New Market On Northeast Side Brings Fresh Food To Area With Limited Options

A Kroger grocery store in an Indianapolis neighborhood closed last week, and local residents are left with scarce options for fresh food. City officials Wednesday announced a new farmers market will open across the street.

The market, coming to the Devington neighborhood on the northeast side, is run by the Indiana Black Farmer’s Co-op through a partnership with the city's Office of Public Health and Safety.

Sharrona Moore chairs the co-op. Moore says since the Kroger closed many residents get food at a nearby dollar store, where they can buy canned and heavily processed foods.

She says the market is one solution to the problem.

"But this area doesn’t have a farmers market at all," Moore says. "So people who don’t drive are not able to take advantage of a farmers market, or be exposed to a farmers market."

The market will have all locally grown produce, and offer home goods like toothpaste and toilet paper. It will accept SNAP and WIC as payment.

Moore says they want the market to be a monthly or bi-weekly event that lasts all year, but she says its future depends entirely on how many people show up.

The first market is this Sunday afternoon, in the parking lot at Zion Hope Church.