Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Jovita Carranza wrote to lenders June 15 asking them to do more to get Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans to smaller businesses and underserved communities.
Carranza’s letter said the SBA recognized that Community Development Financial Institutions, minority depository institutions, certified development companies and Farm Credit System lenders are leading the way to serve individual entrepreneurs and small businesses in underserved communities.
“Together with our partners, the SBA is asking you to redouble your efforts to assist eligible borrowers in underserved and disadvantaged communities, allowing us to expand economic opportunity, before the upcoming deadline of June 30, 2020, to obtain a loan number for a PPP loan,” Carranza wrote.
She said that SBA would work with all PPP lenders to prioritize access to the program and ensure that entities in underserved and rural markets, including veterans and members of the military community, small business concerns owned and controlled by socially and economically disadvantaged individuals, women, and businesses in operation for less than two years benefit from PPP.
“As communities begin to reopen across the country carefully, I am also meeting with several small businesses, non-profits and faith-based institutions who have weathered this emergency and kept their employees on the payroll because of the PPP,” Carranza wrote. “However, there are still many more opportunities to provide this assistance to businesses who have yet to access these forgivable loans.”