Country Deli to close, ward system fails to begin in Chester

The December 14 Chester town board meeting celebrated the efforts and contributions of a retiring business owner and heard critical public comments and suggestions.

The board opened the meeting by honoring Anne-Marie McKevitt, a local resident and owner of Anne-Marie’s Country Deli. Since July 2010, McKevitt has served the Chester community in various ways, including feeding residents during the pandemic and providing hot cocoa during the town’s Toys for Tots drives. She recently retired so she can spend more time with her family.

“Be it resolved that while the town board of the Town of Chester and members of the community are at a loss at this time, it is with great gratitude and well wishes to Anne-Marie McKevitt that we say farewell to Anne-Marie’s Country Deli and look forward to her future endeavors,” said Robert Valentine, town supervisor.

Following this, resident Susan Barhen opened public comment with criticism of the board for not finalizing the town’s ward system. She said that the new ward divisions will be needed for the 2023 town council election to establish which offices candidates will be running for.

“I’m here tonight to comment about the lack of the town board getting into the ward system. Approximately five years ago, there was a ballot referendum that was handily passed by the community. The board at that time indicated that they would wait until the 2020 census was done to do that ward breakdown. That 2020 census has been done and been reported and this board has not done their due diligence in getting the ward system broken down,” Bahren said.

With an election coming in the next few months, Bahren said, the board no longer has time to take action.

“I am probably one of the only people that will continue to be disappointed because this did not happen. Because there’s people out there that don’t know that this should have happened and didn’t happen. And it’s a shame, you guys had all the time in the world to do this, and you didn’t do it,” she said.

Then resident Ted Becker suggested that some of the outdated billboards in town be replaced with different signs.

“I just wanted to question the board on the billboards out there. We’ve had signs for the Sugarloaf Performing Arts Center Summer. I was wondering if we could put up signs welcoming people to Chester, the signs we had previously,” Becker said. “It would be nice to see some different signage for a while.”