$MALL BUSINESS $UPPORT During the COVID19 crisis, the Cashiers Highlands small businesses have made extraordinary efforts to ensure residents had access to limited supplies, meals and food, critical services and more and to protect and provide for their staffs.
We at the Cashiers Area Chamber are working hard to help them meet immediate operational needs so they can successfully navigate the health crisis recovery.
Stay-at-home mandates categorized businesses as “essential” and “non-essential.” But these distinctions don’t define the importance our Chamber recognizes of all small businesses.
Their owners and workers are our friends, neighbors, parents, church members, civic leaders, charity volunteers and more. They drive our local economic engine and every single one of them is essential to us.
The Chamber is filtering through digital information overload to provide focused and relevant information to our members. The federal CARES Act provides $376 billion in relief, including the US Small Business Administration’s Payroll Protection Plan which forgives loans for retaining employees. Its Economic Injury Disaster Loan Advance program offers up to $10,000 to businesses experiencing temporary loss of revenue. The agency offers accelerated capital and operating funds up to $25,000 through Express Bridge Loans for businesses with an existing SBA relationship. And the SBA Debt Relief program provides “financial reprieve” to small businesses during the pandemic.
There are also supplemental state and local government programs. And many charitable and faith-based organizations are working together to coordinate resources for small business families and employees.
We urge readers to now Support Small Business, whether you’re home on the Plateau or off the mountain. Think about the quality of life we enjoy because of the small business economy. Take action and call several … make that many … of your favorites and purchase a gift card, order curbside/delivery, buy online, subscribe to
classes, schedule a future service or find other creative ways to support these enterprises when they need it most.
Let us show our appreciation to them as they push through this adversity with us. Transform your gratitude for the Plateau’s small business community to well-deserved financial support now and in the future.