The Alaska Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development announced the structure for the Alaska ARPA Business Relief Program authorized in the FY22 Budget.
Tim Dillon, Executive Director for the Kenai Peninsula Economic Development District:
“There’s $90 million that has been set aside for small business. It’s not really like the Alaska CARES program. Its set up a little differently. It’s set up on lost revenue instead of expenditures, like the last one was. That will be on the street for approximately 30 days. The application period is going to be for one month and then they’re not going to be allocating dollars out during that month. They’re going to wait until they have everybody’s application in during that monthlong period.”
Gov. Mike Dunleavy originally requested $280 million in appropriation for this purpose, instead of the $90 million that’s available. The AK-ARPA Business Relief Grants issued under the program will be capped at $1 million. It has not been specified as to when the program will open up, the DCCED says that it’s in early Fall 2021.
Dillon says there are two things interested applicants need to know when applying:
“You’ve got a business license and that it’s active. They’re not going to go ahead and let us do what we did last time. We had 30-some businesses on the Peninsula that didn’t have a business license. Most of those were in unincorporated communities on the Peninsula. We were able to sidestep that a little bit with giving them packs, information, and such. They’re not going to allow that this year. The other thing is, you have to make sure that you’re up to date with your taxes, and that’s filing of your taxes. Especially, there’s a variety of businesses that go for an extension and sometime in the fall they go ahead and file for last year. You’re not going to be able to apply unless you have filed your taxes. If there’s one bit of advice I can give to people right now, is you’ve probably got a month before this thing opens up.”
For more information on the AK-ARPA Business Relief Program, including eligibility requirements, eligible expenses, information required to support an application package, FAQs, and more, click here.
