Federal loans to businesses sidelined by bridge disaster total $3.4 million so far

Federal officials who met Friday with business owners facing hardship in the wake of Baltimore’s bridge collapse said they have approved $3.4 million worth of emergency loans and are processing an additional 1,000 applications.

In just over three weeks since a strike by the Dali freighter destroyed the Francis Scott Key Bridge, killing six construction workers and closing the Port of Baltimore to ships, the U.S. Small Business Administration has approved 59 low-interest Economic Injury Disaster Loans, said Dilawar Syed, the SBA’s deputy administrator, during a stop in Baltimore.

The 30-year loans are designed to help businesses overcome temporary revenue loss and have been approved for restaurants, logistics companies and trucking firms, among others.

Syed and other SBA officials visited a Business Recovery Center on South Clinton Street in Canton, one of three opened in Baltimore and Anne Arundel and Baltimore counties since the bridge disaster. The centers offer help applying for federal loans as well as grants and other assistance being rolled out by state and local governments.

The SBA has seen strong demand for the loans, with $500,000 of the $3.4 million approved just since Thursday and numbers of approvals expected to grow in coming weeks, Syed said. He also said the agency is working to fill gaps for those who either don’t qualify or can’t afford to take on additional loan payments, collaborating with Maryland state agencies as well as considering additional federal aid.

“Those folks who did not get through this process successfully … We can now sit down with these business owners, look at their financials, see how we make sure they become eligible in a way that we can assist them,” he said. “We are going to stay as long as it takes to help as many small businesses as we can.”

The port’s closure has led to $28 million in loss of business on a monthly basis, Syed said. A daily workforce of about 8,000 people has been affected by the shutdown, including terminal rail and tugboat operators, pilots, longshoremen and truckers, Gov. Wes Moore has said.

The state Department of Labor has begun offering grants for independent contractors, small businesses that may have only a handful of employees and others that may not qualify for unemployment insurance, said Y. Maria Martinez, a special secretary for small business affairs in the governor’s office, on Friday. The department’s Port of Baltimore Worker Retention Program offers grants of up to $200,000 to eligible businesses to avoid employee layoffs, part of a $12.5 million authorization.

And starting at 9 a.m. Monday, the state’s Department of of Commerce will offer grants, of up to $100,000, through the Port of Baltimore Emergency Business Fund. To be eligible, businesses must show they’ve lost revenue and activity or faced increased costs to due to disruptions at the port and pledge to remain at the port once it reopens.

“Everything has happened rapidly, and we’re trying to make sure that we have wraparound services,” Martinez said.

She noted that in the three business recovery center, “you have all types of supports, you have mental health, you have unemployment, you have insurance … you have all of these pieces. … As things are progressing, the needs are going to be changing.”

Martinez and Chris Lundy, director of small and minority business advocacy and development for Mayor Brandon Scott, joined Syed in listening sessions Friday with several business owners who were approved for federal loans, part of an effort to determine whether SBA and other programs were meeting needs of those facing revenue loss.

“This is a long-term effort, and it’s not going to be over in one or two months,” Syed said.

While governmental assistance is ramping up, it’s not coming quickly enough for some.

Frederick Mensah, independent operator of Cilla Transportation, is among the hundreds of truckers who move containers and other cargo in and out of the port, many of whom don’t qualify for unemployment and can’t afford to take on even low-interest loans.

Mensah, who came Friday to the Business Recovery Center in Canton in search of answers, said he hasn’t had a paycheck since the bridge fell. Meanwhile, his business expenses are piling up, such as the rental of a chassis for his truck and storage for cargo he was scheduled to bring to the port but hasn’t been able to deliver.

“I would say that more than 95% of our business is no more,” Mensah said. “Since the bridge went down, we don’t have work here.”