A bright orange notice posted on the front door of the Brookings-Harbor Farmers Market last week turned a normal preparation day into a cacophony of questions as vendors tried to determine how to respond.

The notice, posted on May 22, informed them that it would be a misdemeanor to occupy the building 48 hours after its posting. Vendors thought this meant at close of business Saturday.

On Saturday the market was mostly quiet to begin with, with a massive influx of people around 11:30 a.m., purchasing goods and questioning what would happen to the Brookings-Harbor Farmers Market moving forward. Most of the 40 vendors who work the Wednesday and Saturday markets didn’t have answers. 

According to Linda Stimson, manager of the Brookings-Harbor Farmers Market, the market will move outside until this issue is resolved. But not every vendor is capable of doing business outdoors due to the nature of their products. Stimson in particular is affected as most of her products are refrigerated. She also oversees the $50,000 Protein Match Grant and Double Up Food Bucks program, which allows SNAP benefits to be matched for a total of twice their value at the market.

As it stands between Curry County and the Brookings-Harbor Farmers Market, there are conflicting claims from both sides. Curry County claimed in its press release on May 23 that, 

“After many subsequent attempts from the Building Division to encourage compliance and numerous conversations both in person, on the phone, and through email to help the owner of the building understand the hazards associated with the violations and the process to move forward, a dangerous building tag was posted on May 22, 2025.” 

The market says that their emails to Garrett Thomson, Curry County’s head of Code Compliance, have gone unanswered. The market has provided PDFs of its correspondence with Curry County in a letter to the community which can be found here.

The issues for which the building was deemed unsafe are all fire hazard related, and, according to the market, have been addressed either partially or in full. The propane heaters used inside the building have been shut off, and market staff have warned vendors against daisy-chaining electrical cords. Originally, having the building doors left open was considered enough for the requirement of entry and exit signage, though the building owners were working on installing exit lights until the notice arrived, according to the market.

As of Wednesday, the Brookings-Harbor Farmers Market is being held outside and in the adjacent Safe Harbor Christian Fellowship Building until the permitting issues are solved with Curry County.