Market Match Expands Into More Farmers Markets Statewide

KQED NEWS
By Adizah Eghan

A recent $3.7 million grant from the USDA is helping Market Match, an innovative program that began in the East Bay, expand to more than 230 sites statewide.

It makes local and organic produce more accessible to those who use the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which is CalFresh in California.

Market Match, led by the Berkeley-based Ecology Center, doubles benefits up to $10 at farmers markets statewide. It was started by Oakland-based Roots of Change in 2009 and administered through the Specialty Crop Block Grant program until March.

Since Market Match started, it has grown to more than 150 markets serving about 50,000 shoppers.

The Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive (FINI) grant to the Ecology Center is aimed at serving 240,000 food-insecure shoppers by connecting them to small farmers. 

"The additional funding allows us to participate with smaller markets, more regional and rural markets," says Martin Bourque, executive director at the Ecology Center. "It also allows us to work with CSAs, farmstands and the emerging mobile markets."

Phat Beets is a North Oakland food justice collective that introduced Market Match three years ago. It supports farmers of color with a variety of programs, including community supported agriculture (CSA) boxes that it distributes around the East Bay and at farmers markets.

"If you're taking and making the farmers market a little more equitable and welcoming to folks, you're increasing the traffic, the access, and you're getting more sales for your farmers." says development director Max Cadji.

The boost in funds also allows markets that couldn't previously afford the program to participate, such as San Francisco's Heart of the City market.

On a Wednesday afternoon at Heart of the City in United Nations Plaza, shoppers on public assistance line up to swipe their CalFresh electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards, which gives them money in the form of plastic tokens to buy fruits and vegetables.

Heart of the City has the largest EBT program in California, with over $250,000 in transactions every year. The farmer-operated market has two market days a week, on Wednesdays and Sundays. In order to match all of the expected EBT transactions in the next two years, the market matches only up to $7, compared with $10 at most markets.

For many shoppers, it's their first time using Market Match. The cashiers at the information tent explain the program, as shoppers swipe their cards.

"Do you know about our Market Match program?" the cashier asks market shopper Ronald Becker.

"What’s that?" he replies.

"Market Match," the cashier says. "It’s our new program where we can match your EBT purchase up to $7 per market day. So since you spent $20, we’ll give you an extra $7."

Becker looks at his handful of tokens. He walked to the market from his home near the Civic Center. As a veteran, Becker receives CalFresh as part of his pension plan. He likes to buy fish, mushrooms and herbs.

"I like to make West African cooking," he says. "I like groundnut chops, different stews. Now I’m into a fish kick, so I’m making a lot of fish -- a lot of seafood."

At Heart of the City, market director Kate Creps oversees the conversion of cash into tokens, and back into cash for farmers.

"Market Match is blue over here," she says, as she sorts a bag full of yellow, blue and green (for debit and credit) tokens. "That's our newest token. We’ve only had it since the beginning of June."

Since launching Market Match, Creps says, Heart of the City has distributed $4,000 in tokens. That's $4,000 worth of food that people couldn't otherwise afford. Consequently, all that extra buying power helps farmers sell more of what they grow, too.

Farmer Grace Teresi grows berries, herbs, and other foods at Miramonte Farms and Nursery in San Juan Bautista. Business has been rough, she says. So those Market Match tokens are always a welcome sight,

"So yes, it’s been a great help," Teresi says. "My sales that would have been down like 20 percent have been down not as bad. It’s been down maybe 10 percent."

Demand for Market Match is so strong that the Ecology Center wants to expand, but funds are limited. The new grant, which was awarded in April, will allow the program to reach 234 sites in the next two years -- but more markets want to join today.

That's why the Ecology Center is sponsoring AB1321, a bill that provides the legal framework for the state to administer nutrition incentive programs like Market Match, to the extent that funds are available.

If the bill passes, the extra money from the state would increase the chance of a second round of funding from the federal government.

A 12% EBT Participation Increase Thanks to Kaiser Permanente

A generous gift of $20,000 from Kaiser Permanente has resulted in a 12% increase in the amount of fresh produce purchased at our market by EBT participants, which not only helped promote access to fresh food in a food desert but also supported small farmers at a time when local small farming is severely threatened.

