The Internal Revenue Service has approved Davidson Farmers Market’s application for non-profit status. Organizers say the move will improve its opportunities for grants and “add security” to its future.
“We are very pleased to have been awarded the 501(c)3 (nonprofit status),” board chair Kathy Pearce said Monday. “It’s a very important achievement. It enables us to receive tax-deductible contributions. We depend upon our sponsors, many of whom are town merchants, as well as individuals. This makes those funding sources a little more likely in the future.”
The market’s non-profit status is retroactively effective to Sept. 15, 2009.
The news comes as the market gets ready to start its third regular season on May 1 at its home off Main Street next to Town Hall. (Twice-monthly winter tailgate markets will continue in April.) Over that time it has grown in popularity among both shoppers and farmers and vendors.
Achieving non-profit status also means the market can finally become a stand-alone nonprofit organization. The market was formed nearly three years ago under the wing of Downtown Davidson Inc., then later shifted under the roof of the Davidson Lands Conservancy, which has continued to nurture it through its growth.
“We were able to do it quite well under DLC, and we’ll continue to partner with them. But this (nonprofit status) does add some security because that was only a temporary relationship,” Market Manager Mary Jane Leach said Monday.
Ms. Pearce thanked Matt Churchill and Dianne Bailey of Charlotte law firm Robinson Bradshaw & Hinson, who donated their time to work on the IRS application.
Ms. Leach said the application included a critical letter of supported signed by Town Manager Leamon Brice and Mayor John Woods. The town’s letter talked about how the market helps further the towns goals of developing a healthy, sustainable community. (See our Jan. 27, 2010, report on the the Town Board goals, “Board goal: Make us a ‘national model of a healthy community.“)
LINKS
Davidson Farmers Market website
DavidsonNews.net coverage of Davidson Farmers Market, CLICK HERE>
