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The pandemic aid program, which provides grants of $10,000 each to about 1,000 small businesses in the state, would receive their own grants under a bill that had a public hearing this week.
The law is AB-963 / SB-891would transform the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation’s (WEDC) Main Street Bounceback Initiative into a continuing source of economic development grants for small businesses.
“The strength of this program is that it fills capital needs that would otherwise go unmet and helps businesses stay open, expand, and add foot traffic to vacant storefronts, especially those that are killing the vibrancy of Main Street. ” said Senator Kelda. Royce (D-Madison), who co-authored the bill with Rep. Alex Joes (D-Middleton), testified Wednesday at a Congressional Tourism Committee hearing.
“We need to continue to prioritize these investments in our communities,” Joes said.
Launched in 2021 with funding from the federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA). main street bounce back It was intended to help small businesses relocate to vacant commercial space in downtowns across Wisconsin.
Sam Rickards, WEDC deputy executive director and chief operating officer, said even the architects were surprised by the success of the two-year Main Street Bounce Back program. Rickards told lawmakers the initial allocation was $50 million that would go to 5,000 companies. Demand has far exceeded the original goal, and Governor Tony Evers has approved two additional allocations of $25 million each, bringing the total investment to the program to $100 million.
The program closed applications at the end of 2022. By the end, “approximately 9,500 businesses and nonprofits in all 72 counties received grants,” Rickards testified.
Grant recipients were not the only beneficiaries. “These grants have brought new excitement to downtown,” Rickards said. The influx of business “encouraged people to stay, eat, shop, and spend money in their communities.”
Aiming for $25 million per year
The new bill would allocate $25 million in general purpose state revenue annually to WEDC over the current two-year budget cycle to help small businesses open or expand. The original program included nonprofit organizations, but the bill would limit the program to for-profit businesses. In other respects, the new program is expected to be largely modeled after Main Street Bounce Back.
Sean Petplace of the Main Street Alliance, a small business organizing and advocacy group, said many of the recipients are “people who have difficulty getting funding from traditional banking sources.”
Businesses located downtown in small communities pay taxes to fund local services such as schools, Petplace said. “At the end of the day, this is about filling a real need that exists.”
Rep. David Armstrong (R-Rice Lake), a member of the Legislature and economic development director for Barron County, said there are 134 Bounce Back grant recipients in the county.
“Was the program successful? Absolutely,” Armstrong told the committee.
Armstrong stressed that recipients should have a clear business plan and three-year financial forecast. “I think the biggest challenge is understanding that $100,000 is not going to solve all your problems,” he says.
He also suggested enlisting local small business development centers and other organizations to vet recipients and guide them in planning. Rickards said WEDC’s partnership with regional planning commissions and other local organizations has provided such support, allowing WEDC to set and meet grant application deadlines.
In most cases, the initial grant was just one element of the larger investment required for the project. “This is part of the capital stack,” Armstrong told the committee.
“This is not a make-or-break amount for a company,” said Daniel Smith, co-owner of Gerber Events, based in a renovated Gerber feed mill on Madison’s East Side. “But all it gave us was a breather after going through the pandemic and everything that comes with it.”
The redeveloped Gerber Mill opened in late 2019 as an event space that houses several on-premises businesses, anchored by Ian’s Pizza locations. The coronavirus pandemic forced Gerber Events to suspend operations for several months. Bounceback grants were part of the road to business recovery.
“We are taking a breather and believe the best use of this funding is to continue doing what we do best: investing in our community by bringing in musicians, artists and other makers from across the region. We determined that there is,” Smith told a parliamentary committee.
Free music sponsored by Gerber Events “creates a space for the community to come together,” Smith said. “It also creates a buzz around the building we’re in.” That’s a boon for the dozen or so facilities that share the site. “So we were able to leverage those funds to build community and turn it into something substantial for our business and other businesses.”
enthusiastic managers
Mr. Joes and Mr. Lois received many pages of testimonials from satisfied recipients of Bounce Back grants across the state. Others who spoke at Wednesday’s hearing also had success stories.
In Appleton, Julie Blair ran an independent record label called Clutch of Memory out of her home. A vacant VFW hall in the community caught her eye, and a $10,000 Main Street Bounce Back grant helped fund the move of her business there.
“My ability to interact with the community has increased significantly because I’m actually out of the house,” Blair told the committee. “It just gave us an opportunity that we wouldn’t have had otherwise. We’re really grateful.”
West Bend City Administrator Jay Shambaugh said 87 businesses in West Bend applied for and received Bounce Back grants. “Before this program started, our Main Street was maybe a little tired and in need of some rejuvenation,” Shambaugh testified. “We have a really vibrant downtown now.”
Shambaugh said apartment building construction completed or underway in or near downtown will add space for 500 homes. He suggested that development was spurred by regional bounce back projects. He said he would welcome the show back.
Jessica Wilde, deputy city administrator and former director of communications and economic development for the city of West Bend, said the city’s Bounce Back participants are a wide variety of businesses. There’s also a mini-golf course for rehabilitation after being mostly dormant, and an indoor gym tailored to the needs of young people on the autism spectrum.
“We have a coffee shop, a restaurant, and we’ve expanded our shoe repair shop,” Wiles said. “It was a great program. I get asked about that a lot.”
Wildes said the city would benefit from reinstating the program to help cover necessary start-up costs as more businesses have the opportunity to expand or expand into new locations. Stated.
In Fond du Lac, 62 small businesses received Main Street Bounceback grants, said Amy Hansen, executive director of the Downtown Fond du Lac Partnership, a regional economic development nonprofit. said.
“It fills empty spaces and brings life to all the businesses downtown,” Hansen said. “Help with start-up costs is a game-changer for many entrepreneurs.”
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