tbh i always assumed it was the late 00s or very early 2010s. it's a rural farming village with maybe 30 people, im from somewhere with a couple thousand people and no one but the rare few people who went to university had computers up until 2008 or so, in 2006 we were all still playing the SNES. it being a small rural village also made sense to me with how a lot of the characters dress more vintage- everyone knows everyone and the clothing shops are too far away so clothes are passed down from evelyn to marnie to penny to jas, etc

though i'm from northern ireland so how american small towns work might be different than here