No SBA loan checks reach Katrina victims

[struggle4progress]

FRANK BASS
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Despite promises of a swift response to Katrina, the U.S. Small Business Administration didn't deliver any loan checks to companies in the disaster zone during the first month after the hurricane, according to records obtained by the Associated Press.

The SBA handed out 950,000 'applications for disaster loans, received 26,100 responses and approved just 142 loans without cutting any checks as of Monday - the one-month anniversary of Katrina's first landfall, the records show. <snip>

"This is really a disaster," said Rep. Nydia Velazquez of New York, the top Democrat on the House Small Business Committee. "These businesses need help."

The slow pace has also begun to frustrate businesses in the region. <snip>

http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/myrtlebeachonline/news/politics/12776183.htm

[aquart]

1. Which crony is running it?

[struggle4progress]

2. Hector Barreto

Posted on Thu, Sep. 08, 2005
AP: 9/11 recovery loans loosely managed
Associated Press

The government's $5 billion effort to help small businesses recover from the Sept. 11 attacks was so loosely managed that it gave low-interest loans to companies that didn't need terrorism relief - or even know they were getting it, The Associated Press has found.

And while some at New York's Ground Zero couldn't get assistance they desperately sought, companies far removed from the devastation - a South Dakota country radio station, a Virgin Islands perfume shop, a Utah dog boutique and more than 100 Dunkin' Donuts and Subway sandwich shops - had no problem winning the government-guaranteed loans.

Dentists and chiropractors in numerous cities, as well as an Oregon winery that sold trendy pinot noir to New York City restaurants also got assistance.

"That's scary. Nine-11 had nothing to do with this," said James Munsey, a Virginia entrepreneur who described himself as "beyond shocked" to learn his nearly $1 million loan to buy a special events company in Richmond was drawn from the Sept. 11 program. <snip>

http://www.tallahassee.com/mld/tallahassee/business/12591910.htm


Posted on Sat, Sep. 10, 2005
Congress to investigate 9/11 loan abuses

FRANK BASS and DIRK LAMMERS

Associated Press


WASHINGTON - Congress will investigate the "flagrant abuse" of a federal loan program designed to help businesses recover from the Sept. 11 attacks and make sure such problems don't occur with Hurricane Katrina relief, a key Senate Republican announced Friday.

Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, chairwoman of the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, announced the investigation in response to an Associated Press story Thursday that showed the federal program was so loosely managed that it gave low-interest loans to companies that didn't need terrorism relief or even know they were getting it.

"The apparent widespread abuse of loans provided through the Supplemental Terrorist Activity Relief Act is nothing short of an outrage," Snowe said.

The committee chairwoman said she would demand answers from both the banks that gave the loans and the Small Business Administration, which supervised the program. <snip>

http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/politics/12605530.htm


Local reps calling for fund probe
By Paul Brooks
Times Herald-Record
[e-mail]

<snip> "At a time when many New York small businesses are indeed still recovering from the disruptions caused by the attacks of Sept. 11th, these reports of abuse of the STAR program and the profligate use of scarce government resources are indeed inexcusable," Clinton said in her letter.

The senior U.S. senator from New York, Chuck Schumer, also weighed in: "The ongoing congressional investigation into possible abuse of 9/11 loans should include any questionable transactions in Orange County and the entire Hudson Valley to make sure that only companies that needed economic assistance due to the terrorist attacks of 9/11 got the low-interest loans," he said.

Republican Rep. Sue Kelly of Katonah said the news reports raised questions about the operation of the loan program. "Congress will be seeking the answers in the days ahead. There is no place for fraud or abuse in any federal program, especially one as vital and serious as this, to help affected small businesses recover economically after 9/11." <snip>

http://www.recordonline.com/archive/2005/09/13/911aid13.htm


September 15, 2005
SBA praises itself, dismisses AP findings as 'sensational'
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Small Business Administration is distributing an audit praising its post-Sept. 11 relief work, while omitting a second report by the same auditor that criticized a substantial part of SBA's $5 billion lending effort.

The agency faces a congressional inquiry after The Associated Press reported it had made numerous loans to small businesses that neither wanted nor knew they were getting money earmarked for economic victims of the terrorist attacks.

The AP reported that companies hundreds of miles from the devastation of ground zero - from a Utah motorcycle dealer to an Ohio Subway sandwich shop - had received SBA-backed loans without being aware they had been drawn from the relief programs. <snip>

http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php?id=1&display=rednews/2005/09/15/build/nation/50-sba-praises.inc

[Erika]

4. Says it all.

[The_Casual_Observer]

3. I would have been amazed if they had actually done anything worthwhile.

This kind of lack of response is text book, guaranteed. And there are a million excuses as to why this has happened too! (this is also text book).

[gulfcoastliberal]

5. Hell our Condo Association was approved for a $1.5 million SBA loan after

Ivan and although our maintenance fees have gone up by $60/mo as promised to pay it off over the next 30 years we've not gotten the check. The story is they want invoices for $1.5 million dollars of work when the association, uh, doesn't have it - because like every other condo association we're suing our windstorm insurance company who paid us 1/8th the actual damage. So that's why they asked for a loan, but you can't get the loan until you've spent it without having gotten the loan. That's how those hurricane SBA "loans" work. Great, huh?