Small business owners across the state of Illinois now have had a financial lifeline shut with the blocking of additional funding to the SBA's Paycheck Protection Program.
Small business owners across the state of Illinois now have had a financial lifeline shut with the blocking of additional funding to the SBA's Paycheck Protection Program.
Democratic House lawmakers, including Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, last week blocked a $250 million bill intended to infuse more cash into the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program to help small businesses during the pandemic.
"By blocking unanimous consent April 9 on the $250 billion small business rescue bill, Democrats place millions of businesses and jobs at risk in their home states. The error is profound, if not swiftly reversed is likely to inflict a significant wound on the country," wrote Robert Charles, a former assistant secretary of state under President George W. Bush, in an op-ed in Townhall.com.
Now the SBA fund-—one of the few lifelines left for small business—has run dry.
Illinois has over 1.2 million small businesses employing 2.5 million people, or 45% of the state's private workforce, according to the Small Business Advocacy Council.
The Chicago Sun-Times reported this week that more than 44,000 small businesses in Illinois received loans from the PPP program, a small number of the 1.2 million in the state. While ranked fourth compared to other large states, Illinois businesses received $12.5 billion in loans.
Unfortunately, many small businesses were not able to secure a loan before the fund ran out.
State Rep. Mark Batinick (R-Plainfield) said most of the mom and pop businesses in his district did not receive funding despite the fact that many applied. Some are still waiting for their SBA loan registration number.
“There are very few that got any money,” Batinick said. “Many have applied and haven’t gotten funding. The mom and pop businesses are really getting hammered.”
He indicated the larger businesses in line first seemed to have secured loans, which were for larger amounts.
When asked his opinion on the blocking of the measure last week by DC House Democrats, including Sen. Dick Durbin, Batinick replied, “It’s not a time to play partisan politics.”
Batinick said lawmakers should focus “on the people hurt” and any measures should not include “ancillary” spending.
“They damn well better help the small businesses in my downtown—the mom and pop businesses, those that are working from home—and not leave them high and dry,” said Batinick.
"I have filed for PPP and haven't received it," said Sean Morrison, 17th District County Board Commissioner, and a small business owner, in a phone interview. He said several of his colleagues are small business owners suffering through the COVID-19 crisis.
"There are many business that are not going to come out of this," Morrison said.
He called the Democratic House actions "appalling" and indicated they should be putting pressure on Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to get this bill passed.
"This is not the time for politics, it's time to protect the American citizens and their families," said Morrison. He indicated that there are 368,000 residents in Cook County, with several thousand businesses shut down.
"Don't screw around with politics at this time," said Morrison.
"It shows a lack of moral ethics that they are going to use this for political benefit," he said. "It exposes their true moral compass."
Durbin did not respond to email requests for comment.
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