https://www.facebook.com/ChestertownResponds/videos/534655217248868/
In a video posted April 8 to the town’s COVID-19 Facebook page, Chestertown Mayor Chris Cerino said the town’s farmers market will not open Saturday.
The town had voted 4-1 Monday night to allow 13 vendors to sell fresh produce and food products in the Wilmer Park parking lot, with vendors separated by about 10 feet and a pedestrian flow configuration that attempted to maintain social distancing among shoppers.
After Monday’s vote, the Kent County Health Department told town officials the vendors “were still too densely packed,” Cerino said in the video, and the health department suggested they should be 30-40 yards apart.
“Clearly we are not to be able to accommodate that in that parking lot and as a result the market will not be reopening this Saturday,” Cerino said, noting “the market will be closed for the foreseeable future at least in the format that we’ve all enjoyed so much over the past several years.”
This video is about five minutes in length.
garret falcone says
Thank you Chris..
a good decision ..!!
We appreciate you and your teams efforts to keep Chestertown healthy and safe!!
Garret
J.M. Kramer says
So the farmer’s market won’t open because the Kent County Health Dept decided to arbitrarily impose a social distancing of 90 to 120 ft. What is the basis of this 20 fold increase of CDC recommendations? This is the same KCHD that decided to stop issuing any information about covid-19 cases in the county. I’d like to know if one of my neighbors is sick. I would make decisions about, for example, whether to go to the pharmacy or grocery store based on that. It seems KCHD ascribes to the mushroom theory of information management: keep them in the dark and feed them horsesh*t.
Steven Mitchell says
I’m a little confused at the logic of cancelling the Chestertown Farmer’s Market yet again. For some reason the Kent County Health Department has weighed in and has decreed that the vendors need to be 30 to 40 yards apart to ensure no transmission of COVID-19. How did they come to this conclusion and what science is this based on?
Takoma Park, Maryland (in Montgomery County) has one of the best farmer’s market in the state. Since the outbreak of COVID-19, they have not stopped having their weekly market, however, they have put certain precautions in place that are very similar to those that would have been in place at this Saturday’s Chestertown market (one entrance, limiting people, only handling food products that they intend to purchase, etc.). Montomery County currently has 1,214 cases of COVID-19 (116.7 per 100K of population) and 29 deaths attributed to COVID-19 (2.8 per 100K). Kent County has 9 cases (45 per 100K) and 0 deaths. Queen Anne’s County has 17 cases (34.4 per 100K) and 0 deaths. (Washington Post, 4/9/20).
Montgomery County is one of the wealthiest counties in the country and probably has a preeminent health department to go with that wealth. Montgomery County is also the home to the National Institutes of Health and has a high number of very educated people living there. I’m certain they have done the analysis and have deemed that the Takoma Park farmer’s market poses no more of a risk to people than going to a normal grocery store and have allowed it to continue with the above-mentioned precautions.
What information does the Kent County Health Department have that they used to come to the conclusion that differs from that of the Montgomery County Health Department that is much better financed and has a higher level of professional expertise than Kent County has?
I would like to see the analysis that the Kent County Health Department did to come to their conclusions, since they seem to have come up with something that differs from the rest of the state. I will be asking Mayor Cerino to post that analysis to the Town’s website so that all of us can see the science behind the decision. Maybe Mayor Cerino can send this analysis to the govenor’s office to have it validated (or invalidated) by the state’s health department.
If there is no science behind this decision, then shame on the Mayor (and I assume the Town Council) for going back on their decision they made just three days ago. Decisions made on a hunch, bad science, or “shooting from the hip” is not something I would expect in Chestertown.
Wilson Bolton says
Now they suggest that we need to be almost half a football field apart at the oprn air farmers market.. The aisles in our 2 Supermarket are no more than 8 feet wide in a closef building…
Very confusing
MARIE treiber says
Thank you mayor Cerino for the explanation of challenges with the farmers market. Once explained, it makes sense to remain closed. Thank you for all your hard work in keeping our community safe.
Ruth Vietri-Green says
Very sensible decision. Thank you KCHD & thanks Mayor Cerino for the explanation. We all miss the Farmers market a lot, but our public health & safety must come first!
Nancy Connolly says
As a retired Kent County Health Department employee, (having worked there 20 years), I can assure C.S. readers, that the decision to NOT reopen the farmers’ market WAS NOT made “arbitrarily”.
Do we really want to post anti messages about our local County health department at such a difficult and medically uncertain time? Support those “in the trenches” and offer solutions NOT criticisms…
Deirdre LaMotte says
This is obviously an emotional subject for many. Fresh local food is wonderful and an economic boom for farmers. I always buy local and organic when I can.
But during a pandemic that is spread by our proximity to others, desires and routine really have to be altered.
Yes, at the grocery we will encounter others. But to have an ensemble of people for a short period of time buying food is not necessary. That is the point. It can wait.
joe says
(How did they come to this conclusion and what science is this based on?) Is what was asked, but no response to a reasonable question. The solution was presented, and KCHD decided to increase the distance by 20 times. Facts. People are asking for a factual response, not an ex employee saying it was a hard decision.