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The City Council announced yesterday that the number of low-income New Yorkers using food stamps at the city’s outdoor greenmarkets is higher than ever before. Residents spent over $500,000 in food stamps to buy fresh fruits and vegetables at the markets last year, double the amount spent in 2009.
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City politicians and food advocacy groups have been campaigning for more greenmarkets to accept food stamps, seeing it as one way to increase access to healthy foods in neighborhoods where they’re usually hard to find. This fall, the greenmarkets at Bronx Borough Hall, Lincoln Hospital, the New York Botanical Garden and Poe Park all accepted EBT card purchases-at Poe Park, over $500 a day came in via food stamps.
Local markets will open up again this spring and summer, though there are several in Manhattan that operate year-round. Locations and schedules can be found here.