The Brownsville City Commission on Tuesday approved the Brownsville Community Improvement Corporation’s Economic Development Revolving Loan Fund Program, also known as “eBridge Fund.”
The program works in partnership with the U.S. Department of Commerce and the Economic Development Administration to provide funds to help businesses start up and expand within the community.
The $2 million grant program will provide the opportunity for Brownsville to have its first revolving-loan fund. The e-Bridge fund is designed for entrepreneurs to address capital attainment issues and recover from economic volatility brought by a natural disaster, such as the COVID-19 pandemic suffered in the year 2020.
During a presentation at the city meeting, BCIC Executive Director Josh Mejia said the program will essentially entertain three core goals: create or retain jobs within our area, diversify the local economy and expand operations among existing businesses in the area.
“In order for us to be able to manage the $2 million grant that was received on behalf of the U.S. Department of Commerce, we are requesting that this program is allowed to proceed with the operations of $2.5 million to be able to successfully implement this revolving-loan fund program for the community of Brownsville,” Mejia said.
“We have already provided the cash match on behalf of the Board of Directors of BCIC, and we have already designed all the management programs. We obtained the fidelity bonds to be able to manage it, we also worked in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Commerce along with their legal team to be able to address all applications that are going to be intake as part of this program.”
Mejia said BCIC is targeting the objective of making this program extremely available, which means they have to provide competitive and flexible rates in comparison to those found by small business loans provided by much larger and established financial institutions, such as traditional banks at the national level, state level and regional level as well.
Mejia said this program will provide equitable resources to be able to address one key challenge that the region has continued to experience for many years — which is attaining capital.
“It is very difficult for our demographic to be able to obtain capital to start up a business, obtain working capital to be able to expand an existing operation,” he said.
“Through the opportunity that was provided by the U.S. Department of Commerce, and the partnerships that we’ve created with said department, we’ve been able to create a very equitable program, and an inclusive one as well, to be able to entertain growth opportunities, help those businesses that continue to sustain a negative impact on behalf of the volatile experience in our community as a result of the impact of the 2020 pandemic.”
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