Sam Paone offers a unique perspective on how Market Match benefits both merchants and recipients. When she was a child, her family received CalFresh benefits.
“Luckily enough, I now sell enough pickles that I don’t have to,” said Paone, the founder of Golden State Pickle Works.
Many of her farmers market customers use CalFresh’s Market Match component, allowing them to double the benefits they receive to buy fresh produce at nearly 300 California farmers markets.
“I benefit from it because it brings more people to the market who might otherwise save their money,” said Paone, working her booth Saturday at Berkeley’s Downtown Berkeley Farmer’s Market.
“But because there’s a Market Match, you get tokens to spend on more food that’s available,” Paone said. “We get visitors who actually stop at the pickle booth, who might pick up that hot sauce or take that jar of sauerkraut, who might not otherwise.”
Introduced in 2015, Market Match is now on the chopping block.
Just days after Gov. Gavin Newsom unveiled a revised state budget on May 14 that he said eliminates California’s deficit, a coalition of food access and farmers markets advocates said that the budget left out a critical food safety net program.
According to the Save Market Match Coalition, without changes to the budget before June 15, the Market Match program will vanish in March 2027.
Portia Bramble is the food and farming director of Berkeley’s Ecology Center, which manages Market Match statewide. She said the program – also funded by federal matching money — will likely get enough legislative support to survive.
Bramble said the state doesn’t automatically renew the program because California has such a big economy, priorities shift with political winds and officials like to be nimble.
“The likelihood we get this funding is high,” Bramble said. “We’ve had a lot of support. But it’s so critical that people take action right now. It’s always best if officials hear it from their constituents.”
Bramble said it’s vital with thousands of Californians potentially losing CalFresh benefits June 1, when new rules kick in from the Trump administration’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” requiring recipients to work 20 hours a week or 80 hours a month.
CalFresh, the state version of the program formerly known as food stamps and now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), is federally funded, state-supervised, and administered by counties. Benefits are loaded onto recipients’ EBT cards.
About 5.5 million Californians use CalFresh, including more than 100,000 in Alameda County.
Bramble said there were 12,657 EBT transactions at Berkeley farmers markets in 2025, distributing $238,824 in benefits. Market Match distributed $198,479 in food tokens for use at those markets.
Statewide, Market Match supported 627,000 shoppers in 2025, delivering nearly 50 million servings of produce, according to Save Market Match, which also said every dollar going to local farmers has a three-to-one multiplier effect in local communities.
“The (Market Match) program is one of the few that puts money directly into farmers’ pockets,” Bramble said.
Market Match operates in approximately 290 markets in California. The Ecology Center works with about 120 partner organizations statewide.
CalFresh recipients use EBT cards to get $15 in tokens from market managers with which to shop. Buying enough produce allows people to double their monthly CalFresh amount.
At Saturday’s market on Center Street, Alice Green used tokens to buy berries.
“Having Market Match, it lifts my spirits that people have a program like that to help people like me,” Green said.
The Berkeley resident said she’s used the program since it became available.
“What I love about it is that the money from Market Match goes 100% to those farmers,” Green said. “In supermarkets, they get like 15% of the sale price.”
Golden Rules Organics owner Eddie Diaz brings produce to three Berkeley markets from Hollister every week. He said 20% of his business comes from Market Match.
“It would be a big chunk,” he said. “And I don’t feel as bad for myself, opposed to the people that use Market Match. They’re the ones that are going to be really affected because I can see how big a part it plays in their lives. They’re taking money away from people that need it. It’s a terrible situation.”
“If you’re going to take it away, take it away when the economy is booming.”
At the Lifefood Gardens booth, Oakland resident Alex Mack said healthy organic food costs more and often isn’t available to lower-income shoppers.
“How else are they supposed to buy fresh food?” Mack said. “We are not an accessible end of the produce market with microgreens. We’re healthier, but people don’t really have access. With market match incentives, people who otherwise wouldn’t come out to the markets come out.”
Berkeley resident Eduardo Morell owns Morell Bread in Oakland. He said many of his customers use EBT, but he can’t take Market Match tokens.
Since his bread doesn’t qualify as produce, Morell doesn’t benefit from Market Match. But he still makes a point of making sure customers know about the program.
“It’s really interesting that I have customers come and say, ‘Oh, do you take EBT?’ And they don’t know about the tokens. So, I say: ‘I do, but you have to go to the Ecology Center booth, and you’re going to get yourself $15.’ They’re excited to find out about the program.”
Morell said losing the program would be difficult for those people.
“They need the help,” he said. “They’re only going to be able to get less stuff here at the market.”
Paone said she wouldn’t have the business she has today without Market Match. She remembered being on the other side as a child.
“Just coming up, even just to taste, I used to be those people who would be uncomfortable just experiencing it, because I felt awkward trying something and not knowing that I wasn’t able to buy,” she said.
Paone said customers prefer spending money there.
“They want to support their small independent vendors the right way.”
