POLL: Growing a Farmer's Market in Lakewood

What do fresh fruits, vegetables, organic foods and baked goods all have in common? Each is grown, baked and sold at Farmer's Markets around the South Sound.

Whether or not Lakewood will have its own Farmer's Market was an appealing topic of discussion on Friday during a public meeting. While details are still being hammered out, planting a seed to launch such a project was the start for city, community leaders and residents.

The energized meeting delved into organizing, financing and logistically identifying key pieces to forming a Lakewood Farmer's Market. A second public meeting has been scheduled at 4 p.m. on March 2 to continue discussion and form a leadership team.

Lakewood resident Cynthia Powell, who attended the meeting, told Patch through a Facebook thread she's already planning on joining the leadership team and hopes others will follow. Powell is a current vendor at Steilacoom's neighboring Farmer's Market where she displays her Organic Dog Treat Bakery business.

Others, like Cindy Amundsen, said there were lots of good ideas at the meeting and there seems to be a good level of community commitment.

"I'm hoping to have a Farmer's Market (in Lakewood) sometime soon," Amundsen said.

Timeline of Farmer's Market in Lakewood

Lakewood City Councilman Jason Whalen—who supported the idea—said having a Farmer's Market is a big deal for members on the council and Lakewood's Redevelopment Advisory Board. He's pushing for a pilot Farmer's Market by summer's end.

"I'm a huge fan for that cool development and redefinition of what it means to have a sense of place in Lakewood, specifically the Towne Center," Whalen said. "It should happen sooner than later."

Coordinating a Farmer's Market location, project marketing

The Lakewood Towne Center and Fort Steilacoom Park were two locations that seemed most logical to the meeting attendees. One resident mentioned the closed-down QFC vacant parking lot near the intersection of Bridgeport Way and Gravelly Lake Drive as a potential locale.

The Towne Center has plenty of vacant parking lot space to host a Farmer's Market, but the core issue is finding both a day and location that draws in the most traffic, according to current market vendors.

Debbie Ranniger, executive director of resource development at Clover Park Technical College, said creating a market when one didn't exist before is one idea but that there's also the possibility of targeting high traffic where a market already exists during days of the week.

In Kent, she said the Lions Club, an already established charitable organization, takes on the coordinating duties of a Farmer's Market as one of their major community service activities.

"Community members work to bring it together," Ranniger said.

After several years of pondering such Farmer's Market in Lakewood, Dodsworth and Amanda Richardson, parks and recreation supervisor, noted the city doesn't have the resources to organize such a project on its own like the town of Steilacoom.

"We are reaching out to help facilitate one but we need help," Richardson said. "We need a group of interested citizens to make it happen."

If you're interested in learning more about the process of launching a Farmer's Market in Lakewood here are the details for the next meeting:

What: Public meeting to discuss details for a Farmer's Market in Lakewood.

Who: Interested residents or vendors wanting to get involved and potentially join the leadership team.

When: The next meeting is schedule for 4 p.m. on March 2.

Where: City of Lakewood first floor next to the Council Chambers.