Millwood may hold market

Several community members’ vision for a farmers’ market in Millwood is coming into focus as the town’s Presbyterian church now plans to hold the market in its parking lot this summer.

“Everyone is just real excited about it,” said Millwood Presbyterian Church Pastor Craig Goodwin.

On Wednesday afternoons from May 23 through October he expects 15 to 25 vendors to offer open-air shoppers seasonal produce, artisan breads, natural meats and handcrafts.

Though the market will be similar, the proposal has changed significantly since community leaders first began discussing it a few months ago.

Initially, an existing farmers’ market on the North Side was looking for a new home and considered moving into the town park. That operation has since found another location in its old neighborhood. The town’s ordinances would have to be revised to allow commercial activity in the park, but the church has since offered to host the market a couple of blocks away.

Vendors are happy with the location, Goodwin said, and many are expected to come to Millwood in the afternoon after selling their wares in Spokane in the morning.

Millwood’s ordinances are ambiguous when it comes to special events, and there has been some question as to whether the market would need to meet development standards that include water and sewer requirements.

Part of the church parking lot has commercial zoning, and at Monday’s Town Council meeting Goodwin indicated the church would go ahead with its plans and appeal to the council if town officials disagreed.

About 15 to 20 people came to the meeting to support the proposal, and it got a good reception from the council.

“Pretty much everyone was in favor of it,” said Mayor Dan Mork.

The council’s tentative approval didn’t please everyone, though, and one business owner left angered that the market could proceed after he was denied permission to run a concession stand he set up a year ago.

“It’s very frustrating,” said Harry Jones, who owns the Trent n’ Dale Pub on East Trent and a separate catering business.

After receiving approval from the health district and state department of Labor and Industries, he said, the town wouldn’t let him run the stand from a property next to the bar because it wasn’t hooked up to sewer.

Mork said the council was constrained by state laws that the town is obligated to enforce, while Jones says the Millwood council is interpreting the rules to do what it wants.

Church and town leaders say they’ve been working to minimize traffic from the market and other concerns, and Goodwin said the neighbors he’s talked to are supportive of the idea.

“We’ll try it and see how it goes,” Mork said.