Jefferson County Farmers Market
Project: Market Food Access Programs
Request: $15,000
Jefferson County Farmers Market runs four food access programs that increase the purchasing power of community members with low incomes: SNAP Market Match; the WIC and Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Programs; and VegRx, a fruit and vegetable prescription program for children from birth to 18 on Apple Health.
Together they serve approximately 1,500–2,000 households annually; children, families, seniors, people with disabilities, and other adults experiencing food insecurity. The programs also serve local farms, by giving the community the buying power to purchase directly from them at the markets or through fresh produce shares at local food banks.
Why the match multiplies
Community match dollars stretch federal and state nutrition benefits at the point of purchase: $50,000 in community match becomes $100,000 in community purchasing power. Your $5,000 in direct food benefits generates $10,000 in purchases from local farms.
So a single donation does two jobs: more fresh food for a household that needs it, and more revenue for the farms that grew it.
Why flexible money matters
People using these programs face rising food and housing costs, limited transportation, physical and geographic isolation, mobility challenges, and reduced access to grocery stores and fresh food in rural areas. Many seniors and people with disabilities live on fixed incomes. Families with young children balance food against housing, childcare and healthcare.
Layered on top is uncertainty in the public nutrition programs themselves; reductions, disruptions and administrative changes that create anxiety for households already stretched thin.
JCFM has repeatedly been the organization that fills the gap in real time. During the 2025 federal government shutdown, community donations allowed them to provide SNAP participants with $30 each week for fresh food while regular benefits were unavailable. When WIC Farmers Market Nutrition Program funding was significantly reduced in May, community support let them create Family VegRx so families who would have lost access didn't.
That kind of rapid response is only possible with flexible local funding.
Here are the problems you can help solve
JCFM expects roughly 10% less state and federal funding overall for SNAP Market Match this year, and 40% less for Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program benefits. A one-year $40,000 grant that helped administer the senior program across Jefferson and Clallam counties is gone. State and federal reimbursement for administering SNAP Market Match — meager to begin with — dropped another 7%.
The programs require trained staff to conduct outreach, help participants enroll, distribute and track benefits, support and reimburse participating farms, maintain records and meet state and federal requirements. As public funding declines, JCFM must raise more community support simply to deliver the same level of service.
What your donation makes possible
Your gift goes directly to food benefits, and supports staff wages for outreach and participant assistance at farmers markets, food banks and community locations, plus the administrative work of distributing and tracking benefits and reimbursing farmers.
JCFM's food access programs cost approximately $193,000 annually. The Farm-to-Table Benefit Dinner generated $40,000 this year and business sponsors are expected to contribute about $16,000, with roughly $100,000 anticipated — though not guaranteed — in state and federal support.
Your gift closes part of the gap. More importantly, it buys the thing declining government funding can't: the ability to respond quickly when a program is cut, delayed or disrupted, so that a family arriving at the market on Saturday still leaves with food.
