Saranac Lake Winter Carnival Queen and King Nancy Heath and Joe Szwed hand out candy to trick-or-treaters Seth and Lucy Dearwood in Saranac Lake Friday. (Enterprise photo — Lauren Yates)

SARANAC LAKE — Trick-or-treaters filled Broadway and Main Street sidewalks Friday afternoon, despite the village board’s move to limit the annual event.

On Monday, the Saranac Lake village board chose to rescind the road closure permit for the annual downtown trick-or-treating event over fears that it might lead to coronavirus-related school closures and put stress on understaffed businesses. But on Friday, many of those businesses opened their doors, and baskets of candy, to costumed kids anyway.

The Adirondack Center for Writing, located at 15 Broadway, just opened to the public in September, and executive director Nathalie Thill said she’s been looking forward to handing out Halloween candy since the center moved to the new space.

“One of the things that — when we first moved here — I thought of was like, ‘Oh, we can finally give out candy for Halloween!’ So I was just really excited about it, and then I heard other businesses were going ahead,” Thill said. “I’m respectful of the town’s decision to not want to sponsor it and take responsibility for it, but I feel like if we’re taking responsibility for ourselves, and the people are, then it shouldn’t be a problem … I don’t think of it as a rebellion.”

The King and Queen of the Winter Carnival, Joe Szwed and Nancy Heath, also made an appearance, handing out candy on Main Street early in the afternoon.

“The CDC said it was fine, it’s outdoors, there’s no real problem,” Szwed said. “We respect the businesses … and the kids look forward to it so much.”

Chelsi Woodruff, the owner of High Peaks Glassworks, was walking around town trick-or-treating with her kids, Reagan and Seth.

“We own a business in town, we already had all the candy, we figured, ‘Why make the kids suffer?'” she said.

Even though trick-or-treaters were sticking to sidewalks and crosswalks, some drivers along Broadway and Main seemed irritated by the increased pedestrian traffic. A steady stream of cars flowed down the roads by 4 p.m. Some trucks briefly stopped for foot traffic and took off at full speed once the coast was clear. A truck turning onto Broadway from Olive Street was seen pulling out in front of other cars that were stopped at the nearby crosswalk.

Susan Byno, who was walking her trick-or-treaters from door to door, said the town was putting kids in danger by “canceling” the event and keeping roads open.

“The kids deserve a Halloween,” she said. “It’s ridiculous that they canceled it.”