SALEM — Business Oregon is seeking applicants from businesses in the Eastern Oregon region to meet geographic distribution targets for the round of grant funding it previously announced on Nov. 18. The grant funding allocated by the Oregon Legislature and Governor Kate Brown specified there should be geographic distribution for the funds across the state, and there is currently room for more businesses from Eastern Oregon.

The Eastern Oregon region includes Baker, Gilliam, Grant, Harney, Malheur, Morrow, Umatilla, Union, Wallowa and Wheeler counties. The grants are available to small businesses in these counties that have seen lost revenue due to the pandemic, and that meet a set of requirements.

Business Oregon received 74 applications from the Eastern Oregon region seeking approximately $2.4 million in funds. The agency estimates another $2 million in additional applicants will ensure Eastern Oregon small businesses are appropriately represented in the final awards.

The previous four rounds of funding from this program were all only available to businesses with fewer than 25 employees, to help Oregon’s smallest businesses first. Most previous rounds also targeted businesses that did not already receive assistance through the CARES Act (such as PPP and EIDL). With the newly allocated funding allowing for a fifth round, the program shifted to serve a group of businesses in need that did not have access to the previous four rounds of grants. This round will now consider applications from businesses with 1 to 25 employees that have already received anywhere from $100,000 to $1 million in funding from these federal resources. Businesses with 26 to 100 employees are eligible regardless of the amount of federal resources they received (up to $1,000,000), if they meet other program requirements.

Businesses are eligible to receive up to $200,000 in grant funding as detailed in the grant application. To be eligible, a business must show it was prohibited from operations by the Governor’s Executive Order 20-12, or demonstrate a 25% reduction in sales over a 30-day period in 2020 compared to a comparable period in 2019.

The application was posted on Monday, Nov. 23 at 3 p.m., and will be accepted until Tuesday, Nov. 24 at 3 p.m.

Applications will be reviewed and processed on a first-come, first-served basis and will be date and time stamped based on when the email or fax is received.

There will be a PDF form to fill out and email back to Business Oregon.

The application form and additional details will be found on Business Oregon’s website in multiple languages, oregon4biz.com/Coronavirus-INformation/ESBA. 

Any information received prior to Nov. 23 at 3 p.m. will not be accepted or reviewed.

Only applications from businesses headquartered in Oregon with primary operations in the Eastern Oregon counties listed above will be considered.

Items needed that will be needed:

•Any PPP and EIDL loan documents

•Oregon Employment Department Form 132

•Profit/Loss statement showing 25% decline in revenue from two like periods in 2019 and 2020 (example: March 2019 and March 2020, May 2019 and May 2020, etc.)

•Eligible period is 30 days, with eligible months being March through August.

Additional resources and information on COVID-19 response can be found on the department’s website, and the Governor’s COVID-19 webpage has the latest guidance.