When Betty Matthews came to the annual Chester Business Association (CBA) picnic last week, she expected to be just another guest. But the CBA had other plans in mind: they honored Matthews with the first Betty Matthews Chester Quality of Life Award.“I was overwhelmed,” says Matthews. “It was a total surprise. I had no clue it was going to happen.”
The CBA board of directors originally came up with the award. “The [Snead-Stebbins] Businessperson of the Year award has some pretty strict guidelines, and we wanted to honor Betty – she’s a volunteer and what she’s done benefits the business community and the community as a whole – but she didn’t fit the businessperson of the year criteria,” says Jim Daniels, president of the CBA.
It was agreed that Matthews should be both the recipient and the namesake of the award, thanks to her work on the Chesterfield Center for the Arts. “If it weren’t for Betty, the Arts Center wouldn’t be moving forward,” Daniels says. “Right now, it is moving forward; an architect is planning and a model is being made. She’s kept it alive.”
According to Daniels, the Betty Matthews Chester Quality of Life Award will be given out on an as-needed basis to “someone who has gone above and beyond the call of duty to volunteer their time and efforts to doing things that make the general community a better place to live and do business.”
(Story courtesy of the Village News, 6-24-09)
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