CHICAGO — Business owners in Illinois will be eligible to receive more funding in the form of grants due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, announced Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
Applications for the Business Interruption Grants (BIG) program will be available as early as Thursday afternoon and will offer $220 million in funds for small businesses.
Pritzker said in a press conference Tuesday that keeping small businesses open has been an important part of the state’s COVID-19 response.
“Helping entrepreneurs stay afloat, giving business owners the help necessary to keep the lights on and payroll flowing, is vital to preserving jobs and businesses until we get to the other side of this pandemic,” said Pritzker.
BIG prioritizes a substantial portion of the funds for businesses that are in vulnerable communities. This second wave of BIG relief has a focus on businesses located downstate or in disproportionately impacted areas (DIA).
$60 million of the grant money is set aside for heavily impacted industries such as movie theatres, performing arts venues, concert venues, indoor recreation, amusement parks, event spaces located at banquet halls and hotels, and more.
The Peoria Civic Center falls under the heavily impacted industries category and lit up for a “Red Alert” at the end of August due to event cancellations causing loss of revenue.
“This round of BIG grants will offer a lifeline to the devastated Illinois cultural sector,” said Claire Rice, Executive Director of Arts Alliance Illinois.
“Our beloved music venues, performing arts centers, museums and other critical community assets remain either fully closed or severely restricted given capacity limitations, and we have yet to see a light at the end of the tunnel in terms of reopening.”
$70 million is set aside for DIAs, which are defined zip codes of communities that are most economically destressed and vulnerable to COVID-19.
According to the map of DIAs in the state, areas of Peoria and Tazewell counties are considered DIAs, meaning more grant money will be available to those areas.
Eligible businesses will include for-profit and nonprofit entities with $20 million or less in annual revenue in 2019 (annualized for businesses that started after January 2019). All businesses that receive a BIG award must have experienced losses due to COVID-19 that exceed the size of the award.
