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05/04/2023 08:35 AMThis is the 33rd year Liz Netsch has taken registrations for Chester’s summer Park and Recreation day camp. That is nothing new, but what is new is that this is the last year that Liz will do it. She is retiring as the director of Chester Park and Recreation after 33 years on May 12. (In a spelling anomaly, Liz’s title is director of the Park and Recreation Department, but the supervising body’s name has park in the plural, Parks and Recreation Commission.)
For 30 years, Liz actually held two part-time jobs at Chester Town Hall. She was also the town treasurer, an elected office. She decided not to run again for the treasurer’s position in 2021 but ended up serving for 15 more months anyway when the person elected moved away.
“A lot of people never even knew I had been town treasurer,” she says. “I have always been the Park and Rec lady.”
She is comfortable with the retirement decision she has made. “I turned 65. It is time to turn this over to a younger person,” Liz says.
That younger person is Chester resident Aaron Page, a former teacher, camp counselor, and current president of the Chester Elementary School PTO.
“I feel very fortunate to continue the hard work and quality programming that Liz has brought to our town for over 30 years. Her public service and dedication to our beloved Chester has been felt by every family in town,” Page said.
Now what Liz wants time for is her own family, a son, Matthew Scully of Groton, and two daughters, Randa Larson of Deep River and Danielle John of Virginia, as well as six grandchildren.
Her own mother died in 2020, and Liz regrets that she did not have more time to spend with her.
Liz’s husband Randy, who ran a family construction company, retired two years ago and now coaches girls’ lacrosse and field hockey at Valley Regional High School. A friend fixed up Randy and Liz, previously married with a two-year-old son, in 1985.
Liz loves the memories of youngsters who started as campers, became counselors in training, then full counselors, and in some cases, went on to be lifeguards at Cedar Lake.
“I’ve watched people, seen them grow from campers to members of the staff,” she says, adding that at a recent medical appointment, the physical therapist told her she had gone to the day camp 15 years ago.
For this summer, day camp has been full since January, and there is a waiting list. Camp costs $125 a week, and it is not town budget-funded.
“The aim is to be self-sufficient,” Liz says.
Lis is particularly proud of changes to the summer schedule, which she feels have increased the day camp’s appeal. Now, campers can sign up for three or four activities, one each program period throughout the day. Activities range from arts and crafts and sports to science and nature programs.
There is a two-week break in the middle of the summer for swimming lessons and lifeguard training.
“We can’t do everything at once,” Liz says.
In addition to recreation activities, Liz’s department also oversees Chester’s parks. She says that her retirement is made easier by the fact that the goals she had wanted to accomplish in park renovation and maintenance have largely been achieved.
She points to the redesign and improvements to North Quarter Park as well as upgrades to other locations.
Some of the work came out of Eagle Scout projects; Chester Rotary underwrote improvements in a number of areas, including the picnic area at Parker’s Point and backstops at the elementary school fields.
An unexpected result of remote learning during the worst of the pandemic, Liz says, meant that there were college students around to help with several of the projects.
She loves the story she was told about grandparents who, during the lockdown, didn’t want to see family indoors but got to visit with their grandchildren in another way: by meeting at Cedar Lake.
There is one project that Liz points to as still on the drawing boards, a boardwalk from North Quarter Park to the center of Chester. “That is a long-range thing,” she says.
Former First Selectman Martin Heft first nominated Liz for the Parks and Recreation Commission. She became director of the department in 1990, when the previous head, the late Anna Sweeney, resigned. Liz and Sweeney had met at Cedar Lake when Liz, with one child and a second on the way, saw the double stroller Sweeney had for her twins and asked about it.
Parks and Rec was a perfect place for Liz who had taught swim lessons and worked as a lifeguard and as a waterfront supervisor at summer camps. She started college in Florida but transferred to the University of Connecticut, where she was a nutritional science major. But she had another love as well, accounting, and ultimately got a master’s degree in accounting and public administration from the University of New Haven.
“I like numbers; I like things to balance, to add up,” Liz says, adding, “I love them both; I love accounting, and I liked to swim.”
Liz is surprised and happy at the number of people who, when learning of her impending retirement, have thanked her.
“I love this job. It has been a big part of my life,” she says. But she knows something else as well. “We’re all replaceable,” she says.