Springfield Creative City Collective

On May 15, 2026, approximately 80 stakeholders gathered at the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center in Holyoke for the 8th Western Massachusetts Economic Ecosystem Summit.

With participation from Berkshire, Franklin, Hampshire, and Hampden counties, Greater Boston, the South Coast, and beyond, Summit #8 brought together leaders across economic development, government, business, clean energy, manufacturing, food systems, public health, research, culture, and community development to explore Western Massachusetts’ future and its relationship to the broader Commonwealth. The day focused on renewable energy, climate resilience and justice, food systems, advanced manufacturing, innovation, public health, infrastructure, workforce, regional readiness, equitable economic development, and shared prosperity.

Our “Powering Western Massachusetts: Energy, Equity, and Regional Economic Opportunity” conversation was moderated by Lydia Berry of ReVision Energy, with Dee Boyle-Clapp of the UMASS Amherst Arts Extension Service, Samantha Hamilton Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts, and Cassandra Holden of Bombyx Center for Arts Equity. Aaron Vega, President & CEO of the Western Mass Economic Development Council, and Commissioner Xiomara Albán DeLobato, former Vice President of the Council, joined us for a fireside conversation about regional economic development and Western Massachusetts’ place within the Commonwealth.

We also welcomed Kristina Racek Pechulis of the Massachusetts Food Systems Collaborative, Beverly Craig, LEED AP of the Clean Energy Center, and Rich Cook, Senior Manager of Manufacturing Growth and Workforce and Zhuqing Wang, Senior Manager of Manufacturing Technology and Innovation at the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative – Center for Advanced Manufacturing, bringing food systems, clean energy and advanced manufacturing into the broader conversation about the infrastructure and industries that support our regional economy.

Michael Goodman, Professor of Public Policy at UMASS Dartmouth, and Jacob Miller, Regional Prosperity Lead for the South Coast Regional Prosperity Collaborative, closed with “Organizing for Shared Prosperity,” offering lessons from regional collaboration elsewhere in Massachusetts.

A heartfelt thank you to our Premier Sponsors, ReVision Energy and IronRidge - An Enstall Company, and Executive Sponsor Senator Adam Gomez. Your partnership reflects a real commitment to Western Massachusetts through your presence, expertise, investment, and willingness to build alongside the people and institutions shaping the region’s future.

A major highlight was welcoming Kalim Azad, Senior Vice President of Operations at Enstall, who traveled from California to represent Premier Sponsor IronRidge/Enstall and present on “Enstall & MA: The Spirit of America.” Drawing on 14 years in the solar industry and 25 years in manufacturing and operations, Azad shared Enstall’s broader manufacturing vision and growing commitment to Massachusetts, including IronRidge’s new solar racking manufacturing presence in Westfield, bringing a global clean-energy leader directly into conversation with Western Massachusetts’ economic development ecosystem.

Lastly, thank you to every person who attended Summit #8. WMEES is strengthened by the collective knowledge, perspectives, relationships, and experiences participants bring into the room. Through thoughtful exchange, new connections, and shared insight across communities and industries, attendees continue to deepen our understanding of Western Massachusetts and strengthen the region’s economic ecosystem.

The 8th Western Massachusetts Economic Ecosystem Summit was funded by MassDevelopment /TDI and the Barr Foundation, this program is one component of a broader “TDI Creative Cities” initiative to boost arts-based economic development.

Her Legacy 2026 is almost here!

This Tuesday, the Springfield Creative City Collective will be hosting, Her Legacy: Portraits of Progress - A Living Archive of Women and Girls Across Western Massachusetts!

Inspired by the anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment and the women's right to vote, Portraits of Progress recognizes the bravery, determination, and persistence of the women who fought for greater participation in our democracy and the opportunities and freedoms we continue to benefit from today. Across Western Massachusetts, women and girls are continuing that story. We are dreaming big, loving big, creating, learning, growing, exploring, finding and amplifying our voices, building relationships, and living freely despite so many obstacles. On Tuesday, we have the honor of documenting some of it.

