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The New York State Equal Rights Heritage Center has announced that it will host the Taste NY Auburn Regional Market beginning Saturday, June 8. The weekly market, held in partnership with the state's Taste NY program and Cornell Cooperative Extension, will take place inside and outside the South Street facility. It will run from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays through the end of October.

The center's visitor experience manager, Courtney Kasper, said the market's scope will be wider than that of a traditional farmers market. It will feature not only food producers, but artisans, food trucks, live music, demonstrations, family activities and more programming. The market builds on both the center's permanent Taste NY market and its monthly Makers Mart programs, she added.

The Makers Mart program will continue Saturdays, April 27 and May 25, before the regional market begins.

Kasper said the center approached the Auburn Farmers Market, which also runs Saturday mornings, about becoming part of the new regional market. However, the Auburn Farmers Market decided not to move from its current location in the parking lot across from Curley's Restaurant, said market coordinator Mark Soper, owner of Bradford Heights Delights in Fingerlakes Mall.

Soper said he does not anticipate competition from the regional market for visitors or vendors, and called it "an added bonus for the citizens of Auburn." The Auburn Farmers Market will open June 1 and continue to operate from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays through Oct. 31.

Nor does the new market intend to compete with the Auburn one, said Kasper and Auburn City Clerk Chuck Mason. They chose to hold it Saturday because that's the day they believe the market has the best chance of succeeding, Mason said. He added that the door remains open for the Auburn market to move to the center, where it was located prior to relocating to Curley's, when the property was a parking lot. But for now, Mason continued, "the more the merrier." And the center will "make sure people know the (Auburn Farmers Market) is there" with its marketing, he added.

The regional market is supported by part of a $150,000 Market New York grant the city received last year, Mason said.

As part of the Taste NY program, everything at the market must have been produced or otherwise originated in New York state.