Due to the high need in our community, Heart of the City Farmers Market has accepted food stamps since our very first market day 32 years ago and today our EBT (electronic benefit transfer) program is one of the largest and most successful in the country. 

Kaiser’s support has enabled us to incorporate an additional staff member on market days to meet the demands of a growing EBT Program and conduct EBT outreach to increase awareness that SNAP/CalFresh participants may use their benefits to purchase healthy food at Heart of the City Farmers Market. As a result, we saw a 12% increase in EBT participation despite our 2014 program challenges, including Federal cuts to the EBT program and decreased farm participation at our market as a result of California’s devastating drought.


Farmers Markets Reaching More Consumers Who Get Nutritional Benefits

by Lee Romney, Los Angeles Times

Reporting from San Francisco —

Mercy Mena arrived at Heart of the City Farmers Market in the shadow of San Francisco’s City Hall on a crowded Wednesday.

Before she meandered the stalls for fresh herbs, broccoli and nuts, she stopped at the main tent. After a swipe of her electronic benefits card on a wireless machine, she was handed bright yellow tokens in exchange for her federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits — formerly known as food stamps.

Mena, the mother of a 4-year-old, lives in the nearby Tenderloin, where poverty rates are high, there are no supermarkets, and life expectancy is 20 years lower than in surrounding neighborhoods largely because of preventable diet-related disease.

A grower-run nonprofit since 1981, Heart of the City knows those statistics well: It has made the most successful push of any farmers market statewide to let local residents know their federal benefits are welcome, processing more than $230,000 in electronic benefits last year.

“Where we live there are so many corner stores with bad food, just bad,” said Mena, 25, who recently lost her cafe job. “This is just amazing to have.”

Other California farmers markets have also begun to reach more consumers who receive nutritional benefits, thanks in part to a subsidy from private and public sources that stretches their buying power.

The Market Match program has been modest — and Heart of the City has simply been too successful to qualify. (It would burn through the available incentive in one market day.)

But now, thanks to $100 million set aside in the 2014 federal Farm Bill for precisely such incentives over the next five years, the program is poised to expand.

Heart of the City Executive Director Kate Creps estimates that access to the incentives could help her market triple its already hefty electronic benefit sales, reaching more at-risk customers while supporting small growers.

An outside evaluation of Market Match and three similar incentive programs in other states — which collectively serve 518 farmers markets — showed that consumers in “food deserts” were buying fresh fruits and vegetables with their benefits.

The research helped persuade federal lawmakers to act, said Martin Bourque, executive director of the Berkeley-based Ecology Center, which manages Market Match.

The catch: the Farm Bill dollars must be matched by state or private funding, and many market organizations lack the time and capacity to pool those resources.

A bill sponsored by Assemblyman Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) would have brought the Market Match program under the control of the California Department of Food and Agriculture. The agency ultimately would have provided the matching funds, applied for the federal dollars on behalf of California’s farmers markets, and ensured that even those operating on a shoestring had technical support.

The appropriations committee last month placed the bill in “suspense” because of cost concerns after unanimous passage in the agriculture committee. Ting plans to reintroduce it.

“The beauty of this thing is that it works,” said Michael Dimock, president of Oakland-based Roots of Change, which in 2009 created Market Match and recently handed the management reins to Bourque’s group. “We’re going to go back. We have support on the Democratic side and on the Republican side, and I think it’s just a matter of timing.”

California has already seen a huge uptick in the purchasing power of benefit recipients at farmers markets, with or without the match.

Mena, who receives $230 per month, greeted a nut farmer by name in Spanish before getting an informal lesson from a sprout grower on his offerings — along with some tastings. The bounty at Heart of the City, she said, is “a blessing, really.”

Farmers market vendors once liberally accepted federal nutritional benefits — when they were paper documents. But when the federal government in 2003 switched over to the electronic benefit, or EBT, swipe card, the markets were caught off guard.

“They don’t have hard-wired phones and power, which you needed for swipe devices,” Bourque said.

The Ecology Center helped devise a wireless, battery-powered point-of-sale swipe card device that satisfied the security concerns of federal officials, and launched a campaign to get them into markets.

According to the California Department of Social Services, which has provided free EBT machines to markets, the number accepting electronic benefits grew from 50 in 2008 to 428 as of last month.

