Chamber Members:
Make sure you read all the way through the end to see the announcement of our next member luncheon in June. It’s a re-schedule with our Joliet Police and Fire Chiefs. Today’s update also is packed in below.
White House aides and Democrats say they’re giving Republicans ample time to put forward their offers on ‘hard’ infrastructure — money to build roads, repair aging bridges and expand broadband. Barring breakthroughs on a long list of sticking points, Biden advisers and Democrats are preparing to wind down talks within a week or possibly two. At that point, they will start shifting their focus to what it will take to pass a bill on a party-line vote. So today, we have info on the newest Republican offer, President Biden’s reaction, and what it will lead to.
Also, the Biden Administration is getting ready to announce budget numbers and specifics tomorrow and they will also officially be probing a little further into the topic of the coronavirus escaping from the lab. Of course we have unemployment numbers as well since it is Thursday.
Finally, today’s update begins with a handful of updates on the Illinois budget, an indictment & it’s tie to energy negotiations, a constitutional amendment on labor, wage underpayment, and telehealth.
*Daily Coronavirus update brought to you by Silver Cross Hospital
State budget details lacking with five days remaining
Lawmakers passed a pair of bills Wednesday — Senate Bill 2800 and House Bill 900 — that are currently devoid of substantial language but could be the ultimate bills that contain the operating budget for the next fiscal year. But with just five days before the end of the Illinois Legislature’s spring session, there’s still no budget for the public to review. Neither state Rep. Will Davis, D-Hazel Crest, nor state Rep. Tom Demmer, R-Dixon, could say when budget details would be released of if there’d be time for public review and feedback.
The Pritzker administration didn’t respond to a request for comment on when it thinks budget details should be made available for public review. But, Demmer said there’s more revenue than expected. He said the governor and Democrats need to drop the motion to do away with a slew of tax credits. “Several of them were bipartisan negotiated products that the House Democrats voted for, the governor himself signed into law and touted the benefits of,” Demmer said. “These are tools to make Illinois more competitive.”
Governor Pritzker has targeted nine different tax incentive programs like the Blue-Collar Jobs Act and the Invest In Kids scholarship program in an effort to generate nearly $1 billion in additional revenue for the state. Despite there being better-than-expected revenue and billions in federal funds, Davis said Republicans need to cooperate in helping plug what he said is a budget deficit.
“It would be better if they engaged us on the front end to help us settle that question versus taking a pass and then allowing Democrats to just come in and take all the heat for whatever decisions are made on the revenue, particularly when they get the benefit of those decisions,” Davis said.
The state’s budget is expected to appropriate around $42 billion in state funds. There are also billions expected from the federal government for the coming fiscal year that begins July 1. The lawmakers are also evaluating their options of how to spend more than $8 billion in federal taxpayer funds coming to Illinois for lawmakers to be appropriated over the next few years.
Demmer said the best use of the federal funds is to refill the state’s unemployment trust fund. “We have about $5 billion in debt in that trust fund today because of the surge in unemployment that happened as a result of COVID,” Demmer said. “We should use these one-time funds to directly pay down a COVID-related debt.” The state’s unemployment skyrocketed in the spring of 2020 following Pritzker’s stay-at-home order, limiting businesses his administration deemed nonessential from being open to the public.
Davis said lawmakers must be prudent with the federal tax dollars to not run afoul and be on the hook down the road for any possible misappreciation. “So this is where we want to be careful, but to the extent in which if there’s an opportunity to repay some of the borrowing, we have an interest in doing that as well,” Davis said.
Recent federal guidance for how stimulus money can be used by states prohibits paying down debt, with the exception of COVID-related expenses, like unemployment benefits. Pritzker had previously said he planned to use federal funds to pay back around $2 billion in borrowing from a federal fund during COVID, but that’s prohibited by the recent guidelines. His administration last week announced they will pay that debt down with better-than-expected revenues.
“Thanks to a number of factors, including the state’s investments in key economic sectors like small businesses and childcare providers, Illinois’ revenues have come in stronger than expected,” the administration said in a statement. “This overperformance, in tandem with effective cash management by the Illinois Office of Comptroller, will be instrumental in paying down the outstanding federal debt.”
Indictment and the Energy Bill Negotiations
Federal authorities unveiled another indictment of a formerly high-ranking Democratic official Wednesday, just six days before the General Assembly’s 2021 session was scheduled to adjourn. How that will affect negotiations of a major energy bill that heavily involves a public utility company that is part of the ongoing federal investigation remains unclear.
