After receiving public comment and listening to a presentation by stakeholders, Seattle City Council’s Housing and Economic Development Committee considered and subsequently approved a proposal to authorize the establishment of a Farmers Market Program that gives farmers markets special status for permitting purposes. The proposed bill was then unanimously passed by city council on Sept. 21.

The program will streamline the permitting process for market operators, particularly those stationed on public property, and reduce costs for vendors. For the last few months, a pilot program has tested the new fee and permit parameters. The bill will essentially make this pilot program permanent.

Background

Due to development pressures, some farmers markets that set up on private property are getting shuffled around. When private property exchanges hands or is scheduled for redevelopment, the markets are sometimes forced to relocate. Representatives of the markets asked the city to help them secure more stable sites on public property to avoid this problem. The city identified that land owned by the Department of Parks and Recreation (Parks) and Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) would be the most suitable areas for hosting farmers markets.

However, to obtain a permit for a farmers market stall on public land, vendors had to pay weekly or “per use” administrative fees, which were costly. The ordinance noted that this was a “major barrier” to using city property for farmers markets. It aims to lessen the burden on vendors by instituting a lower annual fee in place of the weekly fees.

Revised Fees

The superintendent of Parks and Recreation determined that vendors of farmers markets located on parks property should pay $75 for an annual application fee and a fee of $10 per hour of use. Before, farmers markets using land owned by the parks department were subject to fees up to 10 percent of their revenue. The revised fee schedule will waive that fee entirely, which could save individual markets tens of thousands of dollars a year.

SDOT also proposed to amend its fee schedule for farmers markets—as determined by the pilot project—to reduce the overall cost to vendors. Under the previous fee schedule, a farmers market on a closed street would have to pay more than $200 a month and more than $4,000 a season for SDOT permits. The new fee schedule will only cost that market $251 per season.

The fire department has been grouping all farmers markets under a public assembly permit, the same permit used for festivals and concerts. The fire marshal who attended the meeting on Wednesday said that this was the closest fitting category at the time, but found that farmers markets actually require significantly less oversight and management than other public assemblies. Therefore, the fire department will recategorize farmers markets and change the permitting fee schedule to better reflect the true cost of farmers markets needs, which will translate to an annual savings of $1,700 per market. Under the new category established by the ordinance, farmers markets will also be able to more easily and more cheaply obtain outdoor portable heaters.

Improving the Permitting Process

Another burden for farmers markets operators was that they were required to obtain permits from four different departments. This process was time-consuming for the departments and the market operators. The pilot program brought together three of those departments to create a “one stop” permitting process. Instead of market operators meeting individually with all of the necessary departments once a month, an annual meeting with the city departments will be held instead to discuss all permitting needs at the same time. Furthermore, the Office of Economic Development will act as the facilitator for this program, giving farmers markets additional support through the permitting process.

Before casting his vote for the bill, councilmember Richard Conlin stated that the ordinance will “dramatically improve the efficiency and increase the opportunities for farmers markets to be sited.”