The Problem

The Pitt County Board of Commissioners have long neglected the Pitt County Farmers Market. In 2023, Pitt County copied the plans of several other North Carolina counties to create the DoubleBucks program. This program doubles the spending power of one's SNAP/EBT benefits, for example if a recipiant has $50 in snap benifits they have $100 in spending power in our farmers market. While the county approved these plans, they never funded it. The budget of a few thousands for DoubleBucks came exclusively from local donations. As the prices of food rises and accessibility in many parts of our country remains low we need to support our residents to gain access to high quality food.

Our Demand

We, the Pitt County Chapter of Down Home, are asking the Pitt Board of County Commissioners to spend $330k to fund our farmers market. $300k of these dollars are to be used in our Farmers market DoubleBucks program and $30k is to be used in advertising our farmers market double bucks program to ensure greater accessibility for folks needing to use double bucks. In addition to this marketing budget we ask for the Farmers Market to be open three days a week, Thursday to Saturday, to add increased accessibility. These funds will come from a variety of federal grants thus allowing for the added spending. With these new additions the people in our community will be protected against incoming federal cuts and have better quality food. 

Please sign this petition to show your support for our proposal.