Patrons can use Electronic Benefits Cards, but who is really benefiting?
Since 2006, the New York City Council has helped farmers markets sell their local products to people buying with food stamps. To make the sales, the markets need hand-held, electronic reading devices, and the council now provides them to 23 of the city’s 50 green markets. The result, said the city council in a report last month, is that green markets’ food stamp sales have doubled in the last year. Less clear, though, is whether those using the food stamps are the long-term poor, who were the group the city council’s program was designed to help.
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