SACRAMENTO BEE - Farmer´s Market Moving from Sunrise Mall to Rancho Cordova´s Light-Rail Station

Supporters of the local food movement will soon bid farewell to the popular Certified Farmer´s Market at Sunrise Mall in Citrus Heights and - participating growers hope - follow it to a new home in Rancho Cordova starting March 6.

The new venue at the Sunrise light-rail station, at Sunrise and Folsom boulevards near Highway 50, is about four miles from the old one.

Vendors at the Sunrise Mall market – about 20 in the winter, 40 in summer – sell locally grown produce, eggs, honey, cheese, olive oil, flowers and other goods.  The last Saturday at the mall will be February 27; the new market will open the following Saturday at the light-rail station.  The hours will be unchanged: 8am to noon on Saturdays.

Market attendance has ranged from hundreds of shoppers in the winter months to thousands in spring and summer.

“We’ll be a lot ‘greener’ by allowing people to go to the market by taking light rail,” said Dan Best.  “And it gives us a sense of long-term security because we’re less in danger of something being built on top of us.”

Best is the chief executive officer of the California Certified Farmers Markets in Sacramento County and general counsel for the California Federation of Certified Farmers Markets.

The Sunrise Mall was purchased in January 2008 by Steadfast Commercial Properties of Newport Beach.  Now, many vendors and customers are wondering whether Steadfast “raised the rent” on the CFM, forcing the move because it has plans to develop the soon-to-be-vacated space.

“I can’t go into specific details on any negotiation,” said Christi Woodards, the mall’s general manager since July.  “We just couldn’t come to an agreement (with CFM).”

“The displacement of farmers markets is happening all over the state, so it’s not that (Sunrise Mall) is forcing us to go,” Best emphasized.  “There are terms of use (for us) and demands that are substantial… That made us start looking around for the long term.”