Marquette, MI – The Downtown Marquette Farmers Market’s Grand Opening is on Saturday, May 19. This year’s Grand Opening will feature music by Jeff Nelson from 9am-1pm. Join us to enjoy locally raised vegetables, meat, and eggs, baked goods and bread, plant starts for your garden, body care products, wool, prepared foods, and more. In celebration of the local food that is available, the Marquette Food Co-op is sponsoring two food demonstrations that will use produce available at market that day. Join us at 11am and 1pm for a cooking demonstration by Justin Fairbanks, the new deli manager at the Co-op. The Co-op and the Downtown Development Authority are also sponsoring a children’s activity together, and will supply the soil and seeds for children to try their hand at seed starting.
The market has a lot to celebrate this year. We received not one, but two grant awards which increase our community’s access to fresh, healthy food. Many people have already heard of the USDA Farmers Market Promotion grant for $46,000, which will purchase tents for vendors, better facilities for the market information booth, and provide funds for various types of market promotion.
The second grant award was from the Fair Food Network, “a national nonprofit that works at the intersection of food systems, sustainability and social equity to guarantee access to healthy, fresh and sustainably grown food, especially in underserved communities.” Our market’s grant award is through the Double Up Food Bucks project. Under Double Up Food Bucks (DUFB) families who receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits are given the means to purchase more Michigan-grown fruits and vegetables at farmers markets while supporting local food growers and the local food economy. How? Each time a SNAP recipient runs their card at market, we give them double the amount of money they ran the card for, up to $20 per market day. In other words, if a Bridge card is swiped for $20, our grant funding enables us to give out $40. This extra money can only be used for fresh, Michigan grown produce sold at the market, but this frees up the original Bridge card allocation to be used on other groceries found at the market, such as meat and bread.
“Everyone deserves access to nutritious food,” says market administrator Sarah Monte, “and Double Up Food Bucks helps make that access a reality for everyone in our community, regardless of income. Produce at the farmers market is already comparable to grocery store prices across Marquette, but this program makes shopping at the market even more appealing and directly supports our farming and artisan food community.”
As usual, the market will be every Saturday, rain or shine from 9am-2pm until the end of October. Bridge card, Market FRESH, Project FRESH, credit, and debit cards are all accepted. The Double Up Food Bucks Program begins June 2nd, though questions are welcome before then at the market manager booth. We are taking bookings for music at the market, so if you would like to perform, or if you have any other questions about the market, you may call Sarah at 225-0671 ext. 23. The Marquette Farmers Market is sponsored by the Downtown Development Authority and the City of Marquette.
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