We here at The Somerville Times wish everyone a happy and safe Memorial Day Weekend. Here’s looking forward to a fun summer season ahead.

By Marshall Collins

The City of Somerville has been focused on increasing open space for years, but the issue is coming into focus now more than ever before: The city council and planning board meet regularly to discuss the matter, and the city is more broadly looking at the future of open space as it reevaluates its goals in SomerVision 2040.

— Photos by Alonso Nichols, Tufts University

Alfre Woodard, award-winning actor, producer and activist, delivered the 2019 commencement address at Tufts University this past Sunday morning.

Eagle Feathers #179 – King of the Hills

By Bob (Monty) Doherty

Somerville is said to be the City of Seven Hills, and Seven Hills Park in Davis Square highlights them. In reality, the city has fourteen hills known by twenty-eight different names. For over three centuries, Winter Hill has been the most notable.

It began as a way to memorialize the military casualties of the Civil War, and was originally termed Decoration Day.

Decorating the graves of the countless multitudes of fallen soldiers helped to console the grieving survivors of the debacle while uniting the once divided nation in a worthwhile common cause.

— Photos by Jeanine Farley

The Somerville Historic Preservation Commission is partnering with other local organizations to host events honoring Somerville’s history and historic assets as part of May Preservation Month.

The City of Somerville is seeking applications from Somerville residents to serve on the Mayor’s Commission on Energy Use and Climate Change (CEUCC).  The CEUCC provides the city and the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability and Environment with technical and policy advice on the topics of climate change and energy.

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A woman who brings the burlesque to her performance and art
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Usually when someone comes to meet me in the back of the Bloc 11 Cafe in Somerville they find a white-bearded, bald guy hunched over a bagel or a newspaper – contemplating the meaning of meaning or whether it’s chicken or meatloaf for dinner. They are cautious in their approach – calculating in their movements. This was not the case with the multi-talented Somerville artist/performer jojo lazar. She burst into my quiet cocoon like a jovial Ethel Merman, as if, “everything is coming up roses” as the song goes. And indeed lazar is a performer and that is evident the first time you meet her.

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Cindy Veach is the author of Gloved Against Blood (CavanKerry Press), named a finalist for the 2018 Paterson Poetry Prize. Her work has appeared in The Academy of American Poets Poem-A-Day, AGNI, Prairie Schooner, Poet Lore, Michigan Quarterly Review, Salamander and elsewhere. She is a recipient of the Phillip Booth Poetry Prize and the Samuel Washington Allen Poetry Prize. Cindy is co-poetry editor of Mom Egg Review.

Arrests:
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Shannon McKim, of 5 Lincoln St., May 15, 7:07 p.m., arrested at Broadway on a warrant charge of miscellaneous statutory violation.

Noe Hernandez, of 90A Flint St., May 15, 8:04 p.m., arrested at Broadway on charges of resisting arrest and disorderly conduct.