LifeCity Validates Impact of NMTC Investment in Rouses Market
In July 2025, LifeCity visited Rouses Markets’ first store in Picayune, MS to validate the impact of Hampton Roads Ventures (HRV)’s New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC) investment into the company. Rouses is a trusted institution in the Gulf South with numerous grocery store locations across Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. Charles Merrell, Chief Administrative Officer for Rouses, described the stores: “If you took a traditional and a specialty market, you jammed them together and then you turned it cajun and turned it up on the Gulf South, that is a Rouses Market.” The project will allow Rouses to utilize a shuttered grocery location previously run by a competitor while also revitalizing the shopping district surrounding the store.
Low-Income and Low-Access
Picayune is a small community located around 50 miles northeast of New Orleans, LA. Some sections of the community struggle with healthy food access, according to the USDA. The census tract in which Rouses is located is designated low-income and low-access by the USDA Food Access Research Atlas. The United Way found that 31% of households in Pearl River County meet the criteria to be labeled Asset-Limited, Income-Restrained, Employed (ALICE), meaning that even though they live above the poverty rate, these households may still struggle to afford basic needs. In combination with an 18% poverty rate in the county, nearly half of all households (49%) fall below the ALICE threshold in Pearl River County. According to Michael Ledger, President and CEO of Feeding the Gulf Coast, “In some pockets of our counties in Mississippi, the food insecurity rate for children can be as high as one in three.” Feeding the Gulf Coast finds that figure to be a bit lower in Pearl River County (around 18.1%), but the need for increased access to healthy and fresh food options is clear.
Providing Fresh, Healthy Food Options
HRV’s NMTC investment will help revitalize a total of 55,000 square feet of commercial real estate, including the 38,000 square foot Rouses location. A typical Rouses store is around 44,000 square feet, according to Director of Design and Construction Manuel Naredo, which created challenges. Still, Naredo says the Picayune store offers everything a typical Rouses would: “We’ve got a full service seafood department, a full market shop, butcher, meat market. We’ve got the full bakery, deli, hot food, Mongolian, and sushi. Also, we’re able to offer online ordering and curbside business here as well.”
The Rouses store in Picayune will create major community impacts. As a full service grocery store, Rouses is bringing healthy, fresh options to a community in which many people lack access. In Pearl River County, 11,050 individuals were food insecure as of 2023 – 2,340 of whom were children. Healthy food access is a key social determinant of health and is correlated with a variety of health outcomes including all-cause mortality, cardiovascular disease, overweight and obesity, type 2 diabetes, bone health, and certain types of cancer. Mississippi ranks among the highest states in adult obesity rate. Food insecurity also has major impacts on declining school performance. Rouses is making major community contributions to fight food insecurity, according to Ledger, who said that Rouses has “donated dollars that equate to probably over 50,000 pounds of food, in addition to the over 550,000 pounds of food, which would equate to over 2.5 million meals” through its Tackle Hunger program.
Supporting Community Development
Beyond fighting hunger, Rouses is supporting the Picayune community through wealth creation and career pathways. Merrell described employment opportunities at Rouses: “Coming into this market, there were all of these temporary jobs. We brought people in and paid millions of dollars to have them work for almost a year to build this. A lot of folks from this market were hired as part of the construction.” Merrell continued, “On an ongoing basis…you’re going to be running around 100 employees at all times.” The project created 84 temporary full-time equivalent (FTE) jobs during construction and has created 91 permanent FTEs since it opened, all of which come with benefits and opportunities for advancement.
Rouses strives to support the community in other ways, including by providing over $85,000 for a beautification project adjacent to the development, as well as providing $100,000 to support a municipal road extension project. The store is a vibrant space with LED lighting and low-VOC materials. Produce Manager Brandon Gardner described the feeling inside of the Rouses store in Picayune: “Everything is local, fresh, clean. The environment is friendly, customer-service driven. The customers love interacting with one another. Being able to be in a spot where you’re interacting with people you know, your family, your friends, is definitely a blessing.”
LifeCity’s impact report process brings legitimacy to NMTC investments by providing third-party validation of the projects’ impacts. Rouses has the potential to be transformative for Picayune’s community health, and the project will continue to create impact into the future.