The MBTA is preparing to launch its long-delayed, billion-dollar fare collection system – and with it, a crew of “fare engagement officials” who will check whether subway and bus riders have paid their fares and cite those who have not.

Nobody likes someone who uses their strengths to punch down at others’ weaknesses, but there can be a positive side to music snobbery.

Meet two extraordinary women born and raised in Cambridge who broke barriers and extended the boundaries of their respective careers.

Public meetings this week look at making a better Central Square, how to make City Hall contracting more equitable, the economic toll of vacant spaces and the use of “micromobility” devices on city streets.

In a look ahead at a week of Cambridge and Somerville events, there’s hip-hop dance, Valentine’s, Galentine’s, Mardi Gras, Lunar New Year and Black History celebrations, operatic ballet not seen since the 1700s, “How to Steal a Presidential Election” and the arts of writing love poetry and sex scenes.

We continue Black History Month with Emory Clark, who dreamed of owning his own pharmacy and made it come true (with a sideline in ice cream), and Charles Lenox, whose quiet work helped build Cambridge business community in the early 1800s.

Another sign spring is right around the corner? The warm weather music festivals are starting to roll out their lineups. And none are more eager than Boston Calling, our local monument to blue-chip billboard pablum.

In a look ahead at a week of Cambridge and Somerville events, there’s a “Groundhog Day” Improv Show, We Black Folk music festival, a fermentation workshop (with sauerkraut!) and more fun science, Celeste Ng and Jas Hammonds readings, ice skating and play premieres to go apiary for (such as for “Bumbled”).

We begin Black History Month with Rowena Taylor, a midcentury Cambridge assistant city solicitor and a lawyer in private practice with an office in the Abbot Building in Harvard Square; and Dr. Mary Crutchfield Wright Thompson, a 1930 Tufts Dental School grad known as “Dr. Mary” to generations of Cambridge students.

The inaugural edition of a two-day We Black Folk music festival sold out in short order despite a legacy that is often underreported by the history books. Also: How to remember Jimmy Flynn, longtime promoter of the Boston hardcore scene.