Through portraiture, candid photography, and community documentation, we will create a visual record of women and girls as we exist today, our big moments, everyday lives, relationships, joy, creativity, beauty, and community. The evening will feature three photography experiences, live music, poetry, dancing, food, large community photographs, conversation, and opportunities to connect with women and girls from all four counties of Western Massachusetts. At this time, 8 attendee spaces and 5 model spaces remain. Registration will close Sunday.

Thank you to everyone who has registered, shared opportunities, connected us with artists, and helped bring this vision to life. We look forward to celebrating the history that helped make so much of our lives possible while preserving a little piece of the history women and girls across Western Massachusetts are living right now.

See you Tuesday!

Attendee Registration: https://forms.gle/reA7p65SdVXAoatB7

Model Registration: https://forms.gle/EBTd7bLBCFUhAGx3A

Congratulations to the Boys & Girls Club Family Center for creating a new opportunity for Springfield youth to explore art, express their creativity, and connect with the community!

Click on the link below to learn more about this inaugural Springfield family art festival happening next week!

Art in the Park will feature youth artwork, local vendors, live entertainment, food trucks, and interactive art activities. Admission is free.

Saturday, August 15, 2026
10:00 AM–4:00 PM
Sarno Family Park, 481 Carew Street, Springfield

Learn More Here:

Art in the Park Springfield MA | Boys & Girls Club Event Join Art in the Park at the Springfield Boys & Girls Club featuring youth art, local vendors, food, family activities, and community fun in Springfield, MA.

Springfield Fashion Week is just three days away! Have you gotten your tickets yet?

Congratulations to the organizers on their fourth year of hosting this event! It is extraordinarily difficult to sustain an annual event, and the community is grateful for your service.

Check out more details below and buy your ticket today!

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/fashion-at-mgm-tickets-1992606537794

Join Springfield Fashion Week on Saturday, August 8, at MGM Springfield for an evening celebrating fashion, creativity, culture, and designers from across the region and beyond. The event will feature runway collections, live entertainment, red-carpet moments, and opportunities to connect with creatives and industry professionals.

Secure your tickets and support the growing fashion community in Western Massachusetts.

Regional economic development involves an exceptional amount of work that happens between institutions, and conversations that require patience, authenticity and trust. Ultimately, it asks us to think beyond our individual organizations and invest in the longterm health of our regional ecosystem for the collective benefit of the communities we serve.

Executive Director of the Springfield Creative City Collective Tiffany Allecia M.Ed. had an awesome morning continuing these efforts through thought partnership on the future of Western Massachusetts with Western Mass Economic Development Council President Aaron Vega, MassDevelopment Director of Transformative Development Anabelle Rondon-Palau, and Deputy Director James McKeag, as well as Arts Equity Group Founder and Principal Consultant Danielle Amodeo!

Hey Community!

Governor Maura Healey’s Advisory Council on Latino Empowerment is hosting an Informational Community Forum on Economic Development right here in Springfield tomorrow, June 23rd.

This statewide listening tour is designed to share updates on actions being taken to strengthen and safeguard communities while creating space for residents to share their concerns, ideas, and priorities directly with state leadership.

Join the conversation and help ensure Springfield’s voice is heard.

📅 Tuesday, June 23, 2026
🕠 5:30 PM – 7:30 PM
📍 Eagles Nest Hall
1666 Main Street
Springfield, MA 01103

The forum will focus on economic development and provide an opportunity for community members to engage directly with representatives from Governor Healey’s Advisory Council on Latino Empowerment.

✨ This is not a Springfield Creative City Collective event. We are simply helping spread the word to ensure our community is aware of this opportunity to connect, learn, and share feedback with state leaders.

We encourage residents, business owners, community leaders, cultural workers, entrepreneurs, faith leaders and anyone interested in the future of our city and region to attend.

Learn more: https://www.mass.gov/orgs/governors-advisory-council-on-latino-empowerment

Thank you to our local elected officials for being involved with this work and amplifying our community needs - Representative Orlando Ramos, Representative Carlos Gonzalez, City Councilor Jose Delgado and Senator Adam Gómez!

