City Development Administrator Alan DeLisle and St. Pete Greenhouse Manager Jessica Eilerman updated St. Petersburg City Council Thursday regarding the City's Fighting Chance Fund. Per the report, the City has received 2,224 applications. Of those applications, 913 were businesses applications. Of those 913 business applications, 516 are under review and 46 have been approved. To date, 1,311 individual applications have been received, of which 721 have been processed and 261 approved. So far, the Fighting Chance Fund has distributed $130,000.
The number of Floridians filing for unemployment insurance for the first time continues to grow amid the Covid-19 virus pandemic. For the week ended April 11, 181,293 people in Florida filed initial claims, the U.S. Department of Labor said. That was an increase of 11,408 people from the prior week. Over the past four weeks, 652,199 Floridians have filed first-time unemployment claims, Labor Department numbers show. However, there have been widely reported problems with the state's system for filing unemployment claims, suggesting the jobless number may be higher than official statistics indicate. Nationally, 22 million jobless claims have been filed in the last four weeks, including 5.2 million Americans who filed first-time claims in the week ended April 11. The national unemployment rate for April is expected to exceed 15 percent, when it is released on May 8, according to a report from Wells Fargo Securities. "The peak of new claims appears to have passed, meaning focus will now shift to the duration of unemployment," the Wells Fargo report said.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said he is assembling a task force that will focus on the state’s next steps in the Covid-19 pandemic. “The president has talked about reopening the country and some governors in the northeast and the west have talked about the next phase. It’s prudent to start thinking about and planning for people to get back to work and society to function in a healthier way,” DeSantis said during a Wednesday afternoon news conference. He said the task force will address the “resurgence and reopening” of Florida, spanning a wide range of economic sectors. He cited small business, agriculture, restaurants, tourism, large events and conventions, recreation, international travel and education, as well as employer access to Covid-19 testing. DeSantis wants to tap elected officials, people in business and in education for the task force. He said he hopes to release the names of task force members by the end of the week.
Tampa Bay Wave is launching the Rising Tide Relief Fund for technology startups that are members of Wave and struggling during the Covid-19 pandemic. The goal is to offer short-term, near-zero interest loans for quick cash infusions with minimal paperwork, Wave said. The loans are intended to help the businesses retain and pay their employees, stay current on their rent, and cover other fixed costs while they await state and federal funding. The loans will be made available on a rolling basis until funds are depleted. Applicants must be current members of Tampa Bay Wave and be headquartered in the Tampa Bay region, or relocating its headquarters by end of the year. Additional criteria and a link to make a donation is here. Tampa Bay Wave, based in downtown Tampa, is a nonprofit that houses and services young and growing technology companies.
The Glazer family, owners of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, have donated $100,000 to the City's Fighting Chance Fund, which provides grants to help locally owned and independently operated small businesses that hav been hurt by Covid-19 orders. The fund "provides the critical resources that so many small business owners in the area need at a time like this," said Darcy Glazer Kassewitz, co-owner of the Bucs. The Glazer's gift is the third six-figure donation that's been announced publicly, following $100,000 donations from the Vinik Family Foundation and the Milkey Family Foundation. About $6.8 million in city funds was used to pay for the first phase of the fund, and the city has been soliciting contributions for future grants. Eligibility requirements and application information can be found here. To contribute, click here.
Frontier Communications, one of the larger communication companies serving the Tampa Bay area, has voluntarily filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Frontier (Nasdaq: FTR) said it has a restructuring support agreement with bondholders representing more than 75 percent of Frontier’s $11 billion in outstanding unsecured bonds. The deal is expected to reduce the company's debt by more than $10 billion, according to a news release. Frontier expects to continue providing service to customers without interruption and work with its business partners as usual throughout the court-supervised process, the release said. Frontier bought Verizon's wireline operations in Florida, California and Texas in 2016 for $10.5 billion, giving it a major presence in the Tampa and St. Petersburg areas.
Knight Enterprises, a Clearwater company that provides critical communications infrastructure services, was acquired by an affiliate of Mill Point Capital, a middle-market private equity firm. Financial terms were not disclosed in a news release. Knight’s management team, including CEO Jason Welz, will continue to lead the company. "Our partnership with Mill Point provides meaningful experience and resources that will help us build upon a successful platform with significant growth opportunity," Welz said in the news release. Mill Point, based in New York, targets control investments in lower-middle market businesses, with a focus on industrial and business services companies in North America.
Some 52,021 Paycheck Protection Program loans totaling $12.5 billion have been approved for small businesses throughout Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Tuesday afternoon. "That's an unprecedented sum ... I think that will be a really important lifeline for Florida's small businesses who have been hit hard by this downturn." The PPP is a $349 billion small business lending program that was included in the $2 trillion stimulus package designed to blunt the economic fallout from the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic; several local banks and small businesses have participated. A state lending program, the Florida Small Business Emergency Bridge Loan program, awarded more than $49 million to 1,000 businesses through Saturday, the Department of Economic Opportunity said in a news release. DEO said it received more than 38,000 applications for the one-year interest-free loans after applications opened in mid-March. When asked if the state would extend the bridge loan program, DeSantis said the state was looking at some options with the Small Business Administration. He also said he expected a second round of the federal PPP loans, "then we'll see what we can do," DeSantis said.
The city of Tampa has established the One Tampa Relief Now, Rise Together Fund to provide financial relief to eligible small businesses, families, and individuals negatively impacted by local Covid-19 orders. The relief program is an emergency grant focused on the most basic needs — rent and essential utilities, the city said in a news release. The program will provide direct payments for up to one month’s rent or mortgage plus one or more essential utility costs — water, gas, electric. Payments will be remitted directly to landlords, mortgagors, or to TECO, the city said. Click here for details about eligibility and other program information. The Tampa Bay Rays, Tampa Bay Lightning and Tampa Bay Buccaneers have each made $100,000 contributions to the fund, Mayor Jane Castor said in announcing the fund.
Suncoast Credit Union, the largest credit union in Florida and one of the largest in the United States, will contribute 500,000 meals to Feeding Tampa Bay. The donation will be matched by the Rays Baseball Foundation and Rowdies Soccer Fund, for a total of 1 million meals to be offered to those affected by the current Covi-19 crisis. Among those receiving meals are children who are out of school with little to no access to school meals or after-school meals, seniors and others who are at greatest risk and cannot safely secure their food needs, and families who are experiencing higher expenses and unemployment or lower wages who would not normally need food services. Additionally, to help its 884,000 members, Tampa-based Suncoast Credit Union waived fees at non-Suncoast ATMs and allowed CD early withdrawal, credit card skip-a-payment and emergency lifeline loans, among other measures.
The Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners agreed to extend the local state of emergency to April 17. During an emergency meeting Monday, commissioners approved a resolution “ratifying, restating, readopting, and extending” the state of emergency, which includes a Safer at Home order initially adopted in late March. Commissioners spent most of the Monday meeting talking about re-opening Pinellas County beaches and private pools at condominiums for exercise and recreation. They agreed to take up those issues at a meeting on April 16.
DriveTime, a national automobile dealership, has closed an inspection center in Clearwater and laid off 68 workers. The facility, at 5253 126th Ave. N., closed on March 30, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retaining Notice sent to the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity and made public on Monday. The closure resulted from the "unforeseeable downturn in business caused by the coronavirus pandemic," and is expected to be temporary, the WARN said.
