Millbury

This week is marking a major milestone in a return toward normalcy for the Massachusetts economy as major shopping malls reopen.

In an interview for the WBJ Podcast, bankHometown President and CEO Robert Morton said the Oxford-based bank already had 250 loans totaling about $15 million lined up for when the second round of Paycheck Protection Program.

A building on Latti Farm Road in Millbury that's slated for a cannabis cultivation facility has been bought by the applicant for $9.7 million.

When Spectrum Health Systems got its start half a century ago, the agency was located in Methuen, was named the Challenge House, and the addiction treatment industry thought little of the complex ways people could be helped.

The Hometown Financial Group announced Monday its Oxford-based bankHometown has completed its merger with Millbury Savings Bank.

Central Massachusetts has added two more recreational marijuana shops in Ayer and Millbury after the state Cannabis Control Commission authorized stores in those towns to open.

IBA Inc., a Millbury-based supplier of dairy farm equipment, will be relocating to a new 70,000-square-foot facility in Sutton with the purchase of the property for just under $2 million. 

A 112-unit luxury apartment complex in a renovated Millbury factory has been sold to a Maryland property investment firm for $17.5 million.

Aquarion Water Company, the privately-owned utility servicing Oxford and Millbury and a subsidiary of utility company Eversource, has announced a change in leadership for its Central Massachusetts operations. 

Worcester could have up to 15 cannabis shops. Western cities of similar size show there could be demand for far more, but the economic impact may not be so noticeable.