Earlier this month, Springfield Creative City Collective Executive Director Tiffany Allecia M.Ed, Executive Committee Members Evyan Diaz and Destinee Brown Bowens attended MassINC’s 30th Anniversary Celebration at the State Room in Boston. Please see Allecia’s reflection on the historic event below.

“Congratulations to MassINC on three decades of research, journalism, public dialogue, and systems-level thinking! Their 30th Anniversary Celebration inspired me to research their older reports and policy work referenced throughout the evening.

Over the last two weeks, I’ve read Lessons Learned (1998), The Road Ahead (1998), The Changing Face of Massachusetts (2005), An Incomplete Grade (2009), and the opening chapters of the recent Massachusetts Middle Class Status Report. I’m currently enamored by how profoundly MassINC’s work has shaped the Commonwealth’s understanding of systems, regional inequity, civic life, and the interconnected realities shaping the quality of life across Massachusetts.

For decades, MassINC has explored how educational disparities, economic instability, demographic change, civic fragmentation, transportation barriers, workforce pressures, and unequal access to opportunity collectively shape our lived realities. Revisiting these reports feels instructively urgent because many of the tensions they identified remain unresolved today.

MassINC’s work reflects the understanding that people experience systems holistically and simultaneously. Housing impacts workforce participation. Transportation impacts opportunity. Economic instability impacts mental health and civic engagement. Time scarcity impacts community connection and democratic participation. Public trust, belonging, culture, safety, and mobility constantly shape one another in real time.

In 1998, when Lessons Learned and The Road Ahead examined the future of Massachusetts, I was four years old preparing to move from Hartford to Springfield. By 2014, when H.31, An Act to Support Transformative Redevelopment in Gateway Cities, became part of the legislation creating MassDevelopment’s Transformative Development Initiative, I was a sophomore in college navigating many of the realities these reports had spent years documenting.

That legislation and surrounding policy ecosystem eventually created the framework for the TDI Creative Cities Initiative developed by MassDevelopment and the Barr Foundation. Years later, Springfield became one of the Creative Cities, and the Springfield Creative City Collective emerged as the local partnership implementing that work on the ground; the honor of my lifetime to lead.

MassINC’s commitment to research, Gateway City advocacy, and economic development strategy helped lay the foundation for my role as Executive Director of the SCCC. Its work continues shaping statewide conversations around equity and mobility while also driving local outcomes like creative sector growth, organizational sustainability, and job creation.

For 30 years, MassINC has helped Massachusetts more honestly understand itself! Congratulations to Joe Kriesberg, Benjamin Forman, the Queen Elise Rapoza, and the whole MassInc team for helping us think more deeply, act more intentionally, and better understand how we design a thriving society for the Commonwealth!”

Springfield Creative City Collective Executive Director Tiffany Allecia M.Ed. was named a 2025 ALX100 honoree and attended the annual celebration at the JFK Presidential Library in Boston last Friday. Thank you to We Are ALX for recognizing Latinx leaders across Massachusetts and elevating the work, perspectives, and leadership shaping communities throughout the Commonwealth.

Check out Allecia’s personal thoughts on receiving this award below!

“A Morena from the North End of Springfield made the cut!

My family’s journey spans five generations of emigration across multiple Caribbean and Latin Caribbean countries, where they built lives, raised families, and weaved together a legacy that lives across borders. Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Venezuela are all part of that story that I’ve been blessed to inherit.

Recognition like this heals something in the little girl in me.

As a no sabo kid, from a bilingual and multicultural family, I’ve spent so much of my life feeling like I had to defend or prove my heritage. I created Black & Brown Wall Street because I know I’m not alone. There are so many of us living in between worlds, continuously navigating identity, belonging, and visibility in ways that aren’t always seen or understood.

And somewhere within that “in between”, I’ve learned that my heritage doesn’t need to be verified or validated. It’s something to be lived out loud, revered and loved fully.

It is the honor of my lifetime to live, work, and build in a city and a state where I am continuously learning that my full identity, with every unique layer is safe and celebrated.

Thank you ALX100”