Photo courtesy of © Can Stock Photo / freelancebobPhoto courtesy of © Can Stock Photo / freelancebob
Chatham

COVID-19 small business grant recipients up for approval

Dozens of local small businesses could be getting a financial boost to help them adapt to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Seventy applicants to the Chatham-Kent Small Business Recovery Grant have been identified and are up for council's approval on Monday night.

The $200,000 grant program was approved back in June and is intended to provide immediate funds to small, privately-held businesses, stores or restaurants to help them adapt to the COVID-19 business environment. Several weeks later, council voted in favour of allowing not-for-profits to apply for funding as well.

Applications to the program were accepted from July 2 until July 16. According to the staff report going to council on Monday, a total of 169 applications were received.

"The Small Business Recovery Grant Committee met on July 21 to review the list of applicants and discussed how the approved eligibility criteria would be applied," stated the report. "Committee members were required to declare conflicts of interest where appropriate in reviewing individual applications."

One of the eligibility criteria was that the applicant was unable or ineligible to access other forms of relief. A total of 49 applications were deemed ineligible for this reason.

Another eligibility criteria that 33 applicants did not meet was the requirement that the applicant pays commercial taxes or lease from a landlord who paid commercial taxes.

Eleven applications were incomplete or withdrawn while two applicants weren't located in Chatham-Kent, two weren't willing to have the business name published and two weren't financially viable prior to March 17.

Of the applications that were accepted, two are registered charities while two are not-for-profits and the remaining 66 are small businesses.

If approved, the 70 applicants will receive $2,857 each.

You can view a complete list of the grant recipients by clicking here.

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