Under direction from the County of Santa Clara, the Enterprise Foundation opened the Microbusiness Grant portal for local eligible businesses to apply for grants of $2,500 each.
In January, the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors accepted approximately $2.4 million from the California Microbusiness Covid-19 Relief Grant Program to aid microbusinesses adversely affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. The state program provides approximately $50 million in one-time grant funding that counties were offered the opportunity to administer.
“Small businesses, many of them mom and pop operations throughout Santa Clara County, have faced a tremendous amount of hardship over the last two years due to the pandemic,” said Board of Supervisors President Mike Wasserman. “We’re excited local small businesses can start applying for these needed funds to help mitigate the loss of revenues caused by the pandemic.”
To qualify for one of the $2,500 grants, a business must have been in business in 2019, have been negatively impacted by Covid-19, made less than $50,000 in total revenue in 2019, and have less than five employees. Applicants’ businesses must still be operating or plan to reopen in 2022.
The program is expected to provide grant relief to at least 875 microbusinesses in two phases. This first phase will award 500 grants to qualified businesses on a first-come, first-served basis. The second phase, which will follow, will remain open for at least 45 days and all remaining grants will be awarded on a lottery system.
The application is available in English, Spanish or Vietnamese at AccessSBDC.org.
