Editor’s note: This letter has been edited due to several factual errors confirmed today by Egremont Selectboard member Mary Brazie, and one of the Inn’s owner’s, Nick Keene.
To the Editor:
In 2010 the Old Egremont Inn burned down and Egremont was devastated. So in 2013 when Sara Keene bought the Weathervane and renamed it the Egremont Village Inn everyone was delighted. Over the last two and one half years we have watched, with growing dismay, as two restaurants and an entertainment venue have opened and closed.
The Robbie Burns Pub was a notorious roadhouse in the 1970’s that operated out of the barn. Time has dimmed some memories and made this all seem charming and romantic. It was not to the neighbors. There are within 1,500 feet of the barn 50 properties whose owners run businesses from their homes also; families with small children, and school age children who need to sleep; the elderly, and second home owners whose tax contributions to Egremont must be considered as they watch their property values sink.
The Keene’s Egremont Village Inn has 10 rooms, a restaurant that could serve 50; a bar that could serve 20 and a permit for live entertainment on the weekends. The Old Egremont Inn had 28 rooms, a restaurant that could serve 60; a bar that could handle 30 and live entertainment on the weekends. At no time did the Old Eg. feel the need to serve on their porch, their lawns, by their pool or their tennis courts or anywhere else but inside the main building. They respected their neighbors’ rights to not be accosted by sound, smell or lighting. They were packed. We loved them. We miss them. We thought we were getting them back.
On Thursday night (Oct., 1), the Zoning Board of Appeals will hear a request from The Egremont Village Inn LLC. [Editor’s note: the request is for “light entertainment and public assemblies” according to Egremont Selectboard member Mary Brazie] We all want business in Egremont. We all thought we had a good one. I for one am sorry that the Keenes do not seem to know how to operate one. A roadhouse is not an appropriate business for a small rural community whose website claims “we are a quiet community with limited night life.”
Susan Bachelder
Egremont
