Friday, September 18, 2009

Green City Market gets gov't grant to push local produce

Crain's:
Chicago’s Green City Market was among a group of nationwide farmers markets that received a total of $4.5 million in federal funds to promote the growth and sale of local produce.

The year-round farmers market in Lincoln Park was awarded a grant of $76,300 as part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s “Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food” program. Among the 86 programs in 37 states to get funds, Green City Market was the only recipient in Illinois.

“This will certainly change the face of Green City Market,” Executive Director Lyle Allen said of the grant, the largest his organization has ever received. It equals 20% of Green City Market’s 2009 budget.

Mr. Allen said most of the grant will be used to create a scholarship program to help farmers gain certified sustainable or organic status. Green City Market will require all vendors to be certified as sustainable or organic in 2012. Some of the funds will also help low-income individuals buy fresh produce through a federal government assistance program.
Now if we can get in on some of this action!

2 comments:

  1. Well said. The land is available in the community to do this. Although CAPCCowns several of the lots on 82nd King there are a total of 4 and no funds to develop. The land could be used as a community garden until they are able to secure funds to build.

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  2. We weren't going to start broadcasting our Urban Agriculture/Fresh Food plans just yet because we haven't finalized all the details. I will say that all summer we(myself, SOAR CDC, my staff and even our interns) have been visiting urban gardens/urban farms (both here and in Milwaukee) as we prepare to begin a multiple site program of urban farming. We intend to have one large scale site and several smaller ones sprinkled throughout the Ward. We also will have an aquaponics component at the larger site. Once we get in the ground we will start working on creating a year round marketplace similar to the Eastern Market in DC. We are about to do soil testing on some of the sites we have selected, start zoning changes on a few of the others and have grant applications submitted. So we are already on this. It's great however to know that there is community support for the concept.

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