Fall River’s low-income seniors now have the opportunity to purchase fresh produce from local farmers right outside the door to their high rise apartment buildings. On August 19, 2011, Lucy Soares of the Back to Nature Farms in Swansea brought her truck to the Bishop Eid Apartments on Quequechan Street and the Cottell Heights building on Pleasant Street. "Many of these seniors have mobility impairments and find it difficult to get to the farmers' markets at Kennedy Park, Ruggles Park and on Old Second Street in downtown Fall River," commented Fall River Housing Authority Family and Youth Services Coordinator Joseph DaSilva who helped to organize the sales with Healthy City market coordinator Annemarie Sharkey. Ms. Sharkey comes to the beginning of each session to exchange SNAP benefits for farmers' market tokens that can be used at any of the markets in Fall River. Most seniors are also eligible for $25 in free coupons that are distributed every summer and can be used at local farmers' markets. Other farmers have visited the Holmes Apartments, O'Brian Apartments and Mitchell Heights apartments since the program began. For more information, contact Joseph DaSilva at 508-675-3527 or Annemarie Sharkey at 508-679-0922. 

(Top row) Lucy Soares of the Back to Nature Farms in Swansea offers a large variety of fresh vegetables to residents of the Cottell Heights building on Pleasant Street. (Middle row, left) Ted Tetreault and Maryann Levesque of the Bishop Eid apartments on Quequechan Street look over the produce just as it comes off the truck. (Middle row, right) Lucy Soares sells some produce to Christine Thompson who is visiting her mother at the Cottell Apartments. (Bottom row) Fall River Housing Authority Family and Youth Services Coordinator Joseph DaSilva and his summer interns, Jake Williams and Freddy Perez, help put the produce out on tables as Healthy City market coordinator Annemarie Sharkey offers to exchange SNAP benefits for farmers' market tokens for Loretta Correia at the Bishop Eid Apartments.