On February 10th, 2022, ILSR and Main Street America hosted a conversation about how communities can use some of their federal American Rescue Plan Act allocations to support small business growth and development.
Small Business’s Big Moment:
A Webinar on How Communities Can Use ARPA Funds to Support Small Business Development
Thursday, February 10th, from 2:00-3:15pm ET.
The American Rescue Plan Act offers communities a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to fundamentally refocus their economic development strategies. One of the smartest things they can do with this unprecedented cash infusion is to make small business the center of their economic development policies and programs.
The webinar was based on a new report by ILSR, “Small Business’s Big Moment,” outlining a dozen ideas for using American Rescue Plan Act money to cultivate and support small businesses, including:
- Buying commercial property and transferring ownership to a community land trust to provide affordable space for small businesses
- Improving small business procurement policies and practices
- Cultivating small-scale manufacturing and filling gaps in local and regional supply chains
- Closing the racial entrepreneurship gap
- Creating a local restaurant delivery service
- Investing in infrastructure improvements that help small business operate more effectively
Speakers:
- Dionne Baux, Vice President of Urban Development, Main Street America
- Timothy Bishop, Economic Development Director, City of La Grande, Oregon
- Maggie Elliott, Executive Director, Believe in Bristol
- Mathew Hill, Executive Director, Brunswick Downtown Development Authority
- Paola Santana, CEO, GLASS
- Stacy Mitchell, Co-Director, Institute for Local Self-Reliance
The conversation was moderated by Kelly Humrichouser, Director of Government Relations for Main Street America, and Kennedy Smith, Senior Researcher for the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and former director of the National Main Street Center.
