Comptroller Stringer Calls on Congress to Pass RELIEF for Main Street Act to Provide $50 Billion for Small Businesses

(New York, NY) — Today, New York City Comptroller Scott M. Stringer sent a letter to U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi calling for Congress to pass the RELIEF for Main Street Act, a bipartisan bill that would provide $50 billion in direct assistance to cities, counties, and states to provide existing or newly created relief and recovery funds that are explicitly targeted towards small businesses with fewer than 50 employees.

Comptroller Stringer noted that while the Paycheck Protection Program was intended to support small businesses by helping them to retain staff and stem job losses, the program arrived too late, included too many restrictions, was ill-suited for Main Street and urban businesses, and has been poorly implemented. The RELIEF for Main Street Act would offer a broader range of products (grants, loans, technical assistance, and hybrid products) than the Paycheck Protection Program, build on existing local relief efforts, and provide funding for recovery, not just survival.

The Comptroller also underscored that these Main Street businesses are most likely to be owned by and employ people of color, who are currently suffering unemployment rates in excess of 20 percent. Given that these BIPOC communities have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19, Comptroller Stringer emphasized the urgent need for a new approach that actually targets small businesses in the hardest hit communities.

The full letter is available below and can be found here. Save Main Street, Comptroller Stringer’s crash relief initiative to help New York City’s struggling small businesses, can be found here.

Dear Senator McConnell and Speaker Pelosi:

As you know, our small businesses are struggling like never before. Across the country, 16 percent of small businesses are currently closed and their revenues are down 17 percent compared to early January. Circumstances are even more grim in New York City, where small business revenues have fallen 31 percent, and at least 2,800 businesses have closed permanently, more than any other city.

While the Paycheck Protection Program was intended to support our small businesses by helping them to retain staff and stem job losses, the program arrived too late, included too many restrictions, was ill-suited for Main Street and urban businesses, and has been poorly implemented. In New York, just 145,936 of the city’s 1,186,728 small businesses and independent contractors received a PPP loan, or a paltry 12 percent.

Clearly, we must adopt a new approach moving forward, one that actually targets small businesses—not those with up to 499 employees—in the hardest hit communities. Toward this end, I strongly urge you to pass the RELIEF for Main Street Act, a bipartisan bill that would provide $50 billion in direct assistance to cities, counties, and states to scale existing (or newly created) relief and recovery funds that are explicitly targeted towards small businesses with fewer than 50 employees, depending on the location. The program would offer a broader range of products (grants, loans, technical assistance, and hybrid products) than the Paycheck Protection Program, build on existing local relief efforts, and provide funding for recovery, not just survival. It has been endorsed by 100 mayors across the country, including those from Los Angeles, Washington D.C., and Oklahoma City.

As the pandemic ravages our communities and forces Americans to stay close to home and remain socially distant, it is our small, mom-and-pop businesses that have been hardest hit. Restaurants and bars, barber shops and nail salons, retail stores — these are the anchors of our neighborhoods and our Main Street commercial corridors, and the businesses most likely to be owned and employ people of color.

In total, Black Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) represent 41 percent of national employment and 73 percent of New York City employment in the retail, food services, and personal services sectors. They own 31 percent of these Main Street businesses nationally, and 55 percent in New York City. Given that these BIPOC communities have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 and are currently suffering unemployment rates in excess of 20 percent, we cannot allow these small businesses to fail and their workers to be left adrift.

It is time to rise to the occasion and get small businesses, workers, and communities the resources that they so desperately need. It is time to pass the RELIEF for Main Street Act.

Sincerely,

Scott Stringer
New York City Comptroller

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