Market Match, generally capped at $10 a week per shopper, served 38,000 families last year who, using just $237,000 in incentives, spent more than $1.5 million at 150 California markets, according to Roots of Change.

Last month, the early-childhood support organization First 5 LA funded the largest expansion of Market Match to date, with a $2.5-million grant to the Ecology Center that will help 37 Los Angeles-area farmers markets.

James Haydu, executive director of Sustainable Economic Enterprises of Los Angeles, which operates eight markets set to benefit from the grant, said Market Match has driven “overwhelming” customer growth at its Watts and Central Avenue locations. “We’re gleaning new customers weekly.”

lee.romney@latimes.com

Drought Hits the Civic Center Farmers’ Market

SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
By Jonathan Kauffman

“Drought Dispatch” is an ongoing Inside Scoop series about the effect of California’s extreme drought on the food we eat.

Kate Creps, executive director for the Heart of the City Farmers’ Market in Civic Center, can track the effect of the drought on her market by the empty spaces in the line of stalls. Pheng Keng is missing. No one has seen Gloria Avila, who’s been a regular since the 1980s, in months.

It could be worse: Only five or six stalls out of 55–almost exclusively small family farmers, who govern the independent market as well as display their wares at it–are absent so far, she estimates, including a few Vietnamese American and Hmong farmers from the Central Valley. The usual Wednesday-afternoon crowd, a mix of Tenderloin residents and office workers, doesn’t appear any smaller than usual.

But the mood among the farmers is wary, to say the least. Tony Cozzolino, the youngest (at 29) and newest (at several months) farmer at the Heart of the City market, slips off the plastic glove he’s been using to measure out fresh alfalfa and broccoli sprouts to shake hands. He smiles easily–Hollywood whites–but worry flickers at smile’s edge as he talks.

Tony and his wife, Stephanie, who farm in Half Moon Bay, just started selling sprouts this year to bolster the income from their two primary crops: pumpkins and Christmas trees. “We’ve already started planting stuff together more tightly to conserve water,” he says, though the strategy means disease can spread among the plants more quickly. “You can normally water for two hours twice a day, but now we’re only watering for one and a half hours once a day.”

Even that is fragile: There’s no excess water to plant a garden for personal use, and the Cozzolinos even have to think carefully about how they wash the sprouts. All of the farm’s water, after all, comes from a creek. And it’s quickly drying up. If that happens, he says, “That’s it.” He’s not sure how much to plant, and is praying for June rains.

Another empty space belongs to El Hullana of Hullana Farms, who’s been at the Civic Center market since it started in 1981. Hullana’s family has farmed in Merced since 1946, and Hullana stopped selling to wholesalers several decades ago. Instead, his melons, peppers, napa cabbage, broccoli and tomatoes go directly to farmers’ market shoppers, Chinatown produce markets and Korean American kimchi makers.

Hullana hasn’t been coming to the market because he has only been able to plant one crop this spring and summer instead of double-cropping. Not only that, he’s only planting half of his 60 acres — and currently waiting for someone to replace the pump and pipes in his well so it can reach the groundwater, whose surface is far deeper than in years past. “I’m pretty nervous right now,” he says.

Yet Hullana, who speaks on the phone after descending from his tractor to sit under a tree on the edge of his fields, doesn’t sound like nerves are paralyzing him. The drought — and his absence from the San Francisco farmers’ markets — is forcing him to do something he’s been meaning to do for years: install drip irrigation lines to deliver water directly to his plants, and not the surrounding soil and weeds.

“It will save a lot of money and a lot of labor,” he says. “It’s going to work. It has to work. I want to adapt. I don’t want to be in this situation again.”

Read more at insidescoopsf.sfgate.com.

We've Increased EBT Participation by 27%!

The staff team at Heart of the City is proud to report that we've successfully increased participation in our EBT program by 27% in 2013!

Though we've been a small farmer-operated non-profit since 1981, we received our first grant ever after pledging to increase the number of low-income residents who use their EBT benefits to purchase fresh local produce from farmers. The USDA granted us $94,000 to increase awareness that food stamps may be used to purchase healthy fresh food here in the Tenderloin and to open a new market day on Fridays for our low-income "food desert" that lacks a grocery store. Our community has an average life expectancy that is 20 years lower than surrounding communities due mainly to preventable diet-related diseases, shining a light on the fact that we live in a food desert that lacks affordable fresh food options and that poverty is one of the biggest hurdles to a healthy diet.

