The Dorchester Reporter reports a metal panel from the big old Bayside Expo sign, which advertises an expo center on Columbia Point that was demolished years ago, plunged to the parking lot below recently. No injuries. Read more.

UMass Boston still recommends people wear masks indoors, but says that effective today, it's no longer a requirement.

The Columbia Point school had announced the return of a masking requirement as the area Covid-19 rate was rising, but now: Read more.

Boston Police report a Dorchester man who tried swiping a backpack from a member of the UMass cricket team during a practice at Harambee Park yesterday got about a half mile on foot before officers found him, the backpack and the knife he allegedly displayed at team members who were chasing him. Read more.

A federal judge today tossed a request from students at the University of Massachusetts campuses in Lowell and Boston to force the schools to let them attend classes without getting Covid-19 shots. Read more.

Kirk Sykes's Accordia Partners is proposing nearly 6 million square feet of construction, including 1,740 apartments, restaurant and retail space and some 4 million square feet of "office, research and development, life sciences and/or potentially academic uses" where the Bayside Expo Center used to be and where Santander Bank now runs a large check-processing center. Read more.

The state Department of Public Health and the University of Massachusetts Boston reported today that a UMass Boston student recently returned from Wuhan, China, was diagnosed with the 2019 novel coronavirus, the first in the state. Read more.

The Supreme Judicial Court today dismissed a libel suit against the news editor of the UMass Boston student newspaper because the paper accurately reported accounts by campus police that they were looking for a man for some "suspicious" activity on a shuttle bus - and that means she is covered by a legal principle that protects journalists reporting on "official" statements and actions. Read more.

The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today a worker at UMass Boston can proceed with a libel suit against the news editor at the campus newspaper, which published a photo of him in 2013 provided by campus police - who wanted to ask him whether he was photographing women on a shuttle bus from the JFK/UMass T stop to the school. Read more.

The Dorchester Reporter reports UMass President Marty Meehan is pissed at people on campus going public with criticism of the process to find a new chancellor, which may have made the three decide UMass wasn't worth the trouble, and now he's telling UMass Boston: No permanent chancellor for you.