COLUMBUS, Ohio — Many have their eyes set on the $900 billion COVID-19 Assistance Package.
In the signed Stimulus Package, billions of dollars will be set aside as forgivable loans for small businesses.
Co-owner of Wolf’s Ridge Brewing, Alan Szuter, described this extra help as a lifeline and said it couldn’t have come at a better time.
"It’s been really, a challenge. We’ve had a lot of employees that were laid off, or otherwise had their earnings significantly impacted,” said Szuter.
Nearly $300 billion of the $900 billion COVID-19 Assistance Package that President Trump recently signed, will help small businesses by restarting the Paycheck Protection Program. The program ended in August.
Szuter said they only received $600,000 with the first loan, which was good but not good enough.
“It was really more of a benefit for keeping employees on the payroll, keeping employees paid. Unfortunately, we were shut down, we continued to have to pay rent and utilities and everything else,” said Szuter.
So how exactly would businesses receive the money this go-around? Szuter told 10TV it’s just like the process before.
To qualify, businesses must employ fewer than 300 employees, and the money they received the first time would have to be spent or almost used up.
“This is going to help us continue to squeak along. The longer businesses like ours have to squeak along, the more difficult the recovery is going to be,” said Szuter.
But his focus, for now, is on keeping everyone who works and enters his restaurant safe.
“Most industries like ours, once the vaccines really start getting out, it can be a prayerfully rapid recovery,” said Szuter.
He told us he doesn’t know exactly when his business will receive the loans, but once they do, it will help pay the employees and keep up on the rent.