Regardless, Republicans seized on the indictment of a longtime Mike Madigan lieutenant as redistricting hearings continued Wednesday, and it won’t likely be the last time the line of attack is taken in the session’s final days. But redistricting and energy are just two of several major bills that still need approval before the General Assembly adjourns, along with cannabis reforms and ethics reforms.
The former longtime chief of staff to former House Speaker Michael Madigan was indicted Wednesday for allegedly lying under oath and attempting to obstruct justice. Tim Mapes, who also formerly served as the House clerk, was granted immunity in connection with the federal investigation into potentially criminal efforts by officials and lobbyists with Commonwealth Edison to curry favor with Madigan in exchange for favorable energy legislation. Madigan has not been charged and denies wrongdoing.
Mapes allegedly lied to the grand jury when he testified in March about whether he had knowledge about Madigan’s sensitive communications with an unnamed consultant, who is identified only as Individual B in the indictment. He also allegedly lied about whether he knew that the consultant carried out work and assignments on behalf of the former speaker and communicated messages on his behalf, the indictment states.
Proposed Labor Constitutional Amendment
SJRCA 11 passed out of the House by a vote of 80-30-3 and has now been adopted by both chambers. This proposed amendment provides that employees shall have the fundamental right to organize and to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing for the purpose of negotiating wages, hours, and working conditions, and to protect their economic welfare and safety at work. Provides that no law shall be passed that interferes with, negates, or diminishes the right of employees to organize and bargain collectively over their wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment and workplace safety, including any law or ordinance that prohibits the execution or application of agreements between employers and labor organizations that represent employees requiring membership in an organization as a condition of employment. Provides that these provisions are controlling over home rule powers.
“What a great day in Illinois when the General Assembly can stand for workers’ rights,” said the amendment’s sponsor, state Rep. Marcus Evans, D-Chicago.
The amendment now goes to the voters, who will be able to decide if the amendment should become a part of the constitution in the November 2022 election. If passed, it would prohibit lawmakers from passing laws restricting public and private sector employees from collective bargaining. It would ensure Illinois never becomes a right-to-work state, which prohibits employees from being required to join a union as a condition of employment. Former Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner pushed hard to make Illinois a right-to-work state like all of Illinois’ neighbors except for Missouri. Twenty-seven other states already are right-to-work states.
“The trend is clearly toward right-to-work because it’s about economic freedom and economic reality,” said Todd Maisch, president of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce. Several Republicans pushed back on the amendment, arguing it would be legally complicated for the businesses and the courts to decide what the language means. “If we’re going to put a provision like this on the ballot, people should know exactly what rights and exactly remedies they’re going to be asked to live under,” said state Rep. Deanne Mazzochi, R-Elmhurst.
“We have a trust problem in this state,” said state Rep. Andrew Chesney, R-Freeport. “The graduated income tax got defeated because of a trust problem in this state.” Despite their efforts, several Republicans joined Democrats voting to pass the amendment on to the voter.
State Rep. Lakesia Collins, D-Chicago, argued “businesses come here in droves” because Illinois has few laws limiting union abilities. “It is a proven fact that the annual incomes for Illinois workers are 6% higher when they have rights at work,” Collins said.
Maisch pushed back on Collins’ argument that this amendment could help attract more jobs to the state. “It’s absolute malarkey,” he said. Maisch said more states are moving in the opposite direction of Illinois and adopting laws giving workers a choice about unionization “because their employers have said we need flexibility in the workplace.” He said the point of this amendment is really to accomplish objectives for labor groups that want employees to have to join a union to have a job. Maisch said federal law already has rules about this and Illinois’ proposed amendment is unnecessary.
In 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Mark Janus, a Springfield state employee in a landmark decision that found government employees who are not members of a union are not required to pay union dues as a condition of their employment. Maisch said this case helps protect state workers from Illinois’ proposed amendment, but private employees are not subject to the precedent of the Janus case in the same way.
Wage Underpayment Penalties
HB 118 passed out of the Senate by a vote of 40-15-0 and has now passed both chambers. This bill provides that an employee is entitled to recover damages of 5% (rather than 2%) of the amount of any underpayments in wages for each month following the date of payment during which such underpayments remain unpaid.
