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A coalition of 60 major business organizations, including NJBIA, sent a letter to Gov. Phil Murphy and legislative leadership today requesting consideration of having a portion of New Jersey’s share of federal CARES Act funding go toward expanding now oversubscribed NJEDA COVID-19 business recovery programs.

The letter, which also went to NJEDA CEO Tim Sullivan, requests the application of some of the $3.44 billion in federal money that New Jersey is expected to receive to immediately expand the programs for an “infusion of funds (that) will keep operational businesses running and best position New Jersey and our economy for a quicker recovery.”

“We truly appreciate the work done thus far by the NJEDA to get money flowing to our NJ businesses and nonprofits through the already overly subscribed grant and loan programs,” the letter continued. “However, in what we hope will be a Round 2 of NJEDA programs, these programs need to be broadened so that more businesses can access them.

“We are seeing in real time the challenges of the federal SBA programs and fear many of our New Jersey businesses will be left without access to the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).”

Earlier today, the Small Business Administration said it was unable to accept new applications for the federal $349 billion Paycheck Protection Program.

NJEDA’s Small Business Emergency Assistance Grant and Loan programs both launched in recent weeks and were quickly oversubscribed. Applications for both of these programs are no longer being accepted at this time.

For future funding rounds of NJEDA COVID-19 programs, the business groups also collectively recommended eliminating the usage of NAICS code requirements, increasing the size of employers able to apply for grant and loan programs and ensuring that critical businesses like nonprofits and manufacturing are included.

The full letter sent by the business coalition can be found here.

6 responses to “NJ Business Coalition Requests Allocation of Federal Funding for NJEDA Programs”

  1. gary says:

    How many programs that no one knows about with different eligibility requirements are we going to have? We should all have equal access and it should be open to only those businesses that show a decline of 20% or more in loss of sales and/or were closed due to the government mandates

  2. If the (hopefully) next round of funding is not allocated to the TRULY SMALL BUSINESSES (i.e. 20 employees or fewer) the result will be massive numbers of such businesses actually going out of business in the next 6-12 months. I am a Director of a local business association (Bordentown City in western Burlington County) comprised of some 70 businesses, most of which have between 0 and 20 employees or are run by self-employed persons. None that I am aware of have received any assistance and many cannot now even apply due either to lack of funding and/or unclear and poorly communicated application procedures. For such businesses even a small amount of money, even as little as $1, 2, 3, 4,000 could keep them afloat for two or three months.

    • I agree being the owner of a business with three employees. I have applied to PPP with 4 banks, credit unions with no contact. The problem is the banks cannot make much off of the smaller ones with only a 1% return.

  3. Rashid says:

    I totally agree. I also run a children day care center with staff of 10 and have not been able to secure any funding so far. Our facility was totally shut down by the order of the Governor. So, we are down to $0 revenue whereas we still have to pay rent and utilities. Everything is oversubscribed the moment it is open.
    Other aspect is that the employees claim Unemployment insurance which is their right but the employer will see higher UI rates once business gets back to normal but COVID-19 is not a fault of the business. I suggest we lobby with the State not to raise UI rates for small businesses as they would be impacted twice – once for loss of revenue and then by higher UI rates.

    • Jeniene says:

      I was just contemplating that this morning. This should be addressed ASAP. The smaller businesses that do not get relief assistance will have to lay off their employees, or go through whatever reserves they managed to accumulate, which is not recommended. Since no relief has come to them, it is the only option for survival for some, and then they would get penalized later with higher unemployment insurance rates!
      While the other larger companies, with more employees, some that actually still have a good deal of money coming in or on reserve, will recover quickly, and much stronger, especially after having been given free funds to cover their payroll for employees without using their own funds that are still being generated. The little guys will be paying penalties, by way of higher unemployment insurance. They get beat down again.
      That has to be fixed ASAP, as the only recourse for these small business left without relief funds will actually set them back later.
      The FICA or social security payment deferral that small businesses can take advantage of will only save them 6.2% of their payroll and then when/if the business gets back on its feet, they have to pay it all back.
      Small business left out in the cold again. They just can’t seem to get it right or do it fairly.

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