07/28/2026
Office of Chester Supervisor Holdridge
2026 Half-Year Recap:
I'm sorry I didn't have time or help to put this in nice graphics for everyone. Please see my recap that was in the papers below!
I hope everyone is having a great year so far! I work full-time as your Town Supervisor, and I’m honored to be able to do what I do for our community every day. Here is a look at some accomplishments from 2026:
I personally assisted at least 25 of our neighbors in various constituent services cases. These are issues that impact your life daily; like getting potholes filled, garbage issues, building department complaints, flooding mitigation, financial concerns, state/federal services, and more.
Under this current administration, the Town of Chester has either received or been awarded approximately $1,489,182 in grant funding! This year, we’ve been awarded funds for our next Family Field Day, another Senior Picnic, a new Art in the Park Day, a new Senior Hoe-Down event, new playground equipment for Chester Commons Park, Fire Department equipment, and more!
Affordability is a number one issue for most. I’m happy to report that we signed a union contract earlier this year with the Chester PBA that does not affect officer’s benefits but also keeps salary increases at a reasonable rate of 2.25% which will save money for taxpayers at the same time as preserving the quality of life for the officers. We LOWERED the Town tax rate for Village of Chester residents in the 2026 budget. We sold the Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center last year which significantly lowered our financial burdens this year. We reverted a full-time town position back to part-time and we did not replace a clerk position in the Town Court office saving taxpayer dollars in the long term. We accepted a less-costly energy and cleaning contracts for town properties. We started earning more interest in our funds through a new investment vehicle we adopted. Finally, residents can feel confident of our financial stewardship by the results of our most recent audit. We were the FIRST town in the county to submit its yearly audit. We also have no new recommendations from our auditing firm as opposed to the multiple pages of recommendations we used to get prior to 2025. We’ve cleaned up the accounting and financing in Chester to a great degree since the start of 2024.
ICE is back in the news in Newburgh. Most elected Democrats and Republicans agree that having a facility in Chester would have hurt our quality of life, our taxbase, our environment, and our potential for economic development. Our community would have lost out on over $500,000 in tax revenue. It would also put Chester residents, visitors, officers, and detainees at risk here in our peaceful town. We had 68 Hudson Valley elected officials sign my letter opposing the proposed facility. We successfully fought and kept an ICE facility out of Chester.
We’ve passed a couple of local laws. One of which is the Entity Disclosure Local Law that forces developers and other entities to disclose their funding sources and connections when they have applications before any of our boards. This will increase transparency exponentially. We also just passed our Comprehensive Plan and Zoning amendments which bans data centers, bans battery storage facilities, creates a special use permit framework, reinforces the mixed-use zoning for the Hamlet of Sugar Loaf, and converts industrial zoning on Lake Station Rd to suburban-residential zoning cutting down on potential warehousing development in that area.
Quality of life issues are always a personal focus of mine. We’ve repaired a playground slide and installed a security camera at Oak Dr Park. I’ve worked with our Highway Department, County DPW, and State DOT to keep our roads free of potholes and hazards throughout the Winter. Our investment in Winter tarps paid off in a healthier field for our sports teams. Additionally, we reduced the speed limit on Sugar Loaf Mtn. Rd, increasing the safety of vehicles, pedestrians, and animals.
A HUGE thank you to all town representatives, staff, & professional services that helped to make all of this happen!
Looking forward to the rest of the year, this Town Board is laser focused on ensuring your quality of life is as high as possible while also keeping your taxes/cost of living as low as possible. After stabilizing our finances in 2025, we were able to keep the 2026 budget under the tax cap, and we were able to lower Town taxes for Village residents as I previously stated. My goal will be to repeat or improve this outcome for the 2027 budget.
We are very close to modifying our agreement with Empress EMS. This new agreement would have Empress employees staff the rig that we own but would have the Town of Chester keep any billing revenue that comes from emergency calls. This would significantly lower the ambulance tax district burden on residents. Current estimates have us saving a minimum of $400,000 a year compared to our current contract.
Finally, I’m committed to working on projects like additional playground improvements, passing new tax exemptions for our residents who are disabled and/or veterans, putting on all of our Parks & Rec events/programs, expanding our Dial-A-Bus services for those who need it, and fixing/updating our infrastructure.
If you have any questions/suggestions/concerns, please feel free to reach out to me any time!
Brandon Holdridge
Town Supervisor
Town of Chester
845-469-7000 x2
[email protected]