Telehealth Amendment
HB 3308 (SCA 0001) Telehealth amendment was filed. This amendment provides that an individual or group policy of accident or health insurance that is amended, delivered, issued, or renewed on or after the effective date of the amendatory Act shall cover telehealth services, e-visits, and virtual check-ins rendered by a health care professional when clinically appropriate and medically necessary to insureds, enrollees, and members in the same manner as any other benefits covered under the policy.
Provides that an individual or group policy of accident or health insurance may provide reimbursement to a facility that serves as the originating site at the time a telehealth service is rendered. Sets forth provisions with which coverage for telehealth services shall comply. Provides that an individual or group policy of accident or health insurance shall notify health care professionals and facilities of any instructions necessary to facilitate billing for telehealth services, e-visits, and virtual check-ins. Provides that the Department of Insurance and the Department of Public Health shall commission a report to the General Assembly and shall submit the report by December 31, 2026. Provides that the Department of Insurance may adopt rules to implement the provisions.
Provides that specified provisions are inoperative on and after January 1, 2028. Removes provisions concerning the Telehealth Payment Parity Task Force. Defines terms. Further amends the Telehealth Act. Changes a reference to “telehealth” to “telehealth services.” Removes language that provides that health care professionals shall maintain documentation and recordkeeping in accordance with specified provisions of the Illinois Administrative Code. Defines terms. Amends the Illinois Administrative Procedure Act to provide for emergency rulemaking. Makes other changes. Effective immediately.
Unemployment Claims Hit New Pandemic Low
Weekly initial unemployment claims continued their steady downward trend in the third week of May, hitting a new pandemic low of a seasonally adjusted 406,000, a drop of 38,000, or 8.6 percent, from the previous week. While the claims remain well above historical averages, the new total was better than the 425,000 claims economists expected, and points to a steadily recovering labor market.
Thursday’s report had other sunny spots as well, including a continued drop in claims through emergency unemployment programs set up for the pandemic. Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, which offers benefits to gig workers and the self-employed, dropped to 93,546 claims, only the second time it was below 100,000 since the pandemic began.
Amid the earliest pandemic restrictions at the same time last year, the program had over 1.3 million claims. The number of continuing claims, which lags by two weeks, fell to 15.8 million in the latest report from about 16 million the previous week. Nearly two-thirds of the continuing claims came from two emergency programs that are expected to run dry in September.
Robert Frick, a corporate economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, said the steady drops in weekly claims had become a high point in an otherwise unsteady labor recovery. “Fewer Americans are getting laid off as COVID-19 levels drop, and many employers are now worried about finding and keeping workers,” he said, adding that weekly claims could return to normal levels of around 200,000 this summer.
All eyes will be on the Labor Department’s next monthly jobs report, which is scheduled for release next Friday. The last report came in surprisingly weak, showing just 266,000 new jobs added to the economy despite expectations of around 1 million.
Senate Republicans Pitch $928 Billion Infrastructure Offer
Senate Republicans on Thursday unveiled a $928 billion infrastructure proposal that includes $506 billion for roads, bridges and major projects and $98 billion for public transit systems. The latest offer is substantially more than the $568 billion infrastructure framework the group led by Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) introduced in April, but it’s still far short of the $1.7 trillion counteroffer that White House officials came back with last week. “Senate Republicans continue to negotiate in good faith,” Capito told reporters Thursday morning. “We’ve had a lot a good dialogue with the White House. “We’re trying to get to that common goal of reaching a bipartisan infrastructure agreement that we talked about in the Oval Office with the president several weeks ago and I talked with him even previous to that,” she added.
The one-page summary released by Republicans doesn’t include any new detail on how Republicans would pay for the plan, a major sticking point with the White House, which wants to raise corporate tax rates from 21 percent to 28 percent, undoing a core part of former President Trump’s tax-cut bill from 2017.
The GOP proposal calls for $46 billion for passenger and freight rail, $21 billion for safety, $22 billion for ports and waterways, $56 billion for airports and $72 billion for water infrastructure. Other components include $22 billion for Western water storage, $65 billion for broadband infrastructure and $20 billion for infrastructure financing. Republicans have proposed adding some of these components to the $303 billion surface transportation reauthorization legislation that passed out of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee by a vote of 20-0 Wednesday.
Capito said Thursday morning the counteroffer largely reflects what Biden told the group at the White House meeting: It had to be close to $1 trillion to get his support. “We believe this counteroffer delivers on what President Biden told us in the Oval Office that day, and that is to try to reach somewhere near $1 trillion over an eight-year period of time that would include our baseline spending,” she said. “We have achieved that goal with this counteroffer.” But she said the GOP group also stayed within the boundaries of their original plan to limit the proposal to “core physical infrastructure” and kept out some of the “human infrastructure” priorities of Biden’s plan, such as a proposed $400 billion to subsidize the costs of long-term care for seniors and people with disabilities.
