The Department of Commerce (DOC) announced today that is has made available $1.8 million in grant money for rural small business to help with the COVID-19 crisis. While there are some restrictions on the use of the money, the grant will help the businesses hit hardest by the slowdown in the economy.

To be eligible under the Community Development Block Grant program (CDBG), the service must meet the following five criteria:

• Be on HUD’s list of public services or be a substantially similar service and not on the list of ineligible public services.
• Be identified as a new service or offer an increased/improved level of service.
• Be directly linked to delivery of a specific service to a client.
• Meet a CDBG national objective.
• Target residents of CDBG non-entitlement areas.

The money is to be used for small business that can document a loss of revenue due to COVID-19 or to a business that expands its operations to provide medical, food delivery, cleaning and other services to support home health and quarantine.

During the COVID-19 shutdown, programs that help small business continue to operate and avoid layoffs will help Washington recover more quickly. Additionally, in the case of the CDBG economic opportunity grant for COVID-19, the program includes the oversight of local government who understands how best to distribute the money.

More information on the program can be found here.