Payroll Looms Over Brooklyn Business Coronavirus Chat

BROOKLYN, NEW YORK — The best time for Central Brooklyn small businesses to seek for loans to keep employees on their payrolls is yesterday, said a city official.

Gregg Bishop, the city's Small Business Services, didn't mean that people shouldn't apply for federal Payroll Protection Program loans — in fact, just the opposite.

"This money is first-come, first-serve and we want to make sure that everyone has the ability to put their applications forward," he said during the Thursday evening virtual town hall.

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State Sen. Zellnor Myrie, Assembly Member Diana Richardson and City Councilwoman Alicka Ampry-Samuel hosted the wide-ranging discussion about coronavirus resources available for Central Brooklyn businesses.

It's the second virtual discussion Central Brooklyn elected officials and leaders held about the coronavirus pandemic's impact on their community.

The topics this time swerved from obtaining business loans, opening businesses back up following the coronavirus shutdown and health and burial insurance.

Many of those related specifically to business owners, but the discussions also proved relevant to workers who lost jobs or feel unsure about their futures.

That's where the PPP loans came in. The loans were approved as part of a larger stimulus and are designed to help businesses with fewer than 500 employees meet payroll and mortgage, rent and utility payments, said John Mallano, the federal Small Business Administration's deputy director for the New York City District.

“With the Paycheck Protection Program, the SBA will forgive up to eight weeks of eligible expenses for all small businesses that keep their employees on payroll and use 75 percent of those loans on the payroll costs,” Mallano said.

A business owner asked whether it’s worth to seek the PPP loan given unemployment benefits pay for more than their business provides.

Bishop said employees are no longer eligible for unemployment if companies offer for them to come back to work. He said officials want employers to hire their employees back.

Eventually, the government will reinstate a requirement that workers will need to look for work in order to stay on unemployment.

"I do not think employees will sit back, who are at home, resting on the unemployment because they’ll have to show that they’re actually looking for employment,” he said.

Mallano said the PPP’s purpose is get employees back on payroll as quickly as possible. Then businesses can get up and running quickly when things return to relative normal, he said.

The video and discussion can be viewed in whole here. Small business owners can go to the city's SBS for applying for PPP loans from financial institutions.

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