Montgomery County Council Approves $1M Rent Assistance Grant Bill

ROCKVILLE, MD — Following more than a year of small business owners struggling to make their rent due to hardships associated with the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the Montgomery County Council approved a bill this week that provides $1 million in rent assistance to help those who need help.

County council member Will Jawando introduced the special appropriation funding at the council’s meeting on Tuesday after recognizing the obstacle that keeping up with basic bill like rent can be for small business owners. Jawando did so to create a program to provide grants for small businesses that need aid in meeting these basic liabilities at a time when many of these businesses — especially those owned by women or people of color — have not received federal assistance during the pandemic.

Under the program, a business is eligible to receive grant assistance if it has a physical location within Montgomery County or if it’s county-based location accounts for more than 50 percent of the business’s total number of employees or 50 percent of the company’s gross sales, the county announced in a news release on Thursday.

The business must have also received $500,000 or less in total revenue prior to the pandemic as be classified as a small business or service-related business. Restaurants, food service businesses, medical practices, professional service businesses, religious organizations and daycare facilities are not eligible the program, county officials said.

Businesses must also be able to demonstrate a revenue loss during the pandemic. Each business will be eligible for up to three months of rent on its current lease or $10,000, whichever is less, county officials said in the news release. Business owners can either be current or overdue in their rent to qualify for the rent assistance grant funding, county officials said.

“Hard-working entrepreneurs and small business leaders in our county deserve our support. Nationally, 73 percent of black-owned businesses surveyed will run out of money in three months,” Jawando said in the news release. “Latino-owned businesses have had PPP loans approved at half the rate of white businesses and an even smaller proportion of Latino-owned businesses get their full funding relative to white-owned businesses.

“Montgomery County is a great place to live and work and our small business help to make it so. This is a great opportunity to show our full support for our small business neighbors.”

The grant program will be implemented by the Latino Economic Development Center (LEDC) in partnership with the Montgomery County Business Advancement Team. LEDC intends to market this program and leverage its connection with the business community to reach out to disadvantaged communities. It will also be available to assist businesses in preparing application materials, county officials said.