We achieved our goal through nutrition education outreach and promotion and generated an additional $46,000 in EBT revenue for our small farmers in 2013. To learn more about our project and efforts to support our community, view our final report here: Heart of the City Farmers Market FMPP 2012 Final Report.

We now accept over $250,000 each year in EBT purchases to get fresh, healthy, local produce into the hands of residents living in San Francisco's poorest community, making us one of the most impactful sources of fresh food in our food desert. 

Happy New Year to all our friends and supporters! We are so grateful and proud to be a part of this neighborhood and wish you all a happy and healthy 2014.

Each Week Farmers Donate Over 1,500 Pounds of Produce

Heart of the City farmers have teamed up with Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation to donate produce for free distribution to those in the Tenderloin and Mid-Market neighborhoods who cannot afford to incorporate fresh produce into their diets even with the aid of Heart of the City Farmers Market's EBT program, which enables residents to purchase food from farmers with food stamps.

Volunteers from TNDC collect produce donated by farmers at the end of each Wednesday market day and distribute it free to residents at a Free Produce Store in the heart of the Tenderloin. Over 1,300 pounds of produce is donated each day by farmers. On Sundays, Project Open Hand collects produce that they use to deliver healthy meals to residents with mobility challenges. To listen to KGO Radio's spotlight on this effort, click here.

Heart of the City Farmers Market is a non-profit with a mission not only to support small-scale farming, but also make fresh produce accessible to everyone and help to create a Healthy Heart of the City.

Other  “Healthy Heart of the City” Efforts by Farmers

Our farmers market is dedicated to nutrition education  outreach.  Last fall we did 5 workshops  in after-school programs and affordable supportive housing buildings  (partnering with TNDC, Glide, and the Boys and Girls Club) to teach about produce,  farms, and healthy choices, then took participants on tours of the market to  meet the farmers in person. We call these our "Healthy Heart of the City  Workshops" and have plans for six more this fall. We partner closely with  Department of Public Health’s Feeling Good Project to offer nutrition education  activities for the community and the Office of Women's Health and Chinatown  Public Health Center to offer free health resources during market days. Our  farmer-run Board has donated over $50,000 to local non-profit organizations  since the market was founded. 

$94k USDA Grant Awarded to Heart of the City Farmers

A Farmers Market Promotion Program grant awarded for 2012-2013 will enable Heart of the City Farmers Market to bridge the gap between local, healthy food and San Francisco’s Mid-Market and Tenderloin neighborhood “food desert.”

For 31 years Heart of the City Farmers Market has operated in San Francisco’s United Nations Plaza as an independent, farmer-operated non-profit market with a mission to bring a much-needed source of affordable fresh food to the  Mid-Market and Tenderloin "food desert" that for more than three decades has been without an affordable supermarket within walking distance.  Heart of the City’s mission is to keep costs low for small family farmers through subsidized stall fees, which helps keep  produce prices lower for the low-income residents of the Mid-Market and Tenderloin neighborhood.

Due to the high rate of poverty in this community, 60% of CalFresh/SNAP benefits (formerly known as food stamps) used at San Francisco farmers markets to buy fresh produce are used here at Heart of the City. 

“The total amount of purchases made here with an EBT card has grown by 30% each year for the past three years,” said Kate Creps, the market's Executive Director. “For many in this neighborhood, using their food stamp benefits is the only way they can afford  to incorporate fruits and vegetables into their diet.  We know there are many who don’t know they can use their EBT card to shop here but with our limited resources, but our ability to promote and staff this program has not been able to meet the rising need.”

The Department of Agriculture has pledged its support to help change that. $93,778 in federal funding for Heart of the City Farmers  Market was announced on September 21, 2012, by Agriculture Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan as part of the USDA Farmers Market Promotion Program, which will provide over $9 million in grants in 2012 to organizations across 39  states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico for initiatives that bolster the connection between agricultural producers and their consumers while improving access to healthy food and strengthening local economies. 

