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Governor Kathy Hochul today announced that nearly 29,000 small and micro businesses throughout New York State have been awarded over $500 million in grant funds through the COVID-19 Pandemic Small Business Recovery Grant Program. The program was created to provide flexible grant assistance to small businesses, micro-businesses and for-profit independent arts and cultural organizations in the State of New York who have experienced economic hardship due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Small Businesses are the backbone of our state’s economy, and in order to truly recover from the COVID-19 crisis our small businesses need a helping hand,” Governor Hochul said. “It is imperative that we continue to move funding out efficiently and quickly so businesses can get back on their feet and get back to business.”

Governor Hochul is committed to continuing to support small businesses. She has advanced a proposal to provide up to $200 million to support early-stage small businesses to ensure they are successful long term as New York recovers from the effects of COVID-19.

Empire State Development Acting Commissioner and President and CEO-designate Hope Knight said, “ESD’s COVID-19 Pandemic Small Business Recovery Grant Program has been a life-line for our small businesses to get steadily back on their feet. We have worked hard to get this funding where it’s most needed and I am grateful for Governor Hochul’s support and also for all of New York’s small business owners who are working every day to rebuild our economy.”

Micro-businesses—those with ten employees or less—have received 98% of these awards, and businesses that are woman or minority owned have received 90% of awards. These are businesses that have been hit the hardest by the ongoing impacts of the pandemic, and often times have the least access to resources. The average grant award is approximately $17,425.

In August of last year, Governor Hochul expanded the program to include businesses with revenues up to $2.5 million from $500,000 and also increased the limit for businesses that received federal Paycheck Protection Program loans from $100,000 to $250,000, which allowed thousands more small businesses to apply for funding.

Funding is still available for the program. One-on-one assistance, webinars, a call center that has already logged nearly 295,000 calls and materials in 14 languages are examples of support available through Empire State Development, to help small businesses access this critical funding.

To learn more about this and other COVID-19 relief programs, visit https://esd.ny.gov/business-pandemic-recovery-initiative. Empire State Development has a network of partner organizations that provide instruction, training, technical assistance, and support services to entrepreneurs and small businesses statewide that will provide assistance with New York State and federal pandemic relief grant and loan applications. For more information visit https://esd.ny.gov/organizations-available-assist-businesses.

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