ASHEVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA – DECEMBER 23: Debris and destruction from Hurricane Helene is seen in … [+]
After some time, Congress passed a continuing resolution (CR) that keeps the government funded until March 14, 2025. The CR also allocated about $100 billion to help Americans trying to recover from multiple natural disasters in 2023 and 2024, including $2.2 billion to restore funding to the US Small Business Administration’s (SBA) disaster loan fund.
In October, the SBA announced that funding for its disaster loan program has been depleted due to two disasters, meaning the agency cannot offer these low-interest, long-term loans to disaster survivors until Congress to appropriate the funds. With Hurricane Helene, the agency received about 37,000 applications and made more than 700 loan offers totaling about $48 million. The SBA also received more than 12,000 applications for Hurricane Milton.
This lack of support is hurting businesses from Virginia to Florida. For example, the Virginia Creeper Trail is a popular bike path in the southwestern part of the state that runs 34 miles from Whitetop Station through Damascus to Abingdon and is vital to the area’s economy. Unfortunately, 18 miles of it have been destroyed and there are no funds to restore it.
“While local sections of the trail have reopened, the portion managed by the US Forest Service remains closed due to extensive damage, including the destruction of multiple utility poles. The continued closure of the 17-mile section threatens the economic vitality of southwest Virginia, as tourism and related businesses depend on the accessibility of the trail,” Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin wrote in a funding request.
Michael Wright operates four businesses in this area of Virginia, Adventure Damascus, Hellbender’s Cafe, Damascus Outfitters and a screen printing shop, that have been influenced by Helene. When he discovered that SBA disaster loan financing was not available, he told him Cardinal News“I just put the SBA out of my mind and started cleaning up and trying to revive my business.”
Ralph Wilson was forced to close two of his four businesses in Damascus, the Dragonfly Inn and the Damascus Diner, due to flooding from Helene. He also wasn’t able to get a disaster loan from the SBA because he didn’t have the funds and started paying his own employees and sought help in other areas. Unfortunately, Wright and Wilson had to lay off a collective 67 people. This devastation in six states prompted lawmakers from those areas to push to restore SBA disaster loan funding to CR.
“Asheville went 52 days without drinking water. They just got it two and a half weeks ago. It’s a terrible situation,” said Senator Thom Tillis [R-NC] told Fox News. “It’s going to take years to recover, and we shouldn’t be playing games with people’s lives in western North Carolina, in Tennessee, Virginia, Georgia, South Carolina, Florida, everybody that got hit by Helene, they got hit by Milton and they were hit by Debbie. We have to do the right thing with them and put politics aside.”
The fact that lawmakers from both sides of the aisle in these states were committed to this funding is a testament to the bipartisan nature of this issue. Fortunately, CR restored this funding, but we all know that the next natural disaster can strike with very little warning. The new Congress must take steps to ensure that businesses across Main Street have a safer lifeline, ensuring that the SBA does not face gaps in supporting businesses when they are most vulnerable.