“This funding is so exciting for us because to date this market has been 100% stall fee supported and each project we undertake must be paid for by our farmers, who are struggling to survive in this economy,” said Kate Creps.  “Consequently our efforts  have been limited to what we can do inexpensively with our tiny staff team.  These funds will enable us to go above and beyond our current ability to outreach to and support this community.”  Funds will be used to launch an awareness campaign to promote the use of CalFresh/SNAP benefits (food stamps) to purchase healthy foods at the farmers market and to offset start-up costs of a new year-round farmers market on Fridays to increase access to fresh food for local residents.

On August 3, 2012, Heart of the City Farmers Market launched a new Friday farmers market from 7am to 2:30pm at the United Nations Plaza to give residents easier access to fresh food and to lend a hand in Mid-Market revitalization efforts.  “New farmers markets always have a difficult start-up period as customers get accustomed to the new market day.  During this period it costs more for farmers to travel to and staff the market than they profit from sales,” said Kate Creps.  “Because our mission is to support our small family farms and help them survive through this recession economy, we have not been charging our farmers stall fees and have been absorbing the start-up costs. This grant is a welcome reprieve.”

Farmers Market Promotion Program funds will enable Heart of the City Farmers Market:

  1. To provide free stall fees for our farmers on Fridays for six months to encourage them to continue participating on Fridays until the number of customers rises and the market becomes profitable.

  2. To ensure that the new Friday market day will be a year-round market. Heart of the City Farmers Market’s Wednesday and Sunday markets are year-round rain or shine, but the winter brings slower months with a smaller produce selection and fewer customers on rainy days. Concerns that the new Friday market day would not survive through the slower winter are overcome by this welcome source of financial support.

  3. To hire one additional staff person to help us staff the market’s EBT machine and do outreach to neighborhood community organizations, supportive housing buildings, schools and after-school programs to teach residents how to use their food stamps to purchase affordable, fresh-picked produce.

  4. To facilitate free nutrition education workshops and farmers market tours to connect local residents to our farmers and encourage healthy, sustainable food choices.

A Farmers’ Market in the Heart of the City

SPUR.org
by Eli Zigas, Food Systems and Urban Agriculture Program Manager

For more than three decades, San Francisco's Heart of the City Farmers’ Market has been operating at UN Plaza, along Market Street and within sight of City Hall. The market is unique not only for its central location but also for its dedication to offering fresh produce to low-income customers living in the nearby Tenderloin neighborhood while also supporting the livelihood of California farmers. 

Since its start in 1981 as a joint project of the American Friends Service Committee and Market Street Association, Heart of the City Farmers’ Market has been governed by its farmer-vendors. As a result, the farmers have worked to keep stall fees – what they pay for space at the market – low. Currently the fees are $30 per day, per 10 foot by 10 foot stall, which may be the lowest rate in the city. The low stall fees are a prime reason this farmers' market is known not only for its variety but also for its affordability.

The market is also known for its size. With more than 50 farm stands and nearly 20 prepared-food vendors selling fruits, vegetables, flowers, fish, eggs, bread, tamales, rotisserie chicken and more, the market is bigger than most other markets in the city except the Ferry Building and Alemany Markets. According to Kate Creps, Heart of the City market manager, most of the farmers travel 1.5 to 3 hours to reach the market, though some travel further, including Dates by Davall, who drives more than 8 hours one way to bring his produce from the Coachella Valley, east of Los Angeles.

The market also distinguishes itself by its commitment to support the use of food stamps at farmers’ markets. More than 75 percent of all CalFresh electronic benefits used at farmers’ markets in San Francisco are redeemed at Heart of the City.

The organization just reached a new milestone this month with the addition of a Friday market, complementing its existing Wednesday and Sunday gatherings.  While it’s still to be seen whether demand is sufficient to sustain the Friday market, it's an exciting development in a neighborhood with no full-service grocery store. Starting a new farmers’ market is difficult in general, but that’s especially true in low-income areas, with the close of the Bayview farmers’ market providing an example.

Describing the Heart of the City Farmers’ Market, though, doesn’t do it justice. So stop reading and mark your calendar for a Wednesday, Friday or Sunday starting as early as 7 a.m.  Bring a shopping bag, appetite or both, and enjoy this special market yourself.

Read more at spur.org.

Heart of the City Farmers’ Market in July 2012. Photo by Sergio Ruiz.

Heart of the City Farmers’ Market in July 2012. Photo by Sergio Ruiz.

