MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The second round of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) is open for business, while the money lasts.
Small Business Administration (SBA) Regional administrator Steve Bulger said after so many businesses were left out in the first round some changes have been made to the program. The changes have slowed the process, but have allowed greater participation.
“We put restrictions on all banks for how many they can apply for at one time to try to keep the process fair,” Bulger said Tuesday. “It has slowed it down a little bit, but we think that’s the right thing to do.”
The current round of funding is a total of $310 billion, of that total, Bulger said $60 billion has been set aside for small lenders.
“We wanted to make sure those small lenders do have access to the funding because they deal with very small businesses, sometimes in economically disadvantaged communities,” Bulger said.
There were a lot of disappointed bankers and business owners Monday, said Brian Kassalen with Arnett Carbis Toothman, an accounting and consulting firm.
.@BrianKassalen with @actcpas joins @HoppyKercheval via Skype to discuss the second rollout of the PPP. WATCH: https://t.co/wkudfIAoe1 pic.twitter.com/E1NAZQ23P6
— MetroNews (@WVMetroNews) April 28, 2020
“There were issues with the rollout,” Kassalen said Tuesday on MetroNews “Talkline.” “Systems were crashing. I talked to several bankers who expressed a lot of frustration who were trying to get loans approved. They’d maybe get a couple approved and then the system was going down.”
The SBA said Monday afternoon it was having “unprecedented demand.”
Morgantown-based Clear Mountain Bank is one of those institutions in West Virginia processing the loans. COO Clint McCabe told WAJR Radio Tuesday they are working to meet the needs of small business customers.
“Our folks have been very busy working through the second window as best we can to input applications,” McCabe said. “We have folks working around the clock to process these things because there’s a lot of demand, a lot of people need help.”
McCabe said regardless of how many applications the SBA can process they continue to work with their customers.
“Restaurants, beauty salons, service type industries, heating and cooling companies, you name it and we’ve seen it. There are a lot of folks that need help right now,” McCabe said.