redbones-Underbones, 55 Chester Street, Davis Square. It’s an excellent networking event featuring free appetizers and a free business card drawing with cash bar. Sponsored by Rockland Trust. Hosted by Business After Hours Chair Dana Iacopucci of Cubby Oil & Energy. RSVP for “After Hours” with name(s) and affiliation(s) for you and your guest(s) to smackey@somervillechamber.org.

Somerville Fighters acknowledged my Fox 25 during the Firehouse Friday segment of Zip Trip . ~Photo by Emmanuel Vincent

By Emmanuel Vincent

Despite the cold, gloomy and wet weather, residents of the city came out to Union Square as Fox25’s Zip Trip made its way to Somerville this past Friday morning.

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries of The  Somerville News belong solely to the authors of those commentaries and  do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville News, its staff  or publishers)

To The Editor:

In the early morning of July 25th a seven-alarm fire raged through a section of Ward 2 displacing 44 residents and destroying 2 buildings with damage to 4 others.