Heart of the City Adds a New Friday Market Day

Beginning August 3, 2012, Heart of the City Farmers Market will add a new Friday market day to its Wednesday and Sunday weekly market schedule.  The market will be open from 7am to 2:30pm every Friday at the United Nations Plaza.

"Many customers have been telling us that two days a week just isn't enough," said Tony Mellow, a farmer Board member who has been selling at the market since our very first day in 1981.  "We've opened this new market day to help meet the needs of this community."   

There is no full-service grocery store for residents of the Tenderloin and Mid-Market neighborhoods, so many rely on Heart of the City Farmers Market to provide a much-needed source of fresh produce in the heart of San Francisco. 

"The Super Market" Heart of the City Turns 30!

Heart of the City Farmers' Market's 30-year history was featured in the July issue of the Central City Extra. "Heart of the City Farmers Market will champion its 30 years at U.N. Plaza at its 30th Anniversary Festival on September 14, having successfully connected local farmers to the city's famously low-income central city residents while continuing to move toward a healthier San Francisco. The food nation innovation, announced on circulated flyers in five languages, began Sunday June 14, 1981. Trucks laden with fresh produce, and hailing from Sebastopol to Winters to Fresno, rumbled onto the red brick plaza at daybreak..."

Click here to read more: http://www.studycenter.org/test/cce/index.html

Beloved Farmers' Market Celebrates 30th ANNIVERSARY FESTIVAL

BEYOND CHRON, The Voice of the Rest
Press release by Kate Creps, Heart of the City Farmers’ Market

Heart of the City Farmers’ Market, located in the heart of San Francisco at the UN Plaza in the Civic Center on Wednesdays and Sundays, is celebrating thirty years of bringing affordable, locally-grown produce from small farms to a low-income community that lacks a grocery store.

We invite the community to join us for our 30th Anniversary Festival, held during the market day on Wednesday, September 14, at San Francisco’s UN Plaza in the Civic Center (Market Street between 7th and 8th above the Civic Center BART station) from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

The event will feature:

  • Special discounts on our farmers’ fruits and vegetables at the height of the summer season

  • Live music all day on stage

  • Free face painting, balloon animals, hoola hooping

  • Heart of the City Farmers’ Market history exhibit, “Heart of the City Trivia Game,” and “Heart of the City Scavenger Hunt” with free prizes

  • Farm family biographies on every tent

  • Special guests UN Plaza Gift Gallery vendors.

  • Kids who participated in the market’s “Healthy Heart of the City” Nutrition Education Workshop series use art to say thank you to farmers. Farmers will vote at the festival to determine three winners, who will receive a gift basket of produce and a $100 certificate to the market.

1:00pm Birthday Program on stage will feature:

A look back at 30 years of being farmer-run by market founders and City officials. Reaffirming our commitment to the mid-market revitalization effort with remarks by Mayor Ed Lee, Supervisor Jane Kim, and Carolyn Diamond, Market Street Association Executive Director.

Recognition of market’s successful EBT program and kick-off announcement of “Healthy Heart of the City Campaign,” our commitment to give back to the community through nutrition education outreach workshops, increasing access to and awareness of our EBT program and WIC benefits for families and seniors, and providing health information and resource distribution at the market through partnerships with local heath organizations.

Press are welcome, press kits and interviews available:

  • 30-year farmer Board Member

  • Formerly-homeless neighborhood resident sweeper who has turned his life around with the help of his job keeping the market clean for visitors, winner of Heart of the City’s “Heart of Gold” award

  • Market Manager who has been with the market 30 years

Heart of the City Farmers’ Market, at San Francisco’s UN Plaza on Wednesdays and Sundays from 7am to 5pm, was created to bring high-quality and reasonably priced produce from small local farms to the heart of the San Francisco, as well as to support and sustain California’s small-scale growers.

We are an independent non-profit that is run by its farmers, many of whom have been selling here for 30 years, with a mission to bring healthy food and nutrition education outreach to a neighborhood that lacks a grocery store. Over 75% of food stamps used at San Francisco farmers markets are used here.

To keep stall fees low so prices stay affordable for this low-income community, our market operates on a shoestring budget and we are fondly known as “The People’s Market” for our diversity and grassroots cooperative structure. Since the market’s first day 1981, we’ve been committed to our mission of helping to create a healthy Heart of the City.