The Republicans on Thursday proposed paying for the package through a combination of unspent coronavirus relief funds, user fees and infrastructure financing. The White House has already opposed user fees as a payment method, saying they would violate Biden’s pledge not to raise taxes on those making less than $400,000 per year.
White House Sends Positive Signal on GOP Infrastructure Proposal
The White House on Thursday welcomed the $928 billion Republican counteroffer on infrastructure as “constructive” and signaled bipartisan talks would continue into next week as President Biden pressed for swift action.
“At first review, we note several constructive additions to the group’s previous proposals, including on roads, bridges and rail,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement Thursday. “At the same time, we remain concerned that their plan still provides no substantial new funds for critical job-creating needs, such as fixing our veterans’ hospitals, building modern rail systems, repairing our transit systems, removing dangerous lead pipes, and powering America’s leadership in a job-creating clean energy economy, among other things.”
Biden phoned Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) on Thursday to thank her for the counterproposal, Psaki said, and White House staff are expected to continue to engage with officials on Capitol Hill next week on a potential deal.
Biden stressed to reporters at Joint Base Andrews that he needed to get infrastructure done “very soon” and said he planned to meet with Capito next week, while Congress is on recess. Biden also indicated he would speak to another Republican group that is working on an alternative on infrastructure.
“I had a good conversation, very brief, but a good conversation with Capito … I told her we have to finish this very soon,” he told reporters before departing for a trip to Cleveland, Ohio. “We’re going to have to close this down soon.”
Speaking on MSNBC, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said she didn’t believe the GOP proposal to be a “serious counteroffer.” Warren took issue with the Republican plan to pay for the proposal and the lack of investment in green technology while arguing their proposal does not do enough to help women in the workforce.
Psaki would not specify when the White House would decide whether or not to abandon talks with Republicans but said officials “look forward to making progress” before Congress returns to Washington on June 7.
Biden to Propose $6 Trillion Budget
President Biden will propose a $6 trillion budget on Friday that would take the United States to its highest sustained levels of federal spending since World War II as he looks to fund a sweeping economic agenda that includes large new investments in education, transportation and fighting climate change.
Documents obtained by The New York Times show that the budget request, the first of Mr. Biden’s presidency, calls for total spending to rise to $8.2 trillion by 2031, with deficits running above $1.3 trillion throughout the next decade. The growth is driven by Mr. Biden’s two-part agenda to upgrade the nation’s infrastructure and substantially expand the social safety net, contained in his American Jobs Plan and American Families Plan, along with other planned increases in discretionary spending.
The proposal for the 2022 fiscal year and ensuing decade shows the sweep of Mr. Biden’s ambitions to wield government power to help more Americans attain the comforts of a middle-class life and to lift U.S. industry to better compete globally.
The levels of taxation and spending in Mr. Biden’s plans would expand the federal fiscal footprint to levels rarely seen in the postwar era to fund investments that his administration says are crucial to keeping America competitive. That includes money for roads, water pipes, broadband internet, electric vehicle charging stations and advanced manufacturing research. It also envisions funding for affordable childcare, universal prekindergarten and a national paid leave program. Spending on national defense would also grow, though it would decline as a share of the economy.
Mr. Biden plans to fund his agenda by raising taxes on corporations and high earners and the documents show budget deficits shrinking in the 2030s. Administration officials have said the jobs and families plans would be fully offset by tax increases over the course of 15 years, which the budget request backs up.
Perhaps most notably, the documents forecast that Mr. Biden and Congress will allow tax cuts for low- and middle-income Americans, signed into law by President Donald J. Trump in 2017, to expire as scheduled in 2025. Mr. Biden has said he will not raise taxes on people earning less than $400,000 a year. It is possible that he could propose to extend the Trump tax cuts for those earners in a future budget, potentially coupled with additional tax increases on high earners or businesses.
While his plan estimates additional tax revenue down the line, the United States would run significant deficits as it borrows money to finance his plans. Under Mr. Biden’s proposal, the federal budget deficit would hit $1.8 trillion in 2022, even as the economy rebounds from the pandemic recession to grow at what the administration predicts would be its fastest annual pace since the early 1980s. The deficit would recede slightly in the following years before growing again to nearly $1.6 trillion by 2031.
