Providing much needed funding to businesses trying to get through the COVID-19 pandemic is what the Kenai Peninsula Economic Development District did across the Peninsula in 2020.
In providing an update on Alaska CARES Act money, Tim Dillon, Executive Director for the Kenai Peninsula Economic Development District said the region took advantage of the available CARES Act money.
He said, “The Alaska CARES money was broken down to a variety of different kinds of things and the business aspect, there was $280 million that came from the federal government that the state looked at organizations like ours to try and help push those things out and assist with the outreach. So we worked with a variety of our businesses from Seldovia to Moose Pass and Seward and Hope and everyplace in between. We’ve actually just finished up. We had 1,041 businesses approved. This is all grant money, so none of this money needs to be repaid. We were able to get $49,692,653.94 into the hands of local businesses. The maximum anybody received was $100,000. The smallest anybody received was $5,000. It’s all based on expenditures that folks had from March 11th till September 15th. We did rather well, when you start looking around the state of Alaska, we more than doubled what they got up in Matanuska Valley. The only community that got more than the Kenai Peninsula Borough was the Municipality of Anchorage. They were able to get 1,438 businesses approved for $73 million.”
Dillon said that Kenai Peninsula businesses benefited because it was first come, first served, saying his staff would help people apply for one of the grants because the application process would take up to 5 hours to complete.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic continues, Dillon elaborates on whether Alaska CARES Act money will continue into this year. “They’ve actually run out of money. It closed on September 15th. When it comes to the Alaska CARES, the business aspect money, that’s already spent. We’re currently working, right now, with the federal government and taking a look at what else is out there and what potentially may happen in the next 30-45 days with the feds and with the state.”
Dillon gave highlights of municipal relief and the amount of money that went out. “The Kenai Peninsula Borough did the best job out of the entire state of Alaska. If you look around the state, there was approximately 30 cities and boroughs that shared their municipal relief with the actual businesses and community members. We have 7 of those 30 sitting right here on the Kenai Peninsula with the 6 incorporated communities plus the borough. I think we fared very, very well and I think that the whole Kenai Peninsula was an example of how this should be taken care of.”
Dillon concluded that the goal was for businesses to survive another year.
