Small businesses impacted by the coronavirus in Albany County will begin to see some relief within the first quarter of 2021 due to a concerted effort by County officials and community partners to expedite the highly anticipated small grant program created earlier this month.

In a press conference on Wednesday, Albany County Legislature Chairman Andrew Joyce, and Deputy Chairwoman Wanda Willingham were joined by County Executive Daniel P. McCoy and Linda MacFarlane, Executive Director of the Community Loan Fund of the Capital Region, to announce that on Monday, January 4, small businesses could begin applying for the grants through the $500,000 program, the largest created in the Capital Region to help those heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“When I convened the Albany County Legislature's COVID-19 Economic Recovery Task Force at the height of the pandemic, I wanted our members and staff to get creative, and lead the efforts here locally to help small businesses survive this crisis. And that's exactly what they did. This grant program is the most significant investment in grant funding and programs for these businesses in the Capital Region. I could not be prouder of Wanda, Matt and Jeff's efforts,” Joyce said.

“When our small businesses suffer, our whole community suffers, and COVID isn’t letting up any time soon. Their struggles can be seen in our most recent sales tax reports: Albany County has lost more than $21 million this year compared to the same period in 2019. That is critical funding for the programs and services that lift up our residents. This $500,000 grant program being spearheaded by the County Legislature is another important tool in our arsenal to ensure more of our local establishments are able to survive until we have a widely distributed vaccine,” said McCoy.

“In July of 2020, the COVID-19 Economic Recovery Task Force was formed to assess the impact of coronavirus on small businesses located in Albany County. We soon realized that our budget process had to include economic relief for small businesses,” said Willingham. “In the first week of January 2021, Albany County will begin to offer a lifeline for eligible local businesses struggling during the pandemic. It is our hope that we can provide aid to keep our local small businesses afloat and provide a reprieve as they overcome the challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Businesses will have two weeks to apply for the grants, which will be up to $5,000 to assist in paying up to two months of back rent, up to two weeks of perishable goods, and/or expenses related to retrofitting the business for COVID-19 such as personal protective equipment, contactless purchasing, online ordering services, and more.

To be eligible, applicants must be a sales-tax-generating for-profit business, with no more than 50 employees and located within Albany County. The business must also show that its revenue has decreased by at least 25 percent due to COVID-19 and how the current COVID-19 economic conditions make the grant request necessary to support the ongoing operations of the business.

“This has been a very difficult year for our businesses due to the pandemic. Hopefully this program will help provide some much needed assistance they need to keep going in 2021,” Majority Leader Dennis Feeney said. “I want to thank the County Executive and his staff for working with the Legislature to make sure we can get this program started as quickly as possible.”

The program will be administered by the Advanced Albany County Alliance LDC through a partnership with the Community Loan Fund, which will help manage the application process. The applications will be ranked by priority and then scored to determine recipients. The first awards are expected to be distributed in February.

“This new grant program will offer a lifeline for small business owners,” said MacFarlane. “We are so pleased to team up with Albany County to assist more businesses in need.”

The small business grant program comes less than six months after Chairman Joyce, anticipating the impact of COVID-19 on the County’s economy, convened the bipartisan COVID-19 Economic Task Force in the Albany County Legislature to analyze the impact the recovery was having on small businesses and make recommendations for Legislative action. The Task Force consisted of Willingham and Legislators Matthew Peter and Jeff Perlee who began to meet with small area businesses, Chambers of Commerce and Business Improvement Districts in July.

“The Albany County Legislature, under the leadership of Chairman Joyce, and the County Executive’s office have fast tracked relief to struggling businesses in Albany County. While federal government continues to inadequately meet the needs of small businesses, the County has wasted no time in getting businesses the relief they need,” Peter said. “I encourage everyone who owns a small business to send in their application right away.”

Based on the recommendations from CERT, the Albany County Legislature unanimously approved an initial $300,000 for the small business grants on December 7 with an additional $100,000 in the 2021 County Budget. After learning that need in the business community had heightened, the Legislature approved another $200,000 on December 21 to ensure that more establishments had the opportunity to get funding.

“This grant program is a smart investment to ensure the future economic health of our County, especially during a pandemic. By expediting the process to get the funding out quicker will likely help a number of our businesses to survive,” said Perlee.