Total debt held by the public would more than exceed the annual value of economic output, rising to 117 percent of the size of the economy in 2031. By 2024, debt as a share of the economy would rise to its highest level in American history, eclipsing a World War II-era record.
President Biden’s budget, like those proposed by his predecessors, includes assumptions about how the economy will perform if his policies are enacted. But in a break from the recent past, the Biden team is conservative in its forecasts — predicting small gains in economic growth even if Congress approves trillions of dollars in new spending.
The documents suggest Mr. Biden will not use his budget to propose major additional policies or flesh out plans that the administration has thus far declined to detail. For example, Mr. Biden pledged to overhaul and upgrade the nation’s unemployment insurance system as part of the American Families Plan, but such efforts are not included in his budget.
Administration officials have said the budget reflects the policies Mr. Biden has pushed Congress to enact this year and does not rule out future initiatives that are not included in this plan.
The President’s spending requests also do not include money for a so-called public option for health care, which would allow Americans to choose to enroll in a public health insurance plan like Medicare instead of a private plan. But Mr. Biden will call on Congress to create such a public option as part of his budget proposal, a document obtained by The Times shows.
Mr. Biden will also express support for Congress allowing Americans as young as 60 years old to enroll in Medicare, and for efforts in Congress to reduce federal spending on prescription drugs, including allowing Medicare to negotiate prices with pharmaceutical companies, the document shows. It supports an expansion of Medicare to cover dental, vision and hearing services. Those efforts have been a top priority for Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont, who is the chairman of the budget committee. They are presented as goals in the budget but are not included in the proposed spending.
President Biden Calls for Intelligence Report on Origins of Covid-19
President Biden ordered a U.S. intelligence inquiry into the origins of Covid-19, following renewed scrutiny of the possibility that the outbreak of the virus might have started with a laboratory leak in China.
The White House has come under pressure to carry out its own investigation after China told the World Health Organization that it considered Beijing’s part of the investigation complete, calling for efforts to trace the virus’s origins to shift into other countries.
Mr. Biden, who wants a report within 90 days, said that U.S. intelligence has focused on two scenarios—whether the coronavirus came from human contact with an infected animal or from a laboratory accident. He said that there is a divergence among officials in the American intelligence community, or IC, on how the virus might have emerged.
“While two elements in the IC lean toward the former scenario and one leans more toward the latter—each with low or moderate confidence—the majority of elements do not believe there is sufficient information to assess one to be more likely than the other,” Mr. Biden said in a statement Wednesday. He refrained from outlining the positions of specific intelligence agencies.
The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday on a previously undisclosed U.S. intelligence report that three researchers from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care.
The first officially documented case of a Covid-19 infection was in early December in the central Chinese city of Wuhan. So the timing of the intelligence about the sick researchers, if fully corroborated by the new investigation, is deemed by current and former U.S. officials to be potentially significant.
“I have now asked the intelligence community to redouble their efforts to collect and analyze information that could bring us closer to a definitive conclusion, and to report back to me in 90 days,” Mr. Biden said. “As part of that report, I have asked for areas of further inquiry that may be required, including specific questions for China.”
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said at a regular press briefing on Thursday that “the theory that the virus was leaked from a Chinese lab is ‘very unlikely,’ and this was clearly written in the WHO joint research report. This is an authoritative, formal and scientific conclusion.” The Chinese Embassy in Washington said China is the target of a smear campaign on the virus’s origins, though it didn’t say by whom.
A WHO-led team of scientists visited China earlier this year to explore the origin of the virus and afterward called a lab accident “extremely unlikely.” Still, with the other origins hypothesis—that the virus spread from animals to humans—undocumented, some scientists, some governments and the head of the WHO have urged further investigation into the possibility of a lab leak.
China told the WHO’s decision-making body on Tuesday that its portion of the origin-tracing study was finished and the focus should turn to other countries. At that meeting Xavier Becerra, the U.S. secretary of Health and Human Services, pressed the WHO to oversee a second round of studies under rules that “give international experts the independence to fully assess the origins of the virus.” He didn’t specifically mention a lab.
Another potential source of information for the inquiry Mr. Biden ordered is intelligence from friendly governments. On Monday, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said that the information that three Wuhan institute researchers had sought hospital care had come from a foreign entity and that the U.S. needed additional information to independently corroborate it.
