Tanya N. Garfield, director of the West Disaster Center (Disaster Field Operations Center-West) of the Small Business Administration (SBA), recently announced the approval of more than $25 million in federal loans for housing and businesses that were affected by different climatic emergencies in California.

Garfield noted in a press release:

SBA’s disaster assistance employees are committed to helping businesses and residents rebuild as quickly as possible.

Either by severe winter storms, or for straight-line winds, floods or landslide and mudslide, events that began as of February 21, the SBA has approved $6,650,900 for small businesses, and $18,464,300 for housing owners and tenants who require aid to recover from these disasters.

Beneficiary Areas

The SBA called on business owners, as well as landlords and tenants from the following counties to register with the Federal Emergency Agency (FEMA) before the deadline of July 20:

• Butte
• Kern
• Madera
• Mariposa
• Mendocino
• Mono
• Monterey
• San Benito
• San Bernardino
• San Luis Obispo
• Santa Cruz
• Tulare
• Tuolumne

“Don’t miss out on any assistance you may be entitled to by not registering for help. You don’t need to wait for your insurance to settle or obtain a contractor’s estimate," added Garfield.

Continuous assistance

The SBA continues to provide personalized assistance to disaster loans in all federal-state disaster centers (DRC), the Business Recovery Centers (BRC) of the SBA, and through the Promotion and Assistance Center for Disaster loans (DLOC) of the SBA in all affected areas, to explain the administration disaster loans and help housing and tenant owners to close their approved loans for disasters.

In addition to providing additional funds to attend businesses and residents with the cost of improvements to protect, prevent or minimize this type of damage in the future, SBA highlights that businesses of any size and private non-profit organizations can obtain loans for up to $2 million to repair or replace real estate, machinery and equipment, inventories and other assets.

Latino small businesses help drive our nation’s economy. Today at Crecer Business Incubator, @repdeliaramiriez and I met with local small business leaders to hear directly from them about opportunities and what they are seeing on the road ahead. #LatinoProsperityTour pic.twitter.com/vMztFpv4uH

— Isabel Guzman (@SBAIsabel) June 20, 2023

Financial Support 

Through disaster loans due to economic damage (EIDL), the SBA supports small businesses, small agricultural cooperatives, small businesses involved in aquaculture, as well as most private non-profit organizations of all sizes.

Economic damage assistance is available regardless of whether the business has suffered some physical damage to property. The deadline to request a loan for economic damage is January 3, 2024.

Likewise, disaster loans of up to $200,000 are available for housing owners and tenants who seek to repair or replace damaged or destroyed real estate.

For its part, the interest rates of loans are 4% for businesses and 2.375% for private non-profit organizations, as well as for housing and tenant owners for deadlines of up to 30 years.

Recently, SBA administrator, Isabella Casillas Guzmán, announced a policy change granting 12 months without payments and 0% interest.

This refers to all disaster loans approved in response to disasters declared from September 21, 2022, until September 30, 2023.