Program Notices & Reminders – Expanded Information
Workforce Webinar
Join the US Chamber on June 2, 2021 at 2:00 pm, as they’re hosting the Workforce: A Call to Action Summit to rally nationwide support for urgent federal and state-level priorities. This special event will bring together leaders from government and industry to discuss how we can close the people-jobs gap, unleash economic opportunity, and fuel America’s long-term competitiveness.
Register here: https://events.uschamber.com/workforcecalltoaction/1191959?utm_medium=Email&utm_source=SFMC&utm_campaign=&utm_content=
Will County Announces Round 3 of CARES Act Funding
Will County is pleased to announce Round 3 of the CARES Act Small Business Grant Program for Will County businesses adversely impacted by the recent pandemic. All small businesses physically located in Will County able to demonstrate COVID-19 impact are encouraged to apply for these grants of up to $10,000. The following criteria must be met to determine eligibility:
• Have not received a previous Will County Small Business Grant
• Annual revenues under $5 Million in 2020
• Less than 50 full time employees in 2020
• In operation since February 15, 2020, or earlier
• Have proof of COVID-19 impact
• In good standing with the IRS, State of Illinois, and Will County
• Not currently in bankruptcy
For more information and to apply visit: www.willcountyillinois.com/COVIDbizgrant
All required documents must be included and uploaded with each application. This is a requirement to expedite the review of eligibility and determine approval for the grant monies. Priority will be given to businesses located in the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) Disproportionately Impacted Area (DIA). DIA zip codes in Will County include: 60432, 60435, 60436, 60466, and 60471.
CDC Mask Guidance
The CDC still recommends that unvaccinated people continue to take preventive measures, such as wearing a mask and practicing social distancing. In their latest guidance, the CDC now reports that indoor and outdoor activities pose minimal risk to fully vaccinated people and that fully vaccinated people have a reduced risk of transmitting SARS-CoV-2 to unvaccinated people.
Fully vaccinated people can:
• Resume activities without wearing masks or physically distancing, except where required by federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial laws, rules and regulations, including local business and workplace guidance
• Resume domestic travel and refrain from testing before or after travel or self-quarantine after travel
• Refrain from testing before leaving the United States for international travel (unless required by the destination) and refrain from self-quarantine after arriving back in the United States
• Refrain from testing following a known exposure, if asymptomatic, with some exceptions for specific settings
• Refrain from quarantine following a known exposure if asymptomatic
• Refrain from routine screening testing if feasible
For now, fully vaccinated people should continue to:
• Get tested if experiencing COVID-19 symptoms
• Follow CDC and health department travel requirements and recommendations
Governor Pritzker Mask Changes:
Small Business Administration Restaurant Revitalization Fund
The deadline for this program was Monday, May 24th.
For more information, visit sba.gov/restaurants. Efforts are ongoing to push for replenishing of the funds for this program.
Details on application requirements, eligibility, and a program guide are now available in English at www.sba.gov/restaurants or in Spanish at www.sba.gov/restaurantes.
As the SBA builds and prepares to roll out the program, this dedicated SBA website is the best source for up-to-date information for eligible restaurants interested in the RRF.
Small Business Administration Shuttered Venue Operators Grant Program
The SBA has completed rigorous testing and the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant application portal reopened on Saturday, April 24 at 12:30pm ET. Updated guidance documents have been posted below. Applicants may continue to register for an application portal account.
Supplemental documents
- FAQ regarding Shuttered Venue Operators Grant
- SVOG preliminary application checklist
- Cross-program eligibility on SBA COVID-19 relief options
- SVOG-specific version of IRS Form 4506-T
- SVOG applicant user guide
Small Business Administration Paycheck Protection Program
As of May 6, 2021, funding for the Paycheck Protection Program has been exhausted. The SBA will continue funding outstanding approved PPP applications, but new qualifying applications will only be funded through Community Financial Institution, financial lenders who serve underserved communities
Finally, join us in June for our re-scheduled luncheon with Police Chief Dawn Malec and Fire Chief Greg Blaskey on Wednesday, June 16 at Harrah’s Joliet Casino & Hotel. You may make reservations here: http://jolietchamber.chambermaster.com/events/details/2021-member-lunch-june-16-meet-greet-with-joliet-police-fire-chiefs-6060
Stay well,
Joliet Region Chamber of Commerce & Industry Staff and Board of Directors
Mike Paone
Vice President – Government Affairs
Joliet Region Chamber of Commerce & Industry
mpaone@jolietchamber.com
815.727.5371 